by Marc Draco (62), Middlesborough
Robert Heinlein’s 1961 science fiction novel, Stranger in a Strange Land, describes the experience of a human teenager born in space, raised by Martians and his experiences his home planet of Earth. It’s human nature to single out the different; a necessary evolutionary skill that helped our species survive. While physical differences are obvious to all, our brains are hidden. Any natural variation in what the majority (statistically, almost 70% of any population) perceive as normal instantly mark the individual as different and often different is bad. Different has to be excluded because it poses potential threat to the tribe; and tribalism runs deep in human society.
As our ape cousins, human animals are both social and highly tribal. Anything from your socio-economic group to the the little cliques that form from early age to our circles of friends, mark us out. Tribes are defined by their similarities as much as their differences. But what if you’re not like everyone else? What if your brain functions better that the majority in some areas, but less well in others. Many people on what’s now called the autistic spectrum, experience wide ranging problems prefixed by “dys-” such as dyslexia (reading), dyscalculia (maths) or dyspraxia (movement) Dys derives from ancient Greek meaning abnormal or impaired, therefore hanging “bad” label on what, is to us, normal. Even ADHD had disordered in. I’ll let you in on a secret, we see others as different as they do us.
Autism spectrum diagnoses continue to rise year on year because diagnostic criteria have improved and more doctors are more cognisant of the tell-tale signs. Even though the figure has skyrocketed from 1 in 100,000 to around 1 in 37 now, we’re still in a small and diverse minority. I was only diagnosed last year aged 61.
Growing up with the memory of WW2 still raw and through the height of the Cold War things were very strange indeed. I was the stranger in a familiar land. The odd kid. The boy one no one wanted on their side playing football because the very act of simultaneously coordinating both legs and arms in order to run (let alone dribble a ball) was impossible. I was the kid who spend every minute the teacher wasn’t looking studying the metamorphosis tadpole into frogs, while the rest of the class raced to learn long division.
That kid. The weird one who was weird because they didn’t fit the mould of what the majority considered normal. Laws in the developed world have long sought to even the field for people with some visible, physical differences, including skin colour and stereotypical phenotypes (race in other words) simply because they are easy to spot. But our brain, by orders of magnitude the most complex organ nature has developed, remains very poorly understood and invisible physical symptoms like hypermobility even more so.
Learning that my own lived experience was normal – for someone on the spectrum – wasn’t so much enlightening, it was blinding. A dear friend sent me a Keynote presentation by SEDSConnective founder, Jane Green MBE and I was instantly gripped by the popping of mental flashbulbs. “Oh yeah, I did that… I do that… yeah, got that, been there, wore out the tee-shirt and wait, I’m not strange… I’m just stranger in a world of people who consider themselves normal simply because they’re not the same as me.”
I’d love to share more of what makes me tick but I’ll be in trouble with the editor for waxing lyrical rather than waxing the kitchen table.
About Marc
Marc Draco is an autodidactic polymath with an unflinchingly cruel teacher. He lives “up norf” in a place famous its premier league football club and dubious record for the largest number of fast-food outlets in a mile. People still think he’s strange: including him but at least he can laugh at himself now. He is owned by a one cat and still thinks digital watches are a pretty neat idea.
Follow Marc on X @marcdraco63.
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