The Beginning of...Something

I have written a blog before, but lacked the discipline to write more than a few times. I also did not feel like I had any particular skills to offer people or insights that I thought others might care to read. Now that I'm in my mid-fifties, my thoughts about myself and what I might offer have changed. I have so many things that roll around in my head rent-free that putting them into writing will help me explore what things mean to me. I hope reading my blog posts will help others along the way who might think or feel similarly to me.

Now that I have explained a bit about my blog, let me tell you about me. I am a mother of five, three of my sons are special needs: Autism and ADHD. I am also on the Autism Spectrum and was diagnosed in my mid-thirties when my first son was diagnosed. I have two grandchildren who are special needs as well, due to accidents at birth and genetics. I am a wife, mother, grandmother, and more. I live with chronic pain and several other invisible disabilities and conditions. Most of the time, I tell people: I am a mother of five, grandmother of two; therefore, insane.

I have learned to wear a mask, even in front of my family, to fit into society's norms. It is like acting or playing make-believe, but it is my life. I internalize a lot of things and have found that my sense of humor can distract people from my weirdness. If I make them laugh with me, they aren't laughing at me!

I have read that females are often diagnosed later than males. I think it has to do with girls being encouraged to do relationship play. Little girls play with dolls and often have their dollies have complex relationships. For myself, I taught myself how to read facial expressions by watching TV without sound and captions on forcing me to interpret things based on their words and facial expressions. I knew I was weird compared to the other kids in my school. They knew I was weird, too, and behaved as you would expect. School was horrible and that has shaped how I was as a mother for my kids when they were in school. The schools liked me just fine until I went in to defend one of my kids. I will have to do some blogs on my school experience.

Thank you for reading my word salad. I will try to make future blogs a bit more coherent and not so disjointed!