To Me Autism Is...

Today is Autism Awareness day and April is Autism Awareness month. Everyone who is autistic is different and views the world in a different way, so in light of this, and to spread the awareness, this blog post is all about what autism means to me and the world that I live in. 

To me Autism is…

…feeling like a stranger in a foreign country where everyone is speaking a different language to me.

…being irritated by so many little noises all around.

…having an incredible ability to focus on studies that expand my mind and can open new doors.

…becoming so absorbed in things that I’m interested in that the smallest distraction can make me want to explode like a volcano.

…talking incessantly about the same things all the time.

…needing to plan every activity to the smallest detail and then follow the plan EXACTLY!

…losing friend after friend because I don’t know how to hold on to them.

…bluffing my way through conversation because I don’t always understand what people are saying.

…not understanding jokes

…feeling left out

...feeling left out

…feeling left out

…being extremely organised

…valuing friendships and appreciating the smallest kindness or feeling of inclusion because it’s so much harder for me to earn it.

…suffering from anxiety without even knowing why

…achieving the award of Young Animal Welfare Person of the Year 1991 at age 11 due to the focus I placed on running my own animal charity from the age of 9.

…finding it extremely difficult to shut my brain down to sleep, because it’s so busy.

…being bad at eye contact when I’m feeling uncomfortable

…being over the moon with the self-checkouts we now have in the supermarkets because I don’t have to talk to anyone when I do my shopping anymore

…having no sense of how my body relates to the world around me and constantly bumping into things, and dropping things, and nocking things, and falling over!

…having a strange accent that is mostly influenced by the TV I watch and which often causes people to think I am foreign.

…living in the fantasy worlds I find through the TV and in books, because they are more real to me than the real world. I would honestly live in them if I could and resent anything that takes me away from them.

…finding doing normal everyday things like housework, washing clothes, getting up and going to work, doing my work, and so on all a REAL effort, because I’m literally having to pull myself out of my head and remind myself about what actually needs to be done. I could live in my head for hours and hours, without actually doing anything, and be perfectly happy. I find the world extremely irritating, because it doesn’t let me do this.

…losing control over the smallest things because the pressure has built and built and built until it can’t be contained anymore and watching from inside in horror at my behaviour and wondering why no one understands me.

…being able to understand my son and the way his brain works – this is the greatest gift of all.

Would I ever change the fact that I’m autistic? NO! I wouldn’t be me if I wasn’t autistic and I believe I get more out of life because of the focus I have on the subjects that I’m interested in. I am also blessed to be surrounded by a lot of people who support me, love me with my quirks, and make this life one well worth living.