I have a headcanon that I’ve been using for a while when writing MCU fanfiction. Because of reasons, I’ve decided to share so that maybe someone else can enjoy the same idea/concept/thing that I’ve been playing with.
Tony Stark is an undiagnosed Autistic.
That’s it. That’s my headcanon.
Undiagnosed: Because of the combination of Howard Stark’s pride and how quickly Tony progressed through his education, most of his diagnostic traits were either missed entirely or attributed to his prodigious intellect. Since money buys accommodation like it’s going out of business, there was no reason to push for a formal diagnosis if anyone even suspected the condition (which was considerably underdiagnosed & underdiscussed in the years where Tony would have been a kid).
Another issue would likely have been Howard Stark himself and the hubris of perfection. If someone (other than him) had suggested that his son had a mental condition of any sort, they would have been met with angry denial if not anything more violent/drastic.
At the same time, a lot of the internalized ableistic behaviors/traits that Tony demonstrates is likely from Howard hammering home his belief of what Stark men are supposed to be. Not a few of those “lessons” from Howard have their basis in someone commenting on Tony having a visibly neurodivergent trait.
Verbose: Through the constant use of practiced & prepared scripts, Tony is capable of maintaining the ability to verbalize while under stress for a period. When his own words run away, he has a ready supply of old scripts from watching Howard interact with necessary associates to fall back onto.
He got into the habit of speaking over people because they kept messing up the script. The talking over allows him to maintain control over the conversation/interaction.
Socialization has also seen him developing the habit of trying to push through when the stress begins reaching the point of driving him nonverbal.
He also reuses scripts developed from previous interactions with people similar to who he’s with currently, even if they really don’t fit the current group/interaction. This leads to him coming across as rude or inappropriate or otherwise having not paid attention to the mood of the room.
Socialization has also see him developing the habit of deliberately avoiding info dumps, either by declaring from the start that whatever is boring and the listener wouldn’t understand anyway or cutting himself of when he realizes that he’s doing it with a similar comment.
Hypersensitivity: Sight (prone to noticing details of things quickly even in low light conditions; wears sunglasses to offset potential overstimulation); Touch (specifically on his palms and fingers; practices avoidance tactics, including inventing/refining holographic tech)
Hyposensitivity: Hearing (must have noise; loud is best/constant a must); Taste (bitter is favorite for stimulating; tart/sour is a secondary); Nociception (tends to not notice injuries; might be socialized behavior rather than naturally occurring); Interoception (tends to not notice when hungry/thirsty/tired)
Special Interests: SCIENCE (especially engineering & coding); numbers; Classic Cars; Rhodey; charity
Stim Favorites: Music; Tapping things (especially in patterns); Chewing/grinding his teeth (constantly snacking or using his teeth to hold stuff); Dancing (especially moves that focus on arms)
Hyperempathic: He’s hyperaware of the emotional displays of those around him, even though he may attribute the displays incorrectly for various reasons. He makes assumptions of the reasons behind things based upon prior experience unless explicitly told a different reason.
Part of his responses are mixed up with a less than pleasant childhood & like many survivors of childhood abuse, defaults to the assumption that whatever it is must be his fault, even when logic would dictate otherwise. (Takes very little prompting to encourage this thought process to continue.)
He also misremembers what caused an emotional reaction, making wrong connections between bits of personal data, because of how they presented originally. (Ex. remember that there was something important about Pepper & strawberries, something vital, but not necessarily what.)
Facial agnosia: He’s really not good with faces, though he’s great with names and subjects discussed (if he’s sober). This is not helped by the habit of minimizing looking at anyone’s face in order to minimize the chance of making eye contact.
The best part, in my mind, of this headcanon is that it takes minimal deviation from the behaviors displayed in canon to adopt.
