Maturity, Part I
Hyperfocus and Disappointment
Originally published on Blogger on July 6, 2013. Revised on April 13, 2026, as if still in 2013, when I lived in Maine.
Today I met up with an old friend from summer camp whom I hadn’t seen since 1997. She came with her wife and three kids, and together we had a picnic in the park and then went to a local recreation center to go swimming. The larger pool at the center boasts two water slides— one of which is a speed slide— and so these kids were really excited. We were there for only about twenty minutes when someone’s toddler pooped in the baby pool. I guess all of the pools there are on the same filtration system, because the entire facility was shut down for the rest of the day. My friend’s five-year-old daughter said, “Aww! This is so unfair!” But with a promise of ice cream and a game of mini-golf, her attention was rapidly diverted and the crisis mercifully averted.
Had this happened when I was five— or even ten— I would have thrown a fit, maybe even cried; that is, I would have had a classic autistic meltdown. Back then, people routinely dismissed such behavior from a ten-year-old as “immature,” and a “temper tantrum,” but it’s actually more complicated than that. This reaction doesn’t account for the level of hyperfocus typical of autistic people. My friend’s kids were probably very excited to go to the pool and go on the speed slide when their two moms announced the trip the day before, but then they probably forgot about it until it was time to go. In other words, it was not at the forefront of their mind all the time. Had I been promised a trip to a pool with a couple water slides at age ten, I would have thought about it all week, non-stop. To put so much energy into thinking about something so intensely only to be disappointed is not something that is easy for autistic kids to let roll off their backs.
It can be even harder if the disappointment involves a focused interest*. When I was thirteen, the film adaptation of The Rocketeer was one of my focused interests, and I wanted to find copies of the original comics. There was no eBay back then, so I had to rely on the manager of a comic book store to see if he could track down The Rocketeer for me. On a Thursday afternoon, while I was at day camp, the manager called me and said that he had found a copy. I couldn’t wait until the end of the day at camp on Friday so my mom could drive me to the comic book store; it was on my mind at every waking moment. After nearly twenty-four hours of intense anticipation, the manager of the store presented the comic book that he had found— an adaptation of The Rocketeer movie, which I already had. I had the wherewithal not to make a scene, and just told the manager that it was the wrong comic, thanked him for trying, and left. Back in the car with my mom, I didn’t yell and scream and have a meltdown, but I was trying unsuccessfully to contain myself. Despite my best efforts, the tightness in my chest and the racing of my heart were both too overwhelming. I spoke angrily about how I got so excited for nothing, and then audibly wondered what was wrong with me that I was upset about this at all. I recall my mom saying in frustration, “So I guess you’re going to be miserable for the rest of the day.” Now that Mom had essentially voiced what I was hearing internally, I felt even more embarrassed about my reaction.
This situation is not an illustration of immaturity on my part but rather the results of a neurological makeup that caused me to be intensely excited about and hyperfocused on something. Having it taken away is devastating. Parents and friends of autistics, how many of you had to cancel a vacation, for example, because of some bizarre circumstances that were beyond your control? I doubt it rolled off your back. You probably didn’t throw a fit, but I bet some of you cried. Just because a botched trip to a pool or the failed acquisition of a comic book may not seem as significant as a cancelled vacation to Hawaii doesn’t mean the intense disappointment is any less real.
Stayed tuned for “Maturity, Part II” coming later this week!
*I hate the term “special interest,” as I think it sounds condescending, so I use “focused interest.” But that’s another discussion for another day.