If you have been following my blog for a little while then you’ll know that I constantly question the academy and my small role within it. I often think about why I am in academia, what I want to achieve and who I want to do that for.

I wonder what the expectations of the university are then realise that I don’t care all too much. I’m not going to centre their wants and needs, I’m going to continue to lean into individual impact, self-growth and giving trans+ Autistic people a safe(r) space to share what they need to. Some people might call this radical, I just call it humanity.

Who I do research for is an easy question to answer – trans+ Autistic people – but what outcomes I want to achieve is much more complicated. I will always honour the time, knowledge and stories shared with me from co-researchers and participants. What they want is important to me, the stories and spaces we share together are sacred. Yet these wants, needs and desires must go through the mill of academia. How much so, is yet to be made clear. I’ll fight against that as much as my queer disabled bodymind can.

The outcomes of the academy do not run parallel with my outcomes (and many other trans+ and disabled students, I’m sure). What we centre and what we appreciate and acknowledge is often in defiance of normativity and normativity reigns supreme in academia. My central outcome is to survive and enjoy my PhD. My other outcomes include finding community, redistributing funds, creating a chosen academic family, reading, publishing, and adding something to the field of trans+ Autistic research. I might even be able to do something within policy or practice but I’ve got to be realistic.

I have four years to do my PhD (minus 8 months at this point). I have some projects still to complete outside of work, an internship and two extra modules. Then there is the little thing of raising a child and living a life. Not to mention navigating confusing bureaucracy, hierarchies that mean less than nothing to me, and experiencing transphobia and ableism. It is hard to distribute my time and energy amongst these.

I have to conserve my energy and my emotions. I won’t paint myself into the corner that capitalism and formal education have created for me, instead I will come into my understanding of outcomes and impact with curiosity. I will ask so many more questions than I answer. Questions like how can I encapsulate as many elements of personal and community growth? How do I stay true to myself? How do I center marginalised people whilst working within the confines of oppressive systems? How do I thrive in post-graduate research?