Emergent neurodivergent

  It's a popular myth that autistic people lack empathy. Dehumanising the Other has always been the first line of attack, hasn't it. However my experience has been the opposite. As I wrote earlier, I can feel pity for inanimate objects. I physically and mentally can't bear to be around trees being cut down, I kicked a beloved teacher when he organised a Piano Smash (what was  that all about? If you've never heard of them you are younger than me!) And I have a strong sense of social (in)justice. These days that is acknowledged as one of the defining traits of neurodivergent people. Who knew that the uncaring, cold, ASC types might actually lead the way in caring about the world? One of my favourite Bible verses is Micah 6:8 -  And what does the   Lord   require of you?  To act justly and to love mercy    and to walk humbly with your God. This was a verse we focused on for a whole year in the Methodist Church. I sometimes wish this was the only...

49 years ago today I made the decision to follow Jesus. As I was in an   Evangelical Church, I said the time-honoured prayer to ask Him into my life . I didn't even realise it was Armistice Day, although that seems a peculiarly appropriate day to have done it. I'd struggled since being a little girl with self-hate; not sure where it came from but my relationship with my Mum was not great, I was the youngest of 4 very accomplished children and in my head I was definitely the runt of the litter.  I found a Puffin Diary (remember those?) in which I had faithfully filled in the Memoranda  section every week for a year with the phrase, Never forget that you are the most horrible little girl in the world. I was 9 years old that year. I'm not sure why I thought that was the case, nor why it needed to be remembered - I think I was trying hard to be different but I just couldn't do it. I remember how it felt inside my head when I went into a rage, remember wishing someone would...

Looking back, I can see very clearly that I have had a lot of special interests over my life. As a little girl it was dinosaurs, cars and my Mum's collection of incomplete sets of cigarette cards. When I was three and a half I wrote my first book - a heavily-plagiarised (ie copied out) mash-up of How and Why Wonder Books (Dinosaurs, Prehistoric Mammals and I think one other). I still remember the thrill of writing out the long words and seeing them appear on the page.  I read voraciously, books I shouldn't have been anywhere near but I was the youngest by a long way of four bright children so there were plenty to choose from. My bedtime book of choice at 4 was Mayes Handbook for Midwives . I remember marvelling at the 'shiny baby' (aborted foetus) opposite page 112, and I remember shouting downstairs to ask, "What's a plakenta?' [sic] I devoured Thurber cartoons and short stories, My Family and Other Animals and as I grew slightly older, one horrible book ...