A social enterprise helping people on the autistic spectrum and the people around them.
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4 Conversation techniques to add to your social script
Posted: 12 months ago
Many autistic people create for themselves a 'social script' to help them know how to interact in social situations. A social script is a guide for planning what to do and say inside a social setting.
The Girl With The Curly Hair uses a social script whenever she meets up with her friends. Specifically, she uses 4 conversation techniques:
Episode 3 now available
Posted: July 22, 2019
Episode 3 'A Day at College for The Girl with the Curly Hair' is now available to watch on our website! The Girl With The Curly Hair goes to college. She travels by train and has Chemistry, Physics and Biology lessons.
Was it such a bad thing to be diagnosed as an adult?
Posted: July 19, 2019
I often feel bombarded by people who praise early diagnosis of autism. There are lots of benefits of receiving a diagnosis as a young child, for example being entitled to receive support at school. However, there are also some benefits of not getting diagnosed until adulthood. I think that I am a better person in many ways because I wasn't diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome until I was in my twenties. The period of time in which a person is diagnosed, for example 2019 versus 1999, would also affect how useful a diagnosis was. For many older adults, having a diagnosis as a child would probably not have helped them much at all, just because of the period of time and the widespread lack of understanding of autism.
What does having no instincts mean?
Posted: July 9, 2019
One of the most severe difficulties associated with autism is the difficulty imagining what might happen in a situation. You could describe this as social imagination or just simply lacking instinct. Most neurotypical people will go into any situation and be able to cope with it on the spot. The situation can be anything, for example going on the train, going to a cafe, meeting friends, going to the GP or going to a conference. In most instances they don't have to do much 'preparation' beforehand, or least not overly conscious or right-to-the-very-last-detail preparation. Autistic people, on the other hand, have a tendency to either overprepare or underprepare.
The work-life balance: how to achieve it
Posted: June 29, 2019
Working or studying full time exhausts me to the point where I am not normally able to do much else during evenings and weekends. I know that a lot of neurotypical people say their work is tiring but I observe that most neurotypical people can still have a 'life' during evenings and weekends. This is in comparison to autistic people. I have read so many autistic people's experiences of work and education and how it completely exhausts them or leads to burnout. 'Free time' ends up being 'recovery time' and relationships, hobbies and 'life' suffer.
5 ways to be more assertive
Posted: June 18, 2019
Assertiveness means being able to stand up for yourself in situations where you feel uncomfortable or under threat in some way. As a person with ASD, a lot of situations make me feel uncomfortable! I haven't however always been able to be assertive in order to properly manage the situation. Unfortunately I have suffered being around people I didn't want to be around, doing activities I didn't want to do, experiencing little 'internal' meltdowns as my stress levels built up and having no way to cope until I got home.
The steep learning curve
Posted: June 7, 2019
Do you remember the first time you were able to ride your bicycle without stabilisers? Or the first time you could read? Do you remember the feeling inside your stomach of joy and satisfaction? And then what happened thereafter? That skill was mastered and you were able to carry on with it forever. The process of learning anything technical, to me, looks like the beginning of a mountain to climb. At the start there is a massive, very steep incline, then there is a summit to get over, and then afterwards it flattens out.
One skill you need for a less overwhelming life
Posted: May 29, 2019
Ever since I learned the skill of being able to prioritise, life for me has become so much less overwhelming. To prioritise means to determine the order for dealing with a series of tasks according to their relative importance. To be a successful prioritiser means executing the tasks in that order. I realise why a lot of autistic people may have trouble prioritising. The fundamental answer is that prioritising is a skill controlled by executive function, which is an area of difficulty in people who are autistic.
5 amazing ways to manage deadlines
Posted: May 19, 2019
Deadlines are vital for everything that is important because they facilitate people actually getting things done. Without a deadline, tasks can just get left or forgotten about. I love deadlines and I have them for every single thing that I do, however, if not carefully managed, they can cause me to feel very stressed. One… Join The Curly Hair Project Community Today This article and our podcasts are available only to members of our community. If you would like to continue to…
How to cope with overwhelming thoughts
Posted: May 9, 2019
Some autistic people have a great number of thoughts all the time throughout the day. In fact, they can have so many thoughts that they feel completely consumed by them. I thought I would write an article about the different types of thoughts that a person may have and how they could sort and manage them, and ultimately de-clutter their mind!
Food crazes and autism
Posted: April 30, 2019
Eating can be another challenge that comes from having autism. One of the challenges that I personally have is having a craze about particular foods. This means that I eat the same thing for a long period of time. The positives of being like this are that 1) I always know what I'm going to eat and 2) it's easier to manage my money. But there are some drawbacks as well: