Fireside fidget spinners

And validating autistic communication styles.

We are having a (South!) polar blast down here in Aotearoa New Zealand. This morning New Zealanders were asked by power companies to limit electricity usage as a surge of usage was anticipated, and the supply was not expected to cover demand. Which pretty much sums up my week, with my family directly affected by government-enforced job cuts, and my Mum having planned surgery in the UK (which has been a success, yay!).

Last night I went out to our wood shed for the first time this year, as our Antipodean Winter is rapidly closing in. I chopped kindling and wielded the axe with the very force you would expect from an angry midlife woman. No apologies. It was extremely cathartic. Five stars, would recommend. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I then methodically filled the wood basket and hauled it back to the house, where we now have displaced native bush cockroaches fleeing for all the corners of the lounge, much to my cats’ delight!

Photographed here is our first fire of 2024, and it roared fiercely, exuding all the calming reassurance we needed, albeit for a short time. I am enjoying how curated this photo looks, because had I pointed the camera lens in any other direction, you would now instead see what a messy hoarder I actually am. This was not a deliberate Insta style choice, just a happy fluke!

Yesterday morning I visited a friend whose wood burner is always wonderfully alight, and we sat by it’s heat with steaming mugs of coffee, setting the world to rights. Although I must admit I had to sit by an open window as I was hot flushing and felt like I was inside a furnace.

Our homeschooled kids are differing ages, but we enjoyed the comfort we felt in discussing their abilities that are similar regardless of the number of years they have spent growing up thus far. We are all autistic, some of us formally diagnosed (*raises hand*), others not, but we all self-identify as neurodivergent.

As we ranted, it occurred to us that autistics are accepted to have lagging skills but are that we are expected at some point in our lives to “catch up”. With or without early interventions (cringe) or appropriate support. We played a game with all the children, then let them all pick a participation prize afterwards. Once the game was over, each child had to wait their turn to select something from the prize table. The prizes were all different and sparked varying levels of joy to each individual. Her child spotted a fidget spinner, taking an instant liking to it. They waited their turn to claim the chosen toy, and had already surreptitiously pocketed it, then showed it to us when it was their turn.

This seemed like a genius idea to me! They had cleverly hacked the system. Unfortunately both my friend and I were well aware that this action would not be well received in a mainstream setting, where everyone is expected to “wait your turn”, “get what you are given”, and other phrases I can recall from school that still make me feel physically sick.

I admitted that I would have done the same as them even now, if I were in that situation. I see it as cruel to expect autistics to behave in the same way we expect from everyone. Social conformity and suppressing our own instinctive actions is dangerous to us, since it makes us feel wrong for being who we need to be in this world. It demands us to camouflage our behaviours, which is exhausting and leads to inevitable burnout.

No doubt while my friend’s child was choosing their prize and awaiting their turn, they would have been rehearsing a script in their head over and over again. Trying to figure out a verbal explanation that would be acceptable in a social environment. In that situation, I would also be experiencing a visceral reaction to having to find words, arrange them into an intelligible explanation, and feeling my face burn and redden as I anticipate a telling off from the authority figures present. Which would send me into a shame spiral, as I think about how that item must be mine and only mine, and that we must never be parted. My new BFF fidget spinner and I would have such amazing adventures together. I would already be able to hear its metallic tinkling as I spun it in my hands, watching the light reflect from each concentric circle in turn…

Photo by Soothy Spinner on Unsplash

Then the words would either all burst out of my mouth in a nonsensical rapid jumbled bleurgh of words (ADHD me), or I would feel the words all coagulate in my throat, forming a ball that I can not verbally work around (autistic me). Either way, it would not be well received and nor would I. Luckily for us, homeschooling groups are chock full of neurodivergents, whether they identify as such or not, and this would largely be an acceptable action and communication style for us, within a safe community.

Explaining ourselves and trying to hide our true selves in society is just such hard work, usually precluding us from doing the work expected of us in school and work.

Is it any wonder we are so burnt out by the time we reach midlife?

Autistic behaviours need to be accepted, and our natural communication styles are varied and individual. Society needs to stop looking at autistic people as lagging in social and emotional development - we are on an entirely different trajectory!

We thrive when we are in neuro-affirming community, which is what the “Find Your Tribe” rhetoric promotes. Going off script can be frightening and intimidating for us. It causes unnecessary anxiety and stress. Often we self-medicate with substances and compulsions ion order to cope, when our special interests (“Spins!”) should be enough to delight and fulfil us. Being expected to make small talk is frustrating, when we have burgeoning amateur self-taught theses to tell you about! If only people would listen without expecting us to look deep into their eyeballs - ouch.