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I have a morning routine. 

I get up, put on my dressing gown, grab a towel from the banister and walk into the bathroom.  I have a wee-wee.  I only shave on Mondays and Wednesdays, unless I have an important meeting with some important or a presentation or something, but this is rare and avoided at all costs.

If it’s a shave day I shave, then shower.  Otherwise I get straight in the shower.  Hair, face, armpits, ‘bits,’ feet, always in that order.  I get out, dry myself, ruffle my hair in the mirror (if I don’t I’ll have shit hair — well, shitter than usual — all day).  Dressing gown on, I put my towel on the banister and go downstairs, put the kettle on.  Two mugs; me on the right, whatshername on the right.  A teaspoon of coffee in each.  A splash of cold water in mine, milk in whatshername’s.

Two slices of toast in the toaster.  Take whatshername’s coffee upstairs.  Back in the kitchen I wait for toast then spread with margarine and marmite.  I take my breakfast and sit on the right-hand side of the sofa, put on BBC Breakfast hoping Susanna Reid (below, right) is presenting.  Watch until Chris Hollins (hopefully) finishes his sports report.  Upstairs.  Brush teeth, do hair.  Curse shit hair.  Get dressed, go downstairs.  Lunch (if made), laptop bag, in the car by 7:50.

 

It’s my morning routine, my comfort.

This morning whatsername decided to get up early and go for a swim.  I walked into the kitchen to find her making coffee (she put sugar in mine — FFS — but that’s beside the point), and I just stood there.  My routine had been shattered and I wasn’t sure what to do next.  But I waited, made my breakfast, took the coffee from the side and got on with things.

We all have out daft little routines.  I’m sure I’m not the only person who has a morning routine, or who likes the writing on all his CDs to be the right way up (am I?).  I know I’m not the only person who has an order of preference for his boxer shorts (as @iainobrien -  delightfully confirmed: “A teams, B teams, and the real reserve grade bad boys”).

We have these little routines and quirks because we all have in some way or another some autistic tendencies.  All of us.  But while the ‘neurotypicals’ among us will deal with these disruptions and think of another way around them, some people have behaviours and routines so ritualistic and pervasive that they ruin their lives.  Their thought processes are so rigid and inflexible that any deviation can throw them into a violent rage or inconsolable sulk.  This is just one of the many examples of autistic spectrum disorder (ASD).

April 2010 — which, admittedly has pretty much been and gone — is the first ever National Autism Awareness Month, and has seen the broadcast of shows like ‘Young, Autistic and Stagestruck’ and ‘The Autistic Me.’  As entertaining, enlightening and emotional as these shows are, they barely scratch the surface of the problems in the lives of the characters. 

I can’t and won’t attempt to explain ASD in any detail, but it’s something that really interests me.  And for Christ’s sake don’t read this and think autism is just about rigidity of thought.  It’s an incredibly complicated subject, which good old faithful lazy man’s best friend Wikipedia defines as “a disorder of neural development characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior.”

‘Young, Autistic and Stagestruck’ demonstrates just how wide the autistic spectrum is, showing us a ‘high functioning’ autistic twelve year-old who is exceptionally intelligent and eloquent but uncontrollably angry and aggressive, in the same group as an eleven year-old who can barely speak and, in last night’s show, soiled himself and smeared excrement on his chair.

I take my metaphorical hat off to every parent and carer who deals with people with autism, and I hope that National Autism Awareness Month raises all the awareness it can.

Although NAAM is almost over, try and catch one of the many programs on autism on TV at the moment.  Read “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” by Mark Haddon.  Watch the film ‘Adam’ starring the brilliant Hugh Dancy and the quite lovely Rose Byrne, or the BBC drama “After Thomas” (based on the novel ‘A Friend Like Henry’ by Nuala Gardner) starring the equally lovely ‘Ashes To Ashes’ star Keeley Hawes.

It’s such a fascinating and complicated topic on which academics, psychologists, doctors, parents and, erm, former Playboy models regularly disagree.  It is unclear as to the causes, if any, of ASD, be they genetic, environmental or developmental.  One thing’s for sure, some of the brightest and most important individuals have been linked with or rumoured to have shown characteristics of ASD, including Bill Gates, Albert Einstein, Van Gogh and, erm, Jenny McCarthy.  Well, OK, not Jenny McCarthy, but it seems a nice note to end on…