I was speaking at ‘Every Little Thing Festival’ last Sunday (10th September), on Suicide Awareness Day. The festival was created to support wellness and mental health and prevent suicides.

Since the event I have been reflecting on ‘Neurodiversity and Me’

Many people know me as a Chartered Civil Engineer with extensive experience in flood risk or as a fundraiser, co-founder of plastic free Caversham, beauty queen or more recently a BBC presenter on Get Set Galactic or even as a former elected Councillor and Deputy Mayor.

However, I would describe myself through my value system which I summarise as living on purpose and with purpose to make a positive difference.

Beyond all of this, my identity and life story has been heavily influenced by my neurodiversity which highly influences the way I think and interact with the world. 

One of those neurodiversity is that I am autistic.

My journey to diagnosis was one that came later in life. This is the story of many autistic women where diagnosis often comes later in life.

This can be a very difficult journey often filled with wrong diagnosis due to masking and gender bias in the diagnostic criteria and can sadly result in suicide attempts as evidenced in Cassidy et al (2022) which found ’17.2% of those who died by suicide had evidence of autism in coroner’s records and found evidence of possible undiagnosed autism in a further 24.1% meaning possible up to 41.4% of people who died by suicide are autistic.

This is why inclusion is so important to save lives and improve life outcomes.

There is important work happening to increase autism awareness and acceptance. Work I am involved in as an advocate. However, I often find myself partaking in this work through the lens of the quantifiable value of autism to business, the economy due to our systemising minds and innovation brought by our neurological difference.

Now on reflection, I find myself criticizing this current approach to advocacy including my own advocacy. Why? Because no human’s inclusion should be based on their business utility and the solutions their diversity of thought brings.

Therefore, I will be taking another approach from hence forth – a dual approach that highlights the value of our different brains but also acknowledges that we do not need to earn our right to exist because everyone was born worthy of this basic entitlement to simply be.

I like the rest of the autistic community may have a social and communication disability but that in itself is not wrong, it is just a different. And difference is natural, I have read this best explained by Gary Ferguson ‘8 Master Lessons of Nature’ where he explains the importance of biodiversity in nature and the role it play in ensuring resilience in the ecosystem. I do not think neurological difference are so dissimilar, they have a role to play for sure. However, living in world where this difference is treated as a problem that needs to masked is the issue. And I think this is one of the many reasons between the correlation between autism and poor mental health. And this can be exacerbated by late diagnosis and little to no support to navigate a world not designed with autistic needs in mind.

It is so important that everyone feel supported and gets to experience belonging and good mental health and resilience. However, the journey to this does not just rely on the individual in question but also the systems they exist in. After all, as the anonymous quote goes ‘you cannot get healthy in the environment that made you sick’.

I write about this in my upcoming book – “Othered: How to Thrive & Disrupt in Spaces Not Created for You’ where I explore paradigm to support all othered people to navigate this.

I hope to add depth to the advocacy already happening with the hopes to encourage a deeper perspective that outlines the collective work required to save the lives of young autistic people who commit suicide at higher rather than their neurotypical peers.

This brings me back to the ‘Every Little Thing Festival’, a festival on suicide prevention day created to support wellness and mental health and prevent suicides. It is also on the birthday of Diva Gibson, who sadly lost her life to suicide on the 10th of May 2020. This festival is the brainchild of her mother, Sinead Gibson, who continues to work tirelessly in her efforts to support those with mental health issues, as well as anyone else who needs help.

I hope we continue to do the necessary work to save autistic lives where we celebrate the difference and the values it brings as well as validate inherent human value and provide the necessary accommodations to encourage mental health.