Those diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders as adults (e.g., Liane Holliday Willey, Tim Page) perhaps delve into this defense phenomenon because they have learned to compensate—or, they have been authored unto compensation. Being that Asperger’s didn’t officially reach labelhood in the U.S. until 1994, a backlog of adults and adolescents have sought, and attained, the Asperger label—and, if one receives this label over the age of ten, the reality of the label, even though it is normatively induced, is often questioned. Those with high-functioning autism have frequently led lives of misdiagnosis, self-diagnosis, and non-diagnosis, and composition studies, as with other disciplines, is performing theoretical catch-up.

There is no “objective” blood or urine test for autism; rather, we autists are noted for engaging in several deviant behaviors, and thus we’ve been catalogued into neurodivergency—and yet, even though normates refuse our scarlet A’s, they don’t doubt our weirdness. In my experience, they often doubt the incurability of our weirdness, and if we’re adults just now seeking the A-label, then we’re really just looking for behavioral excuses, not explanations, not aid in adapting to normative discourses. We’re the welfare moms of the disability food chain. Or, so I assume.