my autism and a toxic career choice

Hell.

That’s what Architecture was like for me.

Forty-plus years in a team-driven, deadline-critical profession, not knowing I was Autistic.

I wouldn’t be here now without powering through countless silent/invisible meltdowns during those years.

How did I find myself in that impossible situation?

In the 1970s and ’80s, when I was in high school and college, meltdowns were called “nervous breakdowns;” these often led to being removed from society.

To lose it when overwhelmed at school or work equated to failing.

My only option, without masking, would have been institutionalization. That would have been a death sentence. My mom worked for a psychiatrist; I’d heard the stories. This threat was a reality in my world. It took years for me to put the other pieces together: mental health issues (probably Autism?) — and institutionalization — riddled both sides of my family. A paralyzing vibe lurked around any conversations about inner struggle.

The prospect of institutionalization was the greatest terror of my life. I instinctively buried this fear so deep I only recognized it a few years ago.

My Southern-traditional and technically-oriented parents expected me to choose a profession with a proven track record for “advancement.” This expectation included securing a stable income, finding a job in a big city, and making a “better” life than my origins. That was my reward for excelling in school.

During my third year of high school, I found a job with an architecture firm. For my parents, architecture seemed an excellent choice. And it met my naive feminist criteria, offering “something to prove” in a male-dominated profession.

As graduation loomed and I considered colleges and professions, my high-school career counselor suggested medical illustration.

Me Then: Pfft, that’s so boring and isolated-sounding.

Me Now: OMG, that would be perfect!

In the 1970s, who would’ve known that “boring and isolated” was what I needed to flourish? Or that architecture would be a disastrous choice, given my peculiarities?

We all knew I had peculiarities. That didn’t mean I needed accommodation; I needed to adjust.

In 1978, how could my parents, the career counselor, or the 17-year-old me have known something was amiss and called for a different approach to my future?

Leo Kanner first coined “Autism” (as we understand it today) in 1943.

That’s only 30-ish years before I chose a career in architecture.

In those days of snail mail, printed newspapers, and 60-Minutes-on-Sunday-evening-TV, an Autism diagnosis wasn’t even a blip on the horizon unless a child had glaring behavioral issues. Schizophrenia was a more likely diagnosis. The chances that a family doctor in the Deep South might spot Autism in a little girl or a teenager — now, that was Twilight-Zone material.

Even if he (because, of course, in the Seventies, it would have been a “he”) had been a cutting-edge and proactive physician and had suggested to my parents that something was “not normal,” what would have been my options? Not college; perhaps not any career at all.

The US government signed ADA (the Americans with Disabilities Act) into law in 1990. That’s twelve years after I made my career choice. And it addressed physical disabilities. The need for neurological accommodations lagged decades behind.

What was it like in those years as an Architect and Interior Designer with Autism? Here are some snapshots. Feel free to skim.

• Long team meetings around a conference table. Listened and took copious notes because sensory over-stimulus guarantees that Autie brain won’t sort accurately or make sense when I return to my desk.
  
• Trying soooooo hard not to pick my cuticles at the conference table.
  
• Sketching helps. Sometimes. Sometimes it makes things worse.
  
• Developing documents with a team of people I know little about.
  
• Plucking up the energy to go to a networking event. Or not.
  
• Quickly profiling teammates, supervisors, and clients to understand what motivates or triggers them.
  
• Learning who to avoid and how to brown-nose just enough to appease without pissing off my team.
  
• Watching others interact and figuring out how bright or transparent people are, guessing who’s safe for conversation and who might stab me in the back.
  
• Searching for allies, people who could help me understand the corporate culture without threatening my progress or revealing my struggles and insecurities.
  
• Watching closely to understand why certain people get promoted –because they evidently share a secret language.
  
• Staying awake through golf game comparisons.
  
• Containing my impatience, anxiety, and sometimes fury throughout countless hours of mansplaining.
  
• Straining to refrain from snapping at people when I’m exhausted and overwhelmed.
  
• Rising at 4 in the morning after not having slept because I worried about missing my flight, catching a 6 am flight across the country to land in a meeting carrying 100 pounds of material samples, staying attentive and awake through boring spreadsheet explanations, picking through a box lunch, for food that wouldn’t trigger inflammation, and trying not to groan when the boss books dinner for everyone at the famous loud Italian restaurant. Then sleeping in a strange bed with strange noises outside and in the corridor.
  
• Finding words – quickly – when asked unexpected questions while sleep-deprived.

Please note: none of this had anything to do with buildings, spatial design, or construction.

From the day I showed up for my first job through a full assortment of positions and roles until my last day employed, these were some of the worms that bored through my brain. I never felt secure, and I often felt exploited. Every day I did my best.

There was no relief and no forgiveness. A missed deadline affected other firms and could cost millions of clients’ dollars.

When COVID-19 struck, and remote working became a thing, I lost my source for visual cues when calculating my interactions. And all of my support peeps disappeared.

Things went downhill. I had my first panic attacks along with other symptoms and began to realize the job would kill me if I didn’t do something to navigate better. In a moment of clarity, I called my insurance company and got pre-authorization to check into the hospital.

I spent a week as an inpatient, and that was when I first considered applying for Disability. Those nightmarish work experiences morphed into inspiration and launched my self-care journey with Autism.

As it turned out, the dreaded “Institutionalization” — at least, in short doses — probably saved my life.

I still struggle.

I share my experiences in hopes of raising awareness of neurodiversity and sparing others from some of the pain I’ve endured. I don’t hesitate to talk about it, and I’m proud and relieved that I managed to qualify for Disability. Post-Architecture, my life has meaning beyond how much it might have pleased my parents.

But sharing gets prickly. I’ve drafted versions of this post three or four times over the last several months. This is the first time I’ve accomplished it coherently and without slipping into a dark place. For that, I thank my online community, especially Lyric Rivera of NeuroDivergent Rebel. I highly recommend her book on Workplace Diversity — all sincere managers would do well to use it to chart accommodations for their “Neubies” and “Auties.”

And with that, I’m off to make a cup of tea and stim while I game.