Coming Out: I’m Autistic
We aren’t just the best parts of ourselves. We are everything that we are.
Nine years ago, I came out as gay.
I waited longer than most. I wasn’t sure how to tell my story yet. If I hadn’t come to terms with it fully, how could I expect anyone else to?
Today, I’m coming out again.
I’m autistic.
Some of you may know. A few of you may know well. For the most part, though, I’ve been largely silent about this publicly, for many of the same reasons I was so silent about my sexuality for so long.
I hid this from my friends. Would they view me differently? I hid it from my co-workers. Would they be more reluctant to promote me? I hid it from my love interests. Would they turn me away? I hid it from everyone. Would they take me less seriously?
The truth is… I don’t know. Even writing this, I wonder if I’ll be viewed differently if a potential employer or first date looks me up and reads this one day.
I’m sure you’re reading this and shaking your head. I’m being silly! Mental health challenges are normalized! Nobody is devalued because of their mental health anymore!
You probably think you think this. You maybe even think that most people think this. But I’m not sure that we have really convinced ourselves of this yet. And that’s why I’m writing this — because we need to put a face to these things.
The funny thing is that, on the surface, my experience probably won’t feel too unfamiliar to any of you. I have no idea what to do with my hands when I’m walking… but who does? I hate cold calling people… but who doesn’t? I felt very awkward at school dances… but who didn’t?
For me, these feelings are amplified. I vividly remember the dances. The dances always hit me the most.
How did I choose which group of people to talk to? How did I know when I had been there too long? How did I know which group of people to walk to next? How did I know if I was welcome in that conversation? What if it was a group of people I didn’t usually talk to and I didn’t really belong there? What if I had to talk to somebody I didn’t know? Oh God, what if I had to talk to a few people I didn’t know?
It went on like this for hours. Hours. Hours. Hours. At some points, the anxiety became so overwhelming that I faked going to the bathroom just to sit in the stall and feel the euphoria of relief.
(I developed a very deep love of bathrooms in high school. I wouldn’t be where I am today without bathrooms. From the bottom of my heart, thank you bathrooms!)
The best way I can describe the pull autism has on me is the joy of living in my own mind and the trepidation from venturing outside of it.
I feel a pull to sink into my own thoughts. I don’t think I’ve ever told anyone this, but I quit video games when I was 18 because I was afraid that I’d never stop playing when I started. I was so addicted as a kid that I made up excuses to go over to friends’ houses just to play their consoles for a few hours again. I loved getting sucked into that world. Runescape… oh man, Runescape… I would have lived in Runescape forever if I could have (Varrock for life!).
Here’s another goofy one I never told anyone about: as a teenager, I became so absorbed in my own mind that I invented a city. I know everything about this city. I paid no attention in class for two years because I was too busy sketching this city (this is probably why I didn’t get into Brown, my dream school). I drew up every detail I could imagine. Transit system. Disaster preparedness. Sports franchises. All of it. And I never let a single soul see it, because I was embarrassed. It felt… not normal. But it’s called Smithton. There you go. Last I checked there was a fierce debate at the ethics of rent stabilization around a new commuter rail station in a low-income area. I’ll have to check back and let you know how that goes.
Much of it is just odd quirks. I’ll eat the same thing for breakfast six months in a row, then change my mind and have to switch to something else. I can’t sleep if a Wi-Fi router is blinking. For three years I would only eat one brand of Caesar dressing. I am very particular about the shape of my pasta (for a long time I would absolutely, positively never eat Ziti). I prefer to sit on the right on trains and buses — otherwise I feel uncomfortable.
You’re probably reading this and saying, “Ben, none of this is all that abnormal (except maybe Smithton), chill.” You’re probably just laughing at how trivial all this seems. And you’re mostly right!
I love trains (this is a cliché free square if you’re autistic). I love sports. I can’t stop playing video games. I get nervous in large crowds or when meeting new people. High school was a struggle for me. None of this is really that abnormal.
But of course, if you see a stranger exhibiting the kind of innocent quirks I’ve mentioned, I bet you feel weird or uncomfortable. I’m as guilty of this as anybody. There’s a lot of coded language we have built up for those situations, whether or not we externalize it. We are all tolerant and accepting — that is, once we can put a familiar, accepted name to the behaviors. Even then, we maintain an air of skepticism.
This is exactly the point I want to make. I don’t think anything in my experience with high-functioning autism is particularly foreign or problematic. Nor is depression — we’ve all felt down. Nor is anxiety — we’ve all felt worried. Nor even are paranoia, psychosis, obsession-compulsion, or bipolar emotions — we’ve all felt a little crazy after a trauma, loss, breakup, you name it. Often times (and of course this is excepting more severe mental illness that presents different challenges), it’s just the degree to which we individually experience these things.
This isn’t to reduce every battle with mental health to some triviality, but to point out that we all possess more of an ability to empathize with unfamiliar mental health conditions and behaviors than we give ourselves credit for, and destigmatization shouldn’t be all that difficult.
You probably don’t know what it’s like to tear up your knee, but you understand the pain of a physical injury. You feel it, you don’t judge it, and you certainly wouldn’t stigmatize it. Why should this be any different?
Many more people than you realize live every day with that proverbial torn knee in their head. I’m one of them.
Moving from the media to Columbia to tech over the last three years required networking call after networking call after networking event after interview after meeting after phone call. I played the socialite. I’m a charmer when I put my mind to it: radio voice, good grin, spiky hair… I can play the part. But man, it took every fiber of my being making it through some of these events. I learned to knead my toes and clench my teeth. The toes are magic. Nobody can see your toes. You can squeeze them ’til the blood vessels pop and nobody will ever know. Never the hands. Nobody trusts you if they can’t see your hands.
Oh, and then there are the dates. First dates are fun. I love first dates. Fresh slate. Drinks. Fun. Fun fun. Not a care in the world. But after that? Oh god am I screwed.
Take a text exchange like this.
You may know what that text means. You may not. Me? I have no clue. I never have a clue. I have to ask three friends what it means. Or if it even means anything.
This might sound implausible to you. Your first reaction might be, “Ben, just stop overthinking it.” And you’d be right — I do overthink it. But understanding these sorts of cues is extremely challenging when you’re autistic — romantically, professionally, you name it — magically placing your finger on a gut feeling you just don’t have.
Nuance is difficult for many autistic people; everything feels black and white. You’re either disinterested or in love. Today was either phenomenal or disastrous. That pasta dish was either five stars or zero. I had the best day ever or I had a crap one. I’m either going to be CEO in 5 years or I’m getting fired tomorrow.
Often times, it’s funny more than anything. There was a span of my younger life where I would only eat poppy seed bagels from Einstein Bros and I refused to eat plain bagels or bagels made elsewhere. It didn’t even make any sense! I don’t even like poppy seeds! But giving me a non-poppy bagel? I would leave the bagel shop. Oh and good god, please don’t ask my mother about the times she had to send back pasta dishes because the chef put parsley on them.
Many times though, it really beats the crap out of you, and in ways that cut you deeply. Being at weddings of close friends and having to step away because of the strain of processing everything going on around you. Desperately searching for someone you know at a social gathering. Having to carefully count how many dates you’ve been on when you’re seeing somebody because you don’t know how else to gauge what’s happening. Having to do man on the street interviews in radio and being terrified of every man on the street (I braved these out every time for my shows, but god they killed me).
Two months ago, after a particularly difficult series of these kinds of incidents, I texted one of my best friends from the photo above.
But like this I am. I am not me without autism. It is not some immiscible, separable segment of my being.
To wit: the secret to beating autism, I’ve found, is to harness it rather than to fight it. Neurodivergence is a state of being, not a disability.
Obsession, routine rigidity, and diet consistency were invaluable in graduate school. I launched my radio career in large part thanks to the same penchant for hours of intense creative notebooking that got me in trouble in high school. I save stupid amounts of time and money on groceries because I am happy to buy the same five damn things every week. I have a laser-like devotion to my friends because I don’t know any other way to be. And most importantly, I’ve learned to laugh at all this. It’s funny, it really is — and there’s no reason it shouldn’t be as endearing and powerful as it is challenging.
To be fair, I am incredibly fortunate. My autism is high-functioning to begin with, and likely imperceptible to most people. I have an intensely committed family, access to world-class experts, and every resource I can dream of. I’ve had two employers that were patient, warm, and welcoming towards all my goofiness, even with little knowledge of my condition (Entercom/Audacy and OkCupid/Match Group — I love both dearly). I started between third base and home plate, and I’ve been able to grow out of many of these struggles.
Given the battles I had when I was younger, I am very proud of my career and social life. I certainly wasn’t always perfect company around the office, especially in my radio days — although hey, everyone in radio is a little nuts and would happily tell you that themselves— but I grew. Anyone who’s known me over the last two years knows I’m always the first person to lend a smile and break the ice at a Zoom call, party, or meeting. I have so many good friends that I’ll probably need 15 groomsmen at my wedding.
All in all, I’ve matured into a leader and people person in a way I doubt anyone would have expected had I walked in the door and said “I’m autistic.” Heck, would I have been hired to any job had I walked in and said that?
I don’t know. You don’t know. And that’s why I’m writing this. I shouldn’t need to live in fear of sharing this like I have for the last 18 years. Nobody should.
If I can challenge you to do one thing after you read this, it’s to change your internal narrative around autism and mental health. At the moment, how much of it revolves around negative connotations of sympathy, disability, and abnormality? Are you looking the other way, as if to say “not my business”? Are you taking pity? Or are you truly empathizing, empowering, and trying to understand how a person experiences the world differently from the way you do, so you can be the best friend, co-worker, or loved one you can possibly be for them?
I’m autistic. Many days it downright sucks. Many days the focus feels energizing and enables me to accomplish incredible things and be a person that I’m not sure I could have been otherwise. And at the end of the day, this is who I am, and I love who I am. I am undoubtedly the world’s only gay autistic sports radio personality turned data scientist. I am, for better or for worse, inimitable.
We aren’t just the best parts of ourselves. We are everything we are. Our thoughts and emotions are as big a part of our journey in life as anything. And it’s high time we stopped treating them as some ancillary baggage to be hidden in the cargo hold.
I remember once a psychologist asked me, “do you believe your autism is a disability to be mourned, or something to wear as a badge of pride?”
I’m autistic. I’m gay. Both things kick my ass some days. And I’m damn proud of both of them.
World Autism Awareness Day is Friday, April 2
