Well, okay. Not literally. Sheldon Cooper is a fictional character, and while I myself am likely an illusion, my empirical husband almost certainly exists. The parallels between my darling homunculus (a pet name for him, which I posted online years before Penny used it for Leonard) and the character of Sheldon will be obvious to anyone who has watched the show and encountered Jonah Thomas online. Obvious at a glance -- to me suspiciously obvious, even eerie -- including details like Jonah's published plan to solve the conflict in the Middle East, which Sheldon also offers in "The Jerusalem Duality."
(As a person whose family history includes bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, I must take care when confronting coincidences. I don't have the luxury of the layman, whose magical thinking passes unnoticed, deemed harmless. My creativity is real and it has claws.)
Nevertheless. It doesn't take much of a mental leap to see similarities between "high-functioning" people on the Spectrum.
People like my husband -- people like Sheldon and Sherlock -- are almost always portrayed in fiction as outside the realm of normal human intercourse. Their relationships with others are characteristically few and atypical. There is a recurring motif of insensitivity, as if rationality is somehow incompatible with empathy. One cannot avoid the implication that such a person could never connect with someone who is emotionally vulnerable.
In my experience, the truth is utterly the opposite.
I was physically, emotionally, and sexually abused as a child. As a toddler I learned -- instinctively -- to trust no one. No one at all. As a naturally emotional individual, I secretly yearned to be appreciated and understood, but the extreme wariness I acquired from my dysfunctional parents prevented me from connecting with anyone -- until I encountered the internet.
For all its flaws, the internet is a place where strangers can meet safely. Strange people who would never have connected with one another in the course of ordinary "real" life. I was a mathematics student at Northwestern University when I first encountered the man I would marry: he was trolling the Usenet group alt.angst, a place I posted prose poetry.
(My children still can't overcome their incredulity that I married an internet troll.)
Why did I marry him? Why have I remained his partner for almost 18 years?
The answer lies embedded within the theme of this blog: "Reflections on the Myth of Sanity." Assertion: no modern human can claim sanity. On one level or another, we are all insane. Human intellectual achievement has eclipsed our biological evolution. Our brains can't cope with what we do to ourselves on a daily basis. Our brains lie to us all the time. My hypothesis is that people with "Asperger's syndrome" exhibit superior objective clarity to those who prefer self-delusion (which includes almost everyone, even myself).
Therefore I submit, as a pragmatic suggestion -- that persons who have been abused should seek out persons who fall within the Spectrum. These people can be trusted where others cannot. They will not soften their words to comfort you, which means you will have to be strong; nevertheless, they will not casually lie to you. They will not manipulate you. My Asperger's husband actually enjoys sex more than I do. Yet he is okay with my boundaries; he knows that my aversion to physical intimacy has nothing to do with him personally.
(As a person whose family history includes bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, I must take care when confronting coincidences. I don't have the luxury of the layman, whose magical thinking passes unnoticed, deemed harmless. My creativity is real and it has claws.)
Nevertheless. It doesn't take much of a mental leap to see similarities between "high-functioning" people on the Spectrum.
People like my husband -- people like Sheldon and Sherlock -- are almost always portrayed in fiction as outside the realm of normal human intercourse. Their relationships with others are characteristically few and atypical. There is a recurring motif of insensitivity, as if rationality is somehow incompatible with empathy. One cannot avoid the implication that such a person could never connect with someone who is emotionally vulnerable.
In my experience, the truth is utterly the opposite.
I was physically, emotionally, and sexually abused as a child. As a toddler I learned -- instinctively -- to trust no one. No one at all. As a naturally emotional individual, I secretly yearned to be appreciated and understood, but the extreme wariness I acquired from my dysfunctional parents prevented me from connecting with anyone -- until I encountered the internet.
For all its flaws, the internet is a place where strangers can meet safely. Strange people who would never have connected with one another in the course of ordinary "real" life. I was a mathematics student at Northwestern University when I first encountered the man I would marry: he was trolling the Usenet group alt.angst, a place I posted prose poetry.
(My children still can't overcome their incredulity that I married an internet troll.)
Why did I marry him? Why have I remained his partner for almost 18 years?
The answer lies embedded within the theme of this blog: "Reflections on the Myth of Sanity." Assertion: no modern human can claim sanity. On one level or another, we are all insane. Human intellectual achievement has eclipsed our biological evolution. Our brains can't cope with what we do to ourselves on a daily basis. Our brains lie to us all the time. My hypothesis is that people with "Asperger's syndrome" exhibit superior objective clarity to those who prefer self-delusion (which includes almost everyone, even myself).
Therefore I submit, as a pragmatic suggestion -- that persons who have been abused should seek out persons who fall within the Spectrum. These people can be trusted where others cannot. They will not soften their words to comfort you, which means you will have to be strong; nevertheless, they will not casually lie to you. They will not manipulate you. My Asperger's husband actually enjoys sex more than I do. Yet he is okay with my boundaries; he knows that my aversion to physical intimacy has nothing to do with him personally.
1 comment:
"Assertion: no modern human can claim sanity. On one level or another, we are all insane."
So sanity is a goal that no one can accomplish. Like being all good and not evil. Just and not unfair. Wise and not foolish.
I'm not sure how useful the concept is. What if we just reject it?
Frank Herbert said, "Sanity is the ability to swim." You get in over your head. We're all in over our heads. And we swim.
He also said, "Survival is the ability to swim in strange water." When you don't know where you are or where you're going, you don't know what's in there with you -- and you keep going. What else is there to do? Not surviving is always an option, that's an alternative.
So let's not care what's supposed to be sane. Let's learn whatever skills can help us survive together.
There's no one right way to swim. I like the backstroke for minimum energy, for when I don't need to see where I'm going, when the water is dependable. Dog paddling is good when I need to keep my head way out of the water, to see and be seen. The underwater australian crawl is the fastest I can swim, it uses core muscles and strongest muscles, but it doesn't help me breathe.
Maybe there's no one right way to think. Especially in strange waters.
There are people who think they know what sanity is. The one right way to swim. That's what they need to do to get by, so don't look down on them for it. Unless that's what you need to do to get by.
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