I found this blog post saved in drafts since August 2021. Maybe I had more to share, but was just too exhausted.

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Our self discovery journey is a very complicated one.

As the Messenger of Allah ﷺ has told us to live in this world like a traveller. Nothing is stationary- our relationships, our situations, our loved ones, and even ourselves.

For those who actively seek self improvement and direction the journey is is even more appreciated.

In the past year, the trauma of being brown, Muslim, female, and an autistic single parent continued. Time and again I was faced with darkness and despair. Is it really that complicated? Why is it so common? A toxic and deadly combination of of sexism, racism and ableism led to more generational trauma being passed on and the unfortunate familiarity of the past returned in front of me.

What most people don’t understand is that experiencing the myriad of abuse directly and indirectly is felt with much more impact by an autist. Another neurotypical woman may well suffer from PTSD and depression from domestic abuse, racism, ableism of another disability, but the neurodivergent woman… ironically isn’t permitted to lift the veil of tsunami of emotions and pain in fear of being labelled deemed out of control, lying, or drama queen. Autistic women are only more prone to abuse, the impact is more damaging and deep.

Which public health service is to give us our justice?

April 2022

In the past months I have continued my journey of painful growth which has been overall beneficial. Turns out I am not the only benefitting from my quest for understanding, but others, both known and unknown to me as well. The feedback is crucial to me because of rejection sensitive dysphoria. I am my own worst critic and mostly feel I have nothing valuable to add to the discussion around neurodiversity.

Since beginning this blog post in August, I got confirmation that I have ADHD as well! It’s really not surprising since between 30 – 80% of autistic population also have ADHD. It explains a lot more to me about my behaviours and brain than what the autism diagnosis did.

I have also since August delivered training on understanding Autism though my intersectional lens. I learned a lot from my co-trainer and ended the course with a more respect from our South Asian audience than I began with.

Turns out being neurodivergent is actually pretty ausome! (yes the spelling is intentional!)

I will be back with more reflection and lessons as I continue this journey called life.