Autistic and Living the Dream

Category: Blog

  • I won’t be unbiased in the face of violence

    I won’t be unbiased in the face of violence

    It’s not the job of the oppressed to meet our oppressors ‘half way’. There is no half way. There is no half violence, half stigma, or half isolation. I don’t need to engage with people who are harmful to me and the people I love, and that absolutely goes for ABA practitioners. I don’t want…

  • What bisexuality means to me

    What bisexuality means to me

    As a teenager I thought in a binary fashion, and this affected how I understood sexuality and gender. My understanding of what it meant to be bisexual was that you liked both men and women, and that you needed to like them equally. The fact that I swayed to one gender over others meant that…

  • Things to think about before getting involved in autism research

    Things to think about before getting involved in autism research

    I have been a participant in a fair amount of Autistic experience research (what others may call autism research) and I’ve led and assisted on a few more besides. There’s a few things I look for when deciding whether to engage in such research. First, I look at who is running the research – are…

  • Mental health crisis: Reaching out and checking in

    Mental health crisis: Reaching out and checking in

    Content warning: mental health struggles, mention of incarceration, death and estrangement. It is consistently suggested that people who are in mental health crisis need to ‘reach out’ for support. This is problematic as the onus of support and help is put on the person who is struggling, this individual must be able to have the…

  • Abnormality: The new normal?

    Abnormality: The new normal?

    ‘Abnormal behaviour’ is socially constructed through culture- and context-embedded concepts of normativity; the extent to which behaviour is considered abnormal is often dependent on the perception and capacity of others (Emerson & Einfeld, 2011). The perceived characteristics of the individual may also define the extent to which their behaviour is considered abnormal. For example, differences…

  • Learning to regulate my emotions

    Learning to regulate my emotions

    I’m only just learning about my emotions and how to regulate them. I’m 33. I spent a long time with no role models to show me how to do this: What to do before I get angry and do or say something I regret. How to know when I need time to process. When and…

  • OCD in one word

    OCD in one word

    I’ve been trying to write some poetry around the words you all gave myself and Autistic Realms about your experiences of OCD. My rewording couldn’t do justice to the powerful words you shared with us, so I created this instead. The other work in the Autistic Dream Realms project can be found here and here.…

  • Autistic parenthood: Living with mum guilt

    Autistic parenthood: Living with mum guilt

    Content note: transphobia, death, grief, mentions of assault and murder, trauma. I’ve been struggling with a lot of things lately and it all centres around being a mum and not feeling good enough for the job. My feelings of mum guilt is massive. I feel I’m not doing enough for Little Man. I feel guilty…

  • Autistic parenthood: Who am I?

    Autistic parenthood: Who am I?

    I’ve been off the last few weeks, not really feeling myself, I’m content but also really low. Nothing has been interesting me, I just get up do whatever I’m doing and then wait for bed time, to get up and do it all again. I have lots of projects ending, projects beginning, lots of waiting…

  • Advocacy: small steps, big impact

    Advocacy: small steps, big impact

    There’s an idea that online advocacy has to be that you reach X amount of people that you have to be on all the platforms, and you have to continually make content. I see too many Autistic advocates online apologise for going quiet for periods of time. You don’t need to apologise. What you’re giving…