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Welcome to Healing is My Special Interest, the newsletter at the intersection of late-diagnosed neurodivergence and healing from high control environments. As I am trying to plan out the summer / next year (which feels . . . really difficult right now) I know that I want to do my favorite thing which is platform neurodivergent writers! Read on to hear details on what I am looking for when it comes to pitches, plus a few more fun things coming down the pike. As always, the people who support this newsletter financially enable me to pay people for their guest posts and podcast interviews, and I am so very grateful!

Photo by Austin Chan on Unsplash

Hello everyone,

I feel like I say this every dang week, but I am struggling a bit. The news about Gaza —and how Israel has flat-out announced it is overtaking it — has decimated my soul and I am giving myself space to grieve. I am the kind of autistic who grew up reading Anne Frank and Elie Wiesel and who wept bitterly at the Museum of Tolerance in LA. I took the warnings about never allowing another Holocaust to happen in our world literally but now I am forced to watch it happen while my own country financially supports it. There is a part of me that is so deeply wounded by this betrayal and by what this says about our world. There is a part of me that wants to give up on humanity, if I am being honest. But there are other parts of me that want to keep fighting, keep scraping by, keep creating, keep spitting in the face of fascists. I try to honor all of these different parts, but it is tiring and emotionally draining work.

I keep trying to find ways to grieve but it’s hard in the midst of everyday life and the wildness of trying to work and clean and parent under Trump 2.0. I am not writing very much, and the little work I am doing is SO intense that it completely drains me (and adds to the feelings of wanting to give up on humanity). But one thing that always boosts my spirits is connecting with other like-minded souls. People who don’t understand why we don’t do everything within our power to stop the cycles of violence we were born into. People who want to see the earth and all who live on it thrive. People who want to honor the little lives we have by being true to ourselves instead of an ideology.

So in that vein, this summer (and beyond), I would love to publish some essays by neurodivergent writers on the theme of deconstruction stories. I want to hear from people about what took them out of a totalizing environment. What have you had to deconstruct from? Is it a high control religion? The patriarchy? Fatphobia? Ableism? Gender Binaries? White Supremacy? American exceptionalism? A combo of all of these and more?

Totalizing refers to a belief or ideology that impacts all (or most) parts of your life — you know that old saying about how fish don’t know they are in water because it’s what they have been used to their whole life? What are parts of modern life that you have slowly come to realize were put there by people with political and social agendas? What were the ways you came to discover your real values in the midst of an onslaught of propaganda, social pressures, or family enmeshment?

The reality of having to deconstruct from something is that you had to have been indoctrinated in the first place. This seems to be the part that folks have trouble articulating in public, but I am looking for essays that grapple with this reality in creative ways. Now more than ever I think it is really helpful to hear from folks who have been able to self-reflect enough to deconstruct the propaganda they were inundated with and the steps they are taking to connect to their true selves.

I can pay $125 for accepted/published essays plus a year’s long subscription to the DL Mayfield Content universe (HIMSI, STRONGWILLED, and my Patreon). As a part of this process, if you are interested, I can give you developmental edits / feedback on your essay (you can always opt out) plus your work will be copyedited by the incredible Jessica Kantrowitz.

Here’s how you can pitch to me (plus a few writing tips):

1. Make sure you are familiar with the vibe / content of this Substack. Read up on old issues and check out posts from last summer on Autistic Accommodations — there were so many excellent pieces!

2. In a few sentences, send me a pitch where you describe what your essay is about / your unique perspective. Why are you the right person to write this? What will you say / what is the Big Idea? How will this resonate with the HIMSI audience?

3. If you have published before, include a link or two to something you are proud of (it’s OK if you haven’t published before, I just might need to see a draft before I can commit to publishing it here).

4. Be creative, be unique, be autistic, be YOU. I love a literary essay and when I am in a writing rut sometimes I will read through literary journals just to be reminded that there are so many ways to write an essay.

5. Prepare to show your sources. If you have been reading/learning about themes and issues, source them! Don’t pretend like your ideas sprang forth from nothing. Don’t pass off other peoples work as your own but use it, source it, and build off of it in your own unique way.

If you are interested, or you think of a writer who might be, please tell them to send me a pitch at dlmmcsweeneys at gmail dot com. I am especially interested in platforming writers who identify as autistic and who come from marginalized backgrounds (LGBTQIA+, non-white, non-Christian, etc).

I wish I could pay more, but I will say that this newsletter has over 8,000 engaged, thoughtful, incredible readers. As publishing opportunities continue to dry up, I want to continue to carve out spaces for other people here at Healing is My Special Interest. If I don’t get back to your pitch in a few weeks, please reach out again — I get very overwhelmed and sometimes emails get lost in the shuffle. I promise it is nothing personal!

Thank you to everyone who supports this project and enables me to do this work. Be on the lookout soon for some fun zoom events I am planning in June and September (on the themes of anti-fascist creativity and full moons!!!).

Photo by Pedro Lastra on Unsplash