Since my autism diagnosis about 2.5 years ago, much of my mental energy has gone into reevaluating and reinterpreting many of my emotions, especially related to work, that I have held my entire adult life. Here are some examples: Other people do not seem to find it difficult to speak up in meetings, but when …
Dog Training
Our house has been a whirlwind of excitement for the last 10 days or so. The first weekend of the month, we adopted a second dog from an excellent shelter here in our city. Just about 3 years ago, when my then elderly baby, lab-dachshund mix finally passed away at 14yo, I lasted in a …
Being Undiagnosed Autistic can Lead to Learning Who You Truly Are Much Later in Life
I have a theory that we are all essentially living the same life. We are born into circumstances that we do not choose. We are raised, more or less, by our families who do the best they can. We learn in and out of school what is expected of us in society, based on other …
Does the “Root Cause” Even Matter?
I've been working on data processing and software for most of my career. One of my best skills in my job is finding the root cause of client-reported data errors in our products. This means that even after a ticket has been created by client support and bounced around to multiple people in my department …
Racism and White Supremacy are Killing Democracy
Last week, in the days that followed Martin Luther King Jr's birthday, and the federal holiday created to recognize it, the US Senate voted on the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. While the vote on the bill was a tie (50-50, a party-line vote), the bill did not go to the Vice President to break …
Continue reading Racism and White Supremacy are Killing Democracy
And That’s Why My Pajamas are Permanently Stained
I am a pretty excellent cook, believe it or not. I have a couple of specialty dishes (bean dip, most types of soups and sauces, almost anything cheesy like quesadillas, and I make a mean sandwich), but mostly, I improvise in the kitchen. Over the last decade plus, I've gotten to know my husband's taste …
Continue reading And That’s Why My Pajamas are Permanently Stained
What We Lose as Time Passes
We decided to watch the film Napoleon Dynamite over the weekend. For anyone who isn't familiar, well, I won't spoil it, and I'm no professional movie critic anyway (not that they know anything special). What I will say is that this movie really makes me think about all the examples of the past, times gone …
What January 6th Means to Me
I took the day off yesterday. I wasn't physically ill and wasn't on vacation. I didn't have other plans. I specifically took time to reflect on the state of my country, my government and my society in light of the first anniversary of an event that I consider to be the single most vile and …
Conjuring a Theme for the New Year
Happy New Year, dear readers! I'm not gonna lie; we all thought 2020 was bad and 2021 would be better, but at this point, it honestly feels like we've just been through one huge, horrible, double-length year of anguish and uncertainty. After all that, the holidays and typical year end frivolity just didn't feal right, …
The Most Noble Trait of Autistic People
As an autistic person, I am ultimately an observer. I take in information from all around me (sometimes too much). One of the thing I have observed upon my "coming out" are the random acts of truly radical kindness and connection I have received from other autistic people. Not a single one has questioned my …
Autisticoronapoliticalifragilisticexpialidocious 