About This Blog

Hello!   I created this blog in August 2013 while supporting my autistic son in his move from school to adult services. Despite years of planning for this transition the process was stressful and frustrating, culminating in me taking legal action on Dylan’s behalf. Setting the blog up seemed a good way of sharing what I’d learned with other families. Little did I realise that it would be two years before Dylan was allocated an appropriate setting nor could I have known how challenging the journey would turn out to be.

The story of my battle to secure a specialist placement for Dylan is told in some of the posts on this blog (in the Policy and Provision category). There are also some more general pieces on the challenges and celebrations of caring for someone who is autistic. A contents page on the blog provides links to individual posts and a theme cloud and categories button in the right sidebar identifies posts by subject.

When Dylan moved into residential care, the challenge became learning to live without him. In September 2015, therefore, the focus of the blog shifted as I documented the first 100 days of transition in an attempt to record the impact on me of  ‘Living With/Out Autism’. Since the 100 days ended I have posted occasional pieces and updates on Dylan’s progress.

Autism affects individuals and families differently and my posts can only offer accounts based on the particular experience of myself and my son. My work as an educator affects my views on autism and the choices I make in relation to my son and these perspectives will sometimes be evident from my posts. Perhaps more importantly, however, I am a poet. My orientation to Dylan and to autism is, I believe, as much a consequence of my poetic practice as any perspective I might have developed as an academic or mother. This creative and writerly approach to understanding and responding to autism influences many of my posts.  I hope that you find them interesting.

Thank you for reading!