Welcome to Healing is My Special Interest, the newsletter at the intersection of late-diagnosed neurodivergence and healing from high control environments. Today is my 40th birthday, and I want to celebrate ALL THE THINGS. Including this amazing little reader community and our commitment to honesty and self-discovery. Thank you SO much to everyone who supports this newsletter!
I’m turning 40 today!!!!
Which of course is giving me ALL the feels.
(Turns out feeling all the feels is a really good thing actually1—especially when you were raised to stuff down any emotion that your caregivers didn’t like/didn’t know how to handle!)
I’m celebrating so much joy personally, when all around me the news is dire. I have complicated feelings about a milestone birthday when my relationship with my parents is strained. I feel awkward celebrating myself, but I threw myself the party of my dreams anyway2. Because what is the purpose of any of this if I can’t celebrate the incredible experience that is being alive and here and present to experience it all? The good, the bad, the painful and the absurd?
Another reality has been weighing on the back of my mind, which is that now that I am 40 I have officially lived longer than the average autistic person. The sad truth is that the average life expectancy of an autistic person is 393. Autistic people are more likely to die for a variety of reasons—and most of them are related to issues of inequality and trauma. Autistic people, for instance, are nine times more likely to die by suicide than the general population. We experience more instability in work and in relationships, and are more likely to score higher on adverse childhood experiences. Toxic stress—especially for those who have been undiagnosed and therefore unsupported—adds up on the body leading to a whole host of mental and physical problems.
I’ve written before about a few of my health issues—including developing autoimmune disorders during both of my pregnancies that almost killed me. I personally know of SO many people, especially neurodivergent people socialized as female in high control religions, who developed autoimmune disorders after years/decades of pushing stress down. Neurodivergent folks can be prone to addictions that can wreak havoc on our bodies in order to numb the pain of not understanding or fitting into neurotypical society.
When I first started working on this newsletter over two years ago, these realities were heavy on my mind. I was the parent to an autistic tween, and I was terrified for their future. Now, these statistics still pain me—but I also have more hope this year than I think I have ever had in my life. Real hope, that is grounded in my physical body and my own sense of being in relationship to the wider world. All the energy I used to put into the world to fix/change it (first for god, then for activism) now goes to a variety of places—including myself. I care for my emotional and physical well-being in ways I wasn’t able to even two years ago. I trust myself more. I have hope for the future and the enclaves of queer, disabled, fat, BIPOC, neurodivergent rebels that continue to grow and help each other. I have learned how to enjoy myself despite everything. The world is always ending according to the headlines, but I keep waking up each day and find something new to marvel at.
I feel connected to the earth, like the little mushroom I am. I feel connected to you too, if you are reading this right now. I believe that most human beings want safety and goodness and the ability to experience pleasure in the midst of all the pain. I believe that more and more people are waking up to the lies of capitalism and colonialism and high control religion, and are eager to live our little mushroom lives together without borders or ruling aristocracies or cultural scapegoats that must be sacrificed for some to be in power. I believe that most people are good, and that unhealed trauma is passed down through the generations until someone is finally ready to stop and feel all the pain and end the cycle. And I believe so many people are in the thick of this cycle-breaking work right now.
These beliefs are incredibly precious to me, and have been nurtured and cultivated by (frankly) a shit-ton of work over the past few years. I am loath to let anyone tarnish these fragile beliefs I have in the future of humanity, which means I have had to become more and more protective of my mental health. I have set boundaries in my life with people who do not make my nervous system feel safe. I no longer write or speak in spaces where I have to beg for the humanity of anyone to be recognized. I have friendships with people who do not make me feel like I am too much. I am enjoying my partner and my children more than I ever have before, being grounded in the present instead of a future I cannot see nor can I control. I see much of politics these days as a game that plays with the lives of so many and keeps us locked into a cycle of rage and despair, when in reality it is always the same people who get rich off of wars and exploitation and division no matter who is president4. Every time a labor union organizes or a general strike is called for, I get excited. Let’s fire the bosses and work for the rights and dignity of all! I wear clothes that feel good and use a name and pronouns that feel right, and nowadays I don’t make myself be around anyone who thinks this is a sign of something wrong within me.
I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive. And if I want to wear ill-fitting clothes and cut my own hair and use they/them pronouns and eat the same food for breakfast every day and cry at labor union speeches and cackle at animal Tik Toks then why not? I only get this one little life, and I plan on enjoying myself when I can for as long as I am here. I want a future for my children where they experience pleasure and joy in the midst of resistance and grief. I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive. I get to be whoever I want and be as honest publicly as I want about my own life experience. If I am exceedingly lucky, I might get a few decades of living life as my true self—a thought that brings me so much hope and joy. Because I never knew this could be a possibility for me, and yet here we are!
This is a radical reframe from the way I was raised and the expectations placed on me as the child of an evangelical pastor. I grew up in a home where we could never talk about the realities that shadowed us everywhere—the depression, the anxiety, the suicidality, the addictions, or the toxic patterns. We were the perfect Christian family, and to acknowledge any of these issues would cast doubt onto our testimonies. The only solution was to pray harder, worship more, read your Bible, cling to the promises of God, and keep quiet about whatever didn’t fit the narrative.
But I am older now, and I don’t want to be quiet anymore. I feel an ache to be honest, creative, sad, and joyful. Last fall I made a little zine about my childhood. I guess I have been experimenting with what I can create with one sheet of paper and a commitment to radical honesty. I wanted to share it here today, on my 40th birthday, as I think it succinctly sums up where I have been and where I am heading.
The pain of being a prodigal child simply for wanting to live is a tender feeling indeed. So I will celebrate myself, surrounded by other prodigals and heretics and people committed to being honest about their pain and being honest about their joy.
Wanting to be alive is a precious gift I don’t take lightly and that I am committed to protecting no matter what. My biggest birthday wish is that you would do the same. I am so glad you are here, and so grateful to share the earth with you. We need all the little mushrooms we can, spread out and connected to each other through the singularly bizarre experience of being alive. We need all of us, in so many weird and wild ways, pushing back against the forces that aim to dehumanize and divide us (in order for a very small percentage of humanity to get rich and powerful). I am aware of that more than ever these days, and I’m happy to be here during these revolutionary times with so many good-hearted souls.
If you have ever struggled with suicidality, please know that you are not alone and you deserve help and care. Some places want to profit off of your despair and monetize your attention, but hopefully we can keep carving out spaces where (as Mr. Rogers was so fond of saying) that “whatever is mentionable is manageable.” I used to be obsessed with Peter Maurin—cofounder of the Catholic Worker and his drive to work towards a world where “it is easier to be good.” I now hope that together we can all work for a world where it is easier to be alive, for everyone. And to do that we really, really need you here. I know suicidality is something it can be hard to talk about, but If you need resources or a hotline to talk to, please don’t hesitate to do so (it’s easy to google these resources for whatever state or country you live in).
I’m so glad to be 40 in a world where you all exist. Thanks for being here, and helping me cultivate spaces that are safe to be in. It has meant the world to me. I mean that literally—you have given me back my love for humanity!
Much love to you all,
D.L. (finally in my old person era!!!!)
It was a 1990s themed Over the Hill bday party complete with skeletons and caskets and people came dressed for a funeral. I will share more about it next week for paid subscribers!!!!
This post does a great job of unpacking the life expectancy of autistic people: https://undercoverautism.org/2022/12/17/autism-does-not-reduce-your-life-expectancy-being-autistic-does/
I don’t remember where I first heard the phrase, but I love it so I will share it here: the rich have class solidarity beyond politics, so why don’t the rest of us? If the working class rises up together, we truly can be unstoppable :)
Happy 40th! Reading this made me so happy for you and for me as another late diagnosed autistic person with chronic illness raised in high control religion! Just this morning I said out loud, 22 year old me would hate how much makeup I’m wearing. But 36 year old me gets to do whatever I want and she didn’t! She was trapped! The joy of getting free just keeps unfolding as the years go on. Some days I could just bubble over with the bliss of the future I’m living that I never imagined I would be allowed to have and be. Thanks for modeling the way.
D.L., I am a silent reader, never having the time or words to share here. But after reading this post, I had to get on and say a rousing Happy Birthday! and Thank you! You sharing your story is opening up spaces in me that have needed air for so long.