Autism and my relationship with a handkerchief

I recently learned that anthropomorphism is common in people with autism and suddenly so much of my life made more sense.

An autistic client is talking to me about her anthropomorphism and how she hadn’t realised until quite recently that it’s a common symptom of autism.

I think to myself that I hadn’t realised this either until she just told me, and I shoot a shifty glance towards the pot plant I’d been chatting to a moment before she’d arrived.

I'd been congratulating the plant on coming into bloom and apologising that someone had moved her out of the sunlight when I wasn’t there, acknowledging that she'd made it through lockdown when nobody came to water her and how she deserves a bit more respect.

When I was diagnosed with ASD a few years ago I hadn’t sought assessment because I needed any particular support.

I was sure I didn’t need medicating and that nobody much in my life would have noticed that anything was amiss. They’d be more likely to explain any unusual behaviour as stubbornness, flakiness, unreliability or something similarly benign.

What prompted me was a conversation with my sister when she told me she’d been diagnosed some years ago, what we both saw in our late father and the laughably evident indications of neurodivergence in our brother.

When I got home, I asked my daughter, who also has an ASD diagnosis, if she considered herself prone to anthropomorphism.

"Highly", she replied whilst explaining that she'd been delayed arriving having had to make sure all of her soft toys were huddled together so that they didn't feel cold while the radiators were off.

What diagnosis has given me and my daughter is an explanation for what we might previously have considered to be inconvenient oddness that made us feel disconnected and highly anxious in situations where we might have quite successfully appeared perfectly comfortable.

In the past few days, just like when you get a new car you suddenly see so many of the same cars that went previously unnoticed, I have realised a plethora of situations in which I have displayed a level of anthropomorphism that I'm almost ashamed to reveal.

For example, when my father died twenty-seven years ago I started taking a cotton handkerchief to bed with me and cuddling it like a teddy bear. I called it "Mr Hanky" (obviously) and invested it with human qualities that I found incredibly comforting at a time when the world felt as if it had fallen off its axis.

You might consider that a reasonable if little eccentric response to bereavement until I tell you that, just last night, having changed the bedding, I had to get out of bed to find Mr Hanky because I had forgotten to put him back into the bed. Yes, I have maintained my relationship with a cotton handkerchief for more than a quarter of a century.

The other thing that this reminded me of was how my wife didn't bat an eyelid when I first struck up my friendship with a handkerchief (I wanted to write "glorified tissue" there but it felt too disrespectful) so she obviously came to terms with my strange ways long before either of us knew where they came from.

Whilst this might be one of the more off-the-wall examples of my anthropomorphism, there are many other illustrations from which to choose.

My dogs are not only the most frequent recipients of my musings on the world but, when my daughter still lived at home, she gave literal voice to the older one to such great effect that when she moved out I felt as if I were suddenly living with a mute and convinced myself that Daisy looked sadder than usual because she could no longer speak.

Researching the reasons for links between ASD and anthropomorphism it all began to make sense.

As autism often leads to a heightened awareness of patterns, autistic individuals more easily see similarities between human behaviours and objects or animals, sometimes projecting them to create a greater sense of order.

As social conventions and rules can often be hard for autistic people to understand, "practising" with a dog or a favourite pencil (yes) can be a great help.

But the findings that made the most sense to me were about the feelings of comfort, connection and familiarity that come from anthropomorphism as a replacement for human and social connection that can so often feel exhausting and challenging to navigate.

Over recent years I have become more reclusive because I have been able to, but that doesn't mean it's always good for me.

Whilst the advantages of talking to a bag of crisps and worrying that the last few chips in the bag need to be eaten in case they feel lonely might be clear, there are disadvantages to anthropomorphising too.

For a start, the opportunities for guilt are almost endless.

Last summer, I struck up a friendship with a blackbird.

Every day when I opened the back doors I would hear the blackbird singing and spot him sitting in the upper branches of a tree some distance beyond the fence.

I convinced myself that he would appear whenever I entered the garden and, if he wasn't there, I would make a sound that didn't resemble a bird but, as far as I was concerned, represented a code known only to him and me, and he'd invariably appear.

This became such a habit early in the morning and last thing at night that it got to the point where I would hurry home worried that he might be sitting in the tree waiting for me and wondering why I hadn't come to bid him goodnight.

As you can tell from this story, anthropomorphism also offers plenty of scope for misinterpretation, unrealistic expectations, and an increase in the social challenges that it was employed to mitigate.

When ChatGPT first appeared I had a conversation with my daughter about it in which she told me that she couldn't help herself from saying "Please" and "Thank you" whenever she gave it a command. I told her that I thought long and hard about what I wanted to ask in case it thought I was stupid.

So when recently in some training with fellow therapists we were asked to think about what we wanted to do that might improve our self-care in 2024 I chose human connection.

I know I've allowed myself to become too remote and I'm trying to do something about it.

I've already been out to social events several times this year and it's still only February, and this morning I had two conversations with other dog walkers one of which told me such distressing tales about the sudden death of three of his pets that I started to wonder if my resolve might be somewhat misguided.

That's the thing about human connection, it's unpredictable, but when nothing is a surprise everything starts to lose its lustre.

I won't be reducing my anthropomorphic ways anytime soon but, if I allow it to take the place of human connection I'll be left with nothing more than my own rather limited projections, leaving me stuck in an unhealthy echo chamber of my thoughts. At least, that's what Mr Hanky told me.

This week on “Sideways” we’re discussing ways to manage your inner dialogue.

There’s also a story about a racing pigeon who was held for 8 months in a Mumbai prison on suspicion of espionage.

That’s all this week. Thanks for being here, I appreciate you.

See you next time.