I'm Autistic So What!

  I have been working on something special for this blog post. I attended the Independent Book Fair in Marietta, Georgia, a few months ago. This was my first time going. I walked to many tables and networked like crazy. I even broke my budget for books. Lesson learned: expect to spend money, as if I didn’t know this already.   While at this event, I met this young woman (an author, wife, and mother), Mrs. Shelby Hailstone Law, who has written many books: the Scaleshifter Series, Lady Thief, Birthright Unknown, and Death Flirts Back, which I am currently reading.   When she spoke about being on the spectrum during a seminar on writing fantasy, her next book’s main character is on the spectrum. I knew that I had to reach out to her. Much to my luck, she graciously agreed to let me interview her for this blog post.   Death Flirts Back is about a woman, Abigail, whose family is watched by reapers. For years, Abigail has had reapers follow her but never talk, unti...

  Education! The simplest and most challenging thing one will go through in one's life. Simple because all you have to do is sit down and read a book on a subject you know nothing about and question what you are reading allowing it to shape you, along with gaining hands-on experience by practice or trade. It’s coming across a problem and wanting to solve it. It’s the hope of finding something new or creating something new.   So, what’s challenging about it? Is it commitment? Or is it the expectation?   What is more intimidating?   If you find enough interest in something, and make it essential to you, you will commit to it with no problem.  The essentials are budgeting money, cooking food, and whatever else is needed to survive and stand alone.   Unfortunately, the classes that teach this are not normally required.  The requirement is to find Y’s X. Let me tell you something: I have not needed to find Y’s X since my junior year of ...

  I have been glued to one of my other projects. I have gotten more serious about writing my book and locking myself in. It is a dream of mine to become a full-time writer. Due to everyday life and bills, I work full time but then come home to write my book. In the past, I have had a challenge incorporating a writing routine due to my shift moving around. Now that I have a 7 am till 4 pm I can come home and write after a half an hour break. I even started doing these writing sprints, you join someone on a call say what your goal is, and then write for the next hour. Once the hour is over, you check back in and share how well it went without needing to share, unless you want to. It’s so that you are being held liable. It honestly has helped a lot. I am now 54 pages in my first draft. My plan is to be finished this time next year. My current title is “Nordic Secrets”. It is a Nordic-themed action adventure. Dr. Sam Fletcher was recruited to work on a project with the military at ...

  I apologize for being away for a while. You know about that desired change I wrote about. Well, a lot has happened during the past few months. It all started in February when a best friend called me about a job opportunity as a day porter paying $24 an hour with a corporate office company. Instead of working a scattered schedule and fighting to get more hours, I now work full-time with full benefits and a steady schedule. All I do is make coffee for scheduled conferences and all the break rooms, along with keeping track of the supplies. I work Monday through Friday 7-4 and having that as part of my routine feels great. The people that I work with are great too. Everyone talks to me and not to me. I also have the freedom to work on whatever task I need to without people asking me what I am doing unless they are being social with me. No one is pestering me. Also, my boss is great and easy to talk to. I no longer feel uneasy whenever my boss calls upon me. When she does i...

  Growing up, one of the main things that people kept telling me is how Autism is more common in boys than girls. For a very long time I believed this. It even made me feel special like I am rare human being for being a girl with autism. As if I became fated to make a statement. As time went by, to my relief, I learn that autism isn't more common in boys then girls. It's just perceived differently. Autism was first identified in boys during WWII by Hans Asperger. Little did he know that autism shows up different in girls then boys, but he had a sticky situation to deal with during the war at the start of his studies. So lets forgive him. One has to start somewhere somehow. Whether we like it or not, women and men are programmed differently. Boys are more task oriented, as they are more likely to focus on a single task over multitasking and focus on the major details. Girls are more detailed oriented, and are generally more interested in the fine detail of things,...

  Change is inevitable it is also the one thing that a lot of Autistics don't like. A lot of people on the spectrum are routine-oriented. Whether we plan to be so or not. My grandmother would say, “Lena you are so predictable”; I would argue back, “No I'm not”. I hated being predictable. And didn't want to be so. But it was true. Whenever I went to visit her I would often go to the barn and back to the house like clockwork. To my defense I was bored. I didn't have much to do other than listen to music in the barn while cleaning the stalls and going back to get a drink and eat. But I loved being around horses so therefore I didn't care. For years I would say that the only thing that we would need to know about me is that I love reading books and being around horses. Give me a reading nook in a horse barn and I would be in heaven. You would never see me. I would gladly sit there reading to my horses. Unfortunately, I didn't always have a book with me, so I ...