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The Gift of Distance

My therapist once said to me that he wondered why autism hadn't evolved away.  He reasoned that it must have some Darwinian benefit.  I believe he was talking about ASD on an experiential level.  There is some evidence that whatever genes are involved in autism are also involved in increased iron absorption, which is particularly beneficial during cell growth.  Having cells that absorb iron better might be a benefit worth the risk of developing autism, but that isn't what psychoanalysts want to work with.  So what benefits of autism do I experience consciously?

It's hard to say.  Autism is like a small glitch in a single component in an electrical system that causes seemingly unrelated glitches to pervade the system at large.  It's difficult enough identifying all the subtle problems that come with my ASD.  If there are benefits, they're whispers in a storm.  And autism isn't all I am.  It's no mean feat to identify which aspects of my cognitive experience are autistic aspects and which are allistic.

I am very concise in my speech.  I'm also somewhat detached from feeling.  If one needs to make an important decision and one is overwhelmed with emotion, it might be good to have someone dispassionate around who can articulate well what needs to be done.  Perhaps people who are near me on the spectrum might make good generals or teachers.  That seems very optimistic to me, but maybe it isn't unreasonable.  I don't feel like a go-to guy though; I doubt I would be very reliable in a crisis.  At the risk of sounding unreasonably pessimistic, I think that every benefit of autism I experience, whatever those may be, is paired with a malefit.

I am grateful though for my unique perspective.  Being autistic means being on the outside of everything.  It means being distant from people.  And I can see a lot from outside.  Distance can be conducive to insight.  Dispassion is useful in a world full of trouble.  Perhaps these are the gifts, such as they are, of my life as an alien.

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