Patterns and My Neurodivergency

My Experiences with Patterns

Pattern recognition is a normal thing in humans. It's what allowed us as a species to survive and evolve. In the modern day, it can be quite interesting.

I have always enjoyed a puzzle. I found platform games like New Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo DS to be like a puzzle of pattern recognition with the bosses. Even then, I never finished the game (but that's beside the point). It was enjoyable to figure things out on my own. It gave me a sense of worth and accomplishment.

This later evolved into remembering seemingly random strings of characters or words. For whatever reason, I can remember the autogenerated string of my home network, character by character, regardless of the case. The same goes for my DID where I can spot it in a list of repositories.

It also extends to media, where I can recognise most modern-day country flags, albeit ones like Chad and Romania could slip me up. The Côte d'Ivoire and Ireland, while essentially the reverse of one another, are good to spot. I once challenged a friend to find a random flag, only for me to guess Azerbaijan within a second.

Downside

Enough with the gloating. I'm going to highlight one downside in particular:

The ever encroaching hand of death.

Since I have thanatophobia , I have a tendency to overanalyse and notice a lot of things. I also have acute pyrophobia , so things like a lighter in an enclosed space can freak me out but an open, controlled bonfire is fine.

My overarching anxiety means my mind is pretty constantly going a million kilometres an hour trying to keep me safe. It's also a literal pain because I am constantly tense.

Recent Notable Patterns

I have a special interest in lycanthropy , which oddly is not a trigger of my fear of death, and as such, I've watched and read a lot of media engaging in the idea. The most recent hyperfixation that relates to it is the Wereworld series by Curtis Jobling , which is essentially a therianthropic Game of Thrones series aimed at younger teens.

It was recently adapted for Netflix and I was quick to notice that the therianthropes of the series had human appearances that reflected their theriotype. King Leopold has shoulder-length blond hair and Queen Amelie has white hair (despite her age), with them respectively being a Lion and White Wolf. Admittedly I had already guessed Leopold would be the Lion as "leo" is the Latin term for a lion. Another one of my hyperfixations has been linguistics and language as a whole if that wasn't obvious.

Finding Patterns in Fiction and Reality

This pattern-matching ability doesn't just stay in fiction. I've begun to notice similar traits across completely unrelated media. The trope of the silver-haired character being somehow "special" or "otherworldly" pops up constantly—from anime protagonists to fantasy novels. It's as if creators collectively decided that white/silver hair equals mystical powers without explicitly coordinating.

Speaking of coordination, I've noticed that my pattern recognition skills fluctuate with my mental state. When my anxiety is particularly bad (thanks again, thanatophobia), I start seeing patterns that aren't necessarily there. Like noticing when the clock hits 9:11 three days in a row and convincing myself it's an omen rather than statistical probability.

It's fascinating how the number three itself keeps appearing everywhere once you start looking. Three primary colours, three states of matter, three dimensions of space, three acts in storytelling, three wishes in fairy tales. The rule of three is embedded in nature itself—from the three-fold symmetry of a trefoil to the Fibonacci sequence (where each number is the sum of the two before it) that appears in pine cones, flower petals, and spiral galaxies. Sometimes I wonder if my brain's obsession with patterns is just mirroring what the universe is already doing on a larger scale.

Using Pattern Recognition Constructively

I've tried to channel this pattern-matching tendency into something productive. For instance, I've become scarily good at identifying conlangs from just a few sentences. Show me three lines of text, and I can usually tell if it's Klingon, Dothraki, Na'vi, or any other major constructed language from media.

This skill also extends to programming languages. I can glance at code and immediately recognise if it's Python, JavaScript, or C++ based on the syntax patterns alone. It's like how some people can identify a car make and model from just seeing the headlights—except considerably less useful at parties.

The Social Pattern Problem

One area where my pattern recognition fails spectacularly is in social cues. Despite being able to memorise complex character strings or identify obscure flags, I still struggle with understanding when someone is being sarcastic or when they're hinting they want to end a conversation. It's as if my brain has dedicated all its pattern-matching resources to special interests, leaving none for basic human interaction.

Ironically, I've noticed a pattern in how I miss patterns. If it's related to one of my special interests, I can spot the subtlest connections. If it's outside those areas, I might as well be blindfolded.

Conclusion: The Double-Edged Sword

Pattern recognition is simultaneously my superpower and my kryptonite. It drives my special interests to obsessive depths, helps me excel in niche areas, but also fuels my anxiety when I start recognising patterns that suggest danger where there is none.

I wonder if other people experience this duality—finding both comfort and distress in the same cognitive function. Perhaps that's the most interesting pattern of all: how our greatest strengths often contain the seeds of our greatest challenges.

For now, I'll continue cataloguing werewolf tropes across media and probably adding to my collection of memorised strings of characters. After all, pattern recognition is what makes us human—even when it occasionally makes us a bit too human for comfort.