Friday, April 17, 2026
I have always assumed degrees of attachment to physical places and environments differ from person to person. Being neurodivergent, the signals of safety (or otherwise) and familiarity (or otherwise) from the space around me can play a large part in how I’m feeling, thinking and functioning. I’ve watched various people leave homes, offices, third-spaces and never think of them again. In a way, I’m envious.
Places are anchors.
I’m home, no one can introduce things I don’t expect. The local supermarket (a common autistic regulation place, I’m led to believe) - I know where things are. I know where the things I like are.
I know how it feels to be in a certain office, a certain staff room of a school, a relative’s home.
When these places change, or become somewhere I can no longer go - there is grief. Something that helped shape my world has become something else and I have lost it.
I’m moving home tomorrow for the first time in over 11 years. Although at times desperate to move, I’ve avoided it for at least half of those years. Even with its faults, it’s a sanctuary that cannot be replicated anywhere else. However comforting my next main place is, it can’t comfort in the same way, because it isn’t the same.
For a short while I will be anchor-less. Unmoored, I’ll likely take refuge in other places that I am used to. Supermarkets, coffee shops - the people, shelves, tastes, smells and sounds that soothe only because it isn’t the first time I’m there.
Logically, I know my new home will provide as a sanctuary soon enough. It will change me in slight ways because of how it is. How the light moves through it on a normal day. What noises are common to hear. The people in the other houses on the street that I sense, or talk to. They will all start to have an effect on where my attention goes.
Nick Cave talks about us as creatures of loss. Acceptance of that is a loss in and of itself. Losing people, places, thoughts - it happens all the time. I think I’m finally ready to lose this shell for a new one.
Friday, December 12, 2025
Neurodiversity has a surprising large attack-surface on life. Diagnosed with ADHD in my 30s, and with autistic traits abound, I am learning every day a new way these things make my life more... interesting.
Christmas doesn’t get to escape untouched. I have struggled to “accept” the whole month of December for as long as I can remember. There are traps everywhere.
Everything is Different
The most impactful one for me is that everything is suddenly different. I can’t get my shopping delivered on the same day as usual. I feel like I have to “buy in advance” because habitual foods might disappear off the shelves for two weeks, replaced by a (disgusting) Christmas Pudding.
The things I rely on to ground me are all suddenly unpredictable or unavailable:
- Public Transport is different (are there trains today?)
- Opening times are different
- Media is different (yearly recap episodes and “Christmas Specials” feel like they aren’t the real thing to me)
- Everyone else’s routine is suddenly different (colleagues all having different holiday dates, for example)
- The look of things are different - for example packaging is decorated funny
To some these things might seem like I’d want to control the world around me - but honestly, these types of stable constants are what allow me to at least consider feeling secure.
Unclear expectations
What do I buy people? Will it be “enough”? Why do this anyway - isn’t it just me spending £50 on a guess, you spending £50 on a guess? Why don’t we just spend £50 on ourselves for something that we know we want?
What do I bring to this gathering? Do I know them well enough to wear X?
I understand a lot of neurotypical people are plagued with these conundrums, not only us spectrum-residents. But, for me at least, it’s the accumulation of everything, plus unclear expectations.
You must enjoy
Feeling low on a day in June is one thing. Feeling low on Christmas Day is apparently doubly-shameful and you’re wasting a special occasion.
Coupled with that, is the feeling that you must be more social than usual. Catch up with everyone. I love this thought in theory, but in practice the extra socialising heaps on to all the other pressures of the period and exhausts me.
Not all grumpy
There are parts of Christmas that speak to me. The period of rest that only seems possible after sometime in the afternoon of the 25th, until I’m back to work in early January is delicious. All expectations have been released, all mistakes made, nothing more to plan (oh, apart from how you’ll spend the crucial moment at Midnight January 1st).
It feels like less people are around December 26th onwards, making it a bit more peaceful to explore somewhere in a less claustrophobic way. And if I stay in, it’s extra cosy to cuddle up around that time.
I can’t help but be interested in how other people, neurodiverse or otherwise, relate to all this? I’d always love to talk - matt@mattharwood.com or on the Fediverse
Friday, October 31, 2025
This week I took part in a focus group for Nationwide centred around neurodiverse experiences. Their interest seemed good-natured, and the few of us shared some of the pain points we might have in our financial lives as well as more generally.
One neurodiverse trait I have found to be common in myself and those I know is a tendency to be very aware of how people around us are feeling or behaving. A rather persistent monitor, borne from having to predict the future to feel safe. This group was no different.
We spoke about a general collapse of sociability and kindness in the outside world. People in supermarkets not even seeing you’re there, so wrapped up in their own world. An arrogance of entitlement that shows in little interactions - less thank yous, less letting others go first.
How to deal with this growing hostility in shared spaces? My first thought is that being kind, polite, empathetic and outward-looking is now a radical act. And radical acts are there to be radically acted, of course. This does get harder - the more people push in the queue, the more your own cynicism and hostility is prone to grow. But resisting that feels like a worthy cause to me.
This, of course, is not an experience solely for the neurodiverse community. Anyone I talk to in Britain today recognises a decline in spirit. In times like this, being happy anyway is the resistance.