Autistic. Academic. Anxious.

This is my story

Hi! I'm Beth

Welcome to my corner of the interweb

I'm an autistic early careers "creative dementia care" researcher. This site hosts some informal blog posts about my healing and recovery journey from self harm, suicidal ideation and emotionally abusive relationships.

If you're here to see my prior (more academic) work, there's examples of some of my creative work (songs and some poetry) and academic work from across my time as a BA, MASC and PhD student (just filter the blog posts by "academic writing" to tune out the more personal reflections).

I'm learning to understand what drives me and my anxiety/trauma and how I can stay true to myself whilst navigating the endless complexities being an academic entails. I love what I do and cannot see my life without research but for me, research needs to be community led, community first and not contributing to stigmatising or unhelpful discussions around topics like dementia, neurodiversity or mental health.

This website has been changed and altered so many times but at its core, is the story of how I got to where I am today and this journey has shaped me into the researcher I am and hope to continue to be.

Please note that these posts are my own thoughts and views and do not represent any place/s I work for.

This website contains conversations around self harm, suicide attempts, mental health, anxiety and traumatic experiences. Nothing graphic is ever mentioned but these themes are part of my life and research, so thus, present in many posts. Look after yourself :)