Cover Image - Autistic Peer To Peer Support, With Katie Oswald | Spectrumly Speaking Ep. 129

Autistic Peer To Peer Support, with Katie Oswald | Spectrumly Speaking ep. 129

Spectrumly Speaking is also available on: Apple Podcasts | Stitcher | SoundCloud

 

IN THIS EPISODE:

(AUDIO – 38 minutes) In this episode, hosts Haley Moss and Dr. Lori Butts speak with Katie Oswald. Katie is a nonprofit founder, facilitator, and autistic self-advocate. She founded Full Spectrum Agency for Autistic Adults in 2018. Through Full Spectrum Agency, she facilitates peer support groups, discussion groups, and many other programs for over 500 autistic group members. Katie partners with organizations in Michigan to teach sexuality education, social and communication skills for relationships, and self-determination. She also advocates for autistic adults through corporate workshops, conferences, and community presentations. An avid traveler, Katie learned the majority of her self-advocacy and leadership skills through world travel. She has visited 17 countries on all seven continents, including two years in Uganda with the U.S. Peace Corps.

For more about Full Spectrum Agency for Autistic Adults: https://fullspectrumasd.org/ 

Information about the Full Spectrum Agency’s meet-up groups can also be found here: https://www.meetup.com/Ann-Arbor-Autistic-Adults/ 

 

—————–

Spectrumly Speaking is the podcast dedicated to women on the autism spectrum, produced by Different Brains®. Every other week, join our hosts Haley Moss (an autism self-advocate, attorney, artist, and author) and Dr. Lori Butts (a licensed clinical and forensic psychologist, and licensed attorney) as they discuss topics and news stories, share personal stories, and interview some of the most fascinating voices from the autism community.


Spectrumly Speaking is the podcast dedicated to women on the autism spectrum, produced by Different Brains®. Every other week, join our hosts Haley Moss (an autism self-advocate, attorney, artist, and author) and Dr. Lori Butts (a licensed clinical and forensic psychologist, and licensed attorney) as they discuss topics and news stories, share personal stories, and interview some of the most fascinating voices from the autism community.

For more about Haley, check out her website: haleymoss.net And look for her on Twitter: twitter.com/haleymossart For more about Dr. Butts, check out her website: cfiexperts.com

Have a question or story for us? E-mail us at SpectrumlySpeaking@gmail.com

CLICK HERE FOR PREVIOUS EPISODES

 


EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION:     

 

HALEY MOSS (HM): 

Hello, and welcome to Spectrumly Speaking. I’m Haley Moss and attorney, author, advocate. And I’m autistic. We have a fantastic show for you. And of course, before we get started, I have to introduce you to my absolutely incredible co host the one and only Dr. Lori Butts.

 

DR LORI BUTTS (LB): 

Hi, good morning. I’m Lori Butts. I’m a psychologist and an attorney.

 

HM: 

How are you doing?

 

LB: 

I’m doing great. How about you?

 

HM: 

I am feeling good. I feel like I am running on fumes and somehow I did not have any coffee.

 

LB: 

Oh, wow.

 

HM: 

I’ve never actually been a coffee drinker.

 

LB: 

I wasn’t either until I was older because I don’t like the taste of it. But I certainly like the caffeine that it gives to me.

 

HM: 

I drink a lot of Diet Coke for my caffeine. But I I still considered an achievement that I made it through law school without becoming a coffee drinker.

 

LB: 

Yeah, I didn’t drink coffee in law school either.

 

HM: 

That’s a rare club to be part of. I feel like everybody else did drink coffee.

 

LB: 

Oh, yes.

 

HM: 

It’s so embedded in the culture. And you and I apparently just did not.

 

 

Right we’re anti culture.

 

HM: 

What even is neurotypical and culturally and socially acceptable? I mean, you could be a non coffee drinker and people will still think you’re cool.

 

LB: 

I apparently we both did. I think you’re cool.

 

HM: 

Everything’s fine, even if you aren’t running on on coffee.

 

LB: 

So since you’re running on fumes, we should get right to it today.

 

HM: 

We should probably. At least I have the energy. That’s what really matters. And that is how somehow things get done. I think as long as it seems like you have energy.

 

LB: 

Exactly. Fake it till you make it.

 

HM: 

That’s what they all say.

 

LB: 

Yeah, it’s true.

 

HM: 

But thankfully, for all of you listening, we are not faking it when we have a guest joining us. We we keep it real here at spectrum Lee and that’s something that I know, at least speaking for me, I’m always pretty proud of. And to help us keep it real. We have someone that we would love to introduce you to. And today we are welcoming a new friend of the show. Katie Oswald and Katie is a nonprofit founder, facilitator and an autistic self advocate. She founded Full Spectrum Agency for Autistic Adults in 2018. Through Full Spectrum Agency, she facilitates peer support groups, discussion groups, and many other programs for over 500 autistic group members, Katie partners with organizations in Michigan to teach sexuality, education, social and communication skills for relationships, and self determination. She also advocates for autistic adults through corporate workshops, conferences and community presentations. An avid traveler, Katie learn the majority of her self advocacy and leadership skills through world travel. She has visited 17 countries on all seven continents, including two years in Uganda with the US Peace Corps. Welcome to the show.

 

KATIE OSWALD (KO): 

Thank you, Haley. I’m glad to be here.

 

HM: 

I am so glad to have you here as well. And just to get us all started. Can you tell us how you became involved in the neurodivergent community?

 

KO: 

Absolutely. And before I said, I just have to say that no coffee thing is really impressive, because I could not run on no coffee. I’m definitely running on coffee right now. So good for you guys.

 

LB: 

Whatever it takes.

 

KO: 

Yeah. So yeah, I was not diagnosed with autism until I was in my 30s. So it was a little bit later on in my life, I had a lot of different experiences leading up to that, that should have probably been indicators, but kind of went missed. They were missed by folks in my life. So I graduated from high school and tried to do you know, the traditional path that everybody takes, and I was just extremely burned out from being in school all day with around, you know, around so many people. And I was I had what people refer now to as autistic burnout. But that that time in my life, I had never heard of that. And that was back in 19, probably 1998. I don’t know if anybody was talking about it yet. So I had a little bit longer path. And I think that that is actually pretty common in the autism community. From what I see, so, I did come out of that burnout and eventually go on to I get a degree from Michigan State and do my world travel and do a master’s degree. I tried traditional career. And that also didn’t work well for me.

So I couldn’t manage my energy well in a traditional office setting. So I willingly walked away from a career in in, like kind of statistics and evaluation analysis. It was a, it was a pretty good career. I like the work, but I couldn’t handle it. So I went on my personal journey of autism, I was being I was going to a therapist for it and starting to accept that as the reality of my life. And I finally went through the diagnostic process, I think I was think I was 37 ish, I can’t remember exactly. And so during that time, I was looking for, you know, a group of peers that I could talk to that could relate to what I was going through. And I was surprised to find that, really, there wasn’t anything for autistic adults, there probably are things here and there. I don’t want to offend anybody who has maybe also doing similar work that I just haven’t found in my region, but I couldn’t find anything. And so I decided, well, I’ll put this together myself.

So I started it as a meetup. And we are still on meetup.com, actually, so I started a meetup. I thought that it would be not it, I didn’t expect it to take off, like I did. So I thought we were going to maybe have like two or three people at a meetup here and there. And I really didn’t know what I was getting myself into. And it was really the best thing. So it really grew rapidly. And people started coming. I mean, people needed that peer support. So in the process of trying to find something for myself, I created something that a lot of people needed. And I learned a lot about myself. But I also learned a lot about how much diversity there is in the autism community. So that’s how I kind of got started and got involved in being a very, very active participant in the neurodiversity community.

 

LB: 

So what you’re referring to is the Full Spectrum Agency for Autistic Adults, correct?

 

KO: 

That’s right.

 

LB: 

Okay. Why don’t you tell? Why don’t you tell our audience a little bit more about about all of what you offer through that?

 

KO: 

Yeah, definitely. So it started out really organically. And we started out with kind of social activities and peer support, and it grew from there, we did launch into a 501 C3 nonprofit. So we are officially a nonprofit corporation. And we offer we try to be as you know, as much as possible, react to what our community needs, like Haley mentioned, we do have over 500 members in our meetup group, and not all of them are active, but we do have a very large active core, and new people coming to us, you know, all the time. So our peer support is ongoing, that’s been like the core that everybody needs. People have said that, that’s like a lifeline for them, you know, everybody needs a place where they can go and feel like they belong. And I think that was what was lacking for a lot of us.

And so I’m, I’m really happy that I was able to create that for so many people. So that that goes on the first Tuesday of each month, and it is virtual. We started out in person. And of course, because of COVID, we’re forced to go virtual, which was a little bit of a blessing in disguise, because we have folks coming from around the country, and we even have people from outside of the country, we have a very active member from Brazil. And so I’m really proud to say that there’s, you know, you’re providing something for folks that maybe don’t have anything like this in their region or their country. So when you come to peer support, it’s an opportunity. It’s free for everybody. There’s no charge for peer support. It’s an opportunity to be with your peers and learn from them and talk about what’s going on in your life. So I facilitate that and I give everybody an opportunity to share if they want to. So we understand, you know, everybody has different communication needs and not everybody wants to participate or is able to participate in the same way. So whatever works for the participant you can share or verbally, you can share in the text chat, you can pass, we consider everybody an equal participant, even if we’re just there to hang out and kind of listen to what our peers are talking about. So it’s a very supportive and welcoming environment. And that’s only one of our programs. So we’ve tried a variety of different things. And people are really enjoying the game nights, those are hosted by another one of our members, Brian, we’re doing that virtually right now.

Some people have hosted walks, and one program that I started that has really taken off, it’s called companion care group. And what that is, I think that that’s not I don’t know if that’s a very good descriptive title. But we took that title from the, the aging community, they have something they called companion care, where somebody maybe comes to their place and is there with them, they’re not doing something for them. It’s similar to having like an aide, but it’s more like somebody there for as an anchor. In the ADHD community, they also call this body doubling. So we’re doing kind of a group virtual version of this to help each other. Some of us struggle really quite a bit with, you know, just day to day things, doing the laundry, making the bed, doing the dishes. And so at companion Care Group, which is also a free program, we all get together, and each one of us, including me, you know, we all we all come with something that we’re going to work on. And we do 3 25 minute sessions, you know, the Pomodoro method, they call it. And then we check in with each other. And we all help kind of encourage and keep each other accountable for those tasks, initiation, time management, that kind of stuff. So I know I’m sure I’m forgetting something that we do, those have been our most popular programs to date, we do have just regular virtual hangouts once in a while, where it’s less formally facilitated and more just like a social get together, which is a little bit tougher to do virtually, but we’re able to make that work.

 

HM: 

All of that is fantastic. And I love that you talked about the body doubling and companion care, that’s something that I feel like would be so helpful. For so many of us and myself included, it’s a little bit of accountability, and also the help that we want need and might struggle to ask for I think, especially with the other folks in our lives, I actually want to switch gears, just a little tiny bit you mentioned, or at least I did, when I was reading your bio that you have had the chance to see the world and you’ve done a ton of traveling, what really sparked your interest in travel.

 

KO: 

So I was at when I went to Michigan State. When I was I was almost 27 When I finally transferred as a sophomore to Michigan State and they have you go to that kind of, I forget what they call it, where you orientation where you go and sit and learn about, you know, what it’s going to be like and what you have to do. And so they had a student presenting on all of the study abroad programs that he did. And something just kind of clicked for me, I’m not really sure how to describe it. But as he was talking about his travels, I’m like, wow, like, that’s something that I could do. And I had never, I had never thought about world travel is something that was, you know, something that I was able to do or that would be attainable for me. It just was something you know, that other people did, but not me. And so that was the first time I thought about, you know, I could actually do that. And so, you know, in my excitement, I went to my sat my one on one session and said what what kind of study abroad program could I do like that day, I was like ready to sign up for one? What kind of study abroad program could I do and my statistics program, and there wasn’t, there wasn’t really anything for statistics, specifically for a study abroad. But they found me actually a program that they thought one of the classes I could take would count towards my degree it turned out not to but it was it was all good because I ended up spending two summers in Russia and I took Russian language as a second major and that kind of kicked off my world travel. So that spark and it was it was really interesting to see the reactions of people in my life because I I thought you know, they knew that I had gone through that burnout was just kind of getting started and so I started telling people yes I’m blanking on this study abroad to Russia and people were kind of like, oh, sure you are. You know, like, they’re remembering me from when I was younger and like, could barely handle leaving the house. And so there was this kind of reaction of like, okay, sure, Katie. And so I did it. And it picked off what? Like Haley mentioned, I have gotten to seven, I think it’s actually 18. Now, but anyway, a lot of countries on all seven continents. So that really helped. I didn’t anticipate this, but it really helped my personal growth.

 

LB: 

That’s amazing. In your personal growth, I wanted to discuss like, what kind of skills did it give you to do this amazing traveling these experiences?

 

KO: 

Well, what happened is when I got in there in the first it’s a lot of the travel I did in the beginning, was with a group of students. So the study abroad, I did the two in Russia, and I did one to Antarctica and Argentina. And during this, but during the second study abroad in Russia, I said, you know, I should visit some other countries that I haven’t done before our first study abroad to Russia, they had us go to Czech Republic as well for a little bit. And there wasn’t, they didn’t have that on the second one. And then like, well, I should go, you know, I should go somewhere new. So I added on Sweden, and Norway, which was something that I was doing on my own. So I actually that was my first solo travel experience. And all of the whether you’re with a group or on your own, there’s growth opportunities. So one that I can point to for with with the group is just, you know, I remember a moment, the first time I was in Russia, we were all we were sitting at dinner. And there was a woman in my group that was saying, Well, this is different. And that’s different. And they’re not doing this, right. And she was just having a miserable time. And I had this kind of epiphany moment where I saw this woman having a horrible time. And I thought, well, I can choose to notice all the things that are different and resent them and have a horrible time. Or I can just accept that things are different. And that it’s going to be different. And eventually I’m going to be go home, and it’s not going to be different anymore. And it’s going to be okay, either way. And so I had, I had this kind of feeling like a weight lifted off me in that moment. And it’s almost comes back to that Buddhist idea of this too shall pass and I was able to remind myself of those things, you know, that everything that’s happening, like, it’s just temporary, and it helped me enjoy the all my travels really a lot more.

But there’s, of course, unique growth opportunities that you’ll have in solo travel as well. So I was a basket case, especially at the airport, and like train stations and things like that, when I first traveled by myself, and I mean, you’re just throwing yourself in there. And what it forces your it forces you to do is ask for help when you have to, I mean, you have to be willing to ask for help, there’s no way around it. And so the things that you might be hesitant to do, if you’re in your home environment. You know, and navigating on your own part of navigating on your own is, is getting help from other people. But if you don’t have anyone with you, that has to be, you know, the strangers or the people who are working in the restaurant or the train station, or wherever it is you are.

So one specific scenario that I can point to that was you know, kind of a unique experience of solo travel that that helps, you know, get those coping skills is when I was in India by myself and I got — my plane landed in the morning, I’m always very, you know, very, I’m very, I like to make sure that I land in the daylight if I’m by myself. That’s really good to do. And so I got out of my Uber, and I was supposed to go I was staying in a house. I wasn’t staying in a hotel. So I was volunteering for an NGO. And I got out of my Uber and I didn’t know that the address on the Google Map of the place that I was staying was not correct. So I got dropped off by myself and India in the daylight fortunately, very early on a Sunday morning, and had no idea where the place was. And there was nobody around. And so I’m standing with my luggage very obviously a tourist by himself, and I called the place that I was supposed to go and the person did not speak any English. So that was a, you know, that added to the problem. And I’m thinking, Well, what am I going to do, I’m wandering around a little bit kind of looking around, seeing if I can figure out which place I’m supposed to go to, in this residential area. And a man on a motorcycle, motorcycle pulled up to me. And he’s like, Oh, it looks like you need help. And he spoke English. And I’m thinking, okay, so this could go one of two ways, this could be a very dangerous situation. So this is part of that decision making, right? So the situation that I’m in, this could be a dangerous situation, this guy could take me somewhere and rob me. And he’s, he said, Okay, hand me your phone, and I’ll talk to the person and I, you know, I looked at my options, and I thought, Okay, this guy the phone, right? So he has a conversation with this lady that I can’t understand, and then says, I know where this place is, it’s right near where I live, do you want me to take you there? So we started out walking together, and because I think he didn’t want me to feel like something dangerous was happening, which, you know, I noticed that and I appreciated it. So when he said, you know, if you if you want to, we can just get on my motorcycle, and I’ll take you over there. And, you know, it’s a, it’s a judgment call, you’ve got to be able to make those kinds of split second decisions. And with the situation that I was in, it was my best option. So I got on the motorcycle, and he dropped me off there. And, and it worked out just fine. But yeah, you find yourself in those situations where you learn decision making, you know, weighing your options in a much faster, you know, I like to have a lot of time to process. And I didn’t have that luxury…

 

LB: 

Right, right. I mean, in most travel, you don’t have that luxury of time to process the information. That’s an that’s an amazing story. And, and good for you. It’s, it’s very challenging what you what you’ve done, that’s really amazing. Very brave.

 

KO: 

Thank you. And I mean, anybody can do that. And I just want people to know, too, that like, yeah, for sure. Like, before I went, I was a nervous wreck, and like, you know, sometimes even like getting sick to my stomach. And it for me, it was totally worth it. Because it was I have those memories that you can’t take away. And once I start traveling, you know, those nerves go away, and they’re only situational. But for sure, I was scared. But I just didn’t let that stop me. Because it was something that I wanted to do.

 

HM: 

I think that’s really, really powerful. And I know I am a very nervous traveler, especially when there’s any changes in itinerary, but it sounds like you really know what you’re doing. And I appreciate that. And I’m sure our listeners too, too. How can we learn more about you and what you’re doing?

 

KO: 

Yeah, sure. And I’ll say one point on the travel to that debt all comes from experience like, so the more you do it, the better you get at it. And so I’ll leave that, leave it at that. And people can learn more about what I’m doing at the Full Spectrum Agency website: FullSpectrumASD.org. We also have our meetup page, which is where people still sign up for our events to our meetup page. So Meetup is free to join, you can set up an account if you don’t have one already and join our group. So I think if you search either full spectrum agency autistic adults meetup or autism, you know, related, you know, they have a keyword search and meet up around Ann Arbor. It will come up in that search on meetup. So, of course, my contact information is on the full spectrum agency website. And if you are, you know, if anyone’s having trouble finding any of those things, you can always send me an email. So we have those those ways to keep up with what I’m doing. We do have a private Facebook group for our for our group. And even if you’re not in our group, you can join that it’s for autistic adults to kind of hang out and chat with each other. It’s small, but somewhat active. And mostly, we’re just very active in the meetup group. So those are the best way to keep up with what we’re doing is on the full spectrum agency page, and the meetup group. And if anyone’s interested in getting involved in any of the other activities that I’m doing with other organizations like the Navigating healthy relationships, sexuality, education, social and communication skills, or self determination Um, you know, I can share out those links as well, if anybody’s interested.

 

LB: 

That’s amazing.

 

KO: 

Yeah, I’ve really got a lot of the opportunities came after I, you know, I started all from just starting this Meetup group. And what I was doing was outreach to a lot of people who I thought, you know, might know of folks who would benefit from being in our peer support. And so through that outreach over the course of a few years, things just people started asking me like, do you want to get involved in this? Turns out, I’m a good facilitator, I never would have, I never would have guessed it with, you know, I never wanted to speak in public when I was when I was younger. And here I am doing presentations and podcasts and facilitating you find skills you don’t know that you have.

 

LB: 

And you’re pretty amazing at those skills. That’s great.

 

KO: 

But yeah, needing the breaks in between, for sure. That’s the key. So I know, I did that to myself Wednesday, where I didn’t give myself breaks for recovery time. And that solitude, and that makes a difference. So knowing your, your needs and your boundaries. That’s the key.

 

LB: 

So Katie, can you tell our listeners what projects you have coming up?

 

KO: 

Yeah, definitely. So we always have our peer support going on that’s ongoing. We have sections of the classes that I teach, opening various times, including the Navigating healthy relationships, and sexuality education. We have social and communication skills for artistic adults, which I I have to point out as autistic lead, the curriculum is written by autistic adults. And so I just want to point out that this was created in Korea as a reaction to a lot of social skills programs that were created by neurotypical folks. It’s so we wanted to have something that was more or less, you know, not about hiding your autism, but is about how to better manage social situations and communication and relationships. So and also, the Tony Richards Leadership Academy is where I do the launch you program. And that’s the self self determination. So as sections of those are opening at various times, and people can reach out to me to find more, also, in the future, we’re in hopefully, in the near future. I’m working with some other organizations on an ally ship program. So we can be it should be on the lookout. We don’t have dates set yet. But we are starting a series of events aimed at talking about some of the issues that come up frequently in the autism community and the neurodivergent. Community. And what are the neuro divergent perspectives on those things? What are the neurotypical perspectives on those things? And how can we have those conversations together to kind of build bridges, so to speak, you know, in our communities, because there is a lot of tension I see between the neurodivergent and the typical communities. And I think we should be working together to make a better world for all of us. So I’m very excited about partnering with some other folks to work on this ally ship program. And I’ll be putting updates on our Facebook page too. As details come out about that.

 

LB: 

Wow, you’re so busy during so many wonderful initiatives and projects, you’re pretty amazing.

 

KO: 

Thank you. And I’ve been forced to really get good at time management, it’s been an ongoing struggle. I’m gonna I like to be very honest about those things. Because I think when people look at, you know, people who are viewed as being very successful, they think that we just maybe have something that they don’t have, and it’s not true. So I really, really struggle with time management. And so I’ve started using this app called Habitica. If that’s it, for those of you know, listeners who are maybe into gaming, d&d and things like that it kind of gamified is your task management and your to do list so very helpful, helpful for you because it is an ongoing challenge. It’s definitely an ongoing challenge.

 

LB: 

Right and and as you gain skills and as you learn things you’re passing it on in so many different venues and areas to help other people. It’s pretty spectacular what you’re doing.

 

KO: 

Thank you. I have a passion for helping other people I know that’s a, that’s another one of those pieces of the, the stigma that people sometimes have about autism is there’s a misconception about that maybe we don’t care about people, we don’t like people and definitely care about people and love people. But I also, you know, the energy management looks a little bit different, I need a little bit more solitude, then, you know, for recovery than than the average person, but definitely love people.

 

LB: 

That’s very clear in all that you’ve done and accomplished.

 

KO: 

Thank you.

 

HM: 

We have a short segment that we want to talk about with peer support groups and peer to peer groups. And, Katie, I absolutely love that you and the full spectrum agency are doing these peer support groups. I know when I was in college, I actually tried getting involved with support groups, and they were all neurotypical led, which was so uncomfortable for all of us autistic college students at the time, is we didn’t feel safe, necessarily opening up about ourselves. And then we, a couple of us tried to connect with each other outside of the facilitators, because we just didn’t feel comfortable. Because this facilitator gave us very kind of bug under a microscope feeling for us, I don’t know how else to really describe it. So how can peer support groups do you think be that much more impactful and helpful, it’s something I wish that I had, especially as a younger person, and you have so much experience in organizing and really even growing just organically and in person and in virtual setting. So excited to learn more about your support.

 

KO: 

Absolutely. And Haley, I think you really, you know, you hit the nail on the head, so to speak, with, you know, a lot of the support groups are, in the past have been neurotypical LED. And there’s just something and it’s, it’s something in the communication style, and it’s kind of hard to put your finger on. But what I can say, I can say probably a lot of things about that. But in terms of the communication style, specifically, there’s something that happens when we’re in a group of Autistics, or other otherwise neurodivergent folks, that the conversation just flows more naturally feels forced, when we’re interacting with neurotypical I, there’s a lot of neurotypicals in my life that I love very much, and I love you know, being around them. So it is not, you know, a slight on them at all. But you know, it’s just a different style of communication. And so it’s like, two people trying to communicate in different languages and try to pick up on the, you know, the body language and understand what, what each other means. And so it’s difficult from both people’s perspectives.

And so when you’re doing something like peer support, where, you know, some people are there to just, you know, chat about, you know, light stuff, exciting things going on in their lives, but some people are there to talk about really heavy things that are deeply personal. Including, you know, mental health challenges, and even suicide attempts that comes up sometimes. So, you know, you need to have a place where you know, that you don’t have those, those, those communication struggles. And so I know when we get into our autistic group, the conversation just flows very freely. And all of those communication challenges that people talk about with autism seem to disappear. It’s like I’m somebody waved a magic wand. It’s really incredible. And what I noticed, in artistic communication is that people don’t mind so much when people are kind of talking over each other a little bit, but not not to a large extent, of course, you know, we we encourage people not to interrupt and to wait their turn, but people will get in our group once in a while, we’ll get very excited about a topic and just, it gets really, you know, everybody gets really bubbly. And everybody’s kind of talking at once and people are very excited. And it’s a it’s a good, it’s a good thing, it’s very exciting to see. And also the info dumps that people most neurotypicals find so annoying, I think we always appreciate a good info dump, somebody will give us that, you know, like everything they know on a topic and we’re all just like, Wow, that’s incredible. So this, the, you know, the similar nature and the similar communication styles is really important and feeling like everyone in the room, including the facilitator, can relate to what you’re experiencing.

I think, you know, because there’s so much stigma around autism so and so a lot of people have had traumas in their life from like how they’ve been made to feel maybe like sometimes even less than human because of their autism, that kind of a wall goes up. You know, when when there’s a neurotypical like trying to talk with them in a peer support setting. So I think it’s not a replacement for therapy, anyone in our group who is really struggling, I always encourage to also see a therapist, of course, I see a therapist, and it’s very helpful for me. So it’s not a replacement for that. But it is a very important aspect for autistic adults to have. And Haley, you mentioned, it would have been helpful for you when you were younger as well, I think we our age range goes from 18 to there’s no upper limit, we’ve had people from 18 to I think 73, join us. So for the younger adults to and even probably, you know, the teens would be really helpful to have a, you know, a group of people who understands from your perspective, and isn’t going to have potentially that bias or, you know, judgment that sometimes comes from the neurotypical world. I’m not sure if I’ve answered your whole question. I’ve been talking for a long time. So it’s possible. What was the question again,

 

HM: 

I thank you, I think you gave so much valuable insight, especially on to the power of peer support groups. So you definitely answered my question. Wasn’t sure I truly appreciate all of your wisdom and your leadership on this area.

 

LB: 

Yeah.

 

 

Thank you. Thank you, Haley and Dr. Butts too.

 

HM: 

thank you. And we’re almost out of time here on spectrally and are so grateful to have folks like Katie who are truly leading the charge. If you want to follow what Katie is doing, be sure to check out Full Spectrum Agency at fullspectrumasd.org. As for the rest of us, be sure to check out differentbrains.org and check out their Twitter and Instagram at DiffBrains. And don’t forget to look for them on Facebook. If you’re looking for me, please say hello on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram or you can always visit me at my website, Haleymoss.com.

 

LB: 

I can be found at CFIexperts.com. Please be sure to subscribe and rate us on iTunes and don’t hesitate to send questions to spectrumlyspeaking@gmail.com. Let’s keep the conversation going.

Spectrumly Speaking is the podcast dedicated to women on the autism spectrum, produced by Different Brains®. Every other week, join our hosts Haley Moss (an autism self-advocate, attorney, artist, and author) and Dr. Lori Butts (a licensed clinical and forensic psychologist, and licensed attorney) as they discuss topics and news stories, share personal stories, and interview some of the most fascinating voices from the autism community.