You might be autistic if…

You don’t understand what happened in a conversation until it registers three days later as you’re trying to fall asleep.

You don’t laugh at jokes when everyone else does.

No one knows when you’re joking because your face and tone remain the same OR don’t align with allistic humor standards.

You love puns and literal jokes.

You pause and rewind audio a lot because it hasn’t registered yet.

You talk during a movie to ask why someone did something or what something means because you’re afraid of missing something that was supposed to be picked up on.

You have an easier time bonding with animals, possibly even cats, than with other people.

You thoroughly research restaurants before going to them so you have an idea of what they serve, what you might order, and what the inside sensory atmosphere may be like.

You think people on TV and in movies have really bad communication.

You think less communication issues and misunderstandings would occur if everyone respected the definitions of words and used literal context.

You spend a lot of time writing/thinking of how to say something with the hopes that it will be perceived how you want it to be, only for people to completely misunderstand.

You’ve had people think you mean yourself when you refer to your FRIEND(S) doing or struggling with something.

You struggle to determine whether someone is being sarcastic or mean.

Life feels like having to swim in a lake while everyone else rides on a boat.

You accidentally/unintentionally intrude on other people’s boundaries.

Your typical childhood development behaviors were pathologized.

Your caregivers infantilize you.

Your family “doesn’t get autism”.

The things people like/love about you are autistic traits…and the things people can’t stand about you are also autistic traits.

You felt like the odd one out/an alien growing up, like you’re from another planet where people speak and carry themselves similarly.

You are part of the LGBTQ+ community.

You’re extremely sensitive to pain or sensory input.

You seek certain sensory input, even if it’s bad for you (e.g. biting nails, skin-picking, smoking).

You take things more literally than everyone else and don’t understand when they’re joking/exaggerating/being sarcastic, which leads to really awkward/embarrassing moments (and possibly even people thinking you’re gullible/not the brightest).

You like wearing the same clothes all the time. You might even own multiple copies of the same clothes. 👀

You are extremely specific about your socks, to the point that you may have a whole “system” to dealing with them, like wearing a certain style only or having certain socks for each foot (like where the toe shape is biggest on the sock).

You need to know when someone is coming over way before they arrive so you can prepare, what you will be doing together, and when they’ll be leaving.

You tend to zero in on one to a few interests at a time and struggle to maintain several different interests at once.

People often perceive you as “odd”, “weird” or “rude” and you don’t understand why since it’s literally you/who you are.

The people you best get on with are neurodivergent, maybe even autistic.

You have a collection of foods you consider your “comfort foods” and could eat only them for the rest of your life if you had to.

When brands change their packaging or “improve” their recipe, you feel stress/anxious.

You don’t understand why a conversation stopped until you realize, days later, that you said something offensive.

You rehearse conversations or how you might do something that doesn’t require communication, like grocery shopping, before it happens.

Other people accuse you of not being able to sit still or catch you “always fidgeting”, when you didn’t even realize you were doing it — and not being able to do it stresses you out.

You’re prone to getting lost and heavily rely on GPS.

Without GPS, you can’t take a different route than the one you’re most familiar with without “freaking out” (melting down).

You can spend days alone, with your special interests, and it doesn’t bother you.

Sometimes, you sit in a dark room because light is too bright to handle right now.

You watch the same shows/movies and listen to the same songs/albums/artists/playlist on repeat (a form of stimming).

---

This is not a diagnostic list, but a compilation of some of my own everyday experiences as an autistic person.

Do you have any to add?