Want to find out what Asperger's means to me?

 Would you like to know of another way you can find out about me and Asperger's/autism? As well as my website and my children's autism books, there is my YouTube channel. I started it ten years ago, talking about how I found out and was diagnosed with Asperger's, then I got back into writing again and never returned to it. Until this last week. I am creating more short videos of me talking about having Asperger's and what it does and doesn't mean for me. If you would like to learn more about autism and me, then why not pop over there. My latest talk is found here 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TfzTcTWTo4&t=5s

Please let me know somehow if you like it or not. I plan to do more about what it is and isn't for me, especially now I know how to record and upload it to the channel. 

If you know of anyone or organisation who might be interested about these, please let them know as I am working on workshops to help SEND children and their families using story ideas from my books.

Me and lying

 I mentioned that there are some lies I can say. Here are two. If someone (scammer) phones and says ‘about your computer’, I will say I don’t have a computer. If you wore something that looked horrible on you and you were a friend, I would say ‘mmm’. I wouldn’t want to upset you. I hate confrontation.

Yesterday I talked about lies that I can tell. Today I will mention ones I can't. I call them big lies eg if someone asks me to lie that I was with them when I wasn't, I just can't. I might try but it doesn't come out right and you are able to tell that I am lying. So if I say I was somewhere, I was there.

I will give you an example of what I mean about the latter. This happened years ago when I was working at Guy's campus. In the early days of my job in student services I would get given the task of going to the other campus (it was Guy's and St Thomas's) and set up exams for the students. On this one time I had set it up and had to wait for the invigilator to arrive. I needed to go to the toilet, so I did. While I was in there, I heard banging on the outside door. I think I called out I was here. I had assumed it was the invigilator. When I came out I went to the hall but there was no one there. I then went to the security and asked if anyone had arrived to get into the hall. They replied no. I went back to the hall and no one came. Anyway, when I got back to Guy's and where I worked, the staff member in charge at the time called me into his office. He told me off for not being there. I told him I was there but in the toilet, and what had happened. In effect, he really was saying to me that I was a liar. I hated that person at the time. I was so angry. I knew I was telling the truth. It was years later, after I was diagnosed with Asperger's and read about lying, or rather not being able to lie, that I knew. I cannot tell a lie. The staff member left to work in another department at the other campus soon after that.

Want to learn more about autism?

There are lots of ways to find and learn about autism, and these are the ways that I am learning from too. Even though I have Asperger's myself, there is still a lot about being autistic that is new to me and I am finding out. So let's find out together. I split the learning into two sections: fiction and non-fiction. I will start with fiction.

Fiction

Of course I will begin with my own children's autism books 'The Rainbow School' and 'The Pet Rescuers' for 7-10 year-olds. The first series you can find out from my website www.julieaday.co.uk and the second series can be found either via The Book Dragon or Amazon. I have yet to organise for my website designer to put them on there. All of them can be found on the Book Dragon website https://www.thebookdragon.co.uk/

I have just bought the 'Geek Girl' series by Holly Smale. Holly is autistic and I believe so is the main character. There is also 'The State of Grace' by Rachael Lucas which is based on her own daughter who is autistic.

Non-fiction

There are a couple of digital magazines that I know of. SEN magazine and Autism Parenting Magazine. I have had one article in the latter and hope to have more, which will be about growing up with autism and how my mum helped me over the years. You can find out more about this magazine here https://members.autismparentingmagazine.com/dap/a/?a=55311&p=AutismParentingMagazine.com/freegift

There are lots of books about autism and how to help autistics in life. Here are a few that I know about and I have read: Dr Temple Grandin, Pete Wharmby, Jane McNeice, Steve Silberman. There is also 'Marching to a different beat' by Sarah Ziegel, a mother of four autistic boys.

There are also groups on Facebook/Meta who offer webinars and training to help autistic adults and children. The ones I know about are The Nurture Progamme by Jodie Isitt, Ausome Training by Evaleen Whelan.

There is one community where there is learning from webinars, training and chat groups with like-minded autistics. That is Neurodiversity Training International. They have a community App called The EndeeSphere App, which I am an ambassador of. There is a free membership, which comes with a 7-day free trial of the paid version to start with. You can find out more about them here https://www.endeesphereapp.com/a/2147773941/zqK5pxow

All of the above are run by autistics themselves, so know what it is like to live as such.