Arts

Creativity – Yenn Purkis

August 12, 2017 Spectrum Women

It is 2011 in the psychiatric ward at Canberra Hospital, the dingy and oppressive and thankfully now long-closed ‘PSU.’ There is a new patient, a woman who doesn’t say much, looks agitated and scared and who wanders around all night looking at the linoleum tiles which have sparkles in them. She constantly listens to music on a tiny green iPod. Her diagnosis is indeterminate at this point – Asperger’s syndrome and some kind of psychosis. Doctors say she is hard to place diagnostically. The other patients remember her coming in a few days previously, wearing a suit, nice jewellery and […]

Research Studies

RESEARCH: “WHAT DO YOU SEE, WHEN DRIVING WITH ASD?”

August 10, 2017 Spectrum Women

*** RESEARCH ***   “WHAT DO YOU SEE, WHEN DRIVING WITH ASD?” (Ethics approval number: S/16/985)   Learning to Drive?   Level 1 or 2 Autism? Asperger’s Syndrome? 16-24 years old?   OR   Parent (or legal guardian) of a young adult who meets the above criteria?   We welcome you to: Participate in a survey. Drive in a simulator. Give us some feedback on your experience.   For further information contact Clara at clara.silvi@research.usc.edu.au or 07 5430 1165

Featured

How does it feel, not being able to leave my own world? – Renata Jurkevythz

August 10, 2017 Spectrum Women

A while ago I wrote a piece about the feeling of living in my own world. It is a world that exists deep within me, and I am its sole inhabitant and ruler. It is very different from the outside world where this world feels like home to me. It feels natural. With this ascertained, I wanted to explain a different aspect of this world in how hard it is to simply leave it and enter the outer one, where everybody else is. My world is very busy, often confusing and extremely deep, but this is home. This isn’t a […]

Employment

Tech Reject and Still Autistic. An Opinion Piece by Jen Elcheson SWM Features Writer

August 5, 2017 Spectrum Women

It goes without saying that autistic people should have reasonable access to gainful employment in a supportive and understanding workplace. How ‘inclusive’ is it when people automatically assume the most suitable jobs for autistics are always in the tech industry? What about those of us who are lucky enough to just be able to navigate the basic functions of our computers or electronic devices and are employed or seeking employment in non-tech industries? Are we not worthy of support and accommodation? Don’t we deserve the job or career that best suits us? All I know is society still has a […]