Invisible Diversity: A Story of Undiagnosed Autism by Carrie Beckwith-Fellows (Transcript)

Following is the full text of Carrie Beckwith-Fellows’ talk titled “Invisible Diversity: A Story Of Undiagnosed Autism” at TEDxVilnius conference. In this talk, Carrie shares her own personal journey towards diagnosis of autism: why it took 35 years, and what are the root causes for such invisible diversity?

Carrie Beckwith-Fellows – TEDx Talk TRANSCRIPT

Everyone in this room has a unique voice — something about you that is different from others. And I want you to take a moment to think about what that difference is.

Some of you can teach; some of you can create amazing pieces of art; some of you can solve mathematical problems with ease, while others can care for and nurture others unconditionally.

Now, I want you to imagine what it would be like if for your entire life, you had no idea that difference existed. There is a group of people whose unique voice, whose very diversity, is so well hidden that it’s invisible, even to themselves.

I was one of those people. I am autistic, and I had no idea until I was diagnosed at the age of 35. Autism is a condition that affects how a person communicates, how they relate to people, and how they experience the world around them.

Autistic people see, hear, and feel the world differently than non-autistic people. And while no two autistic people are the same, we do share common traits, such as how we communicate, how we are able to plan and carry out tasks.

The level of difficulty a person has with these traits will shape where they fit on the spectrum.

Now, a lot of people think the autistic spectrum is a straight line with severe autism at one end and mild autism at the other, but it’s not like that at all.

Autism is like a kaleidoscope of colors, like that color wheel on your computer where all the colors blend into one another. So let’s have a look at these autistic traits.

We have sensory issues. That’s how you see, hear, and feel. So an autistic person may have amazing hearing, and they may be able to pick out minute details other people can’t see.

Autistic people are fantastic at finding “Where’s Wally,” but they may struggle to process audible sounds. We have social communication. That’s how we communicate and how we understand how other people communicate. It involves things like understanding body language, sarcasm, and humor.

Autistic people can take things very literally. So a saying such as “He wears his heart on his sleeve” may be very difficult for an autistic person to understand because how can the human heart exist outside of the body, never mind on the sleeve of a shirt?

We have executive function. Now, that’s our ability to plan, to organize our time and space, and to carry out tasks. So an autistic person with poor executive function may struggle to complete tasks, they may struggle to organize their space around them, and they may have difficulty with poor time-keeping.

We have repetitive behaviors. Now, this involves things like the level of interest we have in something. So the cliche is the autistic person who loves trains.

One of my special interests is the TV show “Friends.” I’ve listened to it every single night for 15 years, and I know every episode inside out. I can name every episode, and I can tell you who said what line and what episode it came from.

And finally, we have stimming, and that’s using self-soothing behaviors to calm ourselves, to communicate, and to process information.

In autism, we also have these labels, which I hate, and they are “high-functioning” and “low-functioning,” and the reason I don’t like them is because they’re misunderstood and they’re misused a lot.