I was brought up very religious. We went to the Christadelphians – a sort of offshoot of the Baptists in the nineteenth Century who have some rather specific theological views including that Biblical prophecy is about to be realised, the world will end really soon, and Jesus will return to set up world government in Israel – for some reason. Christadelphians do not vote or join the military. If there is a war which involves conscription then they go to court as conscientious objectors so they don’t need to fight. They also don’t join trade unions and see a lot of things as being ‘wordly’. We were never meant to go to the shops on a Sunday because it was God’s day. We thought evolution wasn’t real. Some of the church members believed that the world was 7000 years old! Religion was a huge part of my life as a child and young teen. It was so nice to be firm in my beliefs and to know we were ‘right’… although even as a child I had my doubts. It seemed rather odd that I was born into the only ‘correct’ church! I asked my mum – the expert in all things theological in my immediate family – how we have managed to luck out and be born into the only correct religion. I actually don’t remember her response but even then, I realised that there were lots of options in the religion and faith space even within the Christians and it was pretty unlikely that the Christadelphians were the only ‘correct’ church!

I left the Christadelphians when I was 15. I joined the International Specialists. My dad joked that they were more Christadelphian than the Christadelphians! They also had a pretty specific set of beliefs and tried to recruit new followers and viewed other socialist groups as being on the wrong path. Someone once told me that if you put three Trotskyists in a room for an hour, they would form six factions! Socialism for me was just another belief system and yes, maybe for me at least, something of a religion.

Religion interests me. Nobody can really know that their beliefs are right, but people are so determined to believe what they do and so convinced it is the only right way that they will harm people who believe differently to them. Add countries and politics and it can get really unpleasant and result in justification for war and genocide. I always think that arguing about religion is a bit like arguing about your favourite colour. I don’t think religion actually tends to cause wars, but I do think it is used as a very strong justification to start them and to oppress people and justify violence. This has been going on for millennia, from the Crusades and before.

When I think about Christianity, I get quite confused. I have read the Bible many times in my youth and my understanding of Jesus is that he was a very accepting person and respected people of all backgrounds. The whole notion of Christianity seems to be based in love, forgiveness and kindness. There is nothing in the Christian scriptures where Jesus says ‘I accept everyone except for Queer folks. Go forth and be horrible to the gays and the transgender people.’ In fact, in the Bible Jesus was pretty frequently championing and defending people who were considered outcasts at the time, and he was pretty unimpressed by hypocrisy and people being judgemental. Christianity is meant to be all about love and being decent to everyone so why are so many (although definitely not all) Christians so judgemental around gender and sexuality? It baffles me. There is nothing in the Bible that says ‘love your neighbour…. unless they are trans or gay and in which case oppress and discriminate against them!’

Another issue I have is when people use the Bible to justify their bigotry. This often results in people on the receiving end feeling they need to defend themselves, but we shouldn’t need to. The Bible was written between 2000-3000 years ago, about the same time as ancient Rome was going on. Have you ever heard someone use Roman or Greek mythology to justify poor behaviour and bigotry? ‘Well Zeus was against that so if you do it you will go straight to Hades….’ Of course not and it sorts of puts it in perspective!

I am not anti-faith. I understand that everyone has their own beliefs and views about these things. Faith can be a source of strength and support during hard times. It can help draw people together – in a good was as well as a negative one – and it can help people through difficult times. My issue is where it is used to justify poor behaviour, be that of individuals, groups or nations. I have my own faith tempered by the knowledge that it is ‘wrong’ – I firmly believe we cannot understand the divine and our attempts to do so are just that – attempts but that is OK. Oh, and my favourite colour is purple and if you disagree you will go to Hell – where everything is green!! See, how silly.  

Autistic foils – including me – often have very intense interests and passions. My current ones are cats and autism and Queer advocacy which are very lovely passions and drive my career. Most of the autistic people I know have a passion or passions which range across a huge number of topics. Fandoms are one thing which lots of autistic people have for different things and tend to feed into passions. I used to have a big fandom for Harry Potter (before JK Rowling demonstrated that she is a scary transphobic bigot which sadly took the shine off my excitement for all things Harry Potter! I felt the need to give away my Harry Potter things – of which there were many!)

For autistic people a passion can be all encompassing, engrossing, exciting and engaging. Spending time on our passions frequently fills us with the wonderful thing that is Autistic joy. Passions are just lovely and can also change the world. I often say could you imagine if Mozart’s parents said, ‘stop obsessing about that piano Wolfgang!’ Or if Einstein’s boss said, “stop going on about space time would you!” Our world would be very different, and I suspect not anywhere near as good, if autistic people were denied our passions.

The perception of a passion when comparing autistic and neurotypical is interesting. I have an autistic friend who loves to knit. Knitting is one of her passions. She loves it and is extremely good at it – and I am very lucky to have a blue and purple scarf that she made me. However, if people think my friend is neurotypical, they tend to call her knitting a hobby. When they discover she is autistic they are more likely than not to call her knitting an ‘obsession.’ Why do our passions get called ‘obsessions?’ Well I suspect it is partially due to a good whack of ableism. If a neurodivergent person does something enthusiastically it must be a pathology or part of their neurotype and something to be somehow medicalised. However, I think there probably is also an obsessive element to many of our passions. This is not necessarily in a bad way but in the way they can be all-encompassing and how we prefer to spend time on our passions than pretty much anything else. Interesting to think about semantics and neurodiversity though. There is probably a whole post on the different words used to describe the same thing dependent on a person’s neurology!

There is another element of autistic passions which isn’t often spoken of but is real for a minority of people – including a younger me. This is the situation where the content of a passion is negative – either about something negative or leading to negative behaviour and acts – or both. When I was 13 for reasons still unknown to me, I became fascinated by nuclear war. I wasn’t frightened by it but instead I was completely fascinated by it. I probably would have been delighted if there was a nuclear attack. (Shortly before being dead, I suppose!).

I knew deep down that this interest was not very positive or helpful, but it was so engaging. It felt a bit like an addiction. I read all the books I could find – fiction and non-fiction, and watched some very dark movies. As with a lot of passions, I managed to take in information on my favourite subject as if by osmosis. We didn’t have the internet then but I somehow managed to get a hold of anything related to my passion and devoured it with great enthusiasm. I actually don’t know how I did that.

Sadly, the focus of my passion was pretty dire, and I suspect related to the fact that I was very unhappy due to significant bullying throughout my school career and being pretty much alone at school. I had no appropriate diagnosis until I was 20 and thought I was different to everyone in the world  – and unlike now where I am proud to be different, back then I would have given anything to be accepted by my peers. I spent several years seeking out negative outcomes, culminating in ending up in prison when I was 20 and having the next five years in and out of institutions and being homeless.

My passions after that have all been much nicer and I have changed my life so radically that you would barely recognise me now. I think passions are such a great thing for many autistic people. I feel for those who don’t have a passion or who are between passions. Having a passion is lovely and the joy a passion brings is indescribable and is just amazing.  

I think if people have a passion for something negative – like I did is a teen and twenty-something – this is obviously a cause for concern. I suspect a more holistic view to address things which may be pushing people toward the negative (for example bullying, abuse and / or clinical depression) might help. With kids and teens, forcibly removing the passion and things related to it is unlikely to do anything helpful and is likely to make things worse. It is far better to encourage a different interest (which admittedly may be tricky) and scaffold the person’s life to be more positive and for them to have self-esteem and self-confidence and build their sense of pride and community. This can take some time I should note. People who like and value themselves tend to not have a negative focus! I imagine it is more about understanding why they have a negative sort of passion and supporting them through any difficulties around mental health and self-acceptance.

In my experience, mostly passions are awesome. Spending time on a passion brings joy and is basically pone of the most enjoyable and engaging things you can do. I absolutely love my current passions and the fact that my current job is basically related to my passion is amazing.

My favourite passion is – and has always been – cats! This is my lovely tortie girl Sunflower who has lots of purrs and cuddles and a fluffy belly!!

I turned fifty a couple of weeks ago. Wow! I have no idea how that happened, but it did.

What does fifty-something Yennski do these days? I live in a wonderful home called Yennski HQ which has a lot of art, books and a resident kitty of the naughty tortie variety known as Sunflower (or ‘you furry menace’ or ‘my feline overlord’ or ‘smoochypants’…. Depending on the context! I am self-employed and do a lot of work around neurodiversity – and especially neurodiversity and employment. I am actually pretty happy at the moment – although I do have a habit of stressing about pretty much everything. I have significant mental health issues and need to take a lot of medication to manage this along with having some other health issues. I have some lovely friends, a great family and these days quite a lot of self-respect and confidence. I am an out loud and proud non-binary and Asexual person and most of the time I love what I do.

Fifty is interesting as it is half a century. Who knows if there will still be a Yennski in another fifty years – and how many books they will write between now and then! Given that I have been taking heavy duty mental health medication for 25 years I suspect I may not be around that long, but it is interesting to reflect on such things.

Had you told my 25-year-old self that I will still be here now and all the amazing things I have done I would have been very surprised. I want to reflect on myself at 25. I was a recently released ex-prisoner with a misdiagnosis of borderline personality disorder. I had aspirations of changing my own personal world and becoming what I termed ‘ordinary’ – to be a person with a professional job, an education, a mortgage and a suit. Within eight years I had all those things, despite significant barriers posed by my various health issues and how these were viewed, my criminal history and my pervasive anxiety around anything remotely employment related. My level of determination and motivation to change things has always been quite impressive. Sadly, I put my focus on negative outcomes for many years and so those were what I got. When I made an about face to focus on achieving positive things and my whole life changed for the better.

Along with getting a professional job and a mortgage (and more recently a small business), I also gained some wisdom and insight between ages 25 and 50. I am sought after in relation to a number of things, most of which involve neurodiversity on some way or another. I even have fans – including some children as I have published six kids’ books. When I discovered I had fans who were kids I thought all my authorial Christmases had come at once as when I was a kid, I loved books and their authors and wanted to be a writer when I got older. The idea that my own books might encourage and inspire other autistic kids to write books fills me with immense joy.

I know myself very well. Self-reflection and insight are some of my strongest skills. I had a psychiatrist tell me that around three percent of people with my illness have insight into their mental health. I am fortunate to be one of them and even when I am extremely unwell I can tell that something is wrong and that it is an illness and not reality. Insight is a big plus and enables me to manage some pretty significant symptoms without being destroyed, it also helps me understand others. The stereotype of the autistic person lacking empathy doesn’t work – and I can say that from my own expertise. I have a LOT of empathy in a variety of different ways and some of the insights I have around my own experience transfer into my understanding of others’ situations and my ability to relate and hopefully support them.

I actually like me. I didn’t used to me might add but I do now. I am nice and thoughtful and always try to be respectful. Of course, I fall short on occasion and screw up and do the wrong thing – everyone does. But overall, I think I turned pout OK despite difficult circumstances. Reflecting down my history I think I have made something very good out of something very challenging. I am grateful to everyone who has supported and encouraged me in my journey from there to here and those in my life at the moment.  

So go Yenn, enjoy fifty and here’s to fifty more!!

I have had inviable disabilities for a very long time – 50 years in fact! I am an AuDHDer, and I have a mental health diagnosis or three. Looking at me people can’t tell this. (Although I am pretty obviously autistic to anyone who knows anything about autism! Nobody has ever said ‘oh but you can’t be autistic….’ Despite one unhelpful psychiatrist in the 1990s who misdiagnosed me because he had no idea about autism and figured that because I wasn’t a boy, and I didn’t like trains that I must be neurotypical! Thankfully that doctor in no longer in my world – or in the world for that matter as he died a while back!! Let’s just say I didn’t attend the funeral and my misdiagnosis of borderline personality disorder died with him).

Amway, strangers encountering me on the street do not generally think ‘ooh, disabled’.   When I get a new job, I have to decide whether or not to disclose my disabilities (which I always do but there is still an element of choice involved). Lately this has all changed. I now have a physical / mobility disability condition – quite severe osteoarthritis in my knee. This is very unpleasant and is improved if I use a cane. So overnight I went from being someone who you couldn’t really pick as disabled by looking alone to being a person using a stick.

The stick – which is very lovely and has a brass cat for a handle – is an unassuming piece of wood which helps me walk more quickly and with less pain. But it also carries a bunch of additional meaning. Yesterday I went to my Asexual meetup in civic. I had my stick and as I was paying for my lunch at the venue I dropped a piece of paper. The person next to me instantly bent down and got it for me. Wow! I got on the tram and a teenager was sitting on the accessible seat. They saw me an instantly got up! Wow again. This is going to take a bit of getting used to! Someone even volunteered the information that they accessed the NDIS themselves! I didn’t really need to know that, but it was nice of them to share, I guess.

I am really not used to being identifiably disabled but I must admit I quite like it on one level. Some people carry a sunflower lanyard (with pictures of sunflowers, not a picture of my cat who is called Sunflower!). This denotes that they have a hidden / invisible disability. I have not used this, but it is a really good idea, especially in places like airports or on public transport.

The attitudes of some people around disability are really unhelpful. I told a friend who works in disability leadership about my cane and how one benefit of it is that I don’t get judged if I use the accessible seats on the tram and she said that I shouldn’t have to do that. She is absolutely right – I shouldn’t have to and nobody else should have to but the world we live in is filled with people who judge and make assumptions around disability. Another friend who uses a cane themselves jokingly said the good thing about using a cane is that you can thwack people on the shins if they give you a hard time! I may have to keep that in mind.

I have not had a mobility issue before except when I had serious burns in 1998 and lost muscle from my left leg and it took a while to be able to walk again. Apart from that I have always been able to get around unaided and without pain. It puzzles me that people treat me differently because I use a cane. I am the same person as I was without the cane. Thus far people have been lovely and respectful, but I know all too well as someone who has had various disability conditions for many decades that there are a lot of people who aren’t respectful and inclusive. The whole thing with perceptions is very strange.

I do like my cane – it helps me get around for one thing. I am not so keen on the arthritis which apparently doesn’t get better. If that’s the case by the time I am 60 I won’t be able to leave the house! However, I do try to be positive and as I often say, ‘You are Yennski – you will be OK.’ I now have the following health ‘things’:

• Autism
• ADHD
• Atypical schizophrenia
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Hashimoto’s disease
• Hypertension
• Osteoarthritis
• GORD

Nine things!! I think when they were handing these sorts of things out, I missed the instructions and kept going to the back of the queue!! Anyway, we all have things which influence our welfare and how the world treats us and understands us. I actually quite like some of my health issues, my autism makes me ‘me’, and my ADHD comes with ridiculous amounts of energy and the ability to make quick and good decisions.

I will be interested to see some more responses to visibly Disabled Yennski over the coming months. Hopefully they will be from a place of respect and support.

This statement is something which often gets called a microaggression. Something most likely unintentionally offensive but offensive, nonetheless. It is one many of us who belong to different ‘inclusion’-type groups come up against. There are a number of other variants – ‘you don’t LOOK autistic’ or my personal favourite ‘You shouldn’t say you are autistic – you could pass for normal’ (and someone did actually say this to me once! And worse still they said it at the launch event for one of my neuro-affirming and inclusive books written by a proud autistic person who doesn’t even know what normal is, let alone wanting to look like it!)

I have recently been diagnosed with osteoarthritis in my left knee. It is really painful most of the time and standing for long periods – such as on public transport – can cause a lot of misery in the Yenniverse. As such, sitting in the accessible seat it’s the best option but I don’t ‘look’ disabled, and I don’t ‘look’ old meaning I can cop a lot of judgement from well-meaning people. I have tried to address this by using a cane, but it is an ongoing issue.

Often the people doing this ableism have no idea they are being ableist and unhelpful. They think they are doing the right thing – making it almost impossible to take up the issue with them and get through to them!

The most glaring example of this – and sadly a very common issue – is accessible parking spots. People get shamed for using accessible parking spots by people who think they ‘don’t look disabled enough’ to use the space. Basically, if there is a sticker on the windscreen saying the person needs accessible parking then go by this, not some assumption that Disabled people who drive should have to have a wheelchair in order to qualify for the accessible parking spot! If the person has a sticker, then they are eligible for the access. Simple as that. Mobility issues do not just mean those that result in person needing to use a wheelchair or cane. Some people have fatigue issues meaning they can walk a bit but walking across the entire IKEA parking lot (or whichever business) would cause serious distress. Being the accessible parking spot ‘are you disabled enough?’ police does not help anyone and actually does more harm than good to Disabled folks.

A lot of the issues in this area relate to unhelpful assumptions. I will categorically say that you can’t tell someone’s disability by looking at them. Disabilities come in all sorts of different shapes and sizes. It is not helpful judging people based on assumptions in any area. These issues are to my mind in the top 5 of ableism issues. They are absolutely infuriating. And I shouldn’t have to use a cane in an attempt to convey my need for accessibility requirements. Nobody should have to justify their health conditions to a stranger on the bus! We really would be better off in a world where people didn’t assume and didn’t take it on themselves to be the accessibility spot police.

Basically:

• There is no disabled ‘look’
• There is no autistic ‘look’
• You can’t determine whether a person needs an accessible spot or other accommodation just by looking at them
• ‘Normal’ is not something people should aspire to – and probably doesn’t exist anyway.

And don’t get me started on disability and ‘inspiration’… although I think the is a whole other blog post!

Content warning – mental health issues

Autistic people tend to be more susceptible to overload and burnout than others. There are reasons for this which I will include here, along with some helpful strategies.

An autistic friend once told me that despite being very busy and managing a huge workload I probably didn’t experience burnout because I never mask. With Yenn what you see is what you get – and if neurotypical people have an issue with that I genuinely don’t care! I hadn’t thought of this, but it did make sense. Masking takes a lot of energy and when put in the context of other stressors can tip people into burnout. Burnout to my mind at least, happens when the amount of mental energy you are putting out in order to manage life is significantly more than the amount you are taking in. Burnout is often related to doing too much and it often relates to many separate things – meaning it can be difficult to identify what is causing burnout.

Burnout is basically a response to overload and overwhelm – too much of socialising and relationships, too much sensory input, too much work, too much concern around managing daily life (finances, going to the shops etc). Autistic parents also often experience burnout around raising kids. It can sometimes be hard to pinpoint what thing or things have triggered burnout give the many elements of our lives and the things which take a lot of energy.

The ‘fix’ for burnout involves either avoiding it in the first place or managing it once is has occurred. The strategies if you actually end up in burnout usually revolve around stopping doing the things that contributed to the overload – and often other activities too. while it is often not possible to stop doing EVERYTHING it really helps to excise the stressors causing the burnout if you can identify what this or these are. When I was a lot younger, I experienced overload based mostly on anxiety around a job I had. I got so overwhelmed that it triggered my schizophrenia and I ended up in hospital. The first thing I did was s quit the job I had – this did not make me instantly better, but it avoided further exacerbating the overload. It took me over a year to get back to my usually happy Yennski self. Burnout is a big deal!

A preferable approach to managing burnout is to avoid it happening in the first place. If you feel high levels of stress when doing something and you dread doing it than it might be bast to stop doing it if you can. We tend to struggle with this as humans and as autistic humans. We feel we HAVE TO keep doing something even if it is destroying us. Another Yenn employment example… In one of my recent jobs I was really struggling. I was so overwhelmed and stressed that I spent a lot of time on leave and found myself wanting to die. I figured that no job was worth losing my life for. I got out of there and managed to (just) avoid what I am imagine would have been a significant period of burnout. I was able to do this based on my memory of burnout in the past. I also knew that my workplace would survive if I left, nobody would die, and everything would actually be OK.

Many people think they can push through stress and overload and put off making any changes. They may worry about being judged if they cancel of postpone something. When a major stressor is employment it can be really difficult for people to leave given that it is their income. However,  by not responding to impending burnout they may have to take even more time and avoid doing things for a longer period.

A lot of autistic people have something called alexithymia, also known as emotion blindness. It does not mean that a person lacks emotion – far from it! What it means is that a person struggles to articulate their emotions. It can mean that high levels of stress and overload can go unnoticed, often leading to burnout. It can help to listen to friends and family members if they are concerned about you getting burned out. Others may notice things about how you are presenting to the world and if you seem to be  overloaded, overwhelmed or highly stressed.

There are some things you can do to support your mental health and energy levels and avoid burnout:

• Try to be aware what experiences are causing you high stress and reduce or stop doing those if possible
• If you go into burnout then you may need to stop doing all but essential things
• Be aware that it is not the end of the world to not do something or postpone something
• Take time to do things which make you feel relaxed
• In terms of burnout, prevention is better than cure – i.e. it is much easier and less traumatic to avoid getting burned out in the first place
• Seek support for stress, e.g. from a competent psychologist or psychiatrist
• Remind yourself that your mental health is critical. If you have to postpone something or stop doing something it is not the end of the world.
• Remind yourself that with support and care burnout will pass – it tends to be a transient experience
• Strategies can include spending time attending to your needs as an autistic person – such as stimming, spending time on a passionate interest and spending time with autistic peers
• Sleep and take rest where you can
• Create a sensory friendly space for yourself / stim
• Spend time with people that understand you
• Assertiveness and setting boundaries around your workload and social communication are also important
• Reduce your workload and / or social load 
• If thinking about doing a task or activity fills you with high anxiety stop doing it (providing it is something you can avoid doing). If you can’t stop doing something then seek support in order to do it
• Be aware that many people experience burnout. It is not a failing or flaw and it doesn’t make you less competent as a human being. Try not to apologise or blame yourself 
• Give yourself time. Burnout can take a while to resolve
• Burnout is not something which goes away – autistic and neurodivergent people are susceptible to burnout their whole life. It is a matter of identifying when it is a risk and supporting yourself to avoid it taking hold.
• Where possible, avoid doing the things which contributed to your burnout in the past.

Being able to manage these things can make a big difference.

Reframing Autism has some helpful information around burnout as well – Autistic burnout

I used to be poor. I lived in public housing and my income mostly came from Centrelink. I had very little choice in things like where I lived or what I spent my time doing. I received Centrelink benefits from 1995 – 2007, mostly the disability pension. I could not work despite wanting to. My anxiety around employment was significant. My life then was very different to my life now. These days I have good savings, have a mortgage on my apartment and earn my cash from being self-employed. My attitudes are very different, I am much more confident. I used to work in the public service. I went straight from disability pension to public service. My income quadrupled! It was wonderful.

I don’t really want to talk about poverty though – although it’s probably a topic which needs to be explored so I will add it to my blogs to write list. What I want to talk about today is kindness. The often quite small things people can do to make a difference. One very unhelpful stereotype around autism is that we are all arrogant, thoughtless people that don’t care about anyone other than ourselves. This is a really crappy stereotype and not in the interests of me or my neurodivergent peers, friends and colleagues, and it is also a very long way from the truth. Autistic people tend to be very thoughtful of others and very kind. We might express it differently sometimes but we – adults and kids alike – tend to want a kinder world for those we love and care for.

Anyway, in my own life I have experienced a lot of kindness, and especially when I was poor. People say you shouldn’t give poor people money although I am not 100 per cent sure why this is. When I was poor, I had two people give me what to me was a lot of money and it was a lovely and very helpful thing. The first was my dad. Out of the blue he sent me and my brother a cheque for $1000 each. It was so nice and actually made a big difference in my life at the time. The other one was one of my former socialist comrades. In 1993 there was so a protest in Melbourne and the police were, might I say a little overenthusiastic in the use of their batons! Lots of us got injured and some of the protesters successfully took the police to court. I was not part of the case due to various circumstances (I was in prison – long story – chapters 6-8 of my autobiography if you want more info!!). Sometime later I saw my former comrade at a socialist book stall, and she gave me a cheque for $1000 as well, part of the payout from the court case which my comrade thought I was entitled to even if I wasn’t part of the court case.

I have had people demonstrate so much care and kindness to me over the years. I have a lovely friend who was my main support when I was unwell with my mental illness in 2019-2021. Because COVID and lockdowns were happening the hospital staff questioned my friend for visiting as you could only have one visit a day so it should be your partner or family. My friend took to saying she was my sister – and a very supportive and loving sister she was! And don’t worry, my family were not being slack in not visiting me – they were interstate, and I definitely got some visits form them too just not all the time!

Kindness is sometimes very easy to do, and the impact can significantly outweigh the effort the kindness took. I want to make sure I am kind and that my actions and statements help people and empower others to feel supported, included and respected. I actually struggle with people not being kind. To my mind there are people who are meet someone vulnerable and look for ways to exploit or abuse them and then there are those who want to help. I don’t actually understand the first of those attitudes. My aim is to leave the world a little better when I depart  than it was when I came in.

Kindness and thoughtfulness can make such a difference. I am grateful to everyone who has shown and continues to show me kindness. So put some good in the world and rock the kindness casbah!!!

In 2013 I wrote what would become my second Yennski book. It is a book for autistic teens to support their entry into the workforce. The book is called The Wonderful World of Work. The funniest thing about this book was the feedback I received. The day it came out someone posted a review basically saying the world of work for autistic people is anything but wonderful. This was the first feedback I received, and it got me a little concerned! I wondered if maybe I should have called it something different? Perhaps ‘The OK, challenging and sometimes fraught world of work’? Not sure. The good thing was that everyone else seemed to love my positive and encouraging take on employment and autism.

Work is a pretty important part of life for lots of people. Autistic people face discrimination and exclusion at work. The statistics are worrying to say the least. The unemployment rate for autistics is significantly higher than that for neurotypical people and also higher that for people with disability more generally (using the term ‘disability’  reflecting the human rights and social models of disability rather than the medical and deficits-based view). Autistic people face discrimination in recruitment with things like interviews and CVs required for most roles.   These processes do not favour autistic applicants. There are alternatives available such as work trial activities instead of interviews, but these are rarely used despite being effective for neurotypical applicants as well as their neurodivergent colleagues.

Anxiety is a big issue at work. I spent many years unable to work due to high anxiety and perfectionism. I would have dearly loved a job, but at that time it was impossible. I had to put in place a range of strategies and incrementally more challenging steps to get to the point that I could work full time. I ended up in the public service and stayed there for just over 17 years. I mostly enjoyed being a public servant, but it was full of unwritten rules and my colleagues and managers tended to be very different to me! I was one of a very small number of people in my office with vibrantly coloured hair! And I always figured if I was wearing something to the office it was office attire! Mostly my managers and colleagues were OK with my quirkiness but there was always a clear difference between me and my colleagues – how I presented, identified, thought and approached the work.

I left the public service earlier this year to become Yennski the business! Absolutely amazing, liberating and completely terrifying! I do really love being my own boss. I work at home and get to spend time with my kitty which is amazing, plus my work is now exclusively related to neurodiversity and Queer advocacy – which are my passionate interest. So basically, I get paid for doing something I absolutely love. Just wonderful – and I wish I had done it ages ago. Being a business results in some things I hadn’t anticipated. The first is my attitude to money and income. I am now very careful with my money and don’t generally buy things I don’t need. When I was a public servant I didn’t think twice about spending money but now I am hyper careful. The other thing is uncertainty and patience. I spend a lot of time waiting to be paid and waiting for responses to pitches for work. I am NOT a patient person, so this is an ongoing challenge. I have to tell myself not to bother the people I am working for! Mostly I am loving being self-employed – and Sunflower kitty loves having me home. Thankfully thus far I am earning enough money to pay the mortgage and other essentials (like cat food and books!) I have a big spreadsheet tracking my income and expenditure – gotta love Excel. I juts had a very long conversation with someone signing people up for Save the Children. I am way too frugal to take on new charity donations and he was very persistent! Thankfully I could do assertive at an Olympic level these days so I managed to escape without committing myself to lots of expenditure I can’t afford!

One thing which really bothers me is when autistic advocates and spokespeople who come from privileged backgrounds and assume anyone who is unemployed – including their autistic peers –  is not trying hard enough. One commentator famously said that autistic people who are unemployed should ‘get off their butts and get a job.’ I was on a panel a while back and one of the panellists – a straight, white, cis gender, heterosexual, middle class man (who had pretty much all the elements of privilege in exception to his being autistic)  – said that autistic people who are unemployed were being ‘lazy.’ As an autistic person who spent twelve years desperate to work but being unable to due to anxiety and mental health issues (among other things) I find these sorts of statements highly offensive and unhelpful. More often than not, unemployed people – autistic or otherwise – want to be employed and if they are not then there is a genuine reason for this – not them being ‘lazy.’ I feel privileged that I got to work in government administration for 17 years and I feel privileged that I can be a business and get paid for doing things I love.

It is important to also note that not working is not a failing. Some people can work, some can work sometimes but not always and some cannot work at all due to a range of reasons. There should be no judgement around whether or not a person can work. Employment is not a measure of a person’s worth or character.

My world of work at the moment is pretty wonderful. I wish a wonderful world pf work to everyone who wants one. I think the workplace generally could benefit from some more understanding and respect of neurodivergent people. Things have been changing in this space recently, but I think they need to change more to ensure those who are able to work find a suitable job. And within those jobs that they are supported through inclusive recruitment processes and are accepted and respected in the workplace. There is a wealth of evidence around the benefits of companies hiring neurodivergent staff so employers can definitely benefit from having us in the workplace too – and we can hopefully benefit from being there too. I really do want everyone to have a wonderful world of work – whatever that may mean for them.

Today, 18 June, is neurodivergent pride day. Big yay to that! So, what do neurodivergent people have to be proud about? Well actually quite a lot. I can’t speak for anyone else but pride for me is about survival, respect and sharing my perspectives with a world that doesn’t always appreciate or understand them. I am a very proud autistic and ADHD (also known as AuDHD) person. However, this was not always the case.

I was diagnosed as Autistic in 1994 when I was twenty. The other thing to know about twenty-something Yennski is that they were a prisoner with some pretty significant drug issues and a very negative attitude. They masked and camouflaged in order to survive as an autistic prisoner. When my younger self received their autism diagnosis, they really didn’t like it – or accept that it was correct. Surely they were a big tough criminal? Yup, I was so good at masking that I even convinced myself. Pride was a long way off!

It took me seven years to accept my autism and a further eight years to properly embrace it as a core part of who I am. For a long time I was more comfortable telling people I had been in prison than I was to tell them I was autistic!

Thankfully there were some lovely positive influencers in my journey who helped me to come to a place of pride. The main one was my former autistic mentor Polly Samuel (who is sadly no longer with us). Polly supported me to write my first book – this we s a huge step on my road to acceptance and pride.  My parents were also really helpful. So now I am extremely out loud and proud as an AuDHD person, author, advocate, consultant and influencer – and human servant to my feline overlord, Sunflower the naughty tortie!

We all carry our own history and journey to pride. While the expectation seems to be that autistic people getting a diagnosis immediately embrace it and have a sense of pride this is not always the case, and that is actually OK. My own story demonstrates this. We all walk our own path.

I am now extremely proud to be me and embrace and celebrate my neurodivergences. I am proud of a number of things about my neurodivergent self. These include:

• Determination
• Empathy
• My various ‘gifts’ and twice exceptional skills
• My love for nature – and cats!!
• My work as an advocate
• My wonderful Yennski books – all 18 of them!
• My neurodivergent peers and friends
• My creativity
• The fact that I have overcome immense barriers to get to where I am
• My various Queer identities

So, to all my neurodivergent friends and compatriots I say get your pride on! Of course, every day is neurodivergent pride day in my house – and it should be everywhere. But having a specific day is a great way of highlighting our reality and the great insight, value, power and strength we so frequently bring to the world – Or just the fact that we exist as neurodivergent people and all that migt entail  So go forth, be proud, change the world and be your own wonderful and amazing you.

And this image is a historic Yeme so says Autistic pride day – I don’t have an updated one for neurodiversity pride day but you get the picture!!

I had the absolute privilege to MC a presentation by autistic advocate and author, my friend and co-author, the wonderful Dr Wenn Lawson today. I always love seeing Wenn present as he is a fantastic speaker and has a wealth of knowledge in a number of areas. One of Wenn’s areas of interest and significant expertise is the concept of object permanence.

What is this you may ask? I asked Google which provided this explanation: Object permanence means that you know an object or person still exists even when they are hidden and you can’t see or hear them.

Clinicians used to think (and many unfortunately still think) that autistic people lack empathy meaning we can’t understand what others are experiencing.

The idea of autistic people not lacking empathy per se but instead having difficulties around object permanence is a view which has more recently been adopted and to my mind offers a more accurate – and more inclusive – view. This suggests that autistic people are not aware that someone or something exists if we cannot ‘see’ them. Some people worry that their family and friends don’t exist until they are actually standing in front of them. My own experience of this is that if someone is late that I think they won’t turn up and I will be waiting forever. And I think if someone doesn’t respond to an email or message that they are never going to do so. Mixed in with my impostor syndrome and rejection sensitive dysphoria and you can probably imagine the resultant stress. In fact, I am stressed about this right now!

I will explain… I am working with an organisation that I haven’t been working with for long. I had to amend a document and send it back. The manager has not responded yet. Logic tells me she is probably busy or doing something else. Despite logic, I still called her and she didn’t pick up the phone – this catapulted me into thinking I had somehow offended her! This is an object permanence issue. Without reassurance, I assume that the employer will stop working with me and all sorts of other dire things because I cannot hold that event or relationships in my mind. I assume the opportunity will just disappear. I call myself the follow up fairy because I am a shocker for following things up for this very reason.

The anxiety caused by object permanence issues can actually damage your career and relationships. Many years ago I was invited to give a keynote alongside Temple Grandin and Tim and Judy Sharp. This was early in my advocacy career and I was absolutely delighted and very excited about this opportunity. However, I could not ‘see’ the event so I needed reassurance from the organisation hosting the talk. I would have called them at least once every week often more than that! I wasn’t asked to do the presentation the next time it was held and I am sure my stressy-ness about it probably contributed to that decision by the host.

And I do need to talk about empathy here because understanding around these things is closely related. Autistic people have all sorts of different experiences of empathy. Some people have very heightened empathy and can pick up on the feelings of people around them as is by osmosis. Some autistic people are highly thoughtful and kind. And then some have low empathy. Often we have ‘better’ empathy for other autistic people and less for our neurotypical peers. This does not mean we lack empathy – far from it. In fact neurotypical people tend to have less empathy for autistic folks than they do for their fellow neurotypicals.  Autistic academic Dr Damian Milton has written and presented widely on this through the concept of the double empathy problem.

I find my object permeance issues quite frustrating and wish I could just relax for a little bit and know that the most likely reason is usually the correct one and just because I can’t keep it in my mind does not mean it doesn’t exist or isn’t going to happen. For example conference organisers are almost certainly not going to change their minds and cancel my talk on a whim but I am always worrying about this because I cannot ‘see’ the event or my participation in it!  Even if I can’t see it, I don’t really need to constantly reassure myself that everything is OK, my work still exists and people are still there even if they do not remind me of that all the time.  

I think we need more understanding of object permanence as it explains a lot about the experience or many autistic people.

And here is a link to Dr Wenn Lawson’s website: https://www.buildsomethingpositive.com/wenn/ and Wenn’s YouTube site: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCD8L-Ht_jSQxBmWe6MzZvJA