So, I know I haven’t published on schedule for a week (or three). My apologies to the two people who might actually have noticed.
There are reasons for this. Two, in fact.
The first is that I decided to try and turn all my incoherent ramblings on this blog, along with some of the genuinely useful things I’ve stumbled across over the last five years, into a guide for anyone who ends up where I found myself when my daughter was diagnosed; sitting in a consultant paediatrician’s office, the door locked so your child can’t escape. The doctor trying to explain that your child is autistic while your child has absolutely no interest in the carefully selected toys the nurse is enthusiastically waving around. Instead, they’re alternating between trying to make a break for freedom and attempting to hack the NHS by commandeering the doctor’s computer.
It was… memorable, possibly traumatic.
I hope you manage to absorb more information than I did. We were three weeks away from moving 300 miles, the world was only just emerging from COVID so I was the only parent in the room, and my brain was doing its best impression of a Windows computer displaying “Not Responding.”
The whole appointment felt simultaneously incredibly significant and strangely anticlimactic.
I left clutching a single sheet of A4 confirming the diagnosis, the advice that my daughter should never be left unsupervised, and the instruction that she required one-to-one support in any childcare setting. I also acquired a handful of leaflets and a cheerful “Good luck!” as I was ushered out of the door.
A quick glance through the leaflets revealed they were about as useful as a chocolate teapot. We were moving in three weeks, so every local service they listed was about to become irrelevant. Most of them had waiting lists longer than some mortgages, and several professionals commented that three was “very young to receive a diagnosis…”
“…especially for a girl.”
Whenever I asked what they meant by that, they suddenly became fascinatingly interested in literally anything else.
So I wrote the guide I wish someone had handed me.
It’s a mixture of explanations for all the jargon everyone suddenly expects you to understand, practical advice on things like getting fae children to sleep or convincing them that food isn’t, in fact, a personal attack, where to find help, and how to tackle the endless mountain of paperwork that seems to breed in dark cupboards.
It’s not perfect. I’m sure there are things I’ve missed.
But it’s a start.
Also, I can’t draw to save my life, so the illustrations are AI-generated. If you were hoping for my artistic talents, you’re welcome.
The second reason for my absence is that, two weeks ago, I was diagnosed with a disability of my own.
Apparently we like to keep these things in the family.
I have hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.
Apart from the overwhelming feeling of, “So that’s why I’ve been in pain for as long as I can remember,” I’m still working out exactly what this means for me.
On the bright side, over the next year I’ll probably become accidentally qualified to explain the PIP application process as well.
So… swings and roundabouts.
Which, it turns out, are now also on the list of things I should probably avoid.
Link to where you can buy the guide
Raising the Modern Fae 