Divergent Tabletop Wiki

Untypical How The World Isnt Built For Autistic People And What We Should All Do About It

20 min readEdit

Untypical: How the World Isn’t Built for Autistic People and What We Should All Do About It

Executive Summary

Untypical dismantles widespread misconceptions about autism by centering autistic voices and revealing how societal structures—rather than autism itself—create disability. Pete Wharmby demonstrates through memoir and research that autistic people possess empathy, capacity for relationships, and logical clarity, yet face systemic barriers designed without autistic neurology in mind. The book challenges the deficit model of autism, reframing traits like meltdowns, masking, and special interests as neurological differences requiring accommodation rather than pathologies to be fixed. Written for newly diagnosed autistic individuals and those seeking authentic understanding, it provides practical guidance for creating inclusive environments while exposing harmful myths perpetuated by outdated stereotypes and non-autistic leadership in autism organizations.

Communication Differences as Neurological Variation

The belief that autistic people struggle with communication fundamentally misframes the issue. Autistic people experience genuine neurological differences in how they process and produce language, but these aren’t deficits—they’re different. The core misunderstanding stems from the double empathy problem: neurotypical people struggle to understand autistic communication just as much as autistic people struggle with theirs, but autistic people remain hyperaware of this gap and expend enormous energy compensating while neurotypical people remain oblivious.

Autistic people often interpret language literally, which creates constant anxiety around unwritten social rules. Small talk exemplifies this: neurotypical people instinctively understand that “How was your weekend?” doesn’t require honest answers—it’s a ritual for lubricating relationships. An autistic person answering honestly violates social expectations, while providing the expected “Fine, thanks” feels dishonest. Autistic people also require longer processing time than neurotypical turn-taking allows, and struggle with tone, facial expressions, and body language as communication channels. For autistic people working in social environments, experiencing multiple rounds of small talk creates cumulative exhaustion.

The solution isn’t forcing autistic people to adapt to neurotypical communication norms but rather recognizing these as legitimate neurological differences deserving accommodation. In practice, this means using written instructions alongside verbal communication, providing explicit rather than implicit communication, and accepting that autistic directness—sometimes perceived as rudeness—is often simply honesty without neurotypical social filtering.

The Double-Empathy Problem: Empathy Myth Debunked

The widespread myth that autistic people lack empathy is fundamentally wrong. The misunderstanding stems from autistic people not displaying empathy in expected ways—due to flat affect, difficulty producing expected physical gestures, or slower social responsiveness—rather than lacking empathy itself. In reality, many autistic people experience “hyper-empathy”—absorbing emotions from rooms like “emotional sponges” and becoming overwhelmed by others’ distress, particularly children’s or animals’ suffering.

Historical research claiming autistic children lack “theory of mind” was based on flawed experiments that didn’t account for autistic logical reasoning patterns. When researchers asked autistic children where a character would look for a hidden object, autistic children answered where the object actually was rather than where the character would logically look—not from lacking theory of mind but from prioritizing factual accuracy over social inference. This “mistake” revealed different priorities, not absence of understanding.

The real issue is the double-empathy problem: the neurotypical majority assumes their empathy expression is the only valid form, and autistic people’s different expression is interpreted as absence. Neurotypical people struggle to understand autistic perspectives just as much, but autistic people are hyperaware of this gap and compensate heavily through masking and effort, while neurotypical people remain oblivious. When neurotypical people “correct” autistic people or express doubt about their empathy, it signals they aren’t listening—a phenomenon called “ablesplaining.”

Masking: Central Trauma Response and Consequences

Masking—adopting a neurotypical persona to avoid bullying, rejection, and harm—is the central autistic survival strategy, but it’s fundamentally a trauma response. It says: “I will be whoever you need me to be, just don’t hurt me.” Masking typically begins in childhood when autistic differences become apparent and continues throughout life, with many autistic people developing sophisticated masks by observing others’ personalities until creating layers so complex they become nearly indistinguishable from authentic personality.

Masking is extraordinarily exhausting—comparable to an actor maintaining a role for years without rest. The author worked as a teacher while wearing dual masks: one for colleagues (managing small talk, sitting through meetings) and another for students (performing an extroverted teaching persona). The collapse after lessons was complete—sitting alone with eyes closed to prevent migraines, unable to move or speak. Recovery took hours or days.

Paradoxically, successful masking delays diagnosis because autistic people appear to function seamlessly, hiding their true struggles even from themselves and close relationships. Late-diagnosed autistic people often report relationships deteriorating after diagnosis when they instinctively relax their masks—they quickly learn their unmasked selves aren’t welcome and must re-nail the mask firmly in place. This creates a trap: the very coping mechanism that enabled survival becomes unsustainable and eventually collapses entirely.

Masking is distinct from healthy social adaptation. Everyone adapts their behavior in different contexts, but autistic masking involves suppressing core neurological patterns (stimming, interest expression, communication style) at psychological cost. Allowing autistic people to unmask requires genuine acceptance of their unmasked selves, not merely tolerance. It requires creating environments where autistic traits aren’t seen as problems to solve but as neurological differences deserving accommodation.

Meltdowns and Shutdowns: Stress Responses, Not Tantrums

Meltdowns are categorically different from tantrums—they’re the result of autistic people’s stress thresholds being fundamentally different from neurotypical thresholds. While neurotypical people spend most of their lives well below their stress ceiling and only reach it during major crises, autistic people exist perpetually near their ceiling just from navigating daily life. A seemingly minor trigger can breach that ceiling and cause complete breakdown.

During meltdown, the brain feels like static on an old television, muscles clench rigidly, communication becomes muddled and aggressive, and the body oscillates between fight-flight-freeze responses. In severe cases, this includes self-harm. Recovery takes days—not hours—because the nervous system needs extended time to downregulate. Shutdowns are the passive alternative, approaching catatonia with total communication loss and immobility, equally requiring recovery time and equally non-voluntary.

Crucially, meltdowns aren’t “behaviors” that can be punished or managed through standard discipline. The solution is allowing autistic people autonomy to self-isolate in quiet spaces to decompress. For children, providing space, gentle reminders that it’s okay, and pre-established calming activities works better than intervention. Autistic people shouldn’t be punished for meltdown behaviors or followed/challenged as they try to escape stressors—this escalates rather than prevents breakdown. Understanding meltdowns as neurological rather than behavioral is essential for appropriate response.

Healthcare Access and Communication Barriers

Autistic people face compounded healthcare challenges that prevent them from accessing necessary care. First, interoception difficulties mean many autistic people don’t notice hunger, thirst, bathroom needs, or pain until extreme, delaying recognition of problems. Pain perception is particularly problematic—autistic people often can’t estimate pain levels on a 1-10 scale, leading to understatement that causes doctors to underestimate severity and provide insufficient care.

Phone anxiety represents a specific disability. Autistic people struggle with phone conversation speed, the absence of facial expressions and body language, and audio hypersensitivity where background hisses and electronic artifacts mask actual conversation. Additionally, making unsolicited calls feels intensely intrusive—interrupting someone’s peace feels unthinkable. The author found that of 900 autistic respondents, 500 were still forced to call NHS surgeries for appointments—meaning autistic people avoid seeking healthcare because the access mechanism itself is disabling.

Communication difficulties compound phone barriers. The intimidating power imbalance in doctor-patient relationships causes autistic people to rush appointments, forget prepared questions, and avoid mentioning additional concerns for fear of bothering the doctor. Doctors, despite proximity to neurology research, often hold outdated stereotypes about autism. The solution requires systemic change: email-based appointment booking, doctor training on autistic communication patterns, allowing autistic people to bring companions to appointments, and creating space for written questions and responses.

Autistic Loneliness: Trauma-Induced Withdrawal

The stereotype that autistic people are naturally introverted and antisocial is false and harmful. Many autistic people are naturally extroverted and thrive on company—their apparent introversion stems from social trauma. Autistic children bullied for communication differences learn to withdraw, transforming natural extroversion into involuntary introversion. This means many autistic people desperately want friendships but fear social interaction from past harm.

This distinction is critical: autistic people aren’t withdrawing because they don’t enjoy connection but because connection became painful. An extroverted autistic child repeatedly corrected, mocked, or rejected for communication style gradually withdraws, appearing introverted for life—not because they’re naturally antisocial, but because connection became dangerous. Loneliness can metastasize into depression, yet remains unaddressed because adults assume autistic children hiding alone during lunch are content. In reality, many are traumatized and coping through isolation.

Safe spaces where autistic people can socialize without bullying are rare, making finding connections difficult. This requires creating genuinely inclusive environments—not just token inclusion but spaces where autistic communication differences are welcomed, where stimming is normalized, and where autistic people can relax their masks. It also requires recognizing that many autistic adults report wanting friendship but lacking the “social infrastructure” after years of trauma and isolation.

Autistic Friendships: Different Architecture, Not Lower Quality

Autistic people experience friendships fundamentally differently than neurotypical individuals. Friendships “decay at a much slower rate”—extended periods without contact (even 12 months) don’t damage autistic friendships the way they would neurotypical ones. Autistic people tend to assume nothing negative from lack of contact and maintain comfort despite long gaps, suggesting friendships require less constant maintenance.

Many autistic people maintain primarily or entirely online friendships and consider them genuine and fulfilling. The cultural insistence that “real” friendship requires physical proximity is neurotypical-specific and arbitrary. Autistic friendships with one another often involve “parallel play”—sitting quietly pursuing separate interests in the same space—which appeals to many autistic couples and friends because it provides companionship without demanding constant interaction.

Autistic people strongly prefer one-on-one socializing because it reduces small talk rounds, turn-taking complexity, and emotion-reading demands. Meeting in groups requires extensive planning: researching venues, mentally rehearsing greetings and conversation topics, planning seating arrangements. Unexpected additional people joining planned occasions causes genuine distress. Larger groups work better if they’re big enough to allow “hiding away” for recharging.

Key considerations for including autistic people: don’t change locations last-minute, let them choose seating/positioning, and accept abrupt departures when energy depletes. Autistic people’s energy drains rapidly around others and requires significant downtime after or during social events. Understanding that autistic friends may seem “cat-like” with random disappearances, prefer entirely online relationships, suddenly need to leave social situations, or take months to respond to messages—all without this indicating friendship devaluation—is essential.

Autistic Romantic Relationships and Sensory Intimacy

Despite the persistent search “Do autistic people feel love?”—rooted in the “Raymond Babbitt model” from Rain Man portraying autistic people as childlike and unsuitable for relationships—autistic people date, flirt, marry, and divorce like all humans. The stereotype persists because society wrongly assumes autism only affects children.

Autistic people struggle with recognizing flirtation. Many couldn’t identify someone flirting for years, only realizing in hindsight. Establishing mutual attraction requires navigating an “excruciatingly complicated game of signs and symbols” without direct communication. Despite these challenges, autistic people do maintain successful relationships with both autistic and neurotypical partners.

Autistic-autistic relationships offer particular advantages because of shared experience and often-shared special interests. However, autistic traits can clash—“one person’s necessary stim can be another person’s sensory hell,” and relationship conflict isn’t prevented by shared neurology.

Physical intimacy presents sensory challenges for many autistic people. Sex involves intense sensation and prolonged touch, which can be overwhelming. Autistic people with sensory sensitivities may experience reduced libido due to discomfort with physical sensations rather than lack of desire. Partners should understand this tension between sexual desire and sensory aversion, creating space for honest conversation about comfort and accommodation.

Executive Dysfunction: Neurological, Not Character Flaw

Executive function—planning, prioritization, organization—is deficient in many autistic people through neurological difference, not laziness or poor character. This causes cascading life problems: unpaid bills, forgotten appointments, lost money, missed healthcare, and in severe cases, homelessness. A Twitter poll showed 75% of autistic adults had lost £300+ through forgotten subscription cancellations. Without support, executive dysfunction creates a “vicious spiral” of perceived hopelessness, compounded by depression and shame.

The “spiky skillset” is fundamental to autistic existence—extraordinary abilities in some areas alongside complete inability in others. Someone might struggle to tie shoelaces while being excellent at lecturing, or unable to plan their day while maintaining a popular social media presence. This unpredictability makes autistic people hard to categorize and causes real-world problems.

Without executive function support, many autistic people live with deteriorating homes—broken light bulbs left for years, unusable bathrooms sealed off, broken appliances adapted-to rather than fixed. This isn’t laziness but energy scarcity. The threat of landlord eviction shadows many autistic households. Post-diagnosis, the NHS provides no ongoing support for most autistic adults—this absence of support contributes to sky-high rates of unemployment, homelessness (~12% of UK homeless population is autistic), and suicide.

Autistic Inertia and Task-Switching Difficulty

Autistic inertia is inability to change task or focus—being so engrossed in reading that making tea feels impossible despite wanting tea. Unlike procrastination (avoiding unpleasant tasks), inertia affects enjoyable activities too. Task-switching requires enormous time and energy—like an ocean liner’s U-turn rather than a car’s. This internal process is easily mistaken for laziness or character flaw, damaging relationships and employment.

Autistic people need gradual, incremental warnings before task changes—like motorway junction signs rather than sudden 90-degree turns. Treating task-changing as a motorway intersection with advance warning signs supports autistic people better. Abrupt demands for task changes reliably trigger meltdowns.

Pathological Demand Avoidance involves instinctive refusal of any demand—direct orders or gentle requests—from anyone. The refusal is involuntary, like a reflex, not a choice. Even if the autistic person wants to do the requested thing, being asked prevents them doing it. This affects all life areas with others and leads to avoidance behaviors that paradoxically increase isolation.

Special Interests: Essential Regulatory Tools

Special interests are intense, passionate focuses much more important than typical hobbies. They’re widespread among autistic people and help regulate mood, manage stress, enable social connection through fandoms/clubs, and often support livelihood through expertise-building.

Special interests function as essential coping mechanisms. The author calmed pre-lesson anxiety by reading about steam locomotives for minutes, regaining composure to teach well. This isn’t procrastination but necessary neurological regulation, purging fear from neurons.

Childhood special interests provided refuge from difficult situations. Detailed exploration and narrative creation provided escapism when real life overwhelmed. This continues into adulthood—Minecraft worlds built over decades provide safe havens. Collecting provides long-term joy, focus, goals, and pride in detailed knowledge.

Crucially, never curtailing autistic people’s access to interests is critical—these aren’t mere hobbies but regulatory necessities. Losing access triggers collapse, depression, and autistic burnout. The author’s burnout was triggered partly by inability to indulge special interests due to parenting demands. Gently encouraging struggling autistic people to use interests can mitigate burnout.

Monotropism: Neurological Basis of Autistic Attention

Monotropism describes autistic brains focusing narrowly on single elements rather than wholes—struggling to “see the wood for the trees.” Dr. Dinah Murray’s research proposed monotropism as a unified theory explaining diverse autism traits: sensory sensitivity, communication difficulties, and special interests. Autistic people concentrate attention on relatively few things simultaneously, like laser beams rather than floodlights.

Neurotypical social communication requires juggling multiple channels simultaneously—words, tone, facial expressions, body language, eye contact, social context. Autistic people struggle because monotropic attention can’t juggle multiple simultaneous inputs. Within “attention tunnels,” sensory information is amplified. Outside tunnels, sensory input is missed—the author can be engrossed in reading while ignoring phone calls, knocks, hunger, even loud noises.

Monotropism theory suggests autistic people given time, tools, and supportive environments to pursue passions become “forces to be reckoned with.”

Autistic Burnout: Permanent Masking Collapse

Autistic burnout results from sustained masking—the immense energy required to pretend being neurotypical. High masking energy depletes reserves needed for happiness, functioning, and survival. Burnout can occur at any age but peaks in the twenties. The author’s burnout hit at 33 after his daughter’s birth—routine disruption, responsibility increase, lack of downtime, and high-pressure employment caused complete collapse.

Burnout differs crucially from depression: it has a definite material effect on masking ability. Loss of masking ability appears sometimes permanent. Since masking often enables autistic people to function in work and society, inability to mask can destroy lives. The irony is devastating: masking causes burnout, which destroys masking ability, which can lead to job loss, family breakdown, or death.

This creates an inescapable trap for many autistic people: masking is necessary for survival in an ableist world, but masking causes burnout that eventually prevents masking. Without systemic change making unmasked autistic existence safe and valued, autistic people face impossible choices.

Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria: Disproportionate Emotional Amplification

Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria is a disproportionate emotional response to any perceived criticism, rejection, or negative attention, regardless of how minor. The author experiences RSD as an overwhelming dysphoria triggered by ambiguous social cues. Once triggered, the brain refuses to return to calm despite reassurance, continuing to ruminate for hours. The author estimates 80% of negative feelings stem from RSD.

RSD results from autistic pattern-recognition combined with autistic inertia. It manifests as extreme exhaustion from constant vigilance, severe insecurity draining confidence, and reinforcement when occasional criticism proves fears justified. One actual negative experience from authority destroyed years of self-reassurance and deepened RSD. When RSD fears prove occasionally correct, it provides dysphoria “proof” that validates all future anxiety, making rationalization impossible.

Prevention requires proactive communication: managers should address performance concerns early with a “How can I help?” approach rather than allowing problems to accumulate. Understanding RSD as neurological rather than character flaw enables appropriate workplace accommodation.

Stimming: Essential Regulation and Joyful Expression

Stimming is repetitive physical or verbal action—hand-flapping, rocking, foot-tapping, fidgeting with objects—that autistic people use as a stress-relief valve and mood regulator. Everyone stims to some degree, but autistic people stim far more intensely and frequently because they operate at much higher baseline stress. Neurotypical people often dismiss autistic stimming by noting “everyone does that,” which minimizes autistic experience and suggests autistic people are “weaker” for struggling with something “everyone” handles.

The author learned stimming was “bad” in childhood; all current stims are subtle/hidden to avoid detection—evidence of forced masking. Visible autistic stimming is frequently bullied, making it another aspect of autistic masking. However, stimming is joyful and positive, not only stress-responsive—many autistic advocates share happy stimming expressing excitement and joy. Autistic people need freedom to stim however necessary for regulation, expression, and experiencing joy.

Workplace Barriers and Employment Disability

Only approximately 22% of autistic adults are in any form of employment. Workplace environments are inherently hostile to autistic neurology: they’re designed for neurotypical sensory and social needs without accommodating autistic ones.

Sensory Barriers: Temperature regulation is critical. The author requires 18-19°C; above 20-21°C causes energy drain, headaches, and nausea. Strip lighting causes significant problems—the buzzing sound and inconsistent flicker are common sensory issues. Upgrading to daylight-emulating, silent lighting reduced headache frequency significantly.

Hot-desking as Disability Creation: Hot-desking is catastrophic for autistic employees who rely on rigid routine. The author’s former classroom was a carefully controlled haven—a sanctuary enabling functioning. When forced to teach in unfamiliar rooms, he experienced escalating panic.

Instructions and Ambiguity: Autistic people take explicit rules seriously. Unwritten social rules override written policy, creating constant uncertainty. Recommendations: provide completely transparent requirements and deadlines, provide instructions in writing alongside verbal communication, use judgment-free reminders for executive dysfunction, avoid surprise demands.

Authority Blindness: Autistic people often lack the neurotypical instinctive deference to authority figures—not from rebellion but because authority is a social construct that doesn’t register as categorically different. Interview culture itself favors neurotypical social performance over competence, actively screening out autistic candidates.

School Architecture and Active Harm

Schools are fundamentally misaligned with autistic neurology, actively creating disability rather than accommodating it. Open-plan buildings create cacophonies overwhelming sensitive ears. Narrow corridors cause distress during crowded transitions. Allowing autistic students early lesson exits to avoid crowds would cost nothing but help significantly.

Lunchtime should decompress students; autistic children need quiet, solitary rest. Many can’t navigate crowded lunch queues, entering afternoon lessons hungry and distracted. When allowed, many autistic students prefer hiding in cupboards or under staircases rather than outdoor socializing. Teachers typically root them out, assuming nefariousness. This forced socialization requires masking and increases exhaustion.

Group Work as Trauma: Autistic students experience group work as fundamentally traumatic due to accumulated communication trauma from years of social misunderstandings. Twitter survey showed overwhelming hatred of group work among autistic adults.

Practical Lessons: Practical lessons terrify many autistic students. Routine-following skills break down during verbal instruction-heavy practicals. Allowing observation rather than participation would reduce stress-driven learning failure.

What educators label “challenging behaviour” in autistic students is typically an adaptive response to intolerable environmental stress levels. Rather than addressing root causes, schools punish symptomatic behaviour, creating cycles of exclusion that permanently damage students’ lives.

Transportation Systems As Accessibility Barriers

Autistic individuals face severe sensory and logistical difficulties across all public transportation modes.

Buses present overwhelming sensory experiences due to crowding, noise, heat, and physical contact with strangers. The author must plan entire days around bus travel knowing it will push them close to meltdown. Timetables are fictional—destroying predictability essential for routine maintenance.

Trains offer some improvement but stations are labyrinthine with hidden platforms and amenities, and constant unintelligible announcements make sound filtering difficult.

Airports represent “the nightmare” of transportation—purpose-built to destroy autistic people through sensory bombardment. The author hasn’t flown in six years.

Driving provides unusual mental quietude but involves communicative ambiguity that creates confusion and anxiety.

Practical improvements could include early boarding, clearer signposting, educating staff about neurodiversity, and reducing autistic people’s need to travel by meeting them halfway.

Key Takeaways

  1. Communication differences are neurological variation, not deficit: Autistic people’s literal interpretation, longer processing time, and different turn-taking patterns reflect how autistic brains work, not failures. The double-empathy problem means neurotypical people struggle to understand autistic communication equally; autistic people expend enormous invisible labor compensating while neurotypical people remain oblivious.

  2. Masking is a trauma response with devastating long-term consequences: Autistic people learn to mask to survive bullying and rejection, but successful masking delays diagnosis, hides suffering from even close relationships, and becomes unsustainable—eventually collapsing into burnout or complete breakdown.

  3. Autistic people experience empathy intensely; isolation stems from social trauma: The widespread myth of autistic lack of empathy contradicts lived experience. Many autistic people experience hyper-empathy. Their apparent social withdrawal typically results from being repeatedly hurt for their differences, not from disinterest in connection.

  4. Special interests are essential regulatory tools: Special interests provide stress regulation, mood management, emotional refuge, and often livelihood. Curtailing access causes burnout, depression, and suicide risk. They’re as necessary as medication for many autistic people.

  5. Executive dysfunction is neurological, not character flaw: Autistic adults lacking executive function support face unpaid bills, forgotten appointments, lost money, and homelessness. Post-diagnosis support is largely absent, contributing to high unemployment, homelessness, and suicide rates. This is systemic failure to accommodate.

  6. Autism in schools becomes disability through systemic inflexibility: Schools create disability by forcing incompatible activities without accommodation, then punish adaptive stress responses as “challenging behaviour.” Free or cheap accommodations would dramatically reduce harm.

  7. Workplace disability results from communicative ambiguity and sensory hostility: The 22% employment rate reflects systemic failure to accommodate, not autistic inability to work. Most barriers are free or cheap to fix: explicit deadlines, written instructions, temperature/lighting control, stable workspaces.

  8. Systemic ableism pervades every major institution: Healthcare systems requiring phone calls, workplaces enforcing unwritten rules, schools designed without autistic input, and media representation absent autistic voices all represent ableism. Creating genuinely inclusive environments requires intentional redesign and autistic leadership.