I’m supposed to just be myself.

Be the best me I can be.

There’s only one me.

Kind of glad that last one’s true.

Not sure about the first two.

Because I’m figuring out how much of my identity has been me masking my autism in a vain attempt to get off the island of me and get to play on the beach with the rest of the kids.

I’ll forever associate metaphors for my autism with some form of childhood, because like most traumas, the core ones are formed well before our brains are capable of processing them.

Even though I don’t particularly like the beach, and I’ve written it off over the years to my discomfort with heat and sand, but I’ve come to suspect it’s more about how it’s not a place I’ll ever quite fit in.

I grumble in my old-before-my-time way about how it’s just silly to spend the day trying to avoid sunburn, tossing Frisbees or beanbags because cornhole is a sport now in case we’re not absolutely sure that maybe it’s time we all should just fly into the sun.

When what I mean under that mask of indifference and disdain is that I’m not very good at throwing a frisbee, or a beanbag, thanks to a combination of poor coordination in my youth and a childhood only slightly less isolating than if my only friend had been a volleyball.

The problem with being somewhere on the spectrum where I’m aware of how I come across to people but have no clue what to do about that most of the time is that it enforces a bit of a personality split.

Which, is useful in terms of figuring out my emotional responses to things, but less so when it comes to being either the ASD Bot or A Real Boy.

Because those are two distinct selves, characters I’ve had to introduce to my Significant Other when they tell me they want an honest answer to the question.

Give you my best/worst example.

Father-in-law died of cancer at an age where that was a tragedy.

My SO, being a non-autistic human, albeit with her own neurodivergent inclinations, was understandably emotional.

Day of the funeral, ASD Bot said, “I don’t understand why you’re so upset. You know he was an asshole.”

Granted, this was before I knew I was autistic, so I doubled down, defending the logic by citing multiple instances where Dearly Departed Dad was Delightedly Dead Dickhead.

Surprising no one, that has…come up since.

Just be myself.

Which self would you prefer, then?

It’s not like I come with a menu.

Might could simplify things.

Or at least lessen the pain, theirs and mine.