Tagged introduction

Captain Quirk and his adventures on the Wrong Planet

Since this is my first entry, I'll tell you a little about who I am. The essentials can be found on the 'about me' page (all links on ANW open in new windows), but here's a few extra facts. I was on...

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Autistic Not Weird

10 hours ago

When I was about nine years old, I wrote out Christmas cards for *loads* of people. I went to a lot of effort, spending hours writing them for as many people I cared about as possible.
One of those people was my section leader at Boys' Brigade. Having written her a card saying "Merry Christmas" and thanking her for a great year, I arrived at BB, lumbered up to her and pretty much threw the card straight in her face. Then I walked off.

I think it's fair to say I was a clumsy child, but on top of that I didn't think the delivery method mattered as long as the card arrived at its destination safely. I would later come to learn that if you walk up to someone, throw a card at them and walk away, they will usually think that you wrote the card under duress. Or just generally don't care about them. Both of those conclusions were wrong in that case. The effort and gratefulness that went into that Christmas card weren't reflected outside of the card, so were most likely assumed not to exist.

The moral of the story is: autistic people are likely to care about you very deeply. But we are *not* experts in showing it in the socially accepted way.
A bunch of us get nervous about opening presents because the better the present is, the more important it is that we show the "correct" reaction, which is often difficult to predict. We learn quite early that being happy and grateful on the inside just isn't enough, and that an element of social performance is required for the other person to believe you're actually grateful.

So if an autistic child throws a card in your face this year, appreciate the card anyway. :P ... See MoreSee Less

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Autistic Not Weird

12 hours ago

When you stop pathologising passion, you realise how amazing autistic "obsessions" can be. ... See MoreSee Less

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Autistic Not Weird shared a post.

14 hours ago

This has been doing the rounds across the internet recently. Great stuff.This letter, shared today on Twitter by someone recently diagnosed with autism, is how you do autism diagnoses letters for older children and adults 💥

Update: Apparently this great letter was written by Vicky Bliss from Lancashire Autism Service. It was shared by The Joy of Bex @debecca (Twitter) ... See MoreSee Less

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