It’s cold in the UK so I used that as an excuse to stay in and work on imagining my radio show. I mean it’s not that I’m just thinking about it: I read a book (£1.77 for a Kindle edition), had a look at some websites about running a radio station (even though I’m not going to run one, that’s just what I found), watched two YouTube videos about how to be a radio presenter and now it’s been two hours since I’m scrolling through Spotify trying to choose music that I like and that would help me create the mood I’d like for my show.

All of that before even speaking to the manager about my idea.

I got a bit sad as all that made me think about my mum and how she’d say I overthink things. When I didn’t know that I’m autistic this kind of behaviour, when I’m trying to prepare myself for a new situation, was being interpreted as anxiety and my mum used to tell me that I should ‘just do it’. And only, every time I tried to follow her advice, I’d fail. I’d say something inappropriate and alienated people. I would then end up upset with myself for failing and with my mum for giving me advice that didn’t work for me.

But, when I was able to allocate a few hours to imagine a few scenarios of what may happen and what people may say, I was able to react much better, even if the things that I imagined didn’t happen but something else did.

I’m not sure how neurotypicals react in similar situations. It seems that the ability to react on the spot to what is happening is seen as a sign of intelligence and confidence and I think this is so hurtful for people like me because I consider myself both intelligent and confident, yet I don’t have this ability. But I’m sure I could improve if I could go through a few scenarios with somebody experienced. Yet, that is not really seen as an adjustment for an autistic person.

Anyway, let’s not moan, I’m doing great, thanks.

What I think I’m doing with all this preparation before I even asked if I could have my show, is that I’m trying to imagine running it. If I can imagine it, I know I will be much more confident and everything will seem easier to me.

I didn’t do any patterns during the last couple of days. I tried yesterday but it really didn’t work. I guess my brain decided to allocate all its resources to work out how to deal with this new radio challenge, so patterns will need to wait, I don’t know how long for, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a few weeks. Keep your fingers crossed for me. BTW does that mean that I see everything as a pattern? I wonder if there are any research on this.