Childhood Anecdotes

I recently joined yet another Facebook group related to autism; this one is specifically for autistic women/mothers/girls. It came up randomly and although I was hesitant because it gets overwhelming sometimes, I figured since the female autistic experience is different, I might learn something new. Boy was I glad I joined! I’ve only seen a few posts but it feels like every single one of them resonates! It’s very cool and very validating to know that my weirdness is shared and understood by others! And while I’m extremely hesitant to share the harder parts of my autistic experience publicly, I thought I would use this blog to share some of the lighter sides of my childhood that pointed to me being autistic years before I even knew autism existed.

My pet

One of my most memorable pets lived with me only for a few days, but I took care of it so well! Gave it a bed (the base of an old cord phone), a blanket (a sock) and pet it before putting it to sleep. I vaguely remember some sort of pillow too. This pet? An old carrot from the fridge!!! I found it and claimed it. It was so old the only thing I remember is the carrot being soft and floppy. But it was my treasured pet for a few days until Mummy discovered it and threw it away! Not sure if this is autism-related but it was a weird childhood memory, and a happy one!

Playing school

My first ever desired profession was a teacher! In some ways I turned out to be one! Since I was not a doll person at all and my mother was an aesthetician, my sister and I used what was available to us: nail polish bottles! The most memorable part of playing school for me was getting to line up all the “students”!!! They better not step out of line too, because if they did, it was lix!!! Those were fond memories of perfectly straight, forward-facing rows of nail polish bottles, arranged by height. But you know what? That skill served me well when I worked at The Body Shop while at university and I was a master at tidying the store at the end of the work day! Arranging all of the bottles and tubs came easily and naturally to me, and was one of my favourite parts of that job! And yes, I still line things up and I’m meticulous about certain things!

My colours

For as long as I can remember (and still today), I have a fixation on colours: red, blue, yellow/white and green. At any given moment once this thought pops into my head, I MUST locate this series of colours, otherwise I would not be able to blink until I have found all four. Weird? Yes. Rational? Absolutely not. The reason? No clue. It’s one of those things that always was. The only thing I can say is that it has gotten better, because there were times when it was constant and, quite frankly, annoying. Try finding a missing colour when there is none! And your eyes are watering because you want to blink but you can’t until you find it! And if I happened to blink without finding it, I would feel awful!

I had kept this a secret for all of my childhood and it wasn’t until I admitted it to an OT supervisor when I was in university and she didn’t respond with a horrified look that I didn’t feel so ashamed. Instead what she told me was: “you should get something where you have all of the colours, like a watch.”  I was blown away by her response to something I was so appalled to admit. I followed her advice and got a watch or ring, and it actually helped a lot! These days the urge isn’t as frequent and thankfully when it happens I can either locate my colours quickly, or I don’t get the strong sense of dread when I don’t. Sometimes my eyes would dart around the room and if questioned, I don’t feel so bad now saying “I’m looking for my colours.”

Gotta smell good!

Sticking with some OCD-like traits (of which there were many), one of the most outstanding ones that showed me how easily things can escalate was my deodorant experience. When I was a teenager, my mother bought my sister and me some Old Spice deodorant because we LOVED the smell (that was Daddy’s scent back in the day so we were always familiar with it.) Now being who I am, of COURSE I needed to apply an equal amount of deodorant swipes per armpit. Keep that in mind. Also keep in mind that another fun fact about me is that I have a thing with numbers (mostly with the numbers on volume) where certain numbers “feel good” and I will allow them, and some don’t. For example, if I’m using the volume, it goes 3, 6, 10, 13, 16, 20, 23, 26, and so on. I cannot jump between and use a different number, it’s those or nothing. There is nothing sequential or linear about it, it’s just certain numbers feel good to me and I go by that. So back to the deodorant story now. The facts: I loved the smell. I needed equal amounts per underarm. The numbers jumped. Can you see where I’m going here yet? What started off as 3 complete swipes per arm (down, up, down, up, down, up) escalated soon to 10, then it increased to 26 since that’s my favourite number. Without realising what was happening, it tapped out at 50. Yes: FIFTY swipes of deodorant PER UNDERARM!!!!! Every…single…day. That still felt completely normal to me!! It wasn’t until I developed a RASH under my arms that I realised “hey, maybe it’s because I’m using too much deodorant?!” I cut back and the rash cleared up. These days I am very firm about the number of swipes per underarm so I don’t go overboard (because I’m much more aware of chemicals and cancer etc)….and I still love my Old Spice!!!

Anyway, the point of it is that by hearing other autistic experiences, especially from other women, I am realising that although some of my experiences are undeniably strange, I may not be as alone as I think! And I feel good about that!

This was my favourite "student" back in the day!!!