An introduction to monotropism
There are many social patterns that appear to be held by non-Autistic people as “the” way to communicate and be social together. These are important social patterns that we can be blind to… I am exploring them in detail in this podcast series.
A few of these patterns include a transactional style of conversation in which there is a sing-song kind of verbal “dance” in which superficial questions are asked and answered in a rapid fire exchange with strong emotive tones and inflection. To not rapid fire the “right” kinds of responses in the appropriate sing-song way will get you excluded from further conversation.
Another pattern is a strong desire to find one’s “social status”. This is done by way of small talk, finding common ground of shared interests such as sports teams, or sharing interests in the latest movies or cultural trends and events.
This core drive to find one’s place in the “pack”, is the ongoing refinement by the conscious and subconscious of our story of our self, the fit of that self into the social fabric and world. These narratives of “who I am and what is happening in the world” shape how many Allistic people interpret “reality”.
In brief, Allistic people are “pack” oriented in that considerable amounts of time and attention are invested in one’s social status.
Autists, by and large, do not understand the enormous time and energy spent by Allistic people to develop a narrative of their social status and place in the world. Autists often find small talk to be pointless and taxing, and in particular resent being judged as “not social” when we can’t mimic the allistic “superficiality” correctly.
The way I and many autistic people engage with the world is not via our “social status” asnd narrative. We align our time and attention to our interests, bringing our emotions and sensory focus to “dive deeply” into the experience of a conversation or task. Engaging our full attention into the depths of a connection or issue produces a flow state. Flow draws in our attention like a black hole and in our single point of focus our self, mind chatter, and extraneous sensory data fall away into an ecstatic state in the moment.
For those Autists overwhelmed by sensory stimuli, this flow state might be accessed by nothing more than rolling a toy car backwards and forwards on the floor.
This is well described in these videos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUFDAevkd3E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLdpXM4lT_M
Being yanked out of a flow state is jarring, for an allistic concert pianist, or to an autistic person in flow. This triggers me to be emotionally dysregulated, disoriented and resentful at the sensory assault and the person whose demands are the source of my disorder.
For Allistic people who have an Autist in their life… Here is a recap of the common ways you may be our primary source of pain, suffering, or worse… These are from the Autistic Advocate (the first link above).
Ways Allistic people can blindly torture the Autists in their life.
Do not allow Autists time for transition from one point of focus to another.
Speak too quickly or load up your speaking with coercion, frustration or other highly emotive content.
Not allowing Autists to have the necessary processing time, i.e. being in a hurry.
Using rewards, punishments, or exercise of claimed authority by not explaining why our attention is being called or demanded.
Requesting or demanding our attention in a highly sensory dysregulating environment, such as when chewing gum, in a loud or chaotic location, or where multiple calls for our attention are being made co
