Finding My Tongue

It's 6am on a Monday morning, and I'm sitting by the sea.

I spent the night in my van listening to the waves, hoping they might reset my brain. Hoping they might make this week feel like the fresh start I need.

I love the sea. There is nothing stopping the waves. They are strong, certain of their path and not to be messed with. But they are also magical and peaceful. Their sound can send me into the deep sleep that my body and mind sometimes struggle to find.

Things haven't been easy recently. Things have never exactly been easy. But over the last month, I've felt as though I'm trying harder and harder while somehow still moving backwards.

I had my birthday. It has never been something I've overly celebrated, but it is still a day I try to mark in some way. This year, I spent it upset, lost and trapped in a spiral I couldn't stop.

I had gradually been becoming more overwhelmed, until a few days later it reached another level and I shut down for a couple of days.

I am learning—or at least trying to learn—how my brain works. What it can cope with. What overwhelms it. What it needs.

For most of my life, I didn't understand why I ended up having meltdowns on the floor. Why I seemed to "overreact" to situations. Why I couldn't "function" like everyone else appeared to.

I have always felt too fragile for this world.

For as long as I can remember, there have been moments when silent tears would run down my face and I couldn't control them. I would hide my face or try to escape the situation before anybody noticed.

Growing up, I was called a "fragile" girl.

Then, as a woman, I felt childish and inferior because my brain never seemed to grow out of it.

My birthday week brought me face-to-face with that version of myself again: fragile Fiona. The one who doesn't feel strong enough to manage ordinary, day-to-day life.

But I'm trying to remember that struggling does not mean I am weak.

I am navigating a world that often feels completely alien to me. I am carrying the effects of spending 35 years undiagnosed: the lack of confidence, the painful experiences, the memories of being misunderstood and the mental health struggles that came with never knowing why everything felt so difficult.

A diagnosis and a better understanding of how my brain works cannot erase those years.

The longer you spend without that understanding, the more there is to untangle afterwards.

There is so much I want to talk about.

How I got here. How autism affects almost every part of my day. How people might see me cycling mile after mile without a care in the world, when the reality is very different.

I want to talk about why pulling out of VIA was the right decision, even though it hurt so much. Why being beside the sea resets me. Why I want to start again, be more open and share more than the carefully selected moments that make it look as though I have everything together.

I just haven't known where to begin.

When I was a girl, I had a book called Fiona Finds Her Tongue.

Recently, I've thought about that title a lot.

Maybe these years are my version of finding my tongue. I am trying to find the words for everything I have experienced. I am trying to understand what I want to say and how I want to say it.

But perhaps my need for a plan, perfection and a fully worked-out destination is part of what has been holding me back.

Maybe I don't need to have everything figured out before I begin.

Maybe finding my voice means using it while it is still shaking.

I know I will always have support needs that other people cannot see. I know there will always be environments in which I struggle.

But I also know there are environments where I thrive.

My obstacles do not erase my strengths. They do not mean there is nothing for me to run—or cycle—towards.

I don't want the darkest parts of my life to have been for nothing. More importantly, I never want to return to some of the places I have been in my mind.

So this is me trying.

Trying to show every part of my journey, not only the miles and the smiling photographs.

Trying to understand fragile Fiona rather than being ashamed of her.

And, slowly, trying to find my tongue.