The Criticism-Sensitive, Autistic Child and Adult

The autistic child is very sensitive to criticism and even as an adult, finds it very hard to accept criticism. My logical self tells me it’s not said with any malice, but I’m still hurt. In a class, when the teacher is trying to teach me something, I want to get it right first time – no mistakes. The autistic person puts an incredible amount of pressure on themselves to do things right. The idea of just giving something a go and seeing how it turns out is just plane recklessness.

Why autistic people are so bad at accepting criticism is a complicated question. Firstly it means accepting that one has done something wrong. The word wrong has two meanings; a) when something is factually wrong and b) when something is morally wrong. The autistic brain, or rather my autistic brain, (I’m not sure if others have the same problem) finds it difficult to separate these two different meanings. If something is ‘wrong’ it is both factually and morally wrong. Getting a fact wrong is being morally wrong. For some reason, I can’t accept that all I’ve done is failed to recall a fact and that this okay.

But it’s not just difficult to accept that I am wrong. I also find it difficult to accept that other people can be wrong. Again, this maybe an autistic thing or just me personality, but when I was growing up I had the greatest respect for authority figures and institutions. My belief in authority lead me to some very dark and unhappy moments. The idea of someone in authority (for example, one of my parents) doing something morally wrong or making a mistake was just unbelievable. Being told off for something you have done wrong is bad enough, but being told off for something you haven’t done is even worse.

I had a lot of difficulty getting on with my family while I was growing up. For a long time, I really believed I was unloved. Experiences, like being told off when I hadn’t done anything (which wouldn’t leave much impression on an NT person) made a big impact on me. What I couldn’t get my head round, was that my parents might not know all the facts and that somewhere along the line someone had said something that wasn’t true. These sorts of incidents lead to a lot of confusion and soul searching.

In my child’s mind, my parents must have been told a lie. They could either debunk it, or use it against me. My autistic mind couldn’t accept that they might believe the lie; parents are never wrong. My only option then was to believe I deserved the telling off for something else. In this way could I protect the image of my parents as good people who loved me. However, this came at great cost to my own image of myself as a good person. This repeating scenario threw me into a nightmarish hell on earth. We were a large family and if someone could the pass the blame for something onto someone else they did. Family life was difficult for other reasons also and being autistic I coped very badly. Suffice to say that by the time I was fifteen, I had very little confidence or self esteem, I really didn’t want anymore of this life.

It’s only going over this now that I can see the errors my autistic mind was making. My parents weren’t always aware of the full facts. For example, both my parents worked, and certain tasks had to be completed by the time they got home, like the washing up. This was something we took in turns to do. Only gradually over time this became my task, because one time I forgot to do and I got into trouble. That one incident was all it took. Because I’d done it once, the NT mind thought that it would now believable to say I had forgotten to do it again. Being autistic, I thought people are more likely to believe the truth rather than a lie, so I didn’t do the washing up when it wasn’t my turn, and I did get into trouble.

Of course there are going to be times, when an autistic person is wrong but doesn’t see it. The consequences of being ‘told off’ however are the same. The autistic person believes that are right all the time because; a) they never lie and b) they always use logic. If you always tell the truth and always use logic, how can you ever be wrong? If every other person on the planet were autistic then probably only very rarely. However the majority of people are NT and they have another part of their brain, the social part. It is very powerful. It can be used for good and for bad. It enables them to both comfort and deceive. And most people use this ability to make their life easier, even if it sometimes makes someone else’s life a bit harder.

You see the NT person believes in a healthy competition. If they are better at this social stuff than you, then its okay, it’s just natural selection at work, survival of the fittest, may the best man win, etc.... And probably somewhere along the line you offended the NT, not intentionally, just because you’re autistic and didn’t say hello or something. In which case, it’s just an eye for an eye; no need to take it personally. But the autistic person takes everything personally. Perhaps because we feel so separate from the rest of the world, that we don’t fit; that makes it difficult for us to think of ourselves as belonging to groups. It is never just kids my age you are getting upset with – it is me. It is never just people who live alternative lifestyles you are getting upset with – it is me. And because autistic people live their lives so openly (this isn’t a judgement, we just don’t know any other way) we have no defence. The autistic has no social mask to hide behind, the autistic person can’t hide they are hurt, which makes it all a lot worse.