There’s much more to it than thinking we’re weird. — Ever felt talked down to by a neurotypical? Or that an NT is annoyed by you? Me too. It used to make me feel small, but now I realise that their reaction shows more about them than it does about me. Firstly, I know, I know, not all neurotypicals. I’ve…

This sounds like perfect imagery for the type of situation that seems so inconsequential from the outside, yet makes me feel so inexplicably torn and frustrated that I can get to meltdown or shutdown stage quicker than by any other means.

And it proves that privilege and taboo are alive and kicking — The subject of our absurd tale is a British Clinical Psychologist called Tony Attwood. If you haven’t heard of Tony, he has long been held in high esteem in the field of Autism and is hailed as having written ‘the Bible’ on Asperger’s Syndrome (his preferred term for many years…

The road to hell is paved with good intentions — Over the past few months I’ve read some diversity-related articles on Medium that ranged from making me feel a little creeped-out to downright insulted. Gradually I began to realise that they fit into one of four categories. As a neurodivergent person (i.e. I am autistic and have ADHD), I’m writing…

The day she intervened from beyond the grave — October 2004. It wasn’t long since I had started back at uni for my second year. I was a ‘mature’ student at the ripe old age of 23. In my first year, I’d lived in student halls but my parents only lived 25 minutes away. Since I’d had enough of…

I think I’m having an ‘angry autistic’ identity crisis… — As I write this, I’m sitting on a car park at a local nature spot. It’s a beautiful Spring day and vast reed beds stretch out in front of me. Above the tree line in the intensely blue sky, a family of five buzzards wheel and call. They punctuate their…

Yes, we are good for some things. — Last year I wrote an article called ‘9 Reasons Why Neurotypicals Don’t Like Autistic People.’ Although many people related to it, one commenter accused me of a ‘blatant us vs. them tone,’ which she found ‘sad.’ Although I pointed out that the ‘us vs. them’ was very definitely not started…

Was it wise to ignore doctor’s orders? — In October last year, I had my cholesterol levels tested and the results were a shock. The NHS website says that a healthy level for total cholesterol is 5 mmol/L or below. Mine was 7.1. In terms of ‘bad’ cholesterol, non-HDL (which included LDL) should be below 4 mmol/L. …

I work hard and it’s exhausting being here. — A couple of years ago, I was lured to a meeting with a fraud investigator without any warning of what I had been summoned for. …