Anxiety

If you're a regular reader, or if you've read some of my older posts, chances are you'll know that alexithymia is one of the autism-related conditions I've got, which basically means I have difficulty expressing my own emotions in words, and sometimes even understanding them at all. So with that in mind it's hardly surprising that I'm only now starting to realise that I suffer more with anxiety than I ever thought I did. It's funny how things like this can be there and affect you without you even realising it. I can only remember a couple of times where I've noticed the classic symptoms of anxiety such as nausea, sweating palms and so on.

I've never been the most confident of people but I think there's much more to it than that. I'm always doubting myself, wondering if I'm doing the right thing, wonder if I/what I'm doing is good enough etc. For example, most of the time when I hit the Publish button on a new post I immediately wonder to myself if I've just written a load of crap. Someone on Twitter a while ago once said something that resonated with me quite a bit. They said that perfectionism isn't good because it's often driven by anxiety. I consider myself a perfectionist and I never thought of it like that before. One of my old jobs was preparing route packs for a distribution company and my my supervisor once praised me on how immaculate they are, but said I'm making them too perfect and spending too much time on it when I should be getting each one done as quickly as possible. This is most likely driven by anxiety that I want to do the best job I can because I don't want to get in trouble so I make it as perfect as I can, but that takes more time than they like. I ended up being made redundant from that job but my perfectionism isn't something I've ever been able to change. I'm very rigid in that sense, which is a classic autism trait. When I do something I has to be perfect, and more importantly it has to be right.

As far as I can remember I've always been one to look quite negatively on myself as well as things that could happen. If there's something that I can see a potential negative outcome for I usually spend a lot of time thinking "what if" although I like to think I'm also good at balancing out the positives and negatives and looking at the probability of each outcome. Whenever I get a notification for something on my phone, if the notification shows the first few words of the message I usually have a feeling of dread as though someone is definitely going to have a go at me, or give me some bad news or something. Somehow that doesn't tend to happen if it doesn't show the start of the message in the notification, and of course my feeling of dread is always wrong. There was one time recently where I'd done something wrong that annoyed my wife, and I spent a while thinking I'm a moron and what if she hates me and all those kind of things. This is when the logical thinking kicks in - sometimes on its own, sometimes deliberately. I start thinking that she's human and that she's an emotional and anxious person herself, and she'll calm down eventually, and whatever I did definitely doesn't warrant a divorce. I know she reads my blog so I just want to quickly clarify that I've never thought she was going to divorce me, but just using that as a worst case scenario that I can rule out to reassure myself.

When I first asked my GP back in 2017 to refer me for a second opinion on an autism diagnosis she refused and gave me the details for a self-referral mental health service that I then contacted, and they concluded that I had social anxiety. While I don't deny that I'm very socially anxious the help they gave me was a waste of time mainly because autism still wasn't addressed as the underlying cause of it. You may be wondering what difference it makes as autism isn't something to be treated or cured, but to a certain extent a diagnosis of autism can make a world of difference because it can be very validating and gives a much simpler way of explaining how you are to other people: "I'm autistic." Not that it solves anxiety - social or otherwise - but it certainly helps in my experience. They booked me in for CBT therapy and after a couple of months I realised it wasn't working and stopped. Shortly after that I went back and saw a different GP who then gave me the referral that lead to my diagnosis.

At the moment I'm fine with my anxieties because they don't cause much of an issue, but who knows - after lockdown is over my situation will most likely change so I may need to revisit CBT or a similar therapy depending on how things go. At the time of writing my employer are expecting me and the rest of my home working team to return to the office after lockdown (I've worked from home for a couple of years and we were supposed to return to the office in early April until the pandemic happend). At lot of people have come and gone in the office since I started working from home, so it'll be like going into a completely new environment when we eventually do go back. With that said, my son will be starting school in September which might give me more downtime to decompress and process things, so we'll have to see how it goes.

So there you have it. It's definitely possible to have anxiety without realising it, and I think it's safe to say that goes for almost any mental health issue as well. I'm still unpacking my anxieties bit by bit, but I hope what I've unpacked so far has been insightful and interesting. Please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

[Image description: Silhouette of a person on a chair, hunched over slightly holding their head. There are bubbles showing thoughts entering their head including "Don't," "Can't," and "What if..." Under the silhouette is the word "Autism" in rainbow colours and "Anxiety" in black under that.]

Autistic AF Lists: The Gruffalo

There are a couple of posts that I've made on Instagram that list things I looked into, probably beyond the limit of what a neurotypical person would do. Because I tagged them both with #AutisticAF (and just because I like the hashtag) I'm going with the title of Autistic AF Lists for this mini series that I'm starting here. Listing things and gathering information like this is probably one of the more stereotypical autism traits, but when it's something I find interesting I end up hyperfocusing. I find hidden links, references and easter eggs fascinating, so these are basically going to be patterns, trends or other curiosities that I've noticed in things and that I've been curious enough to look into further. This first part will look at where references to the Gruffalo pop up in the rest of Julia Donaldson/Axel Scheffler's series of children's books.

First of all, I'll quickly explain that there are no Gruffalo references in A Squash & A Squeeze because that's the only one of their books that came out before The Gruffalo, and also that I (my kids) don't have all of their books but we've got a fair few of them so we're going by the references that we've noticed from those ones. These are usually quite subtle so not always noticeable unless you go looking for them, but let me save you the time!

Tabby McTat
A child asleep in a push chair when Tabby McTat goes looking for Fred is holding a Gruffalo teddy.

[Image description: The titular tabby cat Tabby McTat looking up at a street magician's performance. Next to Tabby is a sleeping child in a red push chair holding a Gruffalo teddy which is sat upright and looking out to the front.]

The Scarcrows' Wedding
When Reginald Rake is built to replace Harry he tries to take Betty on a tractor ride. That tractor is a "Gruff-tor" branded one with a Gruffalo face logo.

[Image description: The blue tractor that Reginald Rake drives. On the side of the tractor is a short, grey stripe with a Gruffalo head on the end, and "GRUFF-TOR" written in capitals across the stripe.]

Stick Man
When Stick man rescues Santa from being stuck in the chimney there's a Christmas tree in the background with a Gruffalo face Christmas bauble. I think it's also worth noting that Stick Man as a whole is technically a Gruffalo reference because the titular character was inspired by Axel Scheffler's drawing of the Gruffalo's Child holding a stick figure in The Gruffalo's Child.

[Image description: The top image is a close-up of the green Christmas tree from Stick Man showing the Gruffalo's face as a decorative bauble. The bottom image is from The Gruffalo's Child, showing the Gruffalo's titular offspring looking confused while holding a stick figure very similar in shape to Stick Man.]

Zog
When Sir Gadabout The Great arrives to rescue Princess Pearl from the dragons you can see that his steed's saddle has a Gruffalo emblem on the side. It makes you wonder whether Gadabout had plans to/previously tried to slay the Gruffalo?

(We've actually lost our copy of Zog so can't take a picture for this one.)

Zog & The Flying Doctors
In Zog's sequel, Pearl's uncle (the king) is stricken down with orange fever. While she is tending to his bedside you can see that the Gruffalo's face is carved into the top part of his bed frame, similarly to the side of Gadabout's saddle.

[Image description: A close-up of the king's bed showing the Gruffalo's face carved into the top beam with plants framing it on either side.]

Superworm

When the bugs rescue Superworm by throwing Wizard Lizard in the rubbish dump you might notice that there's a teddy in the rubbish pile as well with its back turned, but its horns as well as its terrible claws and its purple prickles all over its back make it obvious that this is a Gruffalo teddy that's been cruelly discarded. Possibly by the same boy in the push chair? After all, Superworm was released 3 years after Tabby McTat.

[Image description: The Gruffalo teddy seen from the back in the rubbish dump. His top half and one arm is poking out of a cardboard box and he's surrounded by various other pieces of rubbish such as tins and what looks like a sugar bag.]

Tiddler: The Story Telling Fish

When Tiddler gets lost and is trying to find his way back home (very Finding Nemo-esque) he gets chased by a Gruffalo fish. I like this one because it's one of the more obvious crossovers and puts over the Gruffalo's fierceness from the original story, whereas all the other references so far have depicted him as a cuddly teddy or a status symbol in the form of an emblem.

[Image description: Tiddler is swimming in circles around a small pile of rocks with coral on the top. He is being chased by a Gruiffalo fish who has the Gruffalo's terrible tusks, his terrible teeth in his terrible jaws, his poisonous wart on the end of his nose, his orange eyes and purple prickles all over his back. The fish's body seems to be furry and brown just like the actual Gruffalo.]

The Highway Rat

At the end of the story when the Highway Rat ends up working in a cake shop it shows a couple of biscuits on the counter in the shape of the Gruffalo's face, and also a young wolf eating another one of them while his mum talks to the shop owner, who is ironically a sheep.

[Image description: Two Gruffalo biscuits on a plate on a wooden counter in front of a yellow till. There is what looks like a birthday cake on one side of the biscuits, and some sort of strawberry cake on the other.]

The only other story that we've got is Room On The Broom, but there doesn't seem to be any Gruffalo references in that and I don't understand why. If anyone's got an explanation or any other examples of Gruffalo references please let me know in the comments or on social media. On that note, please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

Explaining The Spectrum

The autism spectrum is something that's not well understood outside of the autistic community. It's confusing to the general public for 2 reasons that I want to explore here. First, the phrase "on the spectrum" which is used in an attempt to say "[x person] is autistic" in a politically correct way. The other thing is the way the spectrum itself works.

Addressing the first point, I want to make it clear that although people usually use "on the spectrum" with the best of intentions, autism isn't a dirty word. Nor is being autistic a bad thing. Autistic and autism are perfectly acceptable words to use to describe somebody who genuinely is autistic. Similarly, I wanted to give my point of view on when people say "We're all a bit autistic" or "We're all on the spectrum." These two statements at first glance appear to mean the same thing, but they really don't. The way I see it, everybody is somewhere on the spectrum, such is the nature of diversity. But with that said, it doesn't mean everybody is autistic - whether that's supposedly a little bit or a lot. Neurotypicality (I hope that's the right word!) in relation to the autism spectrum just means that the person's traits sit within the "normal" range and that they have a round profile (more on that later). It doesn't mean that their traits are nowhere to be seen on the spectrum. A lot of people may have a couple of traits commonly associated with autism such as a lack of social skills, or sensory issues, but what makes somebody autistic is their different brain structure causing a high number of these traits and a high intensity of them. So if somebody says to me that we're all on the spectrum I don't have an issue with that - in fact I completely agree. But if someone tells me that we're all a little bit autistic, that's not true. You're either autistic or you're not, there's no "little bit autistic" or "very autistic" and just having a couple of quirks doesn't mean you're autistic.

Moving onto the spectrum itself, a lot of people think that the spectrum is linear (a straight line from one extreme to the other). I know I did when I first realised the possibility that I might be autistic. In actual fact the spectrum is best represented visually as a circular graph. When you plot a person's traits on the graph you'll usually find that autistic people's traits make the graph spiky which represents their heighten skills, their deficits, their heightened/lowered senses, and any number of other factors that often vary wildly. Whereas neurotypicals will tend to show a more consistent and rounded graph as their traits and abilities are a lot more rounded. To demonstrate what I mean, below are screen shots of the results from an autism quiz that me and my wife both took a few years ago just to compare. The first one is mine, the second one is my wife's. You can see that hers is much more rounded and balanced whereas mine is more spiky showing my atypical tendencies.

[Image description: There are 2 images here. The first one is a graph showing my results of the quiz and shows that I have a spiky profile which I've always thought looks like a whale's tail. The second picture is the same graph but showing my wife's results instead. Hers is more round and consistent than mine.]

Although this test is in no way diagnostic, the graph that it gives of the results is very useful for explaining the spectrum and showing how spiky a neurodiverse profile is compared to a neurotypical one. While I admittedly don't know too much about other neurodiversities such as ADHD, dyslexia and so on, I think that their profiles would most likely be similarly spiky in comparison to neurotypical ones. Hopefully these graphs also help explain how although we're not all autistic we are all on the spectrum. I once posted on Instagram to demonstrate the spectrum using PlayDoh but it didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. Even so, feel free to search back through my Instagram to find it if you're intetrested.

I hope this has clarified something that is often confusing and busted a couple of myths in the process. Please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

Racism In Autism

I had originally scheduled a post on insomnia for this week, but with everything going on with Black Lives Matter and all the protests I thought it was important to address it now, as well as how racism had manifested in autism.

Obviously there are individual autistics who are racist just like there are individuals of every kind who are racist, and just like there are good and bad people in a more general sense, but what I'll be discussing here is the racism (whether intended or not) within the autism diagnostic process.

The diagnosis of people with autism has always been heavily biased in favour of white boys and men. I think the earliest we can look back to find the root of this is to the 1930's and 40's with Leo Kanner and Hans Asperger. I explained in a previous posts about how Hans Asperger worked closely with the Nazis who were a heavily racist German political party aiming to establish the German population as a superior race by eradicating others, famously including Jews. I remember someone saying to me years ago that their aim was to create a race of purely white skinned, blonde haired, blue eyed humans but now true that is I'm not sure.

With Asperger's heavy influence at the beginning of our understanding of autism, and the much more racially biased nature of the mid 20th century in general, it's little wonder that racism stuck around in the diagnostic system for such a long time. If I'm honest I do sometimes wonder how nowadays we're only just starting to properly understand autism, but I guess any progress is good progress, even if it's slow.

So how are people of colour affected in the modern day in terms of getting an autism diagnosis? First of all there's medical bias that could stop them from getting a diagnosis. This could mean for example that a doctor (especially an older one whose knowledge might be more outdated) may be may not refer a black person to an assessment service because they don't believe that they are - or even can be - autistic. Just to give an insight into how real medical bias is, my wife is a student midwife and highlighted this article to me which explains that women of colour are 5 times more likely to die in childbirth than white women. Obviously this is a huge difference and is clearly unacceptable.

Another factor that affects the diagnosis of people of colour is their location. One of the many things I learned from watching Netflix documentary 13th is that the "war on drugs" in the US was designed to target black people who were predominantly poor. So in relation to autism, especially in countries like the US where medical and health services are expensive, the autistic person is less likely to be able to afford assessment for a diagnosis.

The final point I want to make (although the points I'm making here are by no means exhaustive) is that other people's reactions and attitudes might be more likely to put them off seeking diagnosis. This ties in a bit with what I mentioned earlier about the attitudes from the 30's and 40's lingering for a long time. Their peers, family, colleagues and so on might have outdated views which can cause disheartening, or even worse it can cause argument and fall outs with the people they confide in.

All of these issues that I've discussed are reasons that we need to educate and inform the whole of society, which is absolutely what I aim to do with this blog, as do lots and lots of other autistic advocates through their blogs, YouTube videos, social media accounts, books etc. I feel like now more than ever education is needed around how autism presents and affects all races, genders, ages... everyone! As a final note I think it's important to share some links to black autistic advocates' pages. The best ones I can think of are AutisticTyla and Aspienelle. These links are to their Instagram accounts. Let me know about any more black autism advocates in the comments or on social media!

I really, really hope I've helped with this post. I know I say that about every post, but this one in particular is such an important topic as we're essentially missing out on a whole section of the autistic populaton. Please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

[Image description: The Black Lives Matter logo (a black fist raised upward) with the infinity loop in white on the wrist to symbolise that black lives really do matter whether disabled, autistic, otherwise neurodiverse, or anything. This is on a white background and underneath it is the post's title with "Racism In" in black, and "Autism" in rainbow colours.]

My Stims

I wrote a post a while ago about why I enjoy chewing. At the time that was my main stim. I do still chew my Chewigem button necklace, but my stims have evolved and changed since then. Either that or I'm just more aware of the things I do these days - maybe a bit of both. Because of that and because almost anything can be a stim I thought I'd go through a few more of the stims that I do.

Just as a reminder, stimming is short for self-stimulatory behaviour and the definition is a repetitive behaviour that appears to have no reason or purpose, although it helps autistics to regulate and ground themselves when they're overwhelmed or emotional.

Finger Stim (No idea what to actually call it!)
One of my more common stims that I've been doing for a while is running my thumb along the inside of my fingers on my right hand. I tend to do that when I'm talking to somebody as I'm often anxious during conversation. It's not usually something that I do consciously (which is the same for most of my stims) but I do notice myself doing it, and I think it's because it's quite a subtle thing to do, especially if I can put my hands in my pocket or something. I find that a lot of my stims are either subtle or "socially acceptable" which helps to avoid detection and awkward comments and so on. I also do it sometimes when I'm concentrating - in fact, I'm doing it now while I write this post. I tried to make gifs of my stims to demonstrate but I couldn't get it to work, so I'll just post a picture of each to help give you an idea. (Let me also apologise for my onesie and messy hair in the pictures. It was a busy day with the kids in self isolation, so I didn't get the chance to have a shower and get dressed until later on!)

[Image description: My hand during the above stim. In the image my fingers are held together and my thumb is reaching down to my little finger. While doing this stim I rub my thumb nail up along my fingers, past my index finger and back down again repeatedly.]

Flapping

It's only recently that I actually realised I'm a hand flapper. Turns out I've been doing it subconsciously for ages, but because the way I do it down by my side and with just 1 hand is very subtle compared to the traditional autistic hand flap it seems to have slipped under even my own radar. It wasn't until just a few days ago when I was tidying up in the kids' play room that I noticed myself doing it. Something else I learned not long ago about flapping is that there are actually different kinds of flap. Obviously there's my own subtle versions like this, and the classic flap where you hold your hands in front of you and flap them up and down with your arms. But it's also classed as flapping if you do it with just a wrist flicking motion similar to how you would shake water off your hands after washing them. It sounds obviously, but I guess it's just one of those things that you don't always register. It wasn't until I realised a flicking motion is also flapping that I realised what I do is flapping. I guess it shows what a difference subtlety can make.

[Image description: My hand down by my side while flapping.]

Leg Swaying/Jigging

This is probably the ultimate in subtle stims because even though it's often noticeable (I used to get told off for doing it by the girl I sat next to at one of my old jobs), it's something that almost everyone does at some point so it doesn't get questioned. I haven't posted a picture because all it's going to show is my leg, but while sitting with my foot on the ground I will either jig my leg up and down or sway it from side to side. I think I do both about equally. It's jigging up and down that I got told off for because we worked upstairs on quite a wobbly wooden floor.

Rocking

This is a classic autistic stim. Typically it's done when sat down and by rocking your upper body either forwards and backwards or from side to side. I also do a standing up variation, usually while I'm waiting in a queue for example, where I shift my balance from one leg to the other and back again to rock myself from side to side. Other than that, the times I've found myself rocking most were when my son was a baby and I used to do the night feeds. I was half asleep and I never used to realise I was rocking until my wife told me to stop it. It was probably just a thing my body did to try to keep me awake long enough to get through the feed until I could go back to sleep. I've also found myself rocking while sat with my kids reading stories or playing with Lego etc. Again, no point posting a picture because it's self explanatory and wouldn't show much.

Bouncing

The last one I'm going to mention is bouncing on my toes, which comes from when my kids were babies. I used to do it while holding them to bounce them to sleep or just settle them down and it's just carried on from there. I only do it at home and it's when I'm waiting for something like my tea to brew. When I'm bouncing I tend to wander around as well in bouncy steps. I try to keep some sort of rhythm to it but I think I usually fail, but it keeps me occupied.

[Image description: Me bouncing on my toes around my dining room. One foot is completely off the ground while the other has just the heel off the ground. I keep my heels in the air the whole time I'm bouncing.]

These are just a few examples. This list is by no means exhaustive for either me or autistics in general and it's always best to remember that everybody stims in one way or another. It's just that autistics usually stim differently, whether that's more noticeably, more often and so on. Don't forget to please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

Washing A Weighted Blanket

A lot of autistics - myself included - love weighted blankets. They're not only good for autistics from a sensory point of view, but they're also good for any mental health issues such as depression and anxiety. I always describe it to people as "a big, one-person hug" and I sleep under mine every night.

Obviously with me using it so much, and also with having 2 young kids around as well, it's bound to get dirty sooner or later. My daughter got mine dirty a while ago and it ended up sitting in the corner being unused for ages because I had no idea how to clean it. I eventually got round to finding out online how to clean it so I thought I'd explain how to do it here, as well as the mistakes I made so you don't repeat them.

First of all, weighted blankets do tend to be machine washable, although due to the weight of them it's best to hand wash them unless you've got access to an industrial washing machine. The same applies with tumble dryers.

Hand washing is simple. If you're washing the whole blanket you'll need a bathtub or something of a similar size to wash your blanket in. Regardless of how much of the blanket you want to clean you'll also need a mild detergent and somewhere to dry it. I'll explain the process here as though you're washing the whole blanket.

• The first thing to do is to fill your bathtub with enough lukewarm water to completely submerge your blanket, and add between half to a full cup of mild detergent depending on the size of your blanket. Strong chemicals, such as bleach for example, can damage your blanket so it's best to avoid them. Make sure the detergent is spread evenly by running your hand through the water.
• Put your blanket fully submerged in the water and gently clean it by kneading it. It's best to do it in sections so you know where you've cleaned and where you need to go next.
• Once you've cleaned it with soapy water, drain it all out of the bath and rinse the blanket all over with clean water, I used the shower rather than the bath tap as being able to move it freely made it a lot easier. Brush or swish the blanket with your hand to make sure all the soapy water has gone. Do this until the water from the blanket runs clean. When I cleaned mine the water coming from it was quite dark so it's easy to tell.
• Get rid of as much water as you can from the blanket, although in my experience you're not going to get rid of anywhere near all of it. Avoid wringing the blanket out like you would with most clothes as it can misshape the blanket. Instead it's best to fold it or roll it on top of itself and press on it to squeeze out the water. The tighter you roll it the better, although my blanket is too big to roll it effectively.
• The final stage is drying. You may need to think about where you've got the room to hang your blanket out to dry, which I found quite tricky. If it's the middle of summer and you have somewhere to hang it outside then it's easy enough but I had to get slightly creative with mine, which I'll go into shortly.

There are 2 mistakes that I made when I washed mine. The first one was that even though it was just a small area that my daughter got mucky I thought it was best to wash the entire blanket. I could have just washed the dirty area, which would have been a lot quicker and easier and I could have probably done it in the sink instead of the bath. The other mistake I made was that I assumed that I could just hang it up to dry on the kids' climbing frame in the garden overnight. The issue with that was that it was in winter and I underestimated how cold it'd be. My thinking was that even if the temperature doesn't dry it, it should still drip dry at least to a certain extent. I was wrong. I woke up in the morning to find it frozen solid. And yes, it was a stupid thing for me to do in the first place. After that I looked around in the house for where I could put it to dry next to a radiator. I ended up unfolding the decorating table on its side in the bedroom, and laying my blanket across it next to the radiator. I kept checking it every now and then and rotating it as it dried. So the lesson from that is plan ahead where and how you'll be able to dry it.

Hopefully this post has been useful as weighted blankets are quite popular among neurodivergents in general, not just autistics. If it's helped you or if it's been interesting please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

[Image description: Black and white outline image of a washing machine. The drum has water in it, and in the water is the text "10kg" as that's the weight of my blanket. Under the washing machine is "Autism" in rainbow colours and "Washing A Weighted Blanket" under that.]

Autism Myths

When thinking of autism most people will conjure up images of some sort of stereotype, quite often in the form of either Sheldon Cooper or Dustin Hoffman's Rain Man. While some autistics may have certain qualities and/or "super powers" reminiscent of these stereotypes, autistics are much more than just the visible traits seen in the media.

Fellow autism advocate Christa Holmans (Neurodivergent Rebel on YouTube) did a short series of "You can't be autistic because..." videos on her channel that addressed some myths around what people think autism is/isn't. Just because I think she's bloody brilliant I'm going to use one of the myths that she busted as an example for this post. In one particular video she addressed the myth that "You can't be autistic because you have empathy." While some autistics do lack empathy (I do struggle with empathy unless it relates to someone I know and/or care about) the majority of us find that we either have too much empathy, or we just don't know how to show it even though we're feeling empathy. These could result in any number of outward responses depending on the person. Some may be overwhelmed by their empathy, some may not show any outwards signs because they don't know how to, and for others like me it varies depending on the person or situation. For me, even if I do feel a lot of empathy I don't really know what to do with it. If it's my wife who's feeling upset for example, I'll cuddle her and try to talk to her even though I don't know what to say. I don't think I'm empathetic to most people, and overall I'm more empathetic towards animals than people.

Judging by my dad's reaction to me getting assessed for autism I think the reason he's not convinced is because all he can see is the stereotype that we're all severely handicapped and dependent on full time care. Our needs are many and varied, and each person's needs are different from each other. In my case, I've been holding down a full time job for 9 years until recent weeks (I'm still working but had to go part time due to unrelated circumstances), I'm happily married, I'm a dad of 2, I drive, I do a lot of other things that a stereotypical view of autism wouldn't allow. I'm hardly handicapped. And while I admittedly think I'd struggle to live fully independently I'm independent enough to do all of the things above. There are definitely things I struggle with such as dealing with finances and remembering self-care aspects if my routine has been disturbed but I'm far, far from the image that my dad has of autism.

There are misconceptions that we all have "super powers" in the vein of Rain Man who is able to instantly count the number of toothpicks being dropped. Some people do have intense skills not usually seen in neurotypicals, but not all of us do. I remember seeing something online a few years ago about an autistic artist who accurately drew the New York skyline purely from memory. In contrast I've got no intense skills that I know of, just a determined mindset when I'm trying to do something that sees me putting more effort in to achieve an outcome than neurotypicals would. When I used to go to the gym a lot in my early 20's my personal trainer told me I was one of the hardest workers in the entire gym. At work my team leader has got me involved in a project analysing the team stats because I like analysing figures and if I'm stuck I'll either keep working at it or ask for help from someone who knows what they're doing. It's this determination that gets me to where I want to be. In fairness, people with extreme skills might rely on determination like this a lot more than it seems from an outside perspective, but it could be a mix of society's view of autism as well as unseen internal effort that makes it look more natural and easy than it is.

People often don't consider that if somebody doesn't show any physical signs of disability it doesn't mean they're not disabled. Disabilities can also be mental/emotional, and regardless of whether it's physical or mental, a lot of disabilities can fluctuate meaning some days they're bad and some days they're not. Autism is referred to as the invisible disability for a reason and is legally considered a disability in the UK, although some autistics might not consider themselves disabled depending on how much it affects them in daily life. Things like sunflower lanyards are great for highlighting when somebody might have hidden struggles or need extra support while in a public space. In fact, I was recently on holiday at Butlins with the wife and kids, and when we were in the club one night for one of the shows there was a young boy at the table next to us with a sunflower lanyard. I did wonder if he was autistic but there are lots of other possibilities that it could be. Either way, I don't like to ask people if they're autistic - I let them approach me about it when they notice my "This is what autism looks like" hoodie, which has happened a couple of times recently.

These are just a few examples of the myths and stereotypes that surround autism, although there are many more. If this post has been interesting and you'd like to see more please click Subscribe at the top of the page and follow me on social media. I'm @DepictDave on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and you can buy me a coffee at my Ko-Fi account here.

[Image description: Question marks on a white background. The middle one is the biggest and is in rainbow colours to represent autism. The others are black, various sizes and scattered around the image. At the bottom of the image is the word "Autism" in rainbow colours and "Myths" directly under it in black.]