Me, Myself & Autism (MMA)

Autistic people often pretend to be like the other people around us in order to blend in. From an early age we begin masking differences and difficulties, in an attempt to keep ourselves safe.​ 

​We learn to hide ourselves, not because we don’t want to be thought of as different, but because often being different has led to experiences of bullying and prejudice.

In this session, we look at who we are, our self-esteem and self-worth, the things in life we find challenging as well as the things that we enjoy.

Our central nervous system processes sensory information. ​

This information helps our body to correctly adjust and adapt to the immediate environment.

In this session we take an in depth look at our eight senses and the impact that each have on our day-to-day functioning, and why it's important to choose the right environments to meet our unique needs.

We explore hyper and hypo sensitivities and what we can do to keep our nervous system regulated.

Autistic overthinking often stems from monotropism, a cognitive style where an individual's attention is intensely focused on a limited number of interests or thoughts. This heightened focus can lead to a deep, detailed analysis sometimes resulting in overthinking. Monotropism makes it difficult for autistic individuals to move between different thoughts or activities. This often results in autistic inertia and executive function difficulties.

In this session we look at strategies to help us to manage our thoughts and move on when feeling stuck.

In this session we explode the myth that surrounds autism and emotions.

We validate the way that autistic people express and feel our emotions, and why we are often overwhelmed with emotion in our empathy for other people and animals.

We look closely at anxiety, how it develops within us and what we may do to reduce anxious feelings.

How do we communicate effectively?

This session explores barriers to communication and strategies for communicating more effectively. We look at communication styles and in life how people often do not say what they really mean leading to confusion.

We look at strategies to communicate more assertively.

Looking after ourselves is essential to our independence. Independence does not mean having to do everything alone, without support. 

We all need boundaries to keep us and other people safe. Autistic adults can sometimes find it hard to set boundaries and stick to them, often saying yes just to have a quiet life.

This session looks at the importance of asserting our boundaries and communicating in an assertive way.