Dear Bobby,
I hope you are well, now that I have returned to work I am away from home three days a week. I know that you have noticed this because when I get home from work, you stay with me once I have fed you as if you have missed me.
Although I have only been officially out of work since October 2023, I have been craving structure and routine for so much longer than this. I know that I do better with both my physical and mental health when I have a solid routine.
Returning to work has given me the much needed structure that has allowed me to get into a successful sleep routine, I am now getting to sleep at a reasonable hour and waking up before my alarm clock goes off.
When I think about how much has been thrown my way since I qualified as a nurse in 2019, I think it is fair to say that I have surprised myself in how much I have battled and how far since then I have come in rebuilding my own resilience.
For such a long time I have been desperately seeking a role that would allow me to feel valued, needed and worthwhile. So I have started a new role that is not nursing, I am now working to support other autistic adults. Although I have my degree and my nursing qualification in tow, I do not feel compelled at the moment to return to a nursing role.
The jury is still out regarding nursing, I decided not to let my nursing registration lapse just yet because you never know what opportunities may arise. For the first time in such a long time I feel like I have something to offer, and right now that is supporting others.
In many ways, those that I have the privilege to support have similar challenges when navigating the NT world around us. I feel fortunate that my own disability has not stopped me from seeking employment, serving my country both in the Royal Navy and also on the front line during the COVID pandemic.
I am now in a position as I enter my fourth decade where I feel comfortable in my own skin, content that I operate differently to others but resolute that I am just as worthy to deserve love, happiness and all that life has to offer. I might be autistic but that is just my operating system, I am so much more and have so much more to give.
For so long I saw my late diagnosis as a burden, but now I think that in a lot of ways it has given me almost 40 years of experience in understanding NT and the many subtle differences in the way my brain operates. I think of it like being bi-lingual, I might not get it 100% all of the time but I can get by but with the added bonus of understanding the many pitfalls that can challenge an autistic person.
It is my hope that my own lived experience will give me a greater understanding of how to better support those autistic people that I am working with. In the short time that I have been in this role, I feel very lucky to be able to be where I am today. I hope that it will continue for a long time.
Today is friday and I have had a great week, I look forward to many more.
Love you
Daddy Lee x
Autism and Lee 