The AutSide Podcast

A brief re-introduction: an autistic gestalt processor, late to language and diagnosis, writing from a script garden of delayed echolalia. Fifteen short points to orient new readers entering the work midstream.
Opening — Welcome / Re-introduction
With Cathy off enjoying a jazz festival this weekend, I wanted to take this time to do something a little different.
There have been a lot of new people arriving—through conferences, through quotes shared on Instagram and Threads, through someone passing a piece along—and I’ve realised that many of you are stepping into the middle of something that’s already been moving for quite a while.
So, this is a kind of re-introduction. Not a summary, not a “best of,” but a way of placing myself—so you have a sense of what you’re stepping into.
I’ve written over 2000 pieces on The AutSide, and over 200 on Sensual Residue. That’s not because I set out to build something that large. It’s because this is how my mind works. Language accumulates. Patterns return. Things get placed, and then re-placed, and then seen differently over time.
So, if you’re new, you’re not arriving at the beginning. You’re arriving somewhere in the middle of an ongoing process.
And I don’t expect you to catch up. I don’t expect you to read everything, or even most things.
What I do want to offer is a kind of orientation.
A way of saying: this is how this space works. This is how I work.
Because what I’m doing here doesn’t always map cleanly onto what people expect writing—or teaching, or theory—to look like.
So instead of trying to explain it all at once, I’m going to give you fifteen short points. Not as rules, not as claims—but as places you can stand for a moment.
And from there, you can decide how close you want to come.
And before I move into those fifteen points, I think it’s important to place something more personal.
I’m an autistic adult. A gestalt processor—and I mean that in the whole sense, not just language. It’s how I organise experience, memory, meaning. It’s the architecture underneath everything I do.
I also live with ADHD, with alexithymia, with sensory processing and integration differences. All of that shapes how I move through the world—what I notice, what overwhelms, what holds.
I came to literacy quite late. Language, as it’s typically understood, wasn’t something I “acquired” in childhood. It’s something that formed over time, differently, and often outside the structures that were meant to support it.
And I was diagnosed late.
Which meant that for most of my life, I didn’t have the frameworks for any of this. I had to figure it out from the inside—through pattern, through experience, through returning to things again and again until they made sense in a way I could hold.
So, what you’re encountering here isn’t just writing.
It’s the result of that process.
1. I’m not a content creator.
First things first.
I think it’s important to say that plainly, because it frames everything else.
I’m not here producing content to meet a schedule, or to grow something, or to keep an algorithm fed. That’s not the relationship I have with writing. What I’m doing is much closer to needing somewhere for language to go—somewhere for things to land when they arrive.
There are days where nothing comes. There are days where something arrives fully formed and I just have to get it down before it moves again. And there are long stretches where I’m circling something without quite knowing what it is yet.
So, if you’re here expecting a consistent product, that’s not what this is. What this is…is a record. A living one. Of how something moves through me over time.
And if people are here for that, I’m grateful. But I’m not shaping it to hold them. I’m shaping it so I can stay with it.
2. The Substacks are my script garden.
The phrase that makes the most sense to me is “script garden.”
Not archive. Not portfolio. Not platform.
A garden is a place where things are placed, but not finished. Where something can sit, and change, and sometimes come back in a different form entirely. Some things grow. Some things don’t. Some things come back years later and suddenly make sense.
That’s what these spaces are for me.
I park language there. Phrases, patterns, fragments—things that feel like they matter, but aren’t fully understood yet. And over time, I start to see how they relate to each other.
So, if you read across pieces, you’ll notice repetition. Return. Slight shifts.
That’s not redundancy. That’s how the meaning forms.
3. Much of what I write is delayed echolalia.
This is something that often gets misunderstood.
Echolalia is usually framed as repetition without meaning. But for many of us, it’s actually how meaning is processed. Language comes in, sits, and then returns later—changed, layered, carrying something new.
That’s what I mean by delayed echolalia.
A phrase I heard years ago might reappear in a piece, but now it’s holding something entirely different. Or a memory will come back, not as a memory, but as a pattern that suddenly connects to something I’m writing now.
So, when you see repetition in my work, it’s not because I’ve run out of things to say.
It’s because something has come back, and this time I can hear it differently.
4. I’m a gestalt processor, and this is what that looks like in the open.
A lot of descriptions of gestalt processing stop at childhood.
They describe how language is acquired, how scripts are used, how things are pieced together over time. But they don’t often show what it looks like when that process continues into adulthood.
This is that.
You’re not hearing something that’s been translated into analytic steps. You’re hearing the pattern as it forms—sometimes mid-formation.
That means it won’t always be linear. It won’t always resolve cleanly. Sometimes it will circle, or return, or layer.
But it will hold together.
And part of what I’m doing here is making that visible—so that it’s not only recognised in children, but understood as a lifelong way of being.
5. I don’t start with ideas—I start with something felt.
Most pieces don’t begin with a concept.
They begin with a sensation. A pull. Something that doesn’t quite have words yet, but insists on being followed.
And I don’t always know where it’s going.
The writing is the process of finding out what that thing was. Of staying with it long enough that it reveals its structure.
Sometimes that becomes something recognisable as theory. Sometimes it stays closer to the original feeling.
But the direction is always the same:
Not from idea to expression.
From experience to understanding.
6. Recursion isn’t a quirk of my work. It’s the method.
I come back to things.
Not once or twice—but over and over, across months, across years. The same moment, the same phrase, the same question.
And each time, something different becomes visible.
That’s recursion.
It’s not going backwards. It’s not being stuck.
It’s a way of turning something, slowly, until you can see more of it.
And for me, that’s how depth happens. Not by moving on quickly—but by staying long enough that the thing begins to open.
7. My past isn’t behind me.
There’s a strong expectation, culturally, that we move on. That we leave things behind. That the past becomes something resolved, or at least contained.
That’s not how this works for me.
My past is active. It’s material. It’s something I return to—not to relive it, but to understand it differently as I change.
So, when I write about earlier parts of my life, I’m not stepping away from the present.
I’m bringing those parts into relation with now.
And that’s where a lot of the meaning emerges.
8. The split between my Substacks isn’t a split in me.
I know some people encounter The AutSide and Sensual Residue as two different spaces—and they are, in terms of tone and entry point.
But they’re not two different selves.
They’re two ways of approaching the same underlying pattern.
One might feel more recognisable as “theory,” the other more obviously embodied. But the coherence—the thing that holds them together—is the same.
And if you read them in relation to each other, that becomes clearer.
9. I’m not trying to make this legible on demand.
There’s often an expectation that writing should be immediately clear, immediately accessible, immediately useful.
That’s not always how this works.
Some pieces take time to land. Some don’t land at all until something else comes along later.
And I’m okay with that.
Because forcing immediate legibility would mean simplifying something that isn’t simple.
So, if something doesn’t make full sense right away, that doesn’t mean it’s failed.
It might just not be ready yet.
10. I live in a place and time that is openly hostile to people like me.
That’s part of the context for all of this.
I’m not writing from a neutral position. I’m writing as someone who exists in a system that doesn’t readily make space for the way I am.
That affects what I write, how I write, and why I write.
This isn’t just exploration—it’s also a way of staying intact.
Of maintaining coherence in an environment that would prefer fragmentation.
11. I don’t separate intellect from body.
For me, understanding doesn’t come from abstraction alone.
It comes from how something is felt, remembered, carried physically as well as cognitively.
So, when I write, those things aren’t separate streams.
They’re part of the same process.
And that’s why some pieces move between registers—between analysis and sensation.
They’re not switching modes.
They’re following the same thread through different forms.
12. I’m not interested in presenting a cleaned-up self.
There’s a version of writing—especially in academic or professional spaces—that involves presenting only the parts that are considered appropriate.
That’s not what I’m doing here.
Not because I’m trying to provoke—but because removing parts breaks the coherence.
The understanding comes from holding things in relation, not from isolating the acceptable pieces.
So, what you see here is not curated for safety.
It’s held for truth.
13. I’m not writing for an audience.
This might sound strange, given that people are here.
But the writing doesn’t begin with an imagined reader. It begins with the need to write.
That said—I am aware that people read, and respond, and share.
And I don’t take that lightly.
There’s a responsibility there, even if it’s not the driver.
So, I hold both things:
I write for me.
And I respect that others are here.
14. If something here resonates, I trust that.
Not everything will resonate with everyone.
But when something does—when there’s that sense of recognition, even if it’s not fully articulated yet—I take that seriously.
That’s often how understanding begins.
Not with clarity, but with familiarity.
So, if you feel that, I would trust it.
Even if you don’t yet have the words for why.
15. This is me, as I am, in motion.
None of this is a final statement.
It’s not a fixed position, or a completed framework.
It’s something that’s continuing.
What you’re seeing is a process unfolding over time.
So, this isn’t an introduction in the traditional sense.
It’s more like a point of entry.
Into something that is still moving.
Closing — Gathering / Forward motion
So those are fifteen ways of placing what I’m doing here.
Not the whole of it—but enough, I think, to give you a sense of the shape.
If you’ve been here for a while, some of that will feel familiar. If you’re new, some of it might not fully land yet—and that’s okay. This isn’t something that has to be understood all at once.
It’s something you come into over time.
I’m genuinely grateful that people are finding their way here—whether through a conference, or a quote, or someone sharing a piece that meant something to them.
I don’t take that lightly.
At the same time, I want to be clear about what this space is and isn’t.
It’s not curated to be neat. It’s not structured to be easily consumed. It’s not designed to present a single, stable version of me.
It’s a place where language is placed, revisited, reshaped. Where patterns emerge slowly. Where things that didn’t make sense before sometimes start to.
And there isn’t just one way to engage with it.
Some people move through it in the Substack app, following along as new pieces arrive. Others come in through the web, where you can search the archive—by word, by idea, by something you’re trying to find language for in a particular moment.
That can be useful, if you’re looking for a script—for something that meets you where you are, rather than starting at the beginning.
Both ways are valid. You don’t have to take it in linearly. You don’t have to do it all.
You can dip in. You can follow threads. You can leave and come back later.
The work holds that.
And if something here resonates with you—if there’s that sense of recognition, even before full understanding—then you’re in the right place.
The work will still be here, continuing. It remains open, free to access, something you can return to as you need.
And I’ll say this simply—as a wee school teacher doing this alongside everything else—if you choose to support it through a subscription, it’s deeply appreciated. It helps keep the space open, and it helps me keep doing the work.
Because that’s what it does.
And that’s what I’m doing.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit autside.substack.com/subscribe

This video introduces The Wrong Reader—a series on therapy, misreading, and autistic jeopardy. Not content, but script garden: a warning, an offering, and a record from inside the weather system of being read wrong.
This morning’s video is less a conventional introduction than a threshold note—a quarter turn before the next doorway opens. I begin by thanking the many new readers and listeners who have found their way here, and by naming how much it matters when someone doesn’t simply consume the work, but recognises themselves in it. Those moments of resonance matter to me because they confirm what I have long suspected: that what so often gets treated as idiosyncratic or excessive in autistic, gestalt, or otherwise marginalised lives is often shared—just rarely named aloud.
From there, I make something plain that feels increasingly important to say in a culture that flattens everything into “content.” The AutSide and Sensual Residue are not content pipelines. They are not engineered for clicks, virality, or market logic. They are, for me, a kind of externalised script garden—a place where delayed understanding can land safely when it finally arrives. As a gestalt processor with significant support needs around language, I often do not have the answer in the moment. Sometimes the answer comes the next day, or the next week, or much later. Writing is how I preserve what would otherwise be lost. The archive is not branding. It is accommodation, memory, and survival.
The heart of the video is an introduction to the new series, The Wrong Reader. I explain that this series emerges from a deeply personal and politically charged question: what happens when an autistic gestalt mind enters therapy and is misread from the start? I reflect on the profound risks built into that first encounter—especially when seemingly simple questions like How do you feel right now? are anything but simple for someone living inside layered time, multiple simultaneous “nows,” somatic memory, and delayed linguistic processing. What is framed as a neutral intake can quickly become a site of surveillance, misclassification, coercion, or even legal jeopardy.
I also name the deeper problem: therapy is never just a private room between two people. It is shaped by professional training, diagnostic assumptions, institutional liability, mandated reporting structures, and increasingly by the logic of private capital. A clinician may present as affirming, but if they do not understand gestalt processing, autistic cognition, or the cultural and bodily realities I carry into the room, then the “fit” may already be broken before the conversation even begins. This new series sits inside that tension. It asks what it means to seek care in systems built to read quickly, categorise prematurely, and default to the limits of their own frameworks.
Throughout the video, I frame the series as both warning and offering. It is heavy, honest, and at times painful. It draws on my own therapeutic history, including moments of being read incorrectly, funnelled toward the wrong interventions, or treated through models that were never designed for minds like mine. But it is also meant to function as a script garden for others—for my children, for autistic readers, for anyone who has ever walked into a room needing help and realised too late that the room did not know how to read them. If the system insists on first contact without scripts, then part of what I am building here is a way to enter with some.
I also reflect on form. I explain why there will be no AI-generated summaries for this series, why the poems will be narrated but the pieces themselves allowed to stand whole, and why I continue to distrust tools that impose guardrails where nuance, tenderness, or danger need to remain intact. The series is written from inside the weather system, not from outside it. It is autotheory and autoethnography in the strongest sense: not a detached commentary on autistic life, but a record from within the storm itself.
By the end, I return to gratitude—but with clarity. I thank readers and subscribers sincerely, and I name the material truth that their support has sometimes paid for groceries, equipment, and the practical conditions that make this work possible. But I also insist, gently and firmly, that this is not a business machine. There is no content team, no strategy apparatus, no polished funnel. There is just me—writing, recording, preserving, and leaving behind what I may one day need again. The video itself becomes part of that archive: not a performance, but another script left in the garden.


This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit autside.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s episode examines how societal institutions utilise simplified questioning as a method of systemic control. The author of the source article, Dr. Jaime Hoerricks, argues that schools and workplaces prioritise compressed, rapid responses to make individuals easier to manage and categorise. By shifting the focus from personal experience to structural critique, her writing explores how the pressure to be concise can be a form of institutional erasure. Dr. Hoerricks suggests that resisting these narrow demands is a political act that challenges the way systems demand legibility. Ultimately, her article serves as an invitation for readers to recognise how their internal struggles are often shaped by external power dynamics.
Here’s the link to the source article: https://open.substack.com/pub/autside/p/wh-questions-and-the-cost-of-compression-4bb
Let me know what you think.
The AutSide is a reader-supported publication. To support my work, consider becoming a aid subscriber.



This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit autside.substack.com/subscribe

In today’s chat with Cathy, we circled a familiar truth: for many autistic GLPs, the whole arrives before the parts. Recognition often begins in resonance, memory, and misreading—long before language catches up.
Here’s the link to my support script that I mentioned in the video.
Today’s conversation with Cathy ended up circling a truth I keep returning to: for many autistic, gestalt-oriented adults, understanding does not begin with explanation. It begins with contact. With pressure. With the felt whole of a thing arriving before any clean language for it exists. Cathy had asked me for “five things,” and what arrived in me was not five tidy bullet points but an entire weather front: a long support script, multiple related pieces, and the familiar flooding that happens when a prompt lands in the field and starts organising itself below conscious language. That became the first living example of the point itself. The whole comes first. Only later can the parts be pulled out.
From there, we talked about what it means to feel information before you can parse it. Not just language, but rooms, people, classrooms, requests, emotional tone, sensory charge—the entire ecology of a moment. I tried to name how a request, a classroom, or even a person can arrive already carrying every prior encounter, every stored pattern, every earlier strain or safety signal, all at once. Cathy kept returning to something she heard clearly in the support piece: that for many of us, the feel of a thing matters before the words do, and often more than the words do. That led us into a deeper conversation about trust—learning, especially later in life, to trust the body’s recognition when the official language arrives late or not at all.
A central thread was adult recognition. We spoke about how so many late-identified autistic and gestalt-oriented adults first encounter themselves not through diagnostic language, but through their children. A parent comes in trying to understand why their child is being misunderstood at school or in therapy, and suddenly realises—often with a kind of shock—that the architecture being described is their own. That felt important. Recognition often precedes vocabulary. People do not necessarily begin with the label. They begin with resonance. With the strange relief of finding a rhythm, an archive, or a body of language that feels like home before they yet know why.
We also touched the danger of frameworks that can only see gestalt processing in children. These children grow up. They become adults, colleagues, parents, writers, teachers, and late-identified survivors of educational and clinical misreading. If a model can only recognise the architecture in a clinic-room child, then it is not simply incomplete—it is mistaking a lifespan orientation for a temporary developmental anomaly. That was one of the strongest undercurrents of the conversation for me: the adults matter, not as an afterthought, but as evidence. The younglings become us.
Memory and recursion came in too, which felt especially alive. Cathy reflected back something she has noticed in my work: that my thinking, writing, and remembering do not move in neat sequence. They loop, recur, return, and gather. That opened the door for me to talk about writing—and Substack in particular—not simply as output, but as storage. As script. As a practical support for a nervous system that needs to place things somewhere stable enough to come back to later. Not a tidy archive in the institutional sense, but a script garden. A field of returns. A place where coherence can remain visible long enough to be recognised.
We also grounded the conversation in classroom life, which mattered to me. I spoke about being misread as “gifted” in childhood because I could draw, whilst what was actually happening was that image and pattern were carrying cognition before language could. Cathy made an important distinction there: that some children think in pictures, some in words, and some in both—but what matters is that schools and adults stop assuming only one valid route to meaning. That felt like a gentle but important bridge between lived autistic experience and educational practice. If we only honour the children who can show understanding in sanctioned forms, we will keep missing the actual architecture of learning.
What I appreciated most was that the conversation did not flatten into tips or diagnostics. It stayed with the deeper pattern: that whole-to-part is not just a speech profile in children. It is often a lifespan orientation. It shows up in how we read, how we remember, how we recognise ourselves, how we learn, how we write, how we return to unfinished meaning until it becomes speakable. The children in the caseload are not the only place this architecture lives. The adults are still doing it. We are doing it when we circle a truth for years before the right phrase lands. We are doing it when a book rotates a field we were already carrying. We are doing it when language arrives late, but true.
The AutSide is a reader-supported publication. To support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.



This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit autside.substack.com/subscribe

Today’s episode introduces a conceptual shift in communication by prioritising the needs of Gestalt Language Processors and others with field-first minds. The author of the source article, Dr. Jaime Hoerricks, advocates for moving away from interrogative extraction toward an atmosphere where truth and inquiry are invited through relationship. By imagining rooms designed for connection rather than compliance, Dr. Hoerricks challenges traditional styles of questioning that can feel restrictive or harmful. Readers are encouraged to engage with these alternative possibilities gently, acknowledging the emotional weight of past exclusionary experiences. Ultimately, her article serves as a visionary guide for creating more inclusive and supportive spaces for diverse cognitive styles.
Here’s the link to the source article: https://open.substack.com/pub/autside/p/wh-questions-and-the-cost-of-compression-05c
Let me know what you think.
The AutSide is a reader-supported publication. To support my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber.



This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit autside.substack.com/subscribe