Search for:
Aug 28 2022
Spirituality and my Autistic experience

“Picture a wave in the ocean. You can see it, measure it – its height, the way the sunlight refracts as it passes through – and it’s there, you can see it, and you know what it is, it’s a wave. And then it crashes on the shore and it’s gone. But the water is still there.”

Chidi Anagonye, The Good Place (Season 4 Ep. 13)

When the average person considers the word “spirituality”, they probably picture traditional places of worship associated with the major world religions. For me, however, spirituality is about a lot more than worshipping am unseen entity, and its arbitrary (and often outdated) models of morality.

When I consider my own spirituality, I think about my place in reality. I consider the interconnectedness of all things, and the beautiful tapestry that is our universe.

Humanity so often considers itself the pinnacle of existence, we are the “dominant” species on our planet. However, we are observably insignificant compared to the scale of our universe. It is, in my opinion, our connection to our universe, and how we influence it that makes us significant.

We are constantly altering our environment, which has knock on effects for all living beings within it. The actions of those living beings, in turn, effect us. Everything we do effects everything that exists in some way, even if to slight to be noticed. We have a responsibility to ensure that our existence does not leave the universe worse than it was before our existence.

This, perhaps, is why the following quote (that I have referenced a few times) has become a mainstay in my own form of spirituality. I use it as a guide for my actions, even if I do so imperfectly.

“To be is to be perceived, and so to know thyself is only possible through the eyes of the other. The nature of our immortal lives is in the consequences of our words and deeds, that go on and are pushing themselves throughout all time.”

Revelation of Sonmi-451, Cloud Atlas, Written by David Mitchell

The actions that we make in our lives will forever change the course of history. The things that we do are writing the future that those who come after us will have to live with. I’m not just talking about humanity’s collective actions. The things we do as individuals ripple out, contributing to huge changes.

We are the multitude of droplets that create an ocean.

In this sense, my work advocating for Autistic people is a spiritual practice for me. I am trying to leave the world a better place than when I found it. Spirituality, for me, transcends the boundaries of religion and such practices. It is a way of enacting good in a world that so often rejoices in the dark.

Another aspect of spirituality that is important to me is the exploration of the self.

The truth is that our entire concept of the self is built upon rules and structures that have existed long before we did. To truly know the self, we have to understand the effects we have on the universe around us. We have to understand how our actions influence our shared existence. We have to embrace the fact that we are imperfect, and that some times our actions will do harm.

When this happens, we have to be open to the process of accepting what we have done, and trying not to repeat our mistake. We also have to respect the fact that once something happens, it cannot unhappen. Every action we make has a permanent impact on the world around us. To put it another way, what is done cannot be undone.

Spirituality does, and should, look different for everyone. Our experiences of reality are subjective, and I believe this is where mainstream religion fails. It tries to box everyone together into a shared and objective reality, which in itself is an impossibility.

We have one life on this earth with which to do good. We can’t waste it trying to fit into someone else’s reality. We can only be ourselves.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Aug 25 2022
The Mental Health Act (1983) explained

The mental health act of 1983 (updated 2007) is legislation in England and Wales that puts into law the individuals rights regarding mental health treatment. In particular, it talks about the individuals rights with regard to inpatient treatment. This is an issue of significance to the Autistic community.

Patients in an inpatient setting can be either formal (detained under the mental health act) or informal (they are inpatients volutarily). For the purposes of this article, we will look at the sections that can be used to detain an individual against their will, and what their rights are with regards to their use.

Section 136

This pertains to the removal of an individual from a public space, to a place of safety, for assessment. This is carried out by police. Under this section you can be held for assessment for up to 36 hours.

Section 135

This section allows police to enter a private place (not public) to detain you for assessment. To do this, they must have permission from magistrate. Again, you can be detained for up to 36 hours.

Section 2

Under this section, you can be detained for up to 28 days in a psychiatric facility for assessment and treatment. People held under this section can be treated against their will. It is unusual for a section 2 to be renewed.

Section 3

This section can be renewed.

Initially you can be detained for 6 months, it can then be renewed for a further 6 months. After this period subsequent renewals allow for 12 months of detainment. This section should only be used for yourself and others safety, and where treatment cannot be provided as an outpatient.

Section 5(2) “Doctors Holding Power”

This section allows a doctor or other approved clinician to detain you for up to 72 hours. This section requires a report to be made to the hospital manager. You are most likely to come across this as a voluntary patient.

Section 5(4) “Nurses Holding Power”

This regards detainment by a specially qualified nurse. You can be held for up to 6 hours, or until a doctor or clinician with the power to detain you arrives, whichever is earlier.

Section 117 aftercare

This section describes the legal duty to provide aftercare for those discharged under sections 3, 37, 45A, 47, and 48. this also applies if you are under a Community Treatment Order (CTO).

Community Treatment Orders

This is similar to being “on licence” from incarceration. A CTO allows you to be treated in the community under certain conditions. If you break the conditions of your CTO, you can be recalled to hospital.

This is not exhaustive, the mental health act contains a great many sections, but these are the ones you are most likely to encounter standardly.

Remember

If detained under section, you are legally entitled to an Independent Mental Health Advocate (IMHA) and a Second Opinion Approved Doctor (SOAD). You also have the right to go to tribunal and ask that your section be ended.

David Gray-Hammond 0 Comments
Aug 20 2022
The tin can conundrum: the problem with “labels”

Most of us have probably heard the saying by now. “Labels go on tin cans, autism is a diagnosis”. It’s true, calling autism a label is inherently invalidating. Being Autistic is an identity, a culture. As Dr. Chloe Farahar of Aucademy explains, autism itself is an abstract concept, the only thing that exists is Autistic people. So why do we feel the need to separate out and diagnose people according to the way their brain works.

After all, this is the neurodiversity movement, are we not trying to end the medicalisation of different neurocognitive styles?

Let’s consider neurotypicality. You don’t get “diagnosed” as neurotypical. This is because people with neurotypical bodyminds are able to perform their cultures neuronormative standards. They are able to assimilate into society, and therefore are generally good and obedient profit machines that don’t upset the status quo.

Neurodivergent people, however, are somewhat of a wrench in the gears. We can not perform neuronormative standards, not comfortably anyway. We require the masters house to be dismantled and rebuilt. Here’s where the conundrum comes into play.

As Dr. Nick Walker explains in her book Neuroqueer Heresies, the master will never give you the tools to dismantle their house. In this case the masters tools look like a society that disables neurodivergent people, and uses that disability to pathologise neurodivergence by locking all of the support that might improve our lives behind a medical diagnosis. That medical diagnosis, in turn, is then used as a marketing tool where by people have to pay for diagnosis (in many countries), pay for support, and in fact the “autism label” is used to wack a premium on anything that might make our lives more comfortable.

Let’s not forget that the ABA industry pulls down millions every year by selling the idea that they can “fix” your “broken” child, converting them into a person who can perform to the neurotypical standard. “Indestinguishable from their peers” has become somewhat of a motto for those who want to see autism eradicated.

So how do we break out of this conundrum?

As Dr. Walker says, we “throw away the masters tools”. We find and bring the tools necessary to dismantle a society that oppresses us. In this case, the masters tools are diagnosis and the so-called “supports” that we find locked away behind it.

It may sound radical, but we need to work towards a world where diagnosis is no longer necessary. A neurocosmopolitan society where no one neurocognitive style holds power over another. It’s radical, and sounds deceptively simple, but it isn’t.

In order for this to work, we have to dismantle the structural oppression that our current economic systems wield.

We have to understand the intersections between different minority groups.

We need to work together to create a world that doesn’t value arbitrary values over the value of human life.

This probably won’t be achieved in our lifetime, maybe not in our children’s lifetimes, but it can be achieved. We just have to take the first steps in the right direction.

A direction that takes us away from the pathologisation of different minds.

So let me end by saying this. My name is David, I’m neurodivergent. It isn’t an illness, I don’t require fixing because I am not broken. I live in a world that doesn’t fit me well by design. I refuse to accept that world, and I hope to leave a better one than the one I was born into.

David Gray-Hammond 4 Comments
Verified by MonsterInsights