April is National Autism Awareness Month, and April 2nd is our designated Awareness Day (since April 1st might have been problematic).

You all are plenty aware, as are many.

“Hey, Hunter, since it’s Autistic Awareness Month, I wanted to say that I’m more aware of your autism.”

Ok, that’s great.

We need to start moving past this basic awareness and into action.

And, lo and behold, even the Autism Society says it:

[W]e want to go beyond simply promoting autism awareness to encouraging friends and collaborators to become partners in movement toward acceptance and appreciation.

Acceptance and Appreciation.

Dang, y’all.

Do you even know what you’re asking for?

Accepting things like me not functioning professionally in group working sessions and needing time to myself to work on things?

Appreciating my too-often clumsy bluntness that still cuts through inefficiency and into truth?

I’ll admit I still have a lot of rough edges, but in the end:

We need less awareness.

We need more acceptance and appreciation.

We work hard to meet you where you’re at, surely you can return the favor.

SO!

In the next few posts, I hope to tackle some of these tough topics of acceptance, appreciation, the “right kinds of awareness”, this puzzle piece thing (?), and maybe even why autism is a key element of inclusion and diversity (!)

Happy April, all!

I’m good at maybe one or two things. Three, tops.

You’d think it would make sense to just let me do those things. They’re not arson, larceny, or crimes, either.

I remember talking with my friend Josh, and they’d gotten Michael, their son, into track. Michael’s autistic, and he’s an energetic boy, only more so. He loves to run.

My thought?

This totally makes sense.

He loves running. Getting him into track, which involves running, is logical. This makes sense.

Permitting a passion with a purpose is key!

Sadly, I have one very fixating obsession: vacuuming.

My house has dogs, and it has carpet. Do the math.

When it is time to vacuum, it is time to vacuum. I’m more rote and robotic than a Roomba would be here. I bought my expensive vacuum as a luxury item, and I enjoy vaporizing the dog hair and making lines in my carpet.

You would think this would go unopposed!

But no.

“Do you have to vacuum RIGHT THIS SECOND?”

“Can’t this wait until we’ve done XYZ?”

“Dad, I’m trying to watch Netflix!”

The Life Autistic is driven by extraordinary propulsion for doing ordinary things.

It’s almost an unstoppable force.

Which is why — if it’s something productive — just let it roll.

It’s like interrupting a golf swing to stop.

It’s like hijacking our logic (good task = do) to bring to a halt.

When my mind and body converge to say, it’s TIME TO VACUUM – y’all, this house is getting vacuumed.

It sucks, I know.

But if it’s good, let it go, k?

 

 

Someone asked me what “the Hunter experience must be like.”

I wanted to joke and say “terrible,” but the question gave me pause.

It’s not something I’d wish on anyone.

Especially the migraines.

Autism and migraines apparently have a small relationship, a sort of fling. I’m stupidly fortunate not to suffer from many health related issues, but shoot — I’d give migraines away if I could.

Migraines are worse for autistic people

Yeah, neurotypicals can suffer from them as much as the next person, but they tend to be an unfortunate complicator to those of us on The Life Autistic.

Why?

We already feel bad (or at least a little ashamed) of our particular preferences

When I insist on keeping it cold, it’s not because I’m a robot (well, uh, anyway) — heat is a trigger. My avulsion to flourescent lighting is already odd, but when it’s migraine time, it’s critical.

My autism is already enough to generate sneers, but when it’s “oh AND for other reasons,” I’m already less thrilled about making insistence.

We also hate how it comes across as a crutch

It’s been more than once, but me needing to “go have a moment to myself” when there are too many people over, too much going on — it’s awkward AF to do that, even when it’s a legitimate migraine missile and not just “generally being autistic.”

It too often invites the question of “is he just faking it? you don’t look sick. you just want an excuse to get out of having to socialize with Aunt Cleotilda” or what have you.

Can we not just suffer in peace?