The Obsessive Joy of Autism

Being autistic, to me, means a lot of different things, but one of the best things is that I can be so happy, so enraptured about things no one else understands and so wrapped up in my own joy that, not only does it not matter that no one else shares it, but it can become contagious. This is the part about autism that I can never explain. This is the part I never want to lose.'

Julia Bascom's depiction of the joy of autistic obsessions tells a story about autism that is very rarely told. It tells of a world beyond impairments and medical histories, where the multiples of seven can open a floodgate of untranslatable joy, where riding a train can make everything feel perfectly sized and full of light, and where flapping your hands just so amplifies everything you feel.

The Obsessive Joy of Autism will resonate powerfully with other autistic people, and encourage those who have a person with autism in their lives to look out for that joy, to chase it, to get obsessed.

Julia Bascom is an autistic woman, writer, and self-advocate. She blogs about autistic identity, community, and language, disability rights, and autism acceptance at www.juststimming.wordpress.com. She served on the New Hampshire DD council as well as her state's team for revitalizing state-wide self-advocacy, and is the founder of The Loud Hands Project. She currently serves as Director of Programs for the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network.