Hi Edward,

I'm so glad the article resonated with you - thank you for your comments!

I do not have the clinical experience you have or a medical background, so you may have a more wide-ranging experience of autism than I do. But I have always believed that that sensitivity to others' emotions you mention is not really a characteristic of autism, per se, but rather a trauma-based response developed after a lifetime of neurotypicals displaying anger at us when we make a mistake.

Some autistics are definitely more sensitive than others, and I've definitely met folks who have very low-tolerance for difficult emotions no matter what. But I think a lot of us just avoid confrontation with neurotypicals because we've learned that it's not worth it.

I do think that most autistics *can* learn to look more neurotypical and participate in neurotypical social norms (and I have, and it sounds like you have), but I resent that we have to. I really with it were more normal to expect NTs to do some of that work to, to learn to read autistic social norms, so the burden wasn't on autistics all the time.