Autism Acceptance Month 2014: Lydia Wayman

April 3, 2014January 31, 2022 by Shannon Des Roches Rosa

This month we’re asking our autistic community members What Do You Want? What Do You Need? We’ll be featuring their answers all month long, right here. Today we’re having a conversation with Lydia Wayman. Please read, listen, and share. What are some things you like people to know about you? I’m a busy girl! I’m a full-time, online grad student in my fourth semester out of six, so, I should have my M.F.A. in English and Creative Writing (nonfiction) in November of this year. I’ve self-published one book and have another coming out with AAPC. I’ve written for Autism Asperger Digest, Autism Asperger Network magazine, Squag blog, and I have a piece coming out in Wild Sister magazine in May. I have a lot of intense health issues but they don’t stop me from living and loving my life. I’m totally cat-obsessed, proud aunt of the cutest baby in the…

Disability

Fish Out of Water

October 9, 2013January 31, 2022 by Shannon Des Roches Rosa

Lydia Wayman autisticspeaks.wordpress.com I take in a gulp of air and shut my eyes tight before I plunge beneath the surface. One, two, three… It starts to feel like my brain is tingling from the inside. Four, five, six… I’m not counting in seconds, not in minutes, but in hours. Seven, eight, nine… I search for anyone, anything who will ground me through my ever-increasing internal chaos. Ten! When given the cue, I cannot break the surface fast enough, gasping for breath. I’ve done this thousands of times, and yet, after twenty-five years of daily descents, I am no more sure that I will survive the next one. —- I’m really not a writer. Writers have readers. I write because it’s the only way for me to get from one day to the next without semi-spontaneous internal combustion taking effect. I’m not a writer. I’m a processor of the world, an organizer…

Disability

Autistics Speaking Day 2012

November 1, 2012January 31, 2022 by Shannon Des Roches Rosa

And you really need to go to the Autistics Speaking Day website to see all the amazing posts that have already been put up, as and also following the @AutisticsSpeak Twitter stream. TPGA Contributor & Self-Advocate Lydia Wayman, representing. For those who would like history as to why this day matters so, please read ASDay co-founder Corina Becker’s TPGA Post The Beginnings of Autistics Speaking Day. Contribute contribute contribute! Spread the word! Boost the signal! Be as loud as your or your hands can be!

Disability

Lydia Wayman and Autism Acceptance Month

April 18, 2012January 31, 2022 by Shannon Des Roches Rosa

We’re featuring “Slice of Life” conversations with Autistics of all ages — kids through adults — throughout April’s Autism Acceptance Month Our goal is to help TPGA readers understand that autistic people are people who have interesting, complicated lives and who are as diverse and varied as any other population united by a label. We are the people in each other’s neighborhoods, and the more we know about each other — the more visible autistic people and children are — the more common autism acceptance will be. That is our hope. Today we’re talking with Lydia Wayman, a 24-year-old who loves friends, Diet Mountain Dew, and cats. She is greatly looking forward to a part time job and her forthcoming service dog, Lexie. She has a vast preference for communicating via text but has found a greater toleration for speech lately. What is your name? Lydia Wayman. Do you have…

Disability

An Autistic’s Advice: Ten Tips for Teachers

December 5, 2011January 31, 2022 by Shannon Des Roches Rosa

Lydia Wayman autisticspeaks.wordpress.com There is so much misinformation and so many misperceptions out there about people with disabilities, and that includes autism. I’ve read some things lately, comments by teachers or people who will teach, that have sent me reeling. In typical Lydia fashion, I will write a Ten Things in an attempt to dispel these myths about people like me. 1. People with disabilities are not always happy, joyful, eternally childlike, or “perfect angels.” People with disabilities are humans. This means that we experience the full range of human emotion, including the uncomfortable ones, such as anger and sadness. Some of us are generally happy, just like some people without disabilities are generally happy, but others of us are confused, angry, hateful, manipulative, and so on. Autistic children display inappropriate and unwanted behavior just like typical children do. 2. Always assume we understand everything you’re saying when we’re in…

Disability

Communication: A Million Little Things

October 7, 2011January 31, 2022 by Jen Myers

Lydia Wayman www.autisticspeaks.wordpress.com If I knew what to say, I’d tell you a million little things that I’ve acquired in my brain over the weeks and months — and lifetime. If I could, I’d tell you that I’m so over age appropriateness. You say Disney and American Girl isn’t age-appropriate for me? Well, excuse my language, but I say you can shove it. I would, if I could, ask you what is the point of encouraging age appropriate interests? Is it to make friends? I have many, even more than I can keep track of sometimes. Is it so that people will like me? Hate to break it to you, but people already do like me (not everyone, but, well, obviously, right?). Is it so that I can be normal? And to what end, I would ask? If I’m comfortable with it, you should be comfortable with it, and that’s…