Autism & Name-Calling

I finally did it.

I crossed the threshold from being occasionally distracted to living in the twilight realm of pleasant confusion.  

I called Finian "Milo".

Milo is the dog.

It's a fine line I managed to stay the right side of for an admirable stretch.  I suppose I should be grateful that I realised I did it.  And that Finian didn't respond to it.

Silver linings, and all that.

Tbf, Finian and Milo have a lot in common.  They both chew the furniture, howl at invisible phantoms and have, on occasion, used the kitchen floor as a toilet bowl.  Easy mistake, really.

I can't blame overwhelming stress for my lapse, either.

As a family, we're cruising through relatively smooth waters, and relishing every minute of it.

Finian is thriving in his adult day services.  He loves hanging with his  friends at his Saturday youth club.  Our older adult 'kids' are painting their own worlds with evolving palettes.  

On a professional level, I'm in the messy process of setting up my own counselling business.  This is fun, if you consider skewering your eyeballs with toothpicks fun.  I comfortably hold space for clients as they grow through the dark recesses of their souls;  however, swallowing the alien language of sole trading, revenue and marketing is like drinking bleach.  I'd prefer to rote learn Ulysses in ancient Aramaic. My resistance has resistance.  But, still, this is not the source of my mis-dropping of names.

Maybe this pleasant confusion is peace?  

It's nice to lean into it without waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Maybe I'm relaxed enough to allow things be as they are? 

To breathe into this life, without pushing, grasping or resisting, accepting the tornados and sinkholes as part of the rich tapestry, is a nice place to be.  When people talk about the search for their 'authentic self', this is where it lives.

Surrendering the weight of trying to force life to be other than it is, is deeply wholesome (if unfamiliar).  Confusing my son with the dog is a pretty stitch in the comfortably bewildered embroidery. 

Autism & Photos

Recently, we've had some really lovely remarks about a photo of James & I on a night out. 

It's always heartwarming to be told how well we look, and what a strong couple we are.

But something inside me kinda broke.

I love photos (which is why I enjoy Insta so much), but they conceal as much as they project.

I guess a photo is a two dimensional snapshot of a moment in time.  The smiles are genuine...... we were having a blast.  But it shows nothing of how hard is to keep moving forward with autism.

Maybe it's more comfortable for me (and for everyone else) to portray our lives as a succession of happy smiles on social media.  It would be quite something if I posted pics of autism in all it's unpretty reality.

Here's the truth of it;

We are not always strong, and we are not always well.

Much of the time we are sleep-deprived, cranky, overwrought, shut-down, exhausted, tearful, scared, lonely, grey-faced, hypervigilant, burnt-out.  

It would be easy to pathologize this as depression, but I'm familiar enough with that to know better.  Depression isn't a 'disease'.  It's an adaptive response to intensely difficult circumstances.

Also, a huge advantage of being a counsellor (and having had lots of therapy) is understanding authenticity.  Authenticity is owning our own reality, in all it's complexities, and responding to our loved ones from that place.  

Living with Autism has dragged me (mostly kicking and screaming) to this place.  It's not pretty, but it's real.  And I like the real me.

I'm not afraid of breaking.  Breaking is necessary to clear away the unhealthy parts that aren't working.  Paradoxically, breaking doesn't break you.

Being real may cost me friends, a clean house, status, a stellar career and that whole bag of jellybeans.  I'm getting used to that.  

But there's a funny joy in it all.  When you don't resist breaking, and become true to yourself, you lose all fear.  All of it. 

It's a strange, exhausting, soul-searching, deeply satisfying journey that autism is taking me on.

It really is a funny old life.

happy to be here

Autism & Cuddles

I'm a shameless hugger.

No-one is safe.

In public, I practice an exercise where I mentally pin my arms to my sides and count to ten until the urge passes.  

Then I hug them anyway.

I've had to had a stern word with myself to refrain from hugging the postman or the bank clerk (mainly to avoid injury or incarceration).

Usually this works.

The thing is, I miss cuddles with my adult children.

Yeah, we hug, and chill together on the sofa etc. etc. But we don't do the big, full-on, soul-deep cuddles we did when they were little.  When puberty arrives, cuddles like that become a bit creepy and Game of Thrones-y.

Finian, however, doesn't waste any mental energy on social norms or raised eyebrows.

Finian folds that flying fuck into an origami humming bird and catapults it far, far away.

This is one of the sunny sides of autism.

On weekend mornings he waits for his dad to get out of our bed (Freud, eat your heart out), dives in, and cuddles up beside me from his head to his toes.  With a big old silly megawatt smile radiating from his lovely face.  The man just wants a goddamn cuddle and isn't shy about getting it.  There's a purity about his demand for love that is both vulnerable and courageous.  His autism bypasses all the conditioned bullshit that prevents most of us from experiencing this.

Things can be right in the world with love like this

.

Autism & Back Flips

There's a funny sorta irony within psychology. 

Part of it's remit is the study of emotions........  which it does in an utterly intellectual way.  

Trying to explain emotions using frameworks and formulations is like trying to understand the experience of awe, or joy, or grief using geometry.

Tbf, the science of psychology seems to be the only way we can attempt to learn about emotions within a classroom.  But in reality, the only way to truly understand emotions is to feel them.

It's kinda funny that psychology as a whole does exactly what lots of us do when we want to avoid painful feelings........  we escape into our heads and attempt to science away the feeling stuff.

Avoiding feelings is called many names; defense mechanisms, cognitive bypassing, spiritual bypassing, repression, suppression, rationalisation, intellectualisation, or whatever banana you prefer to pick from the whole crazy bunch.

We avoid emotions for a damn good reason; lots of them are fucking awful.  Who in their right mind enjoys feeling sad, or rejected or heartbroken? 

To add insult to injury, we are often shamed for expressing our 'difficult' emotions, adding layers of loneliness and self-loathing into the mix.  So the stuffed-down feelings remain stuck and unprocessed, and we get to hate ourselves too.  Yay! 

In this part of the world, we live in a neck-up society.  Intellect is honoured over spirit.  Empirics are more highly valued than gut feelings.  Stoicism is respected over emotional expression.

We are rewarded for cutting ourselves off from our emotions (which we literally feel in our bodies).

By being super-rational, we get to avoid suffering the pain of loss, loneliness, despair or whatever emotional horror you're having yourself.  The downside is that we can't cherry-pick which feelings to guillotine off at the neck, so we end up being split off from all our authentic emotions.  This is when you hear people say "I don't know who I am".

Short-term this is a handy coping strategy.

Long-term, those pesky repressed emotions manifest as anxiety, depression, autoimmune disorders and unhealthy coping strategies (the usual suspects being alcohol, drugs, overworking, perfectionism etc. etc.).  At the risk of being....well.... rational, it makes sense to crash into bed for a few days, feel all the bad shit, cry, wail, gnash your teeth, want to die, hate yourself, hate the world and scream into the void.  If you're really lucky, you'll have a loving soul to hold you or buy you ice cream while you go through this, but sometimes we have to do it by ourselves.

But mostly, we are not allowed, or we don't allow ourselves, the horrible luxury of processing our pain.

Then Finian comes along and turns all this on it's head.  

He does a neat backflip and sidesteps all the intellectual defenses.  He feels all the feels, big and small, as they arise, with savage abandon.    Nobody tries to pathologise his grief as depression.  No-one labels his anxiety as an attachment disorder.  He is not prescribed medication, or instructed to stop crying, man up or get over himself.  He is allowed to process his emotions in real time, at his own pace, in his own way.  He is not shamed for it.

And then he's grand.

There must be irony in the water, as it's also funny how much we can learn from people with special needs.

"now, what page will I find those damn emotions on?"

Autism & Masking

We tend to think of autism as a childhood thing.  

This is kinda dumbass as, inevitably, cute kids sprout into hairy, stinky (albeit impossibly handsome) adults.  I should know, as I've got several of my very own.  

Autistic kids are not just for Christmas, it seems.  We get to keep them forever and ever.  

And ever.

The assumption that autism is a kid-thing is doubly dumbass, as more and more people are being diagnosed well into adulthood.

In Celebrity-Land Anthony Hopkins, Darryl Hannah, Dan Ackroyd, Matt Haig and Elon Musk have been diagnosed as adults.  Not because they recently caught autism off a dodgy toilet seat, but because they were born with it like everyone else.

Like other late-diagnosed people, they probably learned to mask the signs to help them survive in an alien world.

Masking is a great term.  It describes exactly what it does on the tin.  If you can visualise someone printing out a 3D copy of someone else's face and placing it over their own, then you understand it.  Masking is a really clever way to compensate for difficulties with reading social cues (like facial expressions and tone of voice).  It's used to help a person fit in socially, to feel safe, accepted and to avoid mistreatment. Masking is when a person watches and copies someone else's responses, because they know an appropriate response is required, but they are unable to produce one themselves. The result helps the undiagnosed person pass themselves off as neurotypical, although often there is an 'oddness' that others intuitively sense.  

It's hard to imagine how exhausting this must be.

Of course, autistics don't have the monopoly on masking.  Plenty of neurotypicals protect themselves with assumed personas, sometimes becoming so invested in their mask that they lose touch with their authentic identity (this is a large part of my work as a counsellor).  It's a lonely place to be.  Imagine the awfulness of not only being unknown by others, but also being unknown by yourself.

Understanding masking has been part of the perceived increase in autism.  There isn't more autism.  We've just got better at diagnosing it.

On a sidenote, masking seems to be used more by females, which may flip the 'autism is a boy thing' trope on it's head.

Mercifully, Finian's particular flavour of autism doesn't require masking.  The flying fucks he gives about being socially accepted are in negative numbers.  

I can't tell you how much I envy him.

So, masking isn't a good or a bad thing.  It's just a thing..... and a very useful one in the short term.  But long term, masking can lead to burnout, depression, anxiety and whatever you're having yourself.  Having the insight and courage (sometimes requiring help) to expose your true, vulnerable self is what gives life depth and meaning.  It's always worth questioning what lies beneath the façade.

   

Autism & Sexuality

Yesterday, a pleasant chat with one of my nieces created an unexpected shift in how I see myself, and in how I parent Finian.  It's funny how profound growth can surprise us in the most ordinary of situations.

We were talking about relationships, when a clear, undeniable truth crystalised in my mind.  If I was a young, single gal again I would be open to dating girls.  I'm not sure if that makes me bi, pan or curious.  I'm not sure I'm even that interested in a label.  But learning a new truth about myself is thrilling...... that I am sure about.

Many of my friends and family are LGBTQ+ so I told myself that my attraction to the gay scene was to have a bit of fun while being supportive of my loved ones (plus I love rainbows, so there's that). 

But of course it was a covert way for me to explore my own sexuality without making myself vulnerable to judgement.  I find it hilarious that I managed, with great efficiency, to hide my own sexuality from myself.  Of course I had to, as being anything other than straight, white catholic in 80s Ireland guaranteed social ostracism.  It was a dangerous time to be different.

We all know that denial is a river in Africa..... but it  also appears to have plenty of tributaries in Co.Monaghan.

It's criminal that I grew up in a time when sexual exploration meant being an outcast.  Our sexuality is central to who we are, and to be battered and shamed to comply to a social norm is the real sin.  An awful truth dawned on me that the damage inflicted on our identity doesn't stop with us as individuals. 

It also affects how we parent.  

If we don't understand our own sexuality, how on earth are we supposed to help our special needs kids navigate theirs?

It's tricky enough to walk our neurotypical kids through the shifting sands of hormones, identity and orientation.  Throw autism and an  attitude conditioned by shame and self-loathing into the mix, and we have a recipe for a steaming hot mess.

I think the way forward lies in our openness to admit that we don't have any answers for our kids.  It seems to me that the best way to discover who we are is by feeling our way along in the dark, without direction from tradition, parents, churches, peers or social expectations.  We can find our true, authentic path by attending to the still, small voice within.

It's entirely possible to grow in tandem with our kids, if we are humble enough to feel our way in the dark with them.

 

Autism & Muses

So, I'm heading into the last stretch of my foundation degree.  

In my final essay I'm trying to coax words into well-behaved creatures that actually mean something.  I'm quite happy to let them thrum with a little wildness, as long as they help me jitterbug across the finish line.  Written words are my semi-feral friends.

I also have a presentation to prepare.  I'm confident enough to elaborate my points creatively, using my crocheted throws, with their many layers, and my paintings that make zero sense until they're finished.  Energy, colour, chaos and direction will illuminate my talk.

I'm really proud that, at the age of 51, my spirit of adventure and curiosity is exponentially burning.  My age has become an advantage rather than a limitation.

This is not what's keeping me awake at night.

It's the viva.

In the viva, I will sit before a panel and have to account for myself, without the shield of written words or power points.  There will be no props.  I will have to explain how I work, why I work, and just exactly who I think I am.  

I'd rather be Vladamir Putin's personal bum licker.

The prospect of the viva has re-awakened a stubborn core belief that I don't seem to have quite excavated yet.  Hate that.

As my training taught me, I leaned into the anxiety and discovered that I'm terrified of being a fake.  And even worse, being outed as a fake.  When my tutors discover that I tried to fool them by being clever, interesting and competent, they'll be disgusted by my boring, useless neediness.  My fear is that they'll reject the real, exposed me.  That my vulnerable self will be abandoned.

This is an opportunuty for me to embrace more layers of my shadow.  I know how important it is to integrate my unconscious so that it doesn't reactively run the show.    

It's just that sometimes I really wish I was a Nepalese goat herder.

                                                                           

Being fully human is insane.

Luckily, I have a Finian-shaped muse who I look to for inspiration.  He manages the lunacy of  this world by wearing pyjamas all day and being wholly authentic.  His inner world is his outer world.   He doesn't need defences to protect him from being unacceptable.  And I get to live with him every day.

It's about being able to integrate paradoxes.  Owning my fear doesn't magic it away, but it IS liberating.  So I get to feel scared and free at the same time.  What a ridiculous mindfuck.

I'm putting together a post-viva recovery kit of chocolate, pyjamas (naturally) and rioja.  And even though they don't know it yet, my husband is going to give me foot massages, and my daughter is going to binge-watch Brooklyn 99 with me.  And Finian will continue to muse me.

Holy props, Batman!

Autism & Therapy

The more personal development I do, the more I'm in awe of Finian.

The kid who is labelled as having 'special needs' lives in a state of self-acceptance and wholesomeness that most of us can only dream of.

To be fair, Finian does have special needs.....  anyone who routinely chows down on furniture and enjoys a nice game of chicken with traffic has additional requirements.  But 'special needs' is not a uniform blanket that covers every aspect of his being.

As far as I can tell, Finno embodies mindfully living in the present and doesn't waste time ruminating over the past or worrying about the future.  He seems to navigate this earth fearlessly, with a solid sense of his own identity.  He is who he is;  he doesn't fretfully construct a persona to make people love him.  People love him anyway.  

His authentic nature is saving me a fortune in therapy.

As a student counsellor, I'm expected to rise to uncomfortable challenges.

Well, to be fair, things like time management, academics and life balance are difficulties to be expected.  No-one goes to college for an easy ride.

It's the personal development demands of the course that blindside me occasionally.  Now and again I faceplant into that psychological shitpit and have a good old roll around in it.

It's mandatory that we attend our own personal therapy.... this is so that we're aware of our own stuff and don't project them onto clients.  But it occurred to me, that most of my work is around un-learning unhelpful patterns and beliefs.  Finian never bought into this crap in the first place.  It's like Autism has betowed upon him the gift of Not Giving a Flying Fuck (patented counselling term), and I could really do with more of that. 

He doesn't do defence mechanisms.

I've had to dig deep to find the courage and humility to make myself vulnerable (and authentic) to my therapist, and then to my loved ones.  This is a risk, with sometimes painful consequences.  But if I expect this level of openness from my clients, I need to be able to walk the walk myself.  Finian never learned to shut his real Self off from others, so he always knew exactly who he is.

I've had to un-learn relating to others from my ego, and try harder to connect from my deeper, more genuine Self.  I do this by slowing down, checking my responses and being painfully honest about what's motivating them.  It's a work in progress.  For example, sometimes on reflection, I'll realise that I've said something to appear clever instead of genuinely connecting with someone.  Or I'll respond in a certain, insincere, way to prevent a hostile reaction from the other person.  Finian doesn't give a shit sideways (also a patented counselling term) about any of this.  How others perceive him isn't even at the races.  I'm more than a little jealous.

It's not that I spend all my time joylessly naval gazing.  Occassionally I like to get nuts with the dark arts of crochet, or I've been known to crack open a new book midfuckingweek.  If I'm feeling really freaky, I'll drink tea right before bed.  So lock my bad ass up.

We have so much to learn from diversity, if we have the eyes to see it and the heart to feel it.

Also, I may have said before, but Finian would make a great therapist...... if he'd keep his clothes on and stop eating the chairs.

mmmmmm, delicious

Autism & Smiling

I'm not very photogenic.

If you see a photo of me looking pretty, you can be sure I just deleted a dozen shots where I look like I'm chewing a cheese grater.  I feel sorry for the internet.  Somewhere in the ether, there's a cyberdump littered with terrifying pics of my face trying to eat itself.  It's the place where nightmares go to die.

This isn't false modesty.  

I just can't fake smile.

Finian, having authenticity nailed, doesn't even try.  He has no concept of pretending to feel something he doesn't.  As a result, when he smiles, he lights up from his core.  

Why have we been conditioned to 'smile for the camera' from infancy?  

Who are we smiling for?  

At what cost? 

In 2019, the environmental activist Greta Thunberg was criticised for not smiling during an impassioned speech about global warming.  In more recent months, Grace Tame, a campaigner on behalf of sexual assault survivors, was crucified by the media for not smiling during a meeting with the Australian PM.  Both are young, female and autistic.  They challenged injustices maintained by fat, middle-aged men, and were attacked for not smiling like good little girls.

Autistic people have been gifted with the ability to only smile when they mean it.  Much as we try to inflict our internalised script of 'smile for the camera' on them, they just fucking won't.  Autism, as ever, cuts through the crap with surgical precision.  We'd be wise to watch and learn.

They, and we, do not owe anyone a smile.

I used to hate that the camera doesn't love me.  Now I'm starting to appreciate my inability to please others with a cute smile.

My best, most authentic, photos are taken when I'm feeling awkward and slightly bewildered, reflecting my true self.  The camera can do what it likes with that.

Autism & Mad Mothers

This has been one of the most difficult years of my life.  

There was Autism, usual family stuff, college and covid.  But in the Spring, the shell protecting my mental health cracked open and I fell to pieces.  One day, all the defenses I used to avoid my issues (maintaining facades, perfectionism, anxiety, depression, overwork, wine, rationalizing emotions, denying my own needs, unhealthy boundaries, whatever you're having yourself) just stopped working.

It was about fucking time.

My breakdown immersed me in a world of pain that I'd been avoiding for a very long time.

Many months of therapy have helped me to integrate most of my big psychological injuries.  There's still one or two sticky issues  I need to befriend, but I know I'll get there.  Tbh, I'd rather french kiss Boris Johnson after he's eaten a packet of Monster Munch, but you do what you gotta do.  Am wearing Big Girl pants now, and all that.

The big surprise is that processing the awfulness isn't as terrible as pouring all my energy into avoiding it.  I mean, therapy is horrendous.  It's like being atomized in a high-speed blender and then re-shaped in a really unfamiliar new mould.  It takes a while to get used to.  And making friends with the dark creatures in my mental basement has been...... unexpected.  

But avoiding it has been worse.  The relief of allowing the mask to slip is wonderful.  Breaking down gave me the freedom to recognize and discard what was bad for my soul.  It's a work in progress, but yanno.

Autism was the catalyst that forced me to engage with my mental health in a meaningful way.  It's very possible I would have continued to spin in my resistant groove for the rest of my days, had Autism not driven me mad.

It's kinda comical to be grateful for something that caused me pain, but here we are.  Alice in Wonderland knew her shit when she said "curiouser and curiouser".  

Autism & Routines

Rule #1 when you have an autistic kid is to establish routines.  

Lots of autistic people experience the world as chaotic and hard to interpret.  It's sometimes described as being lost in a foreign city where you have no map and don't know the language.  It might a bit like when I first moved to Monaghan and depended on my husband to decode what a 'shuck', 'rulya' and 'clart' meant.  Quite a few people thought I was English (I come from the next county).  I'm still considered a suspicious blow-in 25 years later.  

OK, so a Louth woman living in Monaghan is a bit of a stretchy metaphor for autism, but it's all I got.  My energy levels are kinda down the toilet today.

Anyway,  it's not hard to understand why autistic people become exhausted and overwhelmed.

Building routines gives a sense of predictability and safety in an unfathomable world.  For sure, routines can be kinda tedious, but so is Kim Kardashian's alarming arse (it seems to be everywhere) and lots of us find the time to pay attention to that.   I suppose a caveat to this is that routines shouldn't be too rigid as teaching flexibility is important too.

I stopped using most social media platforms a short while ago.  It's still uncomfortable, but a good uncomfortable.  It's kinda like having an itch in a limb I don't have....... there's nothing satisfying about scratching it.  So I stopped.  It's giving me more time to attend to the real world and the people around me.  

It's good to be more focused on maintaining Finian's routines.  What's surprising is how soothing his routines are for me too.  When I'm more concerned with making lunch than some B lister's divorce, that has to be a win.    

Yeah I know I'm a massive hypocrite.  I get my lovely husband to post my blog on his platforms, but what can I say?  Unlike KK's terrifying buttcheeks, I'm not perfect.  But it's good to keep moving towards being authentic.  Working around routines is another baby step in getting there.  

I keep having a recurring dream where a river floods the road ahead of me and rolls uphill.  I think it'll be impossible to wade through the current while going uphill, but not only is it easy..... it turns out to be beautiful.  Sometimes making changes isn't as tough as we fear.

It's humbling to keep learning from a kid with special needs.  But it's also pretty damn cool.

Autism & Amazing Parents

It's widely accepted that autism parents are saintly, wholesome creatures who could teach the Walton's a thing or two about being virtuous.  We have been gifted by the Gods with an eternal wellspring of patience, shouldering our load with inner tranquility.   We dispense kindly pearls of wisdom to those in trouble, having cultivated our Zen through the serene endurance of hardships.  

It is whispered that Buddha and Jesus are kinda jealous of the level of enlightenment we radiate.

Autism parents are the true Latter Day Saints.

"go in pieces"

No.  We're.  Fucking.  Not.

I'm having a shit day with Finian and I've just given him his third bag of crisps to try to stop him crying.  Learning to regulate his own emotions is a work in progress.  He's OK at indicating that a shower or a walk would calm him down, but he's unable to identify the reason for his irritability.  Equally, I'm OK at using Mindfulness and Other Tricks to help me attempt to co-regulate his emotions, but this relies on me getting enough sleep and eating properly.  This doesn't always happen.

Some days it all goes to shit and all I can do is throw crisps at him and hope it'll pass soon.

Today is one of those days that grabbing a shower is a hazy dream, and cooking a proper meal is the stuff of fantasy.  Balancing a Gin and Tonic on the ironing board while I tackle the laundry seems much more conducive to coping, as does a phone call to our friendly (and very familiar) take-away.  

You do what you gotta do to manage.

It's important that we forgive ourselves for being less than perfect, and for breaking the rules to survive a hard day.

Today I look like a small family of weasels live in my hair, and I seem to be wearing my husband's clothes (and not in a fun, Friday night sorta way).  Finian's breath stinks of salt & vinegar, and I may be half-baked by bedtime.

But I'm OK with not being an Amazing Parent.

Being OK will do grand.

The Waltons.
Off their tits on Mogadon.

Autism & Kindness

Kindness is a tricky concept to teach an autistic kid.

Finian gets that it's expected of him to occasionally share his salt & vinegar Tayto, but I'm pretty sure he only complies to get me outta his face and not out of a sense of moral obligation. 

Really, it's a tough enough gig for many neurotypical people to grasp.  

Kindness, as the cliche goes, is often mistaken for weakness.  This is a sad loss for the western world (it seems to be a western thing to admire stomping all over other people to get what you want?  Just look at the movies we love).  But kindness is not martyrdom.  

As I get older (and work through a lot more therapy) kindness is starting to appear as more of a superpower.  Maintaining the belief that kindness is the antidote to an often jaded, cynical world is an act of faith.  It requires strength and stamina that some days I have to dig awfully deep to find.

Here's what I believe.

Any act of kindness, no matter how small, creates a ripple effect that exponentially increases positivity and goodness.  Ultimately we all benefit, even indirectly, as it makes the world a better place.  Cynics may roll their eyes, but cynicism is lazy.  It takes thought and effort to emit kindness into a world you may have been battered and abused by.

I guess a caveat is that being kind should not hurt you.  There's nothing to be gained by channeling your inner doormat and tattooing 'masochist' across your face (you'd need a pretty big face tbf).  We are also obliged to practice kindness towards ourselves.

I think a particular challenge is to extend kindness (without hurting ourselves) to those who hurt us, or who we don't like.  That's next level Buddhist shit right there.  It makes sense that wishing ill to others is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.  The only person we make sick is ourselves.  It's a counter-intuitive win-win to extend good wishes towards those who wounded us.

Bitterness shrinks the soul and condemns us to live in the half-light.  Love is liberation.

A really hard part of healing my own wounds is being brave enough to experience the pain and bitterness I  buried many years ago. Owning the awfulness I avoided with overwork, perfectionism, wine and fakery has only been possible because I try to be kind to myself.   I've cried more in the last six months than in five decades (and I really fucking hate crying), but I also like myself better.

Being kind to myself has increased my desire to be kind to others, as I know how healing it is.

Now all I have to do is teach this to my autistic son.

morals never tasted so good

Autism & Appearances

A couple of years ago, we placed a log on top of our stove to fill a gap between it and the chimney.  To most people, it seems to be an attempt to introduce a little rustic whimsy into our dining room.  However, I hate to throw icy water across the Beautiful Homes  illusion, but the truth is that it's there to stop the cat dumping a load behind it.  

That log is an unromantic metaphor for life with Autism.

When you live with Autism, a fundamental law is that things are often not as they appear to be.  

When Finian starts rapping about locking people's cars, he's not concerned for the security of the vehicles of his loved ones.  What he's communicating is that he's feeling a bit frustrated.

When he requests a shower it means he's attempting to self-regulate a need for sensory input.  He really doesn't care if he smells like a piece of week-old quiche.

When he escalates to threats of pooing on people's beds, he's not actually going to relieve himself on my favourite duvet (although now that I think of it, he actually did  leave a surprise turd on our bed once, which I made him clean up.... he never did it again).  Threats of waste disposal means it's time to bring in the bomb squad and defuse whatever emotional explosion he's about to ignite.

It really helps if you can speak Autism.

As you can see, shit is a recurring theme in our home, both literally and figuratively.  There's definitely a pun in there somewhere about using a log to stop the cat producing one, but I'm not quite at full capacity today.  Forgive me.  I'll produce much better shit next time.

We're working with school to give Finian the language to express his feelings.  But it's become our normal to have to deconstruct images and phrases to decipher hidden meanings. We're used to taking nothing at face value.

So it's a huge shock to me when something is exactly as it appears to be. I'm not quite sure what to do with transparency.

Finian has taught me to listen to what is being said behind the words.  It's a great skill to bring into my counselling training.  I could do with less anxiety about finding rogue turds in unexpected places, but it's fun to find the silver lining.

Autism & Why I'm an Asshole

Epiphanies aren't all they're cracked up to be.

Having a blinding moment of insight usually means that, up until this point, you've been kinda an asshole (and by 'you', I mean 'me').  It's never my favourite moment to realise this.

I was bopping around the house with Finian and he wanted to go for a drive, but something happened that prevented us from going.  Instead of losing his shit, he amped up his inner Zen and shrugged it off.  He met this with an inner calm that surprised me, and I was struck by his acceptance that our change of plan was beyond his control.

We waste an insane amount of time and energy trying to change the unchangeable.  It occurred to me that we have no control over our outer reality.  This seems obvious, but we often act as if we can bend our environment.  But we can't change the weather, or make the driver in front of us speed up, or make our crush fall in love with us.  We can't force other people to see us the way we want them to.  We can't control random occurrences that scupper a road trip with our kids.  These perceived obstacles enrage us and we become consumed with the need to overcome them.  They devour our energy.

Imagine the creativity we could unlock if we channeled all that energy into developing our own inner strengths? 

It all starts with our self-concept, and the lies we tell ourselves to maintain it.

Our self-concept is who we imagine we are.  We construct it from what other people tell us we should be like, as well as who we imagine we want to be.  We build it as a shield to protect our vulnerable Real Self from the judgement of ourselves and others.  So basically, we become who other people want us to be, so that we will be safe and loved.  Eventually, we may come to believe that our self-concept is real.  Our Real Self  may become silenced and we don't achieve the potential we're capable of, depending on the level of judgment we are exposed to. It's kinda a bum deal.  

It's really only through having the courage and insight to dismantle our false ideas about ourselves that we can embrace our inner truth.  The energy we waste trying to maintain our self-concept could be vastly better used to become the best version of ourselves.

We drive ourselves crazy trying to change an unchangeable world to support our self-concept.  We scream at the slow driver.  We blame the weather for being in a bad mood.  We feel victimized by aging. Imagine accepting reality for what it is, free from the terrible anxiety of trying to twist it to fit a false agenda?

Acceptance doesn't mean passively enduring things that are bad for our soul.  It's not the same as giving up.  Finian knows this, and he kindly schooled me by being chill about change.

Autism & Lying

I'm a useless liar.

I'd love to say lying doesn't sit easily with my saintly integrity, but that's not it.  

I'm just bad at it.

Guilt gets the better of me (thank you, catholic childhood).  As does having a memory that'd embarrass a particularly dull amoeba (it'd help if I could remember what I lie about).  But mostly it's my acting abilities that let me down.  I blush, stammer, fidget, talk too much and make better eye contact with the floor than the person I'm trying to deceive.  In short, fibbing makes me lose my shit.

In less obvious ways, though, we lie all the time.  I'm thinking hair-dye, make-up, push-up bras, Instagram posts, fake smiles, high heels, coked-up 'craic', magic knickers, shaved legs, Botox, uniforms (we believe uniformed workers have their shit together), flashy cars.... it's a long list.  Feel free to add.

Not to mention the lies we articulate to oil the wheels of social conformity.

"yes i'm fine"

"how lovely to see you"

"no, your arse definitely doesn't look like two bags of  terrified weasels struggling to escape your awful jeans" 

So it's great having Finian in my life because we get to be awful liars together...... because autistic people can't lie, right?

Terribly, TERRIBLY wrong.

Finian has discovered the joys of lying his head off, and I was worried.  Does this mean he's no longer autistic and is going to be replaced by a nihilistic, monosyllabic 17-year-old who lives on pot noodle and cheap cider?  Having my sweet, funny boy transform into a grunting, smelly world-hater does not appeal.

I'm relieved to discover, that telling porkies is a developmental milestone.   It's a measure of our ability to recognize that other people think differently than we do.  So lying (in this context) should be celebrated with cake and wine (any excuse, tbf) and not judged as a moral failing (sidebar; autistic people lying makes the Theory of Mind questionable, doesn't it?).

But mostly it's hilarious.

Me;  Finian, did you eat my chocolate?

Finian; (looking me dead-ass in the eye) No

Me; What's that wrapper in your hand?

Finian; (popping the wrapper in his mouth) No chocolate.

I admire him for eating the evidence.  

This showcases his problem-solving abilities as well as indications of empathetic understanding.  You gotta celebrate the wins.

Finian has helped me view the world from a more creative, humorous, authentic perspective.  Loving that my kid lies to my face is a surprising thing to be delighted about.

Autism & Sadness

Sadness is an emotion in need of good PR representation.

It's usually labelled as a 'negative' emotion and we're taught to avoid it at all costs.  But sadness is an important feature of our emotional landscape.  When we're taught that sadness is unattractive, weak or embarrassing, we attach shame to it and learn to suppress it.  Emotions that are not allowed to flow and process become stuck.  They stagnate into defensive blocks and may eventually find expression in physical or mental illness.  

Paradoxically, it's impossible to experience authentic love and joy without acknowledging the inevitability of loss.  We can't know the heights of joy and love without feeling them against the counterfoil of loss and sadness.  

We apologise for shedding tears.  Repeated messages like dry your eyes, put a brave face on, get over yourself etc. cripple our authenticity and we learn to present an acceptably agreeable face to the world.  We run away to cry in the privacy of locked rooms.  Not alone do we avoid expressing sadness, but we are terrified of feeling it.

Except for Finian.

He does sad like a pro.

I envy Finian's ability to express his emotions without censor.  If I buy the wrong chocolate spread at Lidl, or Netflix cancels Bob the Builder, or there's a hole in his favourite pyjamas, he howls with abandon.  He has no concerns about ugly-crying, appearing out of control, or embarrassing those around him.  After a spell of backbone-deep sobbing, he's processed it and is good to go.

It's taken me six months of intense psychotherapy to achieve this and I'm supposed to be neurotypical.  As ever, Finian is my favourite teacher.

One thing we can be sure of is that life will give us plenty to cry about, so it's a skill worth mastering. Processing sadness isn't fun.  To be honest I'd rather chew a pig farmer's boot than sit with my sadness and learn from it.  But it's worth giving grief room to move to appreciate the good stuff.

Autism & Authenticity

Finian has authenticity nailed.

At the risk of generalizing, most autistic people I know present their true Self to the world.  Finian doesn't do personas, mind games or subterfuge.

If Finian doesn't like you, you may be escorted to the front door with an unambiguous "bye bye" (true story).  If he feels like indulging in a spot of naturism, he'll happily deposit his clothes on the nearest floor-drobe.  If your armpits smell like out-of-date ham, he'll advise you to have a shower (usually adding that you "smell manky").

Its fair to say that his flavour of authenticity may be a little.... blunt.  For most of us, it'd be wise to dial down the truth bombs.  But authenticity is a trait to aspire to.

As a counselling student, I am expected to invest a lot of time and energy in becoming as authentic as I can.  This is so that I am aware of my own issues and don't project them onto my clients.  It's about keeping my clients safe.  

Developing authenticity is painful and unpretty.  As well as making friends with our good stuff, we have to uncover and examine our flaws, traumas and unlikable aspects.  For example, I like that I'm open, funny (I find myself hilarious) and fiercely protective of those I love.  I'm not so crazy, however, about my tenancy to be insecure, panicky and clingy within relationships.  This is not an attractive trait, boys and girls, and will likely drive your loved ones nuts.  I'm working on this and often fail spectacularly, but failure is educational (right?  right???).  Hopefully this will help me become a better counsellor and a less annoying human.

Then there's Finian.  He is the most singularly authentic person I've ever met.  He doesn't need therapy or hours of navel gazing to confidently express his true Self.  He is who he is, and embodies an attitude of "fuck you" if you don't like that.  He could make a great counsellor if he'd keep his clothes on and stop telling people they stink.