I think Daniels responses are something he has either heard or he has seen or he has picked up somewhere. Quite often Daniel will say things that I know I have said to him, and he will be repeating them to somebody else, perhaps in a different situation but it is like a learnt response and sometimes I think it is a case of he chooses to say that, because he thinks that is what he should say rather than it being a natural response. So the theory of mind issue can be quite confusing because although he seems to know what it is all about, in reality and in practice it is not quite that easy, and often I look at him, and we are having a discussion and I am thinking you don’t have a clue. You really do not know and he insists he does because if he saw it on paper he could work it out. If somebody read out the story, he knows the answer. But living it, and putting it into practice are totally two different things.

And once they’re your friend, do you still monitor the conversations?

It becomes a little bit more relaxed, I will say that, yes. A little bit more relaxed, I don’t tend to do it as much. But I do tend to find out, what they’ve been up to most of the time straight away, and all I do is try and sort of feed in the information [laughs].

I, for example, for the weekend they all went out with their parents, went on holiday or something and then I try and feed out as much information about their holiday as possible for just being nosy I suppose, really. But it does become a bit more relaxed when I’ve made friends and stuff. I don’t tend to sort of monitor myself as much and stuff like that.

So if you weren’t monitoring yourself do you think you’d start talking about something you’re interested in and then you won’t pay any attention to how they’re responding to you, you just talk?

Yes. Yes. Literally I just carry on. I mean sometimes I do open up about, you know, what I’m interested in and stuff and half the time we’re very clever who we choose as friends, because we choose people that are interested in exactly the same things as us. So it makes the conversation a little bit more easier, because we can, sort of talk I don’t know, for hours about, I don’t know, a video game or something like that. Or a movie or a stupid toy or something like that. You know, we can go onso sometimes we’re a bit choosy in friends. We tend to choose people that are interested in the same thing as us. And sometimes this can be a problem, especially when we’re younger at school and stuff. For example if the teacher’s got us to, I don’t know, done like a little group activity or something, and may not necessarily want to be involved in that group activity because it’s with a toy that we don’t like. So just don’t bother with it [laughs].

And also I wanted to bring up, because you mentioned earlier about your self harming. Is this a regular thing or is it just occasionally?

it’s occasionally when I’m frustrated, I can tend to do it. Yeah. If something, I mean most of the time it’s when it builds up I tend to do it. Like if something has built up over time, I tend to do it. You know, but yes, I’m dealing with it very slowly. I’m learning other ways sort of dealing with my emotions and stuff and I think that’s another key area. I think people can help. You know, talk to parents about how we deal with the emotional side and that. Because we do sometimes become quite violent and stuff, you know, and that’s obviously not very good, you know.

So have you found strategies through your life trying to fit in? Is there short cuts?
You do find strategies. I mean peopleit is like you learn things quite quickly anyway.A lot of the things might be broke if you don’t understand things anyway, you will devise some how, some kind of strategy to make something work. It is like if you were on an island and nobody spoke English and you were hungry, eventually, or if nobody spoke your language, no matter where you were, but if you were hungry you would somehow make yourself understood. Even if it is by only signing that you were hungry. Eventually you would do it.So strategies, yes, you do learn strategies from an early age I think and the problem is with people probably on the spectrum is that you have got a lot of information that you need to store away because you have to remember the strategies for those situations because it doesn’t come naturally so you have to pull that out of your little film cabinet that you have got in your head and play it quite quickly so you know what to do. It is not inherent really, so yes, there are lots of strategies I think that you learn. I think it just takes time.

I still do things now that probably annoy family members but I do things that I know with my partner I sometimes on come on, and I will say to her is everything okay because I can’t read her face and she will say that yes everything is okay. But if the tone is slightly different then it was yesterday, even though the answer is the same, then I feel that there is something wrong so I tend to pursue it to find out what is the matter but it is just that I can remember the tone exact and then it bothers me because it is a different tone the next day.

And I still make the same mistake even though I still well I might not ask. I always ask because I never know. I am never sure. So it is a bit of a loop and I can’t get out the loop you see. Yes.
It is back to awareness isn’t it really? It is an awful lot to expect a lot of people to be readily made to be made more aware, but a lot of it is the actual condition itself. Because I can’t I can’t, I mean I knew you were coming today and I was getting slightly distressed, my hands were sweating and things, and it was because it was different. I didn’t know, you know, and I go through that most days like most people on the spectrum do. I mean and it will be like that in ten years, in twenty years time. It is never going to change. We might get used to a situation but it doesn’t mean to say that we particularly like it. Its I don’t know whether you understand, whether it makes sense to you. I suppose it is like how did you feel when you went for your first interview ever? You know, if you can imagine that same interview like fifty times a day. And then you have got an idea of what it is like because and then you get, you cover things up as well, because you do want to fit in and you do want to be like everybody else. So you, even if you don’t get things, you make it look like you do get things and then you are thinking of what it was that was said, because you want to find out ways so you carry that around in your head all day as well. As well as everything else, and yes, and then you get your overload.