Why is that guy standing first in line to get on the plane? ASD experiences at the airport

Today, I'm gonna be talking about how people with ASD might behave when going to take an airplane, how they are at the airport, and also on the plane. To give a bit of perspective of what you might have seen, and understand better people with neurodiversity in an environment of transport as it is airplane, which is quite different from the rest you can find. I wanted to highlight, because I took a plane very recently, and I'm about to take another plane in the coming week.

When I think about how I behave as someone with ASD, and how different is from majority of people, I thought it would be good just to share the perspective. As I said before, with neurodiversity, it also comes different ways of behaving. And airports, by the nature of confined space and the rigours of security and everything else, really highlights the way we behave differently.

So I'm going to start first of all by something crucial for me, which is about arriving on time. I don't know how much this is from ASD. Definitely my case is very important, which is about always arriving with plenty of time. As an ASD, we like structure, we like order, we like things to just follow a very defined and clear path. And arriving with plenty of time allows to have that serenity and being calm knowing that with the different steps ahead, call it finding a parking if you're driving or getting off the train to go to the airport, security, passport control, if that's applicable, etc. going to finding the gate, you have enough time to do it.

Now, there's nothing more stressful for myself, is that if I arrive with very little time, I just really don't get the best of myself. Now, I found that some people work differently, some people that don't have ASD for them arriving too early, it's like an overkill. Like, why do you go so early? Specially if it's a domestic flight, or if it's a short haul flight, like let's say two, three hours flight, you don't need to be two hours early. Although I do, and it becomes my policy that if it's a long haul, arrive three hours before departure, and if it's short haul, I arrive two hours before departure. To this, I have to add that this is not including check-in luggage. So, regardless if I can go straight to the gate, so I'm not checking in anything, I'm just going with the luggage that I can take on the plane. I still respect the two hours. And it's a quite different approach, as ASD seeks to have that structure, that organization, that control of what's going to happen and the different steps.

Arriving so early really facilitates and really helps in that respect. Now, that's me, and it works very well for myself. When I take all the people along that they are not ASD, that creates a bit of disruption, let's say. They cannot understand why you need to arrive so early. Although going to the point about ASD being an ability, one thing is for sure, if you go with an ASD person that respects that kind of timing and control, it's going to be almost impossible that you miss a flight. That's really one of the advantages.

Of course, you spend more time at the airport. There's some other ways to just entertain ourselves while we're waiting, definitely in my case. And that's just arriving.

When it comes to security and passing through security, that also can tell who is an ASD or not. So as an ASD always looks for efficiency, how to be efficient. And the security control is something that everybody needs to go through, seems to be taking a lot of time.

And especially if you have a long queue, you think, okay, how quick can I go through this?

With ASDs, part of it is the enjoyment of how efficient I can be myself when I go through that, to the point that just even before arriving to the place where you get either put it on the conveyor belt or you put it on a tray or whatever system you have, I have already categorized everything. I make sure I don't have a belt, belt is somewhere, my watch, my phone, wallet, everything is just in the right zip pocket or in the jacket with zips.

Something that I know can be controlled cannot be just lost. And going there, when it comes to my turn, I am as quick as I can be.

Now, that's very different from what I can see with other people that might have approached things in a different way, they might have a different way of thinking about how to structure the way forward. They might be more spontaneous, they might have enjoyed more of the moment, and okay, now I'm here, I'm just getting, oh, I forgot about this, I forgot about that. And that's fine for me. One advantage of coming to terms with having ASD is that I became more mindful of how other people think. And being respectful of how they operate, I cannot expect everybody to be thinking the way that my brain works. That would be an impossible task. So I calm myself, and I arm myself of patience, and I go through security the best I can.

Now, next time you are at the airport and you go through security, if you see someone who is very organized and very efficient and like going through like no problem, chances are my path ASD or might be someone who is very organized and that's all. Simply, it's something to observe. Now, the point where I think the ASD comes to more obvious on the plane is once on the actual airplane, so once finding a seat. I myself very peculiar in terms of what part of the plane I enjoy the most. I like being on the right side of the plane. Now, right or left, it doesn't matter. Obviously, you would say, just in my case, is when I like. And really, for me, finding the seat and getting my station ready at the seat is so important. It just gives me such a serenity of thought. I have my seat, I have my entertainment, I have my water. Just really making it my own space. And that's something very important for people with ASD.

We don't like uncertainty, not that everybody likes it, of course. Just simply, we want to have a degree of control of what's around us, and find order and find way to categorize things. So, what do we have in our pockets? What do we have in our back and in the seat in front of us? What do we have at Accessible? I found it very stressful whenever I'm put into an emergency aisle that cannot have anything with me. And then, if I need something, I need to ask other people to just pass through and go to get it from the whole aisle on top. It's like all my station, all my way where I'm going to be working is gone. My control, my way to have a pleasant flight is just disrupted, which is not what I want to be.

Again, there's a lot of different variances with people with ASD, and each of us might have a different way to approach things. Just take it as might be one way. And the final element for people with ASD and flying is a blessing, I guess. It's an ability, it's the way to disconnect from the plane itself. So I heard a lot of people saying, I cannot sleep on planes, and I just find it stressful, or whatever they feel. With ASD, we are able to separate a bit the emotions from the reality. And when it comes to flying, as long as we have our own setup station, as I mentioned, as long as I say, okay, let's have this, I know what food I'm going to be serving, I know what drinks I'm going to get, if they pass with drinks, I know what time I'm arriving, I know it's a schedule. As long as the pattern is well defined, the rest is, yeah, why not have a sleep? Have a sleep, and we find it easy to sleep, because as long as what I mentioned is in place, everything goes through.

This is something that I wanted to bring to the conversation, because apart from talking about living with ASD, about talking to people that have ASD, or just explaining how to live around them and my own experience, I also wanted to bring some examples of how myself with ASD approach day-to-day ways of being and experiences that, if you think about it, makes us look at things in a different way. And if you are at the airport or about to take a plane next time, if you're curious about how people behave, you will see different ways of behaving. And that has nothing to do with cultural or upbringing, it's just really about how their brain works, where they find solace, where they find the organization to go through.

That's what I had for this article today, which is really about first celebrating that having ASD is ability to face tasks that can be, if you want, boring, like getting a plane, going through security, arriving at the airport on time, things that need to happen. How ASD minds manage to enjoy that structure and the importance of the structure. And once you have that, if you have a friend or relative with ASD, and you're planning to go and take a plane and go to the airport, just be mindful and just understand that it's not about the possibility of being late, because a lot of times it's not going to be late. Just really lacking that reassurance of, okay, I know if I go, if I arrive to the airport two hours before departure, for certain, I'm going to be on the plane.

That's security, that certainty is essential for someone with ASD. Even if you could arrive like one hour before, and I have seen people arriving to the check-in, for checking in, and say, okay, well, last minute, or once they are on the terminal, they have passed security, and they say, okay, last call, and sometimes the planes wait another, I don't know, five, ten minutes, depending on the flight, for that person that came a bit late, and they get in, and at personal level, I only lost one flight in my life, as I remember, and that was a connection, and the connection was only two hours between planes, and the first one, the first leg was delayed, and then, you know, the second one didn't go, which is something that I have not repeated again, simply because the first leg was a very short haul, and the second one was long, so since then, I'm always looking at enough time to connect between one or another, And I will also make sure that from beginning till the end, it's the same company airline. That's the case to have an alternative flight or whatever. Which was not the case when I got stranded in different airplane companies. Anyway, that's a story for another day, as there was a really good outcome out of that unfortunate event.

But that's for another article.

For now, I'll leave you with the thoughts of next time you go to the airport, if you want, just have a look at how people behave. And just really think how much neurodiversity you can see. And can you spot someone with ASD? And, you know, maybe another way to just get that time before boarding or waiting for the gate to think, hmm, that's another way of seeing. So until next article, guys, have a fantastic time.