BY: AASTHA
The Shape Of A Girl
Growing up in the late ‘90s, we believed autism was supposed to look a certain way: no eye contact, loud outbursts, public meltdowns. Textbooks described non-verbal little white boys and my brother fit most of the script. And so he was diagnosed at 1.
I wasn’t until 31.
I fit none of the script. I was the opposite. Quiet. Polite. High-achieving. I didn’t flap or scream — I watched intently. Listened hard. I was praised for being “mature,” for never crying, for explaining others’ feelings better than my own.
I became the translator, not the one in need of translation.
I didn’t grow up thinking I was autistic. I grew up thinking I was difficult. That I asked too much, felt too much, needed too much. So I shrank. Twirled my hair into knots. Picked my fingers raw. Spoke only when I knew I’d be right.
My brother’s autism was seen. Mine was absorbed. His came with therapies. Mine came with silence.
I didn’t grow up thinking I was autistic. I grew up thinking I was difficult.
I mistook that silence for strength. And the world applauded. I wasn’t loud in reaction, but loud in essence — the wrong kind of loud.
My mother often asked, “Why can’t you just be normal?” She meant: marry, obey, don’t talk back. Don’t ask questions.
I’ve always paid attention to words. What they reveal and what they betray. “Say what you mean. Mean what you say,” I’d insisted, long before I knew why.
There was shame in saying, “He is autistic.”
I refused it. I said it when it needed to be said. My mother would quickly add, “Not that autistic. Just slightly.” My father, when around, denied it outright — no autism could exist in a family bearing his blood.
The help my brother received was always laced with discomfort, apology. I often wondered how different care might feel if it began with dignity: “He is autistic. So here’s what we do.”
Shame doesn’t just punish excess — it redraws the lines so vaguely that even a need, a pause, a tear feels like too much. A body that sits wrong. A laugh too loud. A hunger to be more. It punishes softness most — joy, stillness, desire.
So we fold, gracefully. Just enough to survive. Never enough to be free. Shame keeps us blurry — shrinking, correcting, apologizing — just in case the flaw was ours, not the world’s design.
The Color Of Life Is Purple
My brother has always known who he is. Diagnosed as a toddler, he was allowed, at least partly, to be himself.
But this was the early 2000s. Autism came with “corrective” therapies, interventions meant to fix, train, normalize. Painful to watch. More painful, I imagine, to endure.
He was the softest bundle of flesh — round eyes, the most delightful gurgle. And a habit that nearly broke us: holding his breath until he turned purple.
It happened weekly. Triggered by a color, a texture, a sound, a stranger — we never knew. There’d be a scream, then silence. His tiny face darkening, deepening to violet.
Mum would panic. I would move. Calm, quick, precise. I’d grab water, splash it on his face — once, twice, again. My heart steady, my hands faster than thought.
I knew the sequence. I watched for the silence. I waited for the scream.
Only then would I breathe, chest burning. The bottle still in my hand. Just in case.
He’d whimper. Mum would cry. I’d hold him close, listening to the rise and fall of his breath. We were breathing. We would sleep.
For now.
That was the rhythm of my childhood: holding it together while he held his breath. He got therapies, interventions, diagnoses. I got silence. Praise. “So mature.” “So helpful.”
Nobody saw what it cost to watch so closely, to anticipate everything, to disappear just enough.
I don’t turn purple. I’ve always had what they call a resting bitch face. Smiling feels like work. “Arrogant,” they’d say. “Who do you think you are?”
The problem was: I knew who I was, while they did not.
The Day Of The Ball
It was summer break. Weeks at home. Mornings slow, afternoons long. Our days stitched with little rituals, big hopes. One of them: catching a tennis ball.
My brother’s fingers were soft and deliberate, missed more than they caught. But every try was magic. You watched the ball? Yay! Tossed it straight up? Yay! It touched your finger? Yay! That was the rule: always, always yay.
That morning felt different. I don’t know how — I just knew. Today he’d catch it.
I loaded the Kodak. Film was expensive. I didn’t care. Climbed onto the bed. Faced the mirror. He stood between us, eyes bright, waiting.
The ball went up –
once,
twice,
three,
four times.
Almost.
Not yet.
Still — Yay! Click. Yay! Click.
Fifth toss.
He caught it.
The ball sat in his palm, his fingers wrapped around it like he was born knowing how. I didn’t scream. Just the loudest yay I could manage, a hug that squeezed the breath out of both of us. Giggling. Gasping. Glowing.
Years later, he taught me how to spin it — something clever with the wrist. I still can’t get it right. But that day? That was the one.
I caught it on film.
I caught him.
I was never taught to yay myself. I was taught instead to excel quietly. To overachieve, then vanish. To know that when it came to me, excellence was the bare minimum — and the bare minimum does not get applause.
But I’m (un)learning.
Sheepishly. Quietly. Awkwardly.
Yay me — for not pretending. For not smiling when it hurt. For not asking permission to exist.
Yay me — for my depth and intensity. For not making it smaller. For learning that it’s not too much.
Yay me — for the voice I hid in my throat. For the softness I didn’t trade. For coming home to myself.
I was never taught to yay myself. I was taught instead to excel quietly.
The Skin Of It
I pick at the skin around my fingers. The thumb especially.
My face tells another story — confident, aloof, maybe even arrogant. But that’s just the mask. It holds in rage. And fear. And the constant buzz of anxiety.
I still pick. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the skin around my nails whole. Always pink flesh, raw and open, sometimes bleeding. I’ve tried to stop. Gloves. Band-aids. Bitter polish. Nothing works. I pick, and it bleeds. It stings when I wash dishes. When I eat spicy food.
This is what my anxiety looks like. My survival. If it weren’t my skin, it would be something else. If I didn’t give myself these small injuries, I worry I’d reach for bigger ones. Toward myself, maybe others. I feel shame at how they look — ragged, ugly, like a tell. They betray me. The confidence cracks at the fingertips.
Guilt and shame. Those old siblings. Dressed up as virtues. Taught young — through rituals, silence, “what will people say.” Mistaken for humility. But they’re just cages. Tight and inherited.
Religious and cultural codes of conduct necessitate guilt and shame. I didn’t fear God. I didn’t understand obedience for its own sake. I followed the rules, but I questioned every one.
I was defiant, yes, but functional. I talked back, but I showed up. I helped my brother. I carried the weight. I wanted to be celebrated and left alone. Seen and unbothered.
Even as I rolled my eyes at shame, I still swallowed it. It lived in me.
Not invisible. Just quiet. Especially at the fingertips.
The Tough And The Tender
The thing about tragedies born of contradiction is they don’t look tragic. They look like me.
We know now that autism looks many ways: it can be quiet, loud, Black, brown, queer, genius, cruel, hard, soft, and anything it wants. It can be the sibling. It can be me.
I’m sharp. I don’t smile to soothe. I’m not soft-spoken. But I’m kind. Deeply, dangerously kind. I give even when I shouldn’t — time, care, forgiveness, love. Especially love. I’ve always believed I can make more. To excel is the bare minimum after all.
People say I’m secretly soft. But I’m not secretly anything. I’m both. The toughie and the sweetheart. You have to be when you’re protecting a little brother the world keeps trying to make small.
You learn to bare your fangs until there’s blood. Then hold what’s left until the shaking stops.
That’s not contradiction. That’s survival.
No, more than that. That’s thriving.
And I refuse to survive quietly. I want to thrive loudly. Shamelessly. Out of spite. For me. For him.
For every time the world told us to disappear.
BIO: Aastha is a writer, educator, and founder of Proseterity, a publication that explores culture, design, and difference. Through writing, curating, and teaching, she tries to make space for mess, meaning, rigor, and multiplicity.
