Having been in neurodivergent spaces for a while now, I’ve been noticing a new term ‘neuro-affirming’ is increasingly being used in the last year or so. Although I am not aware of a formal definition of neuro-affirming that exists – the general consensus seems to be that neuro-affirming is an approach used in professional practice (such as therapy) that does not try to fix neurodivergent people into being neurotypical. Instead, somebody who is ‘neuro-affirming’ recognises neurodivergent people as part of the natural diversity of human minds and that each of us will have our own strengths and c ..read more

Autistics being dehumanised is nothing new. In fact, most information out there about autism and the history of autism research is full of dehumanisation. However, this week has shown us that being dehumanised for being autistic may not necessarily end when we take our last breath. A few days ago, controversial autism researcher Simon Baron-Cohen announced his latest study where he is analysing the private diaries of a 16-year-old autistic girl who died by suicide. Baron Cohen shares on Twitter.   Thanks Jonathan for sharing Caitlyn's diary with us so we can better understand what ..read more

School attendance policies have always been a sticking point with many neurodivergent people, as lots of us could not attend school for reasons beyond our control. Some of us (and our parents) would have faced unfair consequences as a result of low attendance during school. However, often it’s not due to us “skiving”.  Fresh after the Christmas break, the UK government published propaganda around school attendance, which rightly made a lot of neurodivergent people angry, as it was completely ignorant of our experiences in the education system. Below are some examples of the propaganda put ..read more

Hello everyone, My post will be rather brief today, but that’s because I have more of an update rather than a longer blog post. This week, a paper I co-authored on was published in a journal! It’s a true pinch me moment. Growing up, I was not considered academic and instead received the backhanded complement of “she tries hard but…….”. Fast forward to today and I suspect my academic accolades are higher than the adults who made those comments about me back then, so I will admit I am feeling slightly smug about it (hehe). Seriously though, I’m very grateful to have opportunities later on where ..read more

2023 has been a bit of a rollercoaster year to say the least! (Although most of the chaos stemmed from 2022, and rolled over into this year). During all the chaos I finally finished writing my first book! It is currently being fine tuned by the editors, ready for publication in 2024! Once the publication date has been firmly set in stone, I will be sharing with you all on here.  But in the meantime, I thought it is important to talk about how I actually managed to write a book, as the disabling side of my neurodivergence does make writing a lot more challenging compared to most, especiall ..read more

Hello, me again! Many of you reading this will know me from either my writing on this blog or my various posts about being an autistic ADHDer on social media. Alongside my writing and social media posts, I have provided support for fellow neurodivergent people and their families, and designed and delivered training related to autism and neurodiversity to professionals as part of my day job. I also work on a freelance basis to help individuals/organisations improve their understanding of autism and neurodiversity to boost their confidence when working with neurodivergent people. The services I ..read more

Something we see a lot of in today’s society is an obsession of resilience and demands from people to ‘be more resilience’; particularly so from people with power over others. E.g. a school teacher telling a child’s parents that ‘they need more resilience in the classroom’ without considering why a child may be struggling at first. Although many people both in real life and online would agree with the general narrative around people not being ‘resilient’ enough nowadays, to me all this talk about ‘resilience’ is bullshit. Why you may ask? Well because I have been that person that is seen as no ..read more

If you are unfamiliar with the concept of autistic masking, I would recommend my previous blog post about autistic masking before reading this one ‘Autism and Masking’ A few weeks ago I posted a meme after watching the Barbie film, comparing Stereotypical Barbie’s character as representing autistic people masking with Weird Barbie representing autistic people unmasked. To my surprise the meme took off and went viral on both Twitter ( or X) and Instagram! Thoughts I had when watching Barbie. pic.twitter.com/hiUcRoExf5 — Sarah Boon #StopTheShock (@Saraheboon) August 17, 2023 Although it was a ..read more

*This blog post is not parent shaming. It’s critiquing the documentary* This Wednesday on BBC one, there was an incredibly high-profile autism documentary in the UK. Naturally, being an autistic person living here, I was curious but extremely cautious about the documentary. I was cynical before watching it, as autism is frequently misrepresented in the media in a harmful way. Knowing that millions of people would be tuning in, I was very concerned about the message that could be portrayed and how this would impact the general public’s views and consequently autistic people in their daily lives ..read more

Hello everyone, it’s been a while! I’ve realised in the last year I have not posted as frequently on here, this is mainly due to all my time I have for writing is taken up by my debut book “Young, autistic and ADHD” (working title, so TBC) and life being chaotic the last 12 months with moving last summer and having a significant arm break just before Christmas (note to self, never do IKEA flat pack again) on top of working too. However, I have recently co-authored a post on my friend’s blog Hassaan’s House. Hassaan is a fellow autie and we share our love for the TV show Gavin and Stacey. We no ..read more