‘I’ve found a community I can identify with and feel part of...’
Education editor Abbie Wightwick talks to a Cardiff mother about how her diagnosis with autism has caused her to reassess both herself and her relationships with others
AMOTHER of two who learned she was autistic a year ago at the age of 32, as a result of her son being diagnosed, says she now understands herself for the first time.
Kat Williams, 33, from Llandaff North, Cardiff, says she is “proud to be autistic” and prefers to describe herself as autistic rather than having autism.
Far from being upset when professionals asked if she might be autistic, she said she was overcome with relief to be referred for diagnosis.
“Before diagnosis I was confused and lost and felt I was not part of the world. Now I feel I understand myself and have a community I can identify with and feel part of.”
The former paralegal said she suffered mental health problems and a breakdown as a teenager as a result of the strain of trying to communicate in a world that often seemed confusing.
Her undiagnosed autism meant Kat found it hard to read facial expressions or body language and she took what people said literally.
“Being born in the 1980s, a wellspoken, intelligent girl would not have got an autism diagnosis, so even though I was showing typical signs, it was missed,” she said.
“I struggle to read facial expressions and body language. I had to learn those rather than inherently understanding them. I learned that in my late teens.
“I translate what people are really saying as if they are speaking a foreign language. Initially I took everything that people said literally, which caused problems.
“But ‘masking’ is exhausting and I would have outbursts of anger or cry. In high school I was put under an educational psychologist.
“It was a relief being diagnosed. Because of masking and not understanding why I was so different, I had a lot of mental health problems growing up.
“I started getting depression and severe anxiety and even made suicide
attempts aged 13 or 14.
“I don’t understand figures of speech easily, and sarcasm I do get now but believed people meant what they said when I was growing up. I took people at their word. I took things literally.”
If someone used figures of speech like “I have been up all night” Kat took them at their word. She once assumed her ex-husband had genuinely broken his back because he said so while flippantly describing
his back pain.
“It takes me a lot of mental energy to understand what people are really saying and what they really mean. It’s still not natural to me. It can still feel like a foreign language, especially if I am speaking to people who use hyperbole a lot. If someone says they ‘raised a fortune’ I take that literally at first.”
It was only when Kat’s eldest son, aged 10, began going through diagnosis for autism, that the professionals
she was in contact with asked if she was also autistic.
“A lot of people around me were specialists and some assumed I was diagnosed because of their interactions with me,” she said.
“I was dealing with speech and language and occupational therapists. Eventually a psychiatrist referred me to the integrated autism service based in Penarth, where I was diagnosed. I was diagnosed by a psychiatrist and a professor of
autism.
“Being diagnosed explains a lot and means my anxiety is understood – it means it is down to the autism and I have now come off anxiety medication, which wasn’t working anyway.
“It was not devastating to be diagnosed autistic. It was a relief. Even though I was new to the world of autism, it is a relief to know why you see the world in a different way. I am proud to be autistic.”
Kat believes her close attention to detail and good memory are among the many positives of being autistic. She says she also has empathy for other people going through the autism diagnosis process and now volunteers for AP Cymru, a peer support outreach service for families undergoing diagnosis.
“The negatives are that it’s hard to know what people are getting at and verbal communication does not always come naturally.
“After an extended social interaction I need to recover because I find it mentally and physically tiring.
“Some people say, ‘You don’t look autistic’ but how does autistic look?”
Kat also has sensory difficulties associated with autism. She wears ear defenders in busy, noisy places like shopping centres because all noises become the same volume and she can’t pick out the sounds she needs.
Her sensitive sense of smell also makes her feel sick if people wear strong aftershave or perfume.
“I also have issues with texture. I can’t touch jelly because it makes me feel unwell and I can’t bear the smell and texture of Play Doh.
“People think it’s strange that I always eat my dinner one item at a time and I always have three roast potatoes if I’m having a roast. Things like that which I thought were normal are signs of my autism.”
Kat is now fulfilling one of her delayed ambitions. She is about to start an Open University degree in English literature after her plan to study drama at university was halted by a breakdown when she was a teenager.
“Not being diagnosed stopped me going to university when everyone else around me did. I think there are a lot of autistic people undiagnosed, especially girls.”
Kat is now looking forward to studying and volunteering with AP Cymru.
Her eldest son is at a mainstream school in Cardiff and her younger son, aged six, is currently also under diagnosis for suspected autism.