Autistic and Living the Dream

Tag: Mental Health

  • Prosopagnosia – face blindness

    Prosopagnosia – face blindness

    Prosopagnosia  (face blindness) is the inability to recognise people’s faces. Some people with this neurodivergence cannot recognise family members, or even themselves in mirrors or photographs. Others can struggle with people with certain characteristics…

  • Trans and Autistic: Gate-keeping kills

    Trans and Autistic: Gate-keeping kills

    CW: transphobia, gate-keeping, ableism, mental health crisis, police brutality, murder. Lack of support and validation for trans Autistic children and adults can culminate in fatalities, such as the case of Kayden Clarke, an Autistic trans man who was murdered by police when they responded to his suicide call. Clarke had experienced gate-keeping throughout his transition,…

  • Autistic parenthood: I wasn’t ready for this!

    Autistic parenthood: I wasn’t ready for this!

    Until I became a parent I didn’t quite knew how much having a child would completely turn my life upside down. In the blink of an eye I went from a single person to a wife, from an individual to a mother. I created the most amazing person and I was not ready for his…

  • Spectrum 10K – unpaused and still unethical

    Spectrum 10K – unpaused and still unethical

    In August 2021 the Spectrum 10k (S10K) research project was announced. It aimed to collect 10,000 DNA samples and medical records of Autistic children and adults (there is more information on the study at Aucademy). After a well thought-out and planned boycott from Autistic advocates, academics and many others, S10K was paused so the ethics…

  • Navigating the Confusing PhD Application Process

    Navigating the Confusing PhD Application Process

    Navigating the PhD application process is convoluted, heavily reliant on administrative skills, and often leads to mismatched supervisory teams. The experience highlights systemic barriers, including racism and classism, that deter applicants, especially neurodiverse individuals. The author expresses frustration with the bureaucratic hurdles that hinder deserving candidates and emphasizes the need for inclusive research representation.

  • The truth about OCD

    The truth about OCD

    OCD and anxiety go hand-in-hand, so making our environments more accommodating definitely helps calm OCD. My behaviours and intrusive thoughts are much calmer and less active now I live in my own home and work part time (I understand the huge amount of privilege I have with both of these). I feel less burntout and…

  • My on and off relationship with writing

    My on and off relationship with writing

    Writing has always been a part of my life in one way or another, I used to write poetry and short stories when I was younger and then lost the joy for writing during college and when I went into full time work. I had no energy and the creativity was crushed from me anyways.…

  • Trans and Autistic: no coercion, only care

    Trans and Autistic: no coercion, only care

    There is a strange fear around trans young people transitioning. So much of this is based in ignorance and very little understanding on the systems which support said young people. The words ‘coercion’, ‘forcing’ and ‘grooming’ are used by some people to deny children the chance to explore their gender in a safe environment with…

  • I won’t apologise for my neurotype

    I won’t apologise for my neurotype

    I will apologise for things I’ve done wrong and I’ll do my best to grow and change with whatever new information I’ve been graced with. I don’t know everything, I’m not perfect and life is bloody hard. So I try not to be so hard on myself. There is one thing I absolutely will not…

  • Arguing in a room by myself

    Arguing in a room by myself

    Something I’ve been working on for a while and it’s a habit that is really hard to kick – not taking questions from others as them being antagonistic or belittling me. This is hard as it has been my experience since I was little. I have always had someone devaluing what I say, being dismissive…