Articles & Writing
“ The reason one writes isn't the fact that he wants to say something. He writes because he has something to say. ”
- F. Scott Fitzgerald
Welcome to the Articles/Writing page! This is where you will find an assortment of articles
that I have written for various publications, as well as select pieces of my nonfiction writing, including one or two excerpts from my forthcoming book, The Naughty Autie: Not Your (Neuro)typical Dating Guide.
Below, you will find one of my signature pieces, my "Letter to My Younger Self," which has been published on the official blog of Autism Speaks. I have also read the Letter to several groups of middle school students and at a New Jersey State Assembly hearing in 2009, and at the wrap party for Joey Travolta/Marblejam Kids' summer film camp in 2010.
To read articles that I have written or been featured in, click the "Articles" button below. To read pieces of my writing, click the "Writing" button.
that I have written for various publications, as well as select pieces of my nonfiction writing, including one or two excerpts from my forthcoming book, The Naughty Autie: Not Your (Neuro)typical Dating Guide.
Below, you will find one of my signature pieces, my "Letter to My Younger Self," which has been published on the official blog of Autism Speaks. I have also read the Letter to several groups of middle school students and at a New Jersey State Assembly hearing in 2009, and at the wrap party for Joey Travolta/Marblejam Kids' summer film camp in 2010.
To read articles that I have written or been featured in, click the "Articles" button below. To read pieces of my writing, click the "Writing" button.
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A Letter To My Younger Self
I once received an e-mail from a woman, a reader of my blog, wanting to know what sort of advice I could give to her nine-year-old daughter recently diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. She gave me a very thoughtful suggestion, which was to write a blog entry in the form of a letter to my younger self, which could then also serve as advice for current parents of children with autism and Asperger’s Syndrome.
I was not diagnosed until age 10, but I remember very clearly the loneliness, confusion, and frustration that came to define my life at that time. I remember how I had no one to turn to back then, no one who could tell me that everything was going to be okay. A simple truth of pre-teenhood and adolescence is that we never believe adults or anyone who tells us that everything is going to be all right. This is not due of a lack of trust or innate cynicism – after all, it takes at least a few years to build up to that – but because when we are going through all of this, it’s just impossible to think that anyone could understand.
Now, as a young woman in my 20s, I am someone who does understand. I know that I can’t save that girl, the younger me of long ago, but there are many things I would want to say to myself if I had the chance. By doing that, perhaps I can help a girl not unlike my younger self; a girl who, right now, feels she has no one to turn to and feels very alone in the world. It is for this reason – for that girl, her parents, peers, educators and clinicians who can all use a better understanding of what it’s really like inside, that I have written a Letter to My Younger Self:
I was not diagnosed until age 10, but I remember very clearly the loneliness, confusion, and frustration that came to define my life at that time. I remember how I had no one to turn to back then, no one who could tell me that everything was going to be okay. A simple truth of pre-teenhood and adolescence is that we never believe adults or anyone who tells us that everything is going to be all right. This is not due of a lack of trust or innate cynicism – after all, it takes at least a few years to build up to that – but because when we are going through all of this, it’s just impossible to think that anyone could understand.
Now, as a young woman in my 20s, I am someone who does understand. I know that I can’t save that girl, the younger me of long ago, but there are many things I would want to say to myself if I had the chance. By doing that, perhaps I can help a girl not unlike my younger self; a girl who, right now, feels she has no one to turn to and feels very alone in the world. It is for this reason – for that girl, her parents, peers, educators and clinicians who can all use a better understanding of what it’s really like inside, that I have written a Letter to My Younger Self:
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