Embracing Disability as Key to Autistic Well-Being

• By: Zosia Zaks, PhD Zaks Autism Consulting
• April 4th, 2025
• accessibility, actually autistic, burnout, executive functioning, neurodiversity, self-acceptance, sensory sensitivity, Spring 2025 Issue, well-being
• 23    0

Accepting ourselves as disabled people is key to autistic well-being. Far from defeatist, identifying as disabled is empowering. When we understand ourselves as disabled, anxiety goes down, and self-esteem goes up. For a long time, I compared myself to non-autistic people, and they seemed to...

Intimate Relationship Failures From an Autistic Perspective

• By: Zosia Zaks, PhD Zaks Autism Consulting
• September 29th, 2022
• ableism, abuse, accommodation, actually autistic, communication, compromise, discrimination, Fall 2022 Issue, intimate relationships, miscommunications, negotiation, neurodiversity, relationships, stigma
• 16578    15

The standard narrative positions autism as the cause of relationship trouble when a non-autistic person dates or falls in love with an autistic person. The autistic partner is assumed to be the disruptive or difficult one. Self-help books offer non-autistic partners tips on how to cope with their...