Autism
My mother used to encourage me to be myself, to be proud of myself. In many ways I was privileged for having that, and yet I still grew up uncomfortable in my own skin. I was the weird kid. I had narrow and intense interests, I would sit in class
Autism
As self-advocates, we are often met with suggestions of how we should discuss ourselves. It's deeply frustrating because it suggests that we have forgotten our own humanity, but unsurprisingly, we do not need to be reminded that we are people. You will hear me use identity First language
Autism
Anyone who is even vaguely familiar with the addiction recovery community will likely have come across the twelve-step program in one form or another. Alcoholics anonymous, cocaine anonymous, narcotics anonymous, the list goes on. There are many different groups employing the twelve-steps, and it is often what addiction treatment services
Autism
I would like to start by thanking my good friend for bringing this issue to my attention. I would not have thought to write on the topic without that person, and it is such a very important topic. Being an advocate is weird. For most of us I think it
Autism
By now I'm sure some of you will have come across discussion surrounding a debut feature film by Sia, if you haven't, you can read about it here. It has raised many concerns over ableism in the film and television industry. The film centres around a
Autism
Many people ask me how I found sobriety, what changed in me to trigger that growth. I honestly think that might be the wrong question, not to mention awfully difficult to answer for most people in my position. The question that I think needs to be asked, is why didn&
Autism
Perhaps I am a little early on this, after all, we still have around 6 weeks left of this year, but it felt right at this point to reflect on the year from my autistic viewpoint. December 31st 2019, I had my usual gathering with my friends, but this time
Addiction
Growing up alongside an addict I had heard the phrase "clean and sober" thrown about by many people (interestingly, not my family). When I became an addict myself, I quickly learned of the stigma surrounding drug and alcohol addiction, even at a time when I did not recognise
Autism
Diagnosis is a privilege, it's a fact known by many in the autistic community. Beyond this, there are other issues with diagnostic criteria and how they were developed, but specifically I want to zoom in on one issue; the diagnostic criteria seems to be based on autistic people
Autism
Autism. What does it feel like? This was a question posed to me in a facebook group today. I'm not sure exactly what the person asking was looking for, but it is actually an incredibly complex question. So naturally, I'm going to try and answer it
Mental Health
It's no secret that mental health services in the UK are chronically underfunded. Our current government has expressed time and again it's disdain for universal healthcare, and has funded it accordingly. As a result of this under-funding, mental health services in the UK now operate a
Uncategorized
If you have followed my work, I think it's likely that at some point in your life you may have experimented with recreational drugs at some point in your life. I don't say this because I assume that my followers are drug-users, I say it because