Awareness, Support, Development

I have ADHD. I also have been diagnosed with clinical depression, though it seems to be on hiatus, and I have some rather spectacular issues with anxiety that have never been given a formal diagnosis. I’m pretty sure that both the depression and the anxiety are largely due to the difficulties that come part & parcel with ADHD. Unfortunately, knowing that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with them.

Last weekend I completely fell apart. My systems (for dealing with my ADHD) stopped working, and I fell into a bit of depression. I’m pleased that I didn’t also have an anxiety attack, but I still spent more time crying and saying nasty things about myself than I would have liked. And yes, I’m feeling better now – much better, in fact – but I’m still very much aware of just how easily these things can sneak up on me.

Yes, I said “sneak up on me.”

I’m not always as aware of my own internal (emotional) state as I could be. As a result, things like last weekend tend to seem like they’re happening for no reason, or at least happening rather suddenly. In reality, the stressors build upon each other until I lose control and either become depressed or have an anxiety attack. And I’m exceptionally good at stressing myself out.

See, before I was diagnosed with ADHD, I used anxiety to help manage my symptoms. I became hypervigilant about a lot of things and worried about pretty much everything (except for when I managed to completely forget to worry about them, which happened sometimes too). I dealt with depression on my own every time it surfaced, and I had meltdowns (anxiety attacks) pretty regularly. Medication (for ADHD and, later, for depression) helped with everything, but didn’t make it all go away. I’m not on medication anymore, but it seems that my mood is still fairly constant without it, and my anxiety is not quite as high as it once was.

Of course, because I’m so dang good at stressing myself out, I do still have brief periods of time when I have to deal with minor depression or extreme anxiety. I am trying to learn some Cognitive Behavioural strategies to change the thoughts that result in meltdowns and depressive states, but it’s not an easy thing to do on your own – even with the help of a workbook.

And so I am going to look into counseling again. And possibly ADHD Coaching (which is offered by the Learning Disabilities Association of Saskatchewan). I need help with this, and while I would like to be back on medication for ADHD, I’m well aware that a pill is not necessarily the best answer for me.

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I really like watching movies about individuals with disabilities, especially if the disability being portrayed is (1) a disability about which I have some knowledge (preferably substantial) and (2) portrayed well, if the actor does not actually have the disability in question. I know many people out there think that people who have disabilities should portray characters who have those disabilities, and I agree with that 100%. At the same time, I think that if the casting director isn’t able to find an actor who has that disability and is able to fulfill the requirements of the role, it is perfectly acceptable to hire an actor who does not have the disability in question but has the chops to portray the character and the disability accurately and respectfully.

And so I am always pleased to see actors who I have enjoyed in other movies “pull it off” – especially when they’re portraying autistic individuals.

In Snow Cake, Sigourney Weaver (Ripley in the Alien franchise) plays Linda, an autistic woman whose daughter is killed in a car accident. She is “high functioning,” which in this case means that she lives independently (sort of) and is usually able to carry on a conversation. She doesn’t “do social” and becomes very upset when, after the funeral, the people of her town converge upon her home and proceed to “do social” in her house.

Carrie-Anne Moss (Trinity in The Matrix trilogy) is her next-door neighbour, Maggie, who watches from afar and is concerned about how Linda is going to manage without her daughter around to look after the little things, like feeding the dog correctly and taking out the garbage on garbage day. (Linda refuses to talk to Maggie; no real explanation is given for this.)

Alan Rickman (Severus Snape in the Harry Potter films) is Alex, the man whose car was plowed into by a semi – Linda’s daughter was the passenger. He goes to talk to Linda about what happened, because he feels guilty about the accident, and gets drawn into Linda’s world and the life of the town. (The driver of the semi is played by Keith Callum Rennie, who played the second Ray on Due South, so I was rather in geek heaven throughout the movie.)

Many of the people of her town are “educated” about autism. One woman says that she “knows all about autism. I watched that movie.” Though my favourite exchange was between a husband and wife at the funeral after-party.

Wife: It’s so clean.

Husband: It’s because she’s autistic. They’re really clean. You could learn something from her.

Yes, stereotypes abound, but not in the portrayal of Linda, and not in the ways those who truly care about her treat her. Alex lands on Linda’s doorstep knowing nothing about autism. I think at first he is rather concerned that Linda’s behaviour is due to trauma, but shortly realizes that no, this is just how she is and he really should learn to deal with her on her terms. Maggie accepts that Linda wants nothing to do with her, and she respects that and keeps her distance.

One of the things that was brought up but not one of the themes of the movie was just how Linda got pregnant in the first place. Alex asks Linda’s father, who explains that they were never sure just who the father was, but it was probably one of the other clients at the program she was going to at the time. Nobody even noticed she was pregnant until she was six months along, and the implication was that they probably would have made her get an abortion if they’d known. As I said, this wasn’t one of the themes of the movie, but it makes me sad that her own parents had this attitude. They raised the child for most of her life. (This particular issue should be dealt with, and has been dealt with to an extent, in popular media – see Law & Order – but is not the point of the movie or this post.)

The movie is funny, and it is sad. It’s not one of those “look at how inspiring this disabled person is” kinds of stories. It’s just what real life is like, and that’s what makes it a good movie.

So go watch it.

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This was originally posted to the adults_add community over at LiveJournal.

People who don’t have ADHD don’t know how much of a struggle it is. Even when I try to explain my struggles, they are brushed aside with words like, “oh, everyone does that.” Really? Really? So, you regularly spend three hours reorganizing your books when you meant to be putting away the papers that are strewn all over your office floor, while your dinner burns to a crisp on the stove? You regularly don’t eat dinner until 10.00 p.m. (or skip it altogether) because you forgot you were hungry? You regularly have to race to the bathroom because you forgot you needed to pee until the last minute? Really? Because I promise you, that was my life pre-diagnosis, pre-medication, and even, sometimes, now.

ADHD isn’t consistent. It’s like my tendonitis. Sometimes it’s not a problem; other times it flares up and interferes with my life. But with both of them, I push through the pain and struggle through to reach the finish line. I am not gentle with myself. I never have been. People cry “bootstraps” and I shout back, “what do you think I’m doing, dumbass?” (1)

Over the past week, I have spent some time making myself remember what my life was like before I was diagnosed with ADHD. My life now is pretty good. I make liberal use of timers and alarms to help keep me on task. I work from home, and I make my own schedule, so I am not as stressed as I was even a year ago. I guess right now, I’m not just “managing” or “functioning” – I am actually doing very well. I still have ADHD (and I’m not medicated), but I am working with and around my challenges.

But I was 28 when I was diagnosed in 2005, and my life was very different then. My days were spent rushing from one job to the next (I worked with children with disabilities, in their homes). I rarely ate breakfast. I usually had time for lunch, but by the time I got home in the evening I would often be unable to focus long enough on cooking to make myself something edible. At work, I had trouble keeping up with the paperwork – and it was supposed to be done during my sessions with the children I was working with. My home was a disaster, with piles of papers and books and clothes and God knows what else all over the floor. I could never seem to get on top of things. Those situations I mentioned in my opening paragraph? They were my reality.

My anxiety over failing “yet again” was the only thing that kept me going sometimes. Other times, it was my guinea pigs, or the belief that the children I worked with needed me in their lives. More than once, I called my mother in panicked tears because I simply couldn’t figure out what the hell was wrong with me, why I couldn’t manage my life, why I felt so broken all the time. I knew other people didn’t live the way I did. I knew that other people could focus on phone conversations, that they weren’t afraid to call even their best friend on the phone, that they could keep at least one room of their homes clean all the time, that they didn’t lose important papers constantly. My life was full of desperation, pain, frustration, anxiety, and depression.

It’s been a hard five and a half years. I have put in a lot of effort, first with the help of medication (so I could actually learn the methods and techniques), and then without. The only reason I am as successful as I am right now is because I work hard, each and every day, to accomplish things that other people hardly think about.

I wanted to make this post [here] because I think it is important that we remember the pain of the struggle. That we remember how hard it can be, how frustrating it is to try and try and never succeed. That some days, just trying is success.

We need to be gentle with ourselves – something I am still learning – but more importantly, we need to be gentle with each other. Because while ablism is discouraging when it comes from non-ADHDers, it’s so much worse when it comes from other people who have ADHD, because we really ought to understand and support each other.

(1) The reference to “bootstraps” is shorthand for the attitude in North America that people just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps (i.e., try harder) in order to succeed – an attitude that is decidedly useless for people with disabilities.

(Also, just so you know – I wrote two drafts of this post last week and only just got around to actually posting it.)

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For the past few months, I have been spending a couple of hours once a week doing respite for an 18yo woman who has a mild developmental delay and severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). The developmental delay means that spending time with her is kind of like hanging out with a quiet 15yo who isn’t interested in boys. The OCD means that there are behaviours she has difficulty controlling and topics that we can’t talk about at all.

Valerie (not her real name) is incredibly sweet and good-natured. Our time each week is respite for her and for her family. She gets time away from younger siblings, older siblings, and parents, and gets to spend time with a slightly older woman who doesn’t tell her what to do. Her family gets a break from dealing with the behaviours and obsessions. It’s only two hours each week, but it’s something.

We do what Valerie wants to do. We often go to the library (and I borrow even more books that I probably won’t be able to read before they’re due), and sometimes we go shopping. We’ve been to Michaels craft store a few times, and London Drugs several times. We always get a treat while we’re out, usually at the end of the evening. Often we go to Tim Horton’s or Starbucks; tonight it was Dairy Queen, where our Blizzard purchases helped raise funds for the Children’s Miracle Network.

Valerie chooses what to spend her money on. It’s her money, after all. I offer suggestions if she is having trouble deciding, and today I did the math in my head to tell her what the best deal would be for Kleenex she could carry in her purse. But she makes the final decision, every time. (It helps that we never do anything that is risky beyond riding in my car.)

And today, when we were heading back to her house at the end of the evening, during a lull in the conversation, Valerie said, “I really like hanging out with you.” She said it again to her mother when we got home, too.

High praise, indeed.

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I use Outlook to keep track of my to-do list. Once upon a time, I used my Palm Z22 to manage that, but it died last summer. What works for me with regard to electronic to-do lists is the ability to have recurring tasks that propogate themselves when they’re supposed to be done. So I can set it and forget it and it’ll show up whenever I need to do it. This is much better than writing lists and losing them, or making lists in my notebook and not looking at it, or just trying to remember what I need to do each day.

Of course, the problem with the whole to-do list thing is that feeling of inadequacy when I (invariably) fail to accomplish every single task on the list. Now, considering the fact that my to-do lists tend to be insanely long, it’s probably not a surprise that I don’t get through the whole thing every day (or any day, really). And when you take into account that notorious ADHD lack of time-sense, well… of course I’m overscheduling myself – I can’t help it! Time is simply too fluid for me. I have no idea how long some things actually take, so I’m always under- or over-estimating how long it will take me to complete tasks.

On a good day, I will be busy all day and at the end I will have a list of 10-20 tasks that I’ve been able to check off (before you get all amazed at my productivity, allow me to point out that four of those things have to do with getting dressed, brushing my teeth and washing my face twice a day, and working on whatever report I’m editing for work at the time). On a bad day, I will be unable to convince myself to do anything besides get dressed. (I am serious here, people.) And this inability to get dressed has nothing to do with depression or lack of motivation. It’s all about how well my executive functioning has decided to, well, function.

I have friends who feel inadequate when they compare their most productive days to my most productive days, and that is so sad. We shouldn’t be comparing ourselves to one another, only to ourselves. And even then, we shouldn’t be comparing a good day to a bad day. Let’s make sure we’re always comparing apples to apples and oranges to oranges, and when a banana slips in let’s make a whole new category for them.

I am slowly learning to accept that I simply am not going to get everything done. It’s not possible. It wouldn’t be possible for someone without ADHD, so why do I think it should be possible for me? (Answer: Because I’m a perfectionist and an overachiever, and I should be able to do everything all the time without any help.)

Here’s the key I have found to defeating this “must do it all” mindset: Acceptance is not the same as resignation. It is possible to accept my limitations and still expect that I will try to do better next time. (See this essay for why I never say that I will do better next time.)

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to battle my phone phobia to call and make an eye appointment. Then I have to battle my executive dysfunction and get the dishwasher emptied and reloaded and running. After that I’m walking over to the Farmers’ Market for some fresh fruit & veggies, and I have a doctor’s appointment later on. Oh, and I need to go to the library this afternoon. And I should stop at the grocery store for some lemon juice and some English muffins. Hey, I wonder if I have everything I need for making dinner tonight…

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I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD until I was 28 years old. At that point, I’d been working with autistic children for seven years and had done a fair amount of reading about ADHD as well as autism (and mood disorders and personality disorders and emotional abuse). I had a Bachelor of Music in Composition and had done the coursework for a three-year Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. I’d also flunked out of a Bachelor of Music Therapy after only one semester. My home was a disorganized, chaotic mess, I was constantly struggling to be on time for appointments, and I was attending women & self-esteem group therapy on a weekly basis, through the place I was getting counseling from pre-diagnosis.

When I was diagnosed, I sent an e-mail to my brothers, my parents, and my best friend, telling them about the diagnosis. I didn’t tell anyone else about it. I said it was so I could see if they noticed a difference once I was on medication, and that was certainly part of it, but there was another aspect to my reticence: I didn’t want to have people write me off because of my ADHD.

You see, at the time, I had some friends, most of them male, who also had ADHD diagnoses. Some of them were on medication, some of them weren’t. Those who weren’t on medication were very strident in voicing their rather negative opinions about medication. They were also deemed undependable and disorganized by our mutual friends. Those who were on medication weren’t vocal about their ADHD. They were responsible and clearly made an effort to fulfill their commitments.

One of the things I have always been (besides an ADHDer) is anxious. I worry about things. This has resulted in a few things: (1) I am a perfectionist, and I hold myself to incredibly high standards; (2) I overcompensate for my ADHD traits whenever my commitments involve other people; and (3) I have anxiety attacks from time to time. (The psychologist who diagnosed me said that I was on the verge of developing a full-blown anxiety disorder.)

When I was diagnosed with ADHD, I was working full-time with children with developmental disabilities (not just autism). I was also very active in a Christian youth community. Everyone expected me to be organized and well-prepared, and I generally was. I held keys to churches. I organized and planned events. I took meeting minutes and formatted them perfectly and distributed them well ahead of deadline. I gave talks that actually flowed and made sense.

But there was a cost to all of this, as there usually is. I was always anxious, always stressed about something. I was irritable. And, being an introvert, after I’d spent all that time around people, all I really wanted to do was hide in my home and snuggle my guinea pigs. So that explains my home being unpresentable, if nothing else.

Because of all of the things I strove to be to others, and because of the stereotypes people in my social circle had of ADHDers, I didn’t want to “come out” as ADHD. I wanted to take some time to prove myself – to show them that I wasn’t like the other ADHDers they knew, to show them that the diagnosis didn’t change me… to prove to myself that I was still me.

I’m really not completely sure when I decided it wasn’t worth pretending anymore. It was probably a gradual change, a gradual shift in attitude. But after a while, I just told everyone. If it came up in conversation, I said, “I have ADHD.” I blogged it in public. I decided to embrace it.

I still have anxiety attacks (though nowhere near as often as I once did).

My house is still messy (though it’s slowly getting better).

I’m still a perfectionist (that makes me good at my job as an editor).

I’m still really good at planning, organizing, and running events (hence my continuing addiction to being Municipal Liaison for NaNoWriMo).

I set timers and make constant use of electronic and paper day planners (I love Moleskine notebooks, so I have a Moleskine planner, which I write in using a pencil so I can make changes easily).

I make lists and attempt to follow them (I carry a notebook for lists, and I have an electronic to-do list on my laptop).

I tell people I have ADHD almost immediately (I’ve blogged previously about the responses I get and what I think of them).

There are definite negatives to having ADHD. Time is always going to be completely fluid for me. It’s a good thing there are alarms and timers to remind me of everything from when to turn off the oven to when I should leave for an appointment. Keeping my home tidy is always going to be a struggle for me. I am often easily distracted, so things don’t always get put away like they ought. Impulse control is always going to be difficult for me. I’m glad I am able to simply avoid some of the things that I always want to spend money on (e.g., stationery). Executive dysfunction is always going to plague my very existence. Having an electronic to-do list that self-generates every day is great and definitely helps to a degree, but there are still a lot of days when I’m doing well to accomplish one or two tasks off that list.

Bu there are also a lot of good things about my life. Whether these things are due to ADHD, I can’t really say, as I have no idea what I would be like without ADHD. I have a wonderful husband who supports me in my efforts to improve our home and to improve myself (including going to grad school). I have a number of excellent friends who share my passion for writing and other creative pursuits, others who share my passion for disability rights, and still others who share my passion for all things spiritual (particularly Christian).  I currently work when I want to, and am free to schedule my days as I see fit (thanks to e-mail and a contract with my former employer). I am slowly finishing my unfinished stories (the plague of the ADHD writer – you don’t even want to know how many unfinished projects I have in my list… or how many unstarted story ideas are in said list).

There is definitely stigma attached to ADHD. When we hear the word, the label, we immediately think of irresponsible, disorganized people. I was definitely a responsible and outwardly organized person, yet I fit the diagnostic criteria. But the stigma of the label made me afraid to tell anyone but my nearest and dearest about it for the first six months to a year.

I think it’s important for those of us who “name-drop” our ADHD diagnoses to recognize that not everyone sees their ADHD as an inherent part of who they are. Some people are in denial. Some people simply hate the hard stuff and can’t see any good stuff. I’m not one of those people who will say that I’m not disabled – trust me, I very definitely am; the only reason I am as successful as I am in my life is that I have learned to work with my strengths and around my weaknesses… and I’m learning to accept my imperfection.

Three bloggers whom I read regularly made posts today that look at stigma and disabilities. I want to link you to them.

1. ADHD Stigma: The New Four-Letter Word (Douglas Cootey). I would say that Douglas is much better than I am at writing coherent blog posts, so definitely read this. The situation he discusses in his post is kind of what sparked mine.
2. An Ode To Peter Parker (Dave Hingsburger). Dave’s posts are always incredibly insightful. This one is about how non-disabled people always seem to want to be unique, while people with disabilities often just want to live a normal life. (I know I have often wished I were normal – especially pre-diagnosis!)
3. A Single Mom’s View of Autism, Divorce Rates and Stigma in the Pursuit of Love (Estee Klar). Estee is a talented writer, a great speaker, and a pretty good mother. This post makes a few really salient points about where the blame for the dissolution of a marriage properly belongs. (Hint: it’s not on the disability of a family member, nor on the disabled family member.)

So, comment here and/or go check out these three posts. Let’s talk about stigma. The more we discuss it, the less it will influence our lives.

And hopefully someday, people won’t have to worry about others’ reactions to their diagnostic labels.

This just in: Lots of posts this week about stigma. I’ll keep adding to the list below as I find more.

1. Arbitrary Normality (Dr Rob). I just discovered Dr Rob; he is a physician who has an ADHD diagnosis and a blogger I will have to read more of (I’ll be adding this blog to my RSS feed). This post is about how his perception of autistic children has changed over the years, and includes the point that autistic children grow and mature over time, just like non-autistic children do. Fancy that!
2. What do people do when they learn your child has special needs? (Emily). I read Emily’s blog regularly and enjoy many of her posts. Her posts are always interesting. This one is about how people respond to parents of children with disabilities. Be sure to read the comments for some great discussion of what a good response actually is.
3. Fresh: No One Was Paid For This Blog (Dave Hingsburger). I just read this (Dave’s latest post) and was thrilled to see a post about what is possible when the stigma of disability is set aside and people simply work together to achieve equality for everyone, regardless of disability or ability. Check out this post: you’ll be glad you did.
4. Invisible Visible; Visible Invisible (Savannah Nicole Logsdon). I have Savannah’s blog in my RSS reader; if you check out this post, you’ll understand why immediately. Here, Savannah talks about “passing” – that thing we’re doing when other people can’t tell we have a disability. She ends with quite the challenge, one that I’ll have to think about in order to make it happen.

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On July 3, 2010, I got married.

We spent a week in Banff, then flew to Nova Scotia and spent a week on Cape Breton (and one day on Prince Edward Island). Then we flew home.

On one of the plane rides, I had an encounter with an individual whom I believe may be on the autism spectrum. He is a young teen. I do not know his name or his actual age. I will not tell you which flight I met him on, and I will not describe him to you. But I will describe the encounter.

First of all, I just barely fit into plane seats. This is because I have rather ample hips. Luckily, my husband and I were sitting together on this flight, so we were able to simply lift the arm rest between our seats and I could spill into his seat for the duration of the flight. The young man about whom I am writing this post was sitting on the other side of me.

We are talking here about a young man whose concept of personal space was somewhat lacking. I didn’t really have space for my feet under the seat in front of me because he put one of his feet there. He couldn’t keep his feet in front of himself because his “carry-on” bag was a bit too large to be under the seat and it stuck out a lot.

And then he started fiddling with the bag, trying to get something out of it.

Turned out it was a copy of the Marvel Encyclopedia from 2006. My brother didn’t help with that one, but I was curious and looked at it a bit with him and made some conversation. After a little while I moved on to watch some of the in-flight TV, as did he. Periodically he would say something to me about the book.

So what makes me think he is autistic?

1. His fingernails were rather long. I know this isn’t necessarily an indication, but I have known a few autistic men who don’t cut their fingernails. Please know that I don’t consider this an actual indication of autism – it is just something that, looking back on the encounter, seems important to mention.
2. He seemed to have some kind of a reading disorder. I’m not sure what exactly; he got his alphabet mixed up here and there when looking up characters in the Encyclopedia, and there were a couple of times when he turned to me and asked me what a word was (one was “caucasian”). He also read everything out loud, though in a very quiet voice (so to himself, not so that others could hear). Again, this is not necessarily indicative of autism; he could simply have some kind of a learning disorder.
3. Periodically, while watching cartoons on the in-flight TV, he would kind of jerk backwards and close his eyes tightly while making a particular expression with his mouth that I have rarely seen in the non-autistic population. It’s kind of a cross between a grimace and a smile.
4. Every once in a while, the way he moved his hands and fingers just screamed “autistic” to me. It’s difficult to describe, but it’s kind of a shake and a flick at the same time.

That is all I have to share about this young man. He was very friendly and (rightly) cautious of strangers. He was traveling alone. I have tried to keep things as unidentifiable as possible, which is easier since I don’t know his name or actual age or anything like that.

The point of this post?

Just to share. The flight was long, but it was manageable, and this encounter helped make it interesting.

Also, they really are all around us. Keep an eye out – you never know when or where you’ll meet an autistic individual!

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There are currently at least two issues being argued over. The problem is, I think, that we are getting them mixed up in our minds because they involve some of the same players. Note: This is my take on the situation, and may not be entirely accurate. I’m not going to be able to please everyone. If you have corrections to this account of events, please do post them to the comments or e-mail me so we can talk about it. I can’t promise that I’ll edit the post, though, because I want to keep it about my interpretation of events. I might make a comment to it with any new information that seems important.

Issue One: ASAN & Accountability

To my mind, this is the issue that really needs to be addressed publicly, and soon.

Information is currently one-sided, because ASAN hasn’t made any formal statements. (So far as I can figure out, ASAN isn’t making any statements at all except to shut down discussion of the issue on its own lists.)

What is the issue, specifically?

1. ASAN has apparently made some claims about Michelle Dawson and her work that are not true. So far as I can tell, ASAN has failed to respond to her accusations in any reasonable fashion (or at all, aside from an apology that didn’t seem to address all of the concerns Michelle had). (I note here that, as I said above, this is all one-sided information, because ASAN hasn’t made any public statements about the situation, which occurred nearly a year ago now. As a result, the only information that is accessible to me is Michelle’s version of events, and while Michelle certainly considers herself to be error-free, I know for a fact that she often misinterprets things people say.)
2. ASAN does not seem to have a policy in place regarding the promotion of ASAN by its leaders. Such a policy should include requirements for disclosure regarding the individual’s role within ASAN, if this is not immediately apparent in another way.

Since ASAN is a lobby group that claims to represent autistic interests, it would be in its best interests to deal with these two points, both internally and publicly. Not doing so will continue to hurt its standing in the minds of everyone, particularly the autistic individuals it claims to represent.

Issue Two: Michelle Dawson herself

There has also been a lot of buzz about Michelle Dawson. For the most part, this buzz has been critical of Michelle’s black and white style of thinking – her difficulty with seeing others’ points of view – and her responses to those who either disagree with her outright or who attempt to challenge her to think about things in a new way.

I’ve stated my case in several places now. I stand by what I have said, and I won’t be a regular reader of TMoB anymore, nor a poster there. That is my choice. I have not tried to take anyone with me, and I won’t. Michelle’s work is incredibly important, and I hope she continues with it, regardless.

This post explains my involvement and views perfectly.

So now what do we do?

DJ has written a very good post about what needs to happen. That, coupled with the post by almandite (linked above) should inform us as we go forward.

I hope they do.

First, the second issue of AutistiConnections should be out on Sunday. It was supposed to come out yesterday, but my life hasn’t been conducive to putting out a magazine. And then today I realized that we forgot to renew the domain, so we have to wait on that, too. When the site is back up, you’ll be able to check it out at http://autisticonnections.org. In the meantime, if you want to submit something about independence at the last minute, please do so. You can e-mail me articles, stories, poems, or artwork at janna@thehoskincentre.com. Please include a short paragraph about yourself, and be sure to let me know what name you would like to be published under.

Second, this blog is eventually going to go the way of the dodo. I’ll be importing everything into a blog I have over at my primary web domain and will make a final post here with a link to the new location once it’s been done. There are a few other blogs up and running over there already; feel free to check them out at http://jannalouise.thehoskincentre.com/blogs. I’ll leave everything here, but any new posts will go up over at the new location.

I think that’s it for now. Thanks for reading.

I suddenly realized I should inform my few readers of the news: as of Christmas morning, I am engaged!

The details will all be posted over at our wedding blog, so if you’re interested that’s where you’ll want to go. I may well post here about the trials and tribulations of attempting to plan a wedding with unmedicated ADHD, but for the actual wedding information, you’ll want the wedding blog.

Oh, speaking of medication, I have concluded that I do, indeed, need meds in my life. I’ve asked my doctor, but she only prescribes Strattera, and we all know how horrible that is, so I’m waiting for a referral to a psychiatrist. I hope it goes through soon…!