Correcting Reflex in Autism

Do you remember that kid who is raising their hand desperately during elementary school and then says, “You mean Thursday” to the teacher.

The teacher said Thursday instead of “Tuesday” thirty minutes ago, and has no idea what that kid is talking about, but gets annoyed at this constant interaction and says, “Only raise your hand if you have something relevant to add to the conversation.”

That kid learns mostly that they’re not allowed to ask questions or to add helpful information to any discussion even though everyone else is, because they don’t know what the teacher means by “relevant” and they can never figure it out after years of trying. All they know is that no one likes what they add to conversations.

This was me as a kid. Sometimes it is still me as an adult.

I struggle so much to figure out what is considered relevant to other people. But I am also not clear on when it is or isn’t appropriate to correct other people. I think an autistic brain is often one that is seeking out patterns. I was great at pattern recognition as a young child and excelled at math for years, at least to the extent that math is a field of pattern recognition. I enjoyed literature and grammar to the extent they were about pattern recognition, as well. But there’s an added part of my brain that really enjoys “correctness.” It’s about putting in the right piece of the puzzle. There’s a thrill at doing that I’m not sure neurotypical people experience, or at least not to the same extent.

It actually hurts me to not correct someone else. It feels to me much the same as holding in needing to go to the bathroom. I know that it isn’t welcome in public discourse and try to hold it in as long as possible, but then it just has to come out. I can’t stand the sensation of the words that I’m holding in my brain being “wrong.” They must be fixed in order for me to get relaxed about the conversation and just let people talk again. As an adult, I’ve learned that sometimes the best way for me to give myself this release is to write something down, often on my phone, so I can just fix it in my own head. It doesn’t always work, but it does often enough that I’m much less annoying in conversation than I was as a kid.

I have many autistic friends and my experience is that most autistic people are not at…