Autistic Spectrum Disorder

Stuart Bechman is a business analyst who "self-diagnosed" as being on the autistic spectrum only ten years ago. Despite demonstrating in high school and college that he was bright, accomplished, and capable, he struggled with personal and professional relationships and job situations throughout his adult life.  It seemed to him that he had a "talent" for “ticking people off" without any idea why.  Just prior to turning 40, Stuart finally found a stable and enduring relationship to a woman who became a high school teacher. A few years into teaching, she suggested that he appeared to display many aspects of something called autism. After a fair amount of reading and even some therapy, he came to agree with her assessment.  Since then, he has striven to better understand how his autism has contributed to his life's travails and to reach out and provide advice to others on the spectrum.
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I was the oldest of 3 brothers. My childhood was generally tranquil and my parents ensured that I was regularly engaged in social activities such as Little League Baseball, Y-Indian Guides and Boy Scouting as well as developing a proficiency in music.  But despite these activities, I grew up as somewhat of a loner, finding little in common with my peers and preferring to spend time with books and personal projects.

I was a very bright student in school who took every high school AP class available to me, graduating in the top 1% of my class. I was quite ambitious and interested in the world, and imagined living a successful life, making an impact in whatever I chose to do. I went to college, completing my college undergraduate work in 3 years and earning a double Bachelor's degree in Accounting and Computer Science before then earning a Master's degree in Management Information Systems.  I was only 20 years old by the time I graduated from college and started his career.

Despite these academic successes and a promising future, I soon found unexpected obstacles in dealing with personal and professional colleagues. In college, I found it unexpectedly difficult to connect or find common interests with other students.  After a lonely first year, I joined a college fraternity at the suggestion of my parents. But here, too, I seemed to attract little more than derision and antagonism from my frat brothers; I eventually withdrew from the fraternity after a group of them cornered and beat me for an unspecified transgression. It seemed that I had a "talent" in arousing hostility among both my male and female peers in college without any idea why.

After college, my alienation continued into my professional life. Despite my knowledge and training, I was involuntarily and unexpectedly terminated from my first couple of jobs. I began working as a temporary / contract worker, which I came to prefer because it seemed there were less ambiguous job expectations and fewer social irritations. Despite believing that I had an abundance of attractive qualities, romantic relationships were few and far between, often ending before they really got started, and usually without much explanation.  I suffered through long stretches of depression during this period of my life.

Late in my 4th decade, several years into my relationship with Jeanie and after she had switched career path from software developer to high school math teacher, she became aware of a mental / psychological condition called Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). She provided me with a book about the condition and suggested that I might read it and consider whether I might see any similarities with my own situation. The book did, indeed, resonate with me; and I began to reassess my life history to consider whether this was the "vague disorder" that I felt had burdened me my entire life.  At Jeanie's suggestion, I began participating in therapy with a counselor who specialized n ASD children to further my investigation.

Virgin Mary vs. Jezebel

Early on, I became aware of the cultural norm of "good" women being those who were chaste and non-sexual. This never made much sense to me, as it seemed to go against the clear and strong sexual drives of the human male - and, frankly, of all animals. Was I to understand that sex occurred only through rape, that women had no interest in sex?


I observed this norm in multiple aspects. Initially, I became aware of the practice of "slut-shaming" in junior high and high school, where girls would accuse other girls of being "too" sexually available (eg, "easy"). I was never privy as to what exactly the accused girls did of garnering such an accusation, but it was clear that it was perceived as a terrible label that could destroy one's social life and ego.  I saw it to a lesser extent with men, who talked privately and disparagingly about girls who they claimed were "easy" to have sex with (but for whom the boys would target in order to get this "easy" sex).  As sex and sexual attraction always struck me as a good thing, I never grasped why such a meme had such cultural power.


One girl I was extremely attracted to in high school ended up shunning me after we ended up in my car kissing and her top and bra came completely off, exposing her beautiful breasts to me.  At first, she seemed relaxed and comfortable with my gaze; but then she snapped into shame and upset, putting on her clothes and demanding that I take her home immediately. Of course, I complied, but didn't understand what had happened to make her so upset. She didn't give me the chance to talk further about it before I dropped her off at her house. As soon as we touched the curb, she immediately jumped out of the car and all but ran inside. From then on, she took extreme steps to avoid running into me at school. That Christmas season, she participated in a school group that sang Christmas carols in students' neighborhoods; they came to our house one night.  We invited the singers in to rehydrate and use the bathroom. She refused to make eye contact with me and stayed as invisible as possible while they were at our house.  I felt that I was being punished for simply seeing her semi-naked.


But then I encountered the same trope among parents and other adults. More than once, I found myself being treated as dangerous around girls - once, my mother scolded me after she found out that I and a (female) friend had spent time investigating an empty house; another time, a girl I met while on vacation in Hawaii and had reached out to see again when I was on a trip to Seattle got an irate call from her father, telling me to stay away from her and saying over and over "she's only 16!".


My initial efforts at offering compliments and flirtatious comments to attractive girls were taken poorly, often responded to with an awkward silence and discomfort if any response at all was provided; or they would tell me that they're only interested in being "friends" and/or would make special efforts to introduce me to their current beau / fiancée / husband / whatever.


At another point, when I was working in Phoenix, I took it upon myself to introduce myself to a very attractive new girl in my office and let her know just how attracted I was to her.  After another awkward silence, I excused myself and went back to my work desk.  She stayed away from me for the rest of her time there (she was a summer temp), only occasionally exchanging ambiguous glances. Not long after, I was let go (fired).  When I asked my boss for the reasons, he explained to me that the girl I had approached was the Managing Partner's daughter and who apparently was engaged.  She had been so upset at my approach that she went crying to her father's office about the incident, which led to my actions being discussed at the next Partner's meeting.  It wasn't clear that they agreed to terminate me at that meeting, but it apparently was a significant factor into my boss' decision to do so.


All of the above clearly indicated to me that reminding a girl of her sexual attractiveness was extremely unwelcome and socially inappropriate.  I internalized a huge fear and reluctance of expressing any such opinions whenever I was around attractive women, telling myself that that was the polite and respectful thing to do.


It wasn't easy. When around attractive women, I naturally become obsessed with their attractiveness, to the point of pushing most everything else out of my mind. For the next 30 years, I ended up spending my time in such situations repressing and denying my feelings, rendering me all but mute around them. Now, I can only imagine how uncomfortable and unhappy I looked to the women I was meeting in those situations.


For the next 30 years, not until my 50s, did I learn that that was entirely the wrong conclusion.