Hello and welcome to my blog. The first thing I will say is I am not a writer but that's not really what this blog is supposed to be about. Daft I know, its a blog! I decided to start to this blog for a number of reasons. I was diagnosed with Aspergers syndrome a few years back now, I found it really difficult to navigate the process; discovering what Aspergers is, where I can find help and guidance and not only that managing my family and work life. It's not easy to go through a process like that for neurotypicals, never mind when you struggle with communication and change amongst other impairments as a non neurotypical! Very quickly I found out that actually there is very little help out there post diagnosis. My employer was ill equipped to deal with my diagnosis more through lack of experience as opposed to willing. I therefore spent quite a bit of time banging my head on the metaphorical brick wall before deciding enough was enough, last year I embarked on a journey to boost my knowledge on the subject and have recently completed a qualification in understanding Autism. This was a brilliant course and excellent for those who dread mixing, an online course funded by the Fire Brigades union. They are a great and provide a wealth of learning in a variety of subjects, and no you don't have to be employed by them.
Over what will hopefully be the coming days and months I will endeavour to post about what's going on in my life and how I now make my own adaptations for situations I dread. At the moment I have a few aspie dreading things going on;
I am buying a new car, no fun at all walking into big showrooms and onto forecourts. I have devised a couple of my own cheats and tactics to avoid putting myself in those positions whilst also getting a great deal, stay tuned and I will share them with you.
On the 25th May my beloved Tranmere Rovers or The Super White Army, will be appearing at Wembley in the league 2 playoff final, amazing! I have my ticket but I most definetly am not looking forward to it! One aspie multiplied by an all seater 90k stadium, the best and noisiest fans in the country, a 700 mile round trip I never drive and a full car equals chaos and meltdown, lets see how it goes!
Before The Super White Army march on Wembley I will be attending my daughters ballet recital, not perhaps as big of a venue as Wembley but definitely enough people and madness to cause some problems.
We've got three horses or ponkies as the kids refer to them, they've just moved home so thats a bit of nightmare at the moment. A new place for them equals horse stress, a new place and new people for me equals me stress! I am currently in the phase of keeping my head down, making no eye contact, shuffling about as quickly as possible and generally speaking to no-one. Obviously I guess the other owners all think I'm rude but I'll deal with that in due course.
I'm waiting for a promotion in work, just dealt with the interview and selection phases, successfully navigated them thanks to some reasonable adjustments this time round, its only taken seven years! It did involve a little bit of meltdown and a lot of stress. Not content with that in my working life I moved departments at the same time, about 4 months into that now and just about selling down. I've past the eyes down shuffling phase and a little more comfortable speaking to my new team mates. No doubt I'll settle down fully and it will be back to square one when my promotion comes through! I'll post the info on how I went about seeking reasonable adjustments and how I felt they worked out for me, so be sure to come back.
As if I wasn't in for enough punishment and stress I will hopefully be running in the Chester marathon in October so currently training for that, Ill worry about the crowds and mayhem in a few months time! If you aren't a running buff its definetly something to consider getting into, its certainly helped me to deal with my sensory processing disorder. Not only does running act as a stim it gets you fit and healthy. It's free, you don't need to mix with anyone, something all us aspies love, pop your earphones on and get out on the street, best of all you don't look out of place alone!
One of the ponkies in full flight!