Living By The Rules

There are different ways in which the autistic mind thinks and processes information. These different types are discussed in detail in the video "It Takes All Kinds of Minds" by Dr. Temple Grandin. No matter which kind of mind you are talking about, there is one thing that is common to all of them: all actions, reactions, and interactions are based on rules. Rules are made over time as things are categorized and differentiated. For example, Temple had to learn that not every piece of furniture that had four legs was a dining table. There are coffee tables, end tables, chair with four legs, flower stands, etc. As for me, living by the rules had to do more with how to do my job and interact with people rather than categorizing objects and animals. This led to a rather debilitating amount of cluelessness. This cluelessness could eventually be overcome only by observing results on the job and the reactions and feedback I would get from people. When the outcomes were negative, I'd think of how little my presence and my input was worth. When they were positive, I'd feel motivated to keep going.

A good example of how I learned something by forming rules was the job I had when I worked as a data trip record clerk for Penske Truck Leasing. One of my tasks was to enter paper reports that the drivers of the leased vehicles would fill out into the mainframe computer. On a daily basis, I would type between 150 and 300 reports, logging departure cities, destinations, mileages, fuel purchases, etc. To look at the piles and piles of reports left me feeling exhausted and disoriented before I even began. For the first few months I worked there, I was the slowest in a department of sixteen people. It wasn't because I didn't know how to type. I certainly could, and I knew computers well. I just moved very slowly, as I usually do before I develop a knack. Then one day I discovered something. As I was typing along, I could modify the way I typed to form certain musical patterns. I could form arpeggios when typing in the mileage column. I could bang out a quick tap-tap to enter in a state abbreviation. I would create similar genres for each column on the page. After forming these rules by which each bit of information could be easily and playfully typed, I went from being the slowest person in the department to the fastest! But it came with a price. The better I got at typing, the louder I hit the keys. Hearing the same mosaic banging over and over again all day long caused everyone around me to have headaches.

They say that one thing an autistic person cannot do is function in any job that requires a lot of distraction and multitasking. This is one reason why I am glad that I did not find out I was on the autism spectrum until I was in my late 40s, well after having become a successful ambulance attendant, fire police officer, and respiratory therapist. I would have surely been told that I could never accomplish any of these things because of how demanding they are had I been diagnosed early on. As a result, I pursued these interests and eventually learned how to excel at them, even moreso than many people of the people I worked with. I did it by forming procedural rules within my own head. It is one thing to practice and master being able to put a sling on somebody's broken arm in a classroom. It is a completely different situation when you are performing the same action when you also have three other victims of an accident to tend to, monitor their vital signs, take their health history, write a report, and then eventually regurgitate all this information to the emergency room staff. I could do all this only after months and months of making mistakes, eventually figuring out a set of rules that would "categorize" each action until they became second-nature. If a distraction would come along, as it always did, I would form a picture in my head of whatever task I was being pulled away from, thereby putting this task on "hold", so that I knew what I had to return to. For example, when assessing a patient with a collapsed lung, and then suddenly being asked to set up an IV elsewhere, I would envision myself with half a lung on one side in order to remind myself what task I had to go back to when I was finished.

Being prudent in social situations, though, took a lot more doing. There was no forming of rules. There was only figuring out what was acceptable and not acceptable by seeing the outcome, sometimes making enemies or losing “friends” along the way. In the book “Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships” by Dr. Temple Grandin and Sean Barron, rule #6 states “Not everyone who is nice to me is my friend.” Because I never had the ability to simply “fit in,” I had no idea what guys talk about or what is appropriate conversation and with whom. I found out the hard ways that it is not okay to assume that a woman is romantically interested in you simply because she talks nicely to you, even if she is married. I found out that it is not okay to repeat gossip in front of the gossip subject’s friends. I also found out that it is not okay to be mean-spirited when directing traffic as a fire police officer because the person you may be yelling at is an off-duty sheriff. It is also not okay to tell a young black female that you talk to all the time, and think that you know well, that she looks “yummy” in a photo shoot. That situation resulted in my losing the best part-time job I ever had. Because rules are people based, as rule #1 of the “Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships” states, and because you really never truly know somebody unless you have already broken an unwritten rule, living by the rules continues to be a major challenge. In that light, it is always safer for me to simply be silent and to be a loner. I have to know somebody very very well nowadays for me to even have a conversation about varying topics with them. I am far from being shy, although I have always been reserved.

The number one reason why forming any rules even happened is the fact that I had a mentor or somebody who gave me a chance. Without my boss Linda who always liked my demeanor at Penske Truck Leasing, I had job security. Because of Larry who was my ambulance driver and mentor with the former Governor Mifflin Area Ambulance Association in Shillington, PA, I learned how to be a darn good Emergency Medical Technician – one who eventually became a trainer of new EMTs for our squad. It is so very important for people on the autism spectrum to be in the company of people who believe in them. Once they have that, they can accomplish anything they set their minds to. Nobody should ever tell a person with some form of autism that they cannot accomplish their goals or fulfill their dreams. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I had accomplished feats and did tasks that people with autism are being told all the time that they cannot handle. I did it all by forming rules. What would have helped me even further was if I had somebody who taught me what the proper rules of social interactions are. Life would have been SO much easier for me! As for now, now that I know I am on the autism spectrum, I don’t worry so much about it. I know that there is a reason (but not an excuse) for the awkwardness.