Can we put "how much time do you spend worrying if you are being misunderstood?" on the list of autism diagnostic questions?
Being misunderstood is my greatest fear in life, & I'm pretty sure autistic trauma is why.
"How often do you feel like you need to clarify things you say with very specific language?"
Here's a good one: "Do people often claim that you said something which you *definitely* did not say & get mad at you, even though you chose your language very specifically to try to make your meaning *abundantly* clear?"
"Do conversations with a single individual sometimes feel like a game of 'telephone' because the other person keeps incorrectly paraphrasing things you say?"
I have no idea how many hours of my life I have spent explaining to people that I didn't say the thing that they are saying that I did, but it's fucking stressful as hell.
Among other things, people seem to think all words with an overlapping semantic range are interchangeable, so you'll choose to use one that is specific to what you mean & then they substitute a different word with significantly different connotations & don't even seem to notice.
Having a very uncanny valley moment reading this thread.
My answer to the first proposed diagnostic question in OP would be "Never, or near enough that can't recall ever having done." But then, my neurospice seems stubbornly determined not to align with common testimony as to the autistic experience, so that's not surprising.
Now, the second proposed question, the answer is "Often", but not for reasons of fear. Rather, for reasons of loneliness. Desperately trying to invite folk into a world they seem unable to perceive, let alone visit, this being the only world myself am able to inhabit. Perpetually just out of phase with those around me.
1/2
This is unpacked by your third proposed question. Specifically, my experience is not that folk misunderstand and get mad. It's that folk insist that myself am agreeing with them, and no amount of clarification will overcome their insistence that we're "saying the same thing".
My response to all this, increasingly, has been neologism. The problem not being significantly different connotations, but mutually exclusive denotations. The things myself am trying to communicate being things that typically folk do not have words for, instead resorting to floating and empty signifiers, meant to denote entirely different things, so as to rest comfortably in consensus through shibboleth.
A whole life thinking about language and how it is used to the point of inventing new language. Not being understood almost coming as a relief, because at least upon the admission that they don't understand, they're hearing that we're not saying the same thing.
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Artemis
sport of sacred spherical cows