yet-another-autistic-blog

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

Anonymously submitted June 17, 2024.

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

My Wife: babe I think my dad might be autistic

Me: your face-blind, emotionally oblivious, picky eater of a father, who has numerous niche interests and the best-organized fly-tackle-box I have ever seen, might be autistic?

My Wife: you knew?

Me: you didn’t?

My Wife: babe I’m not ok I’m having a whole-

Me: you can hear the TVs, babe.

My Wife: What

Me, pointing at the special no-flicker lighting I installed in our house so that we never actually have to have the Big Overhead Light on: babe!

My Wife: … oh my god am I autistic?

Me:

My Wife:

Me: you didn’t know!?

My Wife: YOU DID!?

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

FOUND IT!

It was goblin.tools.

I need help tracking down a thing. I remember seeing on here a while back a website where you could type in a task, and it would break it down into steps for you, and there was a slider to control how many steps. I think the website also had other neurodivergent-friendly tools. I can’t remember the name of it, and Google isn’t helping.

Does anyone else know the name of the thing I’m talking about?

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

I need help tracking down a thing. I remember seeing on here a while back a website where you could type in a task, and it would break it down into steps for you, and there was a slider to control how many steps. I think the website also had other neurodivergent-friendly tools. I can’t remember the name of it, and Google isn’t helping.

Does anyone else know the name of the thing I’m talking about?

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

I'm trying to figure out a good way to say "you really should actually learn the basics of small talk" with sounding like I'm biased against autistic people.

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

Starting to hate how ears aren't like the other organs on the head. I can close my eyes if the light is too bright. I can hold my breath if there's a smell I don't like. I can close my mouth if I don't want to speak. Not with ears. I will have to listen to every sound in existence and I have to like it.

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

If nobody ever explained this to you, if someone you see a lot does something you like and you never ever tell them that, they might think you don’t like them or don’t like the things they do for you.

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

>doing a thing >neurotypical person stops me and tells me the "right" way to do it >ask if it's actually better or just societal convention >they don't get it >show a chart explaining what is actually better and what is just societal convention >"haha it's the right way to do it" >do it their way >it's societal convention

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

comorbid disorders are either like "yeah ok, makes sense" or "what the fuck"

adhd and autism having a high comorbidity rate? yeah checks out

adhd and autism both having high rates of comorbidity with hypermobility and GI issues? thats an evil curse

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

I’m about to save you thousands of dollars in therapy by teaching you what I learned paying thousands of dollars for therapy:

It may sound woo woo but it’s an important skill capitalism and hyper individualism have robbed us of as human beings.

Learn to process your emotions. It will improve your mental health and quality of life. Emotions serve a biological purpose, they aren’t just things that happen for no reason.

1. Pause and notice you’re having a big feeling or reaching for a distraction to maybe avoid a feeling. Notice what triggered the feeling or need for a distraction without judgement. Just note that it’s there. Don’t label it as good or bad.

2. Find it in your body. Where do you feel it? Your chest? Your head? Your stomach? Does it feel like a weight everywhere? Does it feel like you’re vibrating? Does it feel like you’re numb all over?

3. Name the feeling. Look up an emotion chart if you need to. Find the feeling that resonates the most with what you’re feeling. Is it disappointment? Heartbreak? Anxiety? Anger? Humiliation?

4. Validate the feeling. Sometimes feelings misfire or are disproportionately big, but they’re still valid. You don’t have to justify what you’re feeling, it’s just valid. Tell yourself “yeah it makes sense that you feel that right now.” Or something as simple as “I hear you.” For example: If I get really big feelings of humiliation when I lose at a game of chess, the feeling may not be necessary, but it is valid and makes sense if I grew up with parents who berated me every time I did something wrong. So I could say “Yeah I understand why we are feeling that way given how we were treated growing up. That’s valid.”

5. Do something with your body that’s not a mental distraction from the feeling. Something where you can still think. Go on a walk. Do something with your hands like art or crochet or baking. Journal. Clean a room. Figure out what works best for you.

6. Repeat, it takes practice but is a skill you can learn :)

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

Help Me Train Nurses About Psych Stuff

I do a presentation at our hospital aimed demystifying mental illness and the people who live with it. The talk is for medical-surgical nurses, so specifically staff that does NOT work psych who feel ignorant about treating that population. A lot of the people I'm talking to are also young and still developing the foundation of their nursing practice.

If you've ever been in the hospital as a psych patient (or a psych patient navigating the medical system in general), what would you want the hospital staff to know based on your experiences? What advice or insight would you give?

I'd especially love anything about positive experiences, things that helped you, what someone did that improved the situation, stuff like that. In addition to saying what not to do, I'd love to give staff actionable things they CAN do instead.

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

for the love of god, do not use chores to punish your kids!!!! it's just going to make them struggle deeply to keep their houses tidy as adults since you made them associate necessary chores with punishment and suffering, and it's going to take years of therapy to undo. don't use chores as punishments!!!

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

autistic people dominate AAC conversation on tumblr so for this AAC awareness month (October), let us also remember all non-autistic AAC users & autistic AAC users who not use AAC because or solely because autism.

people use AAC for from intellectual & developmental disorders to neurocognitive disorders to neurological to physical disorders. people use AAC for disorders from birth & acquired disorders. progressive & non progressive disorders.

some AAC users have mouth speech, motor, and/or sound clarity related difficulties, others use for language and/or cogntive difficulties, some for combo of reasons.

those with…

intellectual disability

genetic & chromosomal disorders like down syndrome, rett syndrome, angelman syndrome, williams syndrome, etc.

cerebral palsy

speech language disorders like aphasia & dysarthria

schizophrenia & schizoaffective & schizo-spec

brain injury

dementia

amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), multiple sclerosis (MS), huntington’s, frederick’s ataxia, etc.

tracheotomy

locked in syndrome

n so much more not listed here

[yet-another-autistic-blog]

Does anybody else track their life though a series of obsessions? Like “ah yes, i remember that happening, i was obsessing over Star Gate Atlantis at the time,” or, “this was during my Supernatural era.” I can map out my whole life in this way.