Having to remind myself to stop doing the complex and interesting thing to have lunch.
Don't you hate having to get out of hyperfocus to do mundane things such as eating?!

Having some time off I realise just how much sleep I really need. It turns out it's about 10-12 hours a day.

#Autism #autistic #neurodiverse @actuallyautistic #AutisticBurnout #ActuallyAutistic

@actuallyautistic

One of the things I've always loved is spending time alone in nature. Mostly for the obvious reasons that most people enjoy it. But also, as I now realise, because I could drop the mental shields and defences I'd created, almost entirely unconsciously, and really allow my senses to expand and sink into the world around me, without all the usual noisy horror of humanity causing me its pain. There was also a sense of peace in the wilds, that nothing was being demanded of me.

Grow up knowing you are different, even if you don't really know why, and you quickly learn the dangers of showing it, of letting others see the truth. It's why many of us learn to mask from an early age. The world around us quickly lets us know, in many subtle and, quite frankly, fucking unsubtle, ways, that we aren't right and that it's us who have to change. Being in nature was the only place I could feel free of that. Alone in it, nothing was being demanded of me by the world around me, just as I demanded nothing of it. We could just be, existing in the world that we made together. It was the only time I ever felt truly at peace and relaxed, without the nagging thoughts and whispering fears of caution and of not being seen.

I realised today that this was because I separated, in my mind, the human world, from the world of nature. In one, I had a sense of belonging, of just being a part of something, just like everything else. In the other, I was always the outsider, who could never really belong because he was too different, too other and that all I could really do was hide that, mostly for justified fear of being seen. It was, and still remains, the cause of so much of the anxiety and stress I feel just being out in the world. This sense that I'm always in hostile terrain and the fear of showing it.

Which, whilst still so true in many ways, I realised isn't really needed any more. I'm an adult now, OK a gnarly old git, who's often far more trouble than he's worth, and I have my own truths to live by and don't need theirs and that it was never their world anyway, they just happen to populate mine.

#Autism
#ActuallyAutistic
#Neurodivergent

Many christians run to grace churches in the hopes that they will be shown "grace" and "mercy" little do they know that such churches are lead by narcissist pastors, ready to trap them and destroy them.

Learn why you should not attend a grace church:

https://open.substack.com/pub/seththebrave/p/why-you-should-not-attend-a-grace?r=5bhbya&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

#autistic
#autism #actuallyautistic
#Neurodivergent #AutismAwareness #AutismAwarenessMonth #adhd
#lgbt #trans #transgender 
#Christianity #Christian #church #bible #god

Tomorrow morning, approx 8:45 I will be on TV on Ireland AM talking about being autistic, autism in Ireland, and the book I edited Wired Our Own Way; An Anthology of Autistic Irish Voices, published by New Island Books.
Channel Virgin Media 1.
Hope I do us Autists proud
@actuallyautistic
#Autistic
#Autism

Autism implies the existence of homotism, heterotism, bitism, pantism, polytism, and demitism.

#Autism

For #autism acceptance month, I hope to accept that I'm autistic, and almost everybody else thinks the same way, a way that I do not think.

Elopement in autistic children is a worry among parents. Wandering off can sometimes be innocent and led by a child's interests, but it can also be dangerous, especially in wild areas and areas with water. Here are some strategies to help prevent elopement.

#Autism #Parenting

https://buff.ly/2NUjgJK

Zum Autism Acceptance Month gibt es einen kleinen Ausschnitt aus meinem Comic „Lisa und Lio“: Hier erklärt Lisa gerade, wie sie maskiert.


Worum es im Comic geht: Lisa kommt an eine neue Schule und das ist besonders aufregend für sie, denn sie ist Autistin. Auf dem Schulweg trifft sie auf den Fuchs Lio, der aus dem Weltall kommt und gut verstehen kann, wie es ist, anders zu sein.
 Der Comic wurde 2022 mit dem Max-und-Moritz-Publikumspreis ausgezeichnet .
#Comic #Autism #AutismAcceptanceMonth

Pete Wharmby really made me laugh today with this.
#Autism
#Autistic
@actuallyautistic

Two things prevent you from understanding a person with double exceptionality (gifted + autism)...

1- One is that you can't believe how easy some things are for them, just those that are very difficult or almost impossible for you.

2- The other is that you can't believe how difficult some things are for them, just things that seem easy and normal to you.

They don't look gidted because they are autistic and they don't look autistic because they are gifted...
#2e #gifted #autistic #twiceexceptional #actuallyautistic #autism

Thank Goodness for Neurological Differences

You ever just stop and appreciate how incredible and important it is that so many vastly different neurotypes exist? Like, there are people out there with special interests in, what to some people would be, the most off-the-wall, dull topics who are out there just improving everyone's lives simply by caring about something that few others do. There are folk who struggle to eat breakfast consistently and never learned their times tables, but expose them to something they're interested in and they become so incredibly fixated on it that they'll go without sleep to study it, work on it, and/or improve it until they're at the bleeding edge of the field because their ability to focus on something is either near-absent or a force of nature.

Meanwhile, conspiracy-brained neurotypicals who do nothing well but sophistry and emulating social cues are on stages and behind podiums talking about putting these intellectual weapons into camps, employers are losing what could be their top performers because they find the amount of eye-contact someone uses unsettling, or because someone shows up to work five minutes late a few times a week, for-profit education systems with steep fees and unnecessary course requirements keep people out of professions where they'd be star assets, and capitalism keeps people who could be improving lives struggling for survival.

What lives would we be living if we just gave people the space and resources to do what they care about?

Every autistic person needs support and help. We should not be ashamed to ask for help and asking for help should not be used against us.
#autistic
#autism #actuallyautistic
#Neurodivergent

So, anyone got some AuDHD-compatible time management tips?

So it's #autismawarenessmonth apparently. I got my official diagnosis last year at the age of 39. I wouldn't call myself a part of the #autism community (yet), so I can't and won't speak about other autistic people (or is it autists? I'm still learning!).

I always knew I was "different"; school and my parents noticed it in third grade. I was diagnosed as highly gifted with a personality disorder (thank God for the German healthcare and school system!). Two therapies during my childhood 1/5

Things I'd like you to be aware of on #Autism Awareness Day

Autism Can mean we:
-take people/ things literally
-don't understand you because you aren't saying what you mean (see above)
-feel all the feelings, but don't know how to show them
-are overwhelmed by too much colour/ objects/ loud noises

Please note: I say 'can mean' because if you've met one autistic person; you've met one autistic person. Our presentations & experiences vary

More details of my experience

https://elisecarlson.com/2024/09/14/oh-im-also-actually-autistic/

It's World #Autism Awareness day, so I'm asking you to share some facts:

- Autism isn't rare, it's pretty normal. It's estimated that >1% of the population is affected. You probably know at least one autistic person. (Hi there!)

- Autism isn't more common now than in the past, we just have better diagnostic criteria today. (Your eccentric uncle may have never been diagnosed with it, but maybe he wasn't just eccentric. And that's okay.)

- A society that's more inclusive to the neurodivergent also causes less suffering for the neurotypicals. So be kind to your neighbours, whatever their plight may be, it will make a better world for all of us.

- The popculture trope that autistic people have zero empathy is just wrong. We're bad at interpersonal stuff, yes. But please read up on the "double empathy problem", it's a thing.

- Empathy is not a weakness. Elon Musk is just self-diagnosed. While he checks many of the boxes and may plausibly be on the spectrum, he's abusing the label of autism as a shield against criticism for being an asshole. Surprisingly, being autistic doesn't necessarily make you an asshole.

- RFK jr. and Andrew Wakefield are grifters who got kids killed and are willing to see more killed over their conspiracy theories about vaccines. Fuck them for all eternity.

- If you need a good present for a kid who just got diagnosed with autism or for their relatives to explain what's going on, get the graphic novel "Schattenspringer" or its English translation "The world beyond my shadow" by @Fuchskind - she's an autistic comic artist based in Berlin and her autobiography explains things really well. (Buy books by actual artists!)

Be kind to yourself and those around you. Thanks.