Once again we're in a state of emergency. But, bizarrely, states of emergency actually calm my son. Maybe it's because of the surprising synchronization between his internal world and the outside situation.

He's finally not the only one experiencing anxiety and disruption; everyone is anxious and tense and everything is disrupted, so he doesn't have to be the guard at the gate. He can simply let it go and trust us to worry for him.

Not sure where I'd even start looking for references, but I have read about this phenomenon being observed repeatedly in different conflict zones, where people who struggle in "normal properly functioning society" due to "mental health" problems tend to have significant relief of their symptoms when society re-adjusts to less abstract concerns like "get some food for the day and don't die."

Obviously autism isn't a "mental health problem" and I'm not trying to conflate the two at all, in particular its the symptom of anxiety that the mother mentions that makes me think autism aside this is probably the same thing manifesting.