Posts

When an Autistic Brain Can’t Just “Move On”

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When an Autistic Brain Can’t Just “Move On” Just because an autistic or otherwise neurodivergent person is still talking about something that hurt them does not automatically mean they are attention-seeking, dramatic, “obsessed,” or refusing to move on. Sometimes the brain genuinely has not finished processing what happened. Rumination is when the mind keeps circling back to the same event, conversation, question or feeling, often trying to understand it, make sense of it, work out what should have happened differently, or resolve something that still feels unfinished. For autistic people, this can be especially intense because several autistic traits can make painful or confusing situations much harder to mentally put down. Perseveration can make it difficult to disengage from a thought once it has become emotionally significant. Monotropic attention can cause the brain to focus very deeply on a small number of things at once. If one of those things is an unresolved conflict, injustic...
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DARVO, AuDHD and Why Community Groups Can Become So Difficult

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DARVO, AuDHD and Why Community Groups Can Become So Difficult Community groups are supposed to help people feel connected, informed and safe... But they can quickly become difficult when personal loyalties, gossip, misunderstandings and group politics take over. For autistic and ADHD people, those environments can be especially difficult because communication differences are often judged as attitude. AuDHD people may communicate directly, take words literally, struggle with unspoken social rules, become overwhelmed by conflict or feel a strong need to correct something that is unfair or inaccurate. That can create a familiar problem: The original behaviour gets ignored, while the neurodivergent person's reaction becomes the main issue. That is exactly what happened to me recently, and the person involved used a very recognisable DARVO pattern. What is DARVO? DARVO stands for: Deny — deny, minimise or reframe the behaviour being challenged. Attack — turn attention onto the person ...
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This Life Chose Me: Filmmaking, Acting and the Reality Behind the Glamour

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This Life Chose Me: Filmmaking, Acting and the Reality Behind the Glamour Something happened recently within one of my filmmaking circles that made me want to speak on something a little bigger than one bit of drama. Scare actors are not movie actors. That doesn’t mean scare acting isn’t valid, because it absolutely is. It takes confidence, timing, physicality, presence, improvisation and the ability to create an immediate reaction. But screen acting is a different discipline. Playing an actual character with history, flaws, emotions, relationships, motivations and a completely different personality is not as easy as good actors make it look. And good actors really do make it look easy. It isn’t. You can be filming one emotional scene in the morning, something completely different later, then return to that first emotional state from another angle and have to match the same performance all over again. Some scare actors can absolutely cross over and be brilliant screen actors too, but n...
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The Assisted Dying Bill:

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On the #AssistedDyingBill: I live with disabilities that cause suffering I cannot simply “recover” from. But I also love being alive. Those two things are not mutually exclusive. I am strongly pro-choice. I believe adults should have autonomy over their own bodies and, in the right circumstances, I can understand wanting the legal right to decide when enough is enough. But autonomy means the decision has to be genuinely YOURS. No coercion. No manipulation. No subtle suggestion that your care costs too much, that your family would be better off without you, that you're a burden, or that death is somehow more appropriate than giving you the support you need to live. That is where my fear comes from. As a disabled woman, I have personally experienced ignorance, cruelty and treatment from people and systems that were supposed to protect me — experiences that contributed to my PTSD. Disabled people are still abused, dehumanised, threatened and treated as though our lives have less value...
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Chronic Pain Days:

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Chronic pain days. 🖤 I’m on day twenty-something now. At this point I’ve honestly lost count. This is the side of chronic pain that people don’t always see. I might still post, create, laugh, message people, advocate, work on music or share little pieces of my life — but none of that means I’m not hurting. Some days are manageable. Some are brutal. Some blur into the next until you realise you’ve been in a flare for weeks. I don’t show you every bad pain day, because if I did, chronic pain would become my entire online identity — and I am so much more than the pain I live with. But those days still exist. Today is another sofa, comfort object, pain-management, take-it-as-it-comes kind of day. Still here. Still creating when I can. Still finding little bits of myself between the difficult moments. 💗✨ Not seeing someone’s pain doesn’t mean they aren’t living through it. Sarah Wingfield Actor • Author • Advocate KawaiiDollDecora.uk #ChronicPain #ChronicIllness #DisabledAndProud #Invisib...
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K•Doll Makes Juggalo History — Welcome to the Multiverse:

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K•Doll Makes Juggalo History — Welcome to the Multiverse 🎪💗🖤 K•Doll is my alter-ego clown persona, and somehow this wonderful little Juggalo music journey has turned into something much bigger than I ever expected. I accidentally became what I believe to be the first UK female Juggalo music artist, and honestly? That opens up a whole new multiverse of possibilities. 😉 If you don’t know K•Doll yet, she’s my creative alter ego — a rising UK independent artist blending horrorcore, alternative rap, dark humour, vulnerability, community spirit and a whole lot of clown energy. I’ve spent years working in advocacy, charity and community spaces, and music has become another way for me to do what I’ve always tried to do: help people feel seen, heard and less alone. My music is available across streaming platforms, and I use it to express pain, raise awareness, tell stories, challenge injustice, process trauma, uplift people and sometimes simply give people something to scream along to when ...
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Lil' 'Hood of Horrors:

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Lil' 'Hood of Horrors: ChatGPT actually cheered me up! 😂 I ended up venting to the poor thing about what’s been happening with one of Peter’s neighbours after I woke up at 4am, already in agony, saw I’d been removed from the local community WhatsApp group, and immediately had my RSD go: OH, WE’RE DOING THIS NOW ARE WE? To some people, being removed from a neighbourhood group probably sounds tiny. But for me, it wasn’t really about a group chat. I stay at Peter’s regularly because he’s my partner and also supports me, and being in the group helped me keep an eye on what was happening locally. When you’re disabled, neurodivergent, dealing with chronic pain and already trying to manage a dysregulated nervous system, feeling informed about your surroundings can be part of feeling safe. So being excluded, especially after being made to feel like I “don’t belong” because I’m not on his tenancy, and being compared to his ex partner, as though she was somehow more acceptable, hit hard...
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