Tag Archives: AUTISTIC

Congruence in the making – how to live autistically in a socially hostile world?

It wasn’t until I was home again and took off my handmade brooch (pictured above) that I made the connection between the powerful congruence I felt at #InsideOutAutism and wearing it on both days. I’m still processing why this act of making and wearing felt significant. I’ve never been one to wear text on my body in any form, perhaps because my identity has been at times uncertain and under siege.

But my self-fashioned brooch was different. Here was an artefact, crafted over time and without conscious purpose, redolent of my journey as an autistic woman in reclaiming the language used about me, and my people. So antiquated is the text that I am unfamiliar with some of the words, and it acts as a curio, or something I could have inherited. I feel I have. It holds a familial feeling, and when I peer at its loveliness I hear the ancestral whisper – we were once like you. If an object can be joyful and witty, it has those qualities. Have you ever bounced on a trampoline? My brooch is the rebound which tosses your heart in the air. It gives me abnormous joy. It trumpets confidence. That zing-a-ling feeling that I’m A-okay.

Autism and labelling; outing myself for #NUNOproject

I recognise that in some profound and irreversible way I’ve unmasked myself, and that yet in doing so I’ve hardly faltered, feeling that it is worth it for my community and for the future I want for my children. But it’s not all about altruism and social change.

I’m an autistic person who embraces my disability as identity (not all of us do), and finds the ‘label’ liberating. The more I push through the better my life gets. I only struggle when confronted face to face with people who are patronising, angry, or want to deny my struggles. I chose to paddle away as quickly as possible. I’m too old to spend my time engaged in this kind of nonsense. I’ve spent too much of my life confused and wrong-footed.

Not thinking in pictures; autism and a possible sub-diagnosis of aphantasia.

  It’s been a curious time – one of transitions, I guess. Spring weather and lighter nights coincide with reaching beyond the 2 year anniversary of my diagnosis of autism. A decisive diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome came as a surprise, I expected equivocation and maybes’. Hidden disability is a tricky rogue, adept at fooling evenContinue reading “Not thinking in pictures; autism and a possible sub-diagnosis of aphantasia.”

Saturated – losing my mojo, & the question of embodied existence as an autistic person.

Photograph by Stu Allsopp 2018 Don’t bother reading this. Yes – probably this blog post has been written before. Possibly even by me? I’ve written so very many posts since my diagnosis that even I can’t keep up! Deja vu, reinventing the wheel, this is what comes to mind when I hit the web theseContinue reading “Saturated – losing my mojo, & the question of embodied existence as an autistic person.”

Troublesome People – a New Year’s Resolution. #autism

 It’s perhaps important to conclude with the view that faux enablers are not necessarily ‘bad people’ per se. They may have good intentions which are simply maladaptive. This is tricky, because the truly malicious may be easier to discern and disengage from. In the end it doesn’t really matter – the only thing which does matter is you. 

Out of the Ashes – a talk for TORCH at Pitt Rivers Museum. #autism

In becoming visible, we encourage others to do the same. This creates momentum and so can lead to change. But, in doing so, we can be measured in what we share, and this too is our right.

Face it! #prosopagnosia #autism.

I’ll put it out there – I’ve had a very challenging time of it recently. It’s a funny thing finding out you’re autistic late in life. I still sometimes wake up in surprise at my ‘newfound’ situation – and lately find myself astonished at some random moment in my day when my autism is revealedContinue reading “Face it! #prosopagnosia #autism.”