My parents gave a lot of parties so maybe I absorbed the blueprint, making it easier for me. And by now, in middle age, I have all my party things - cups and plates, tablecloth, party foods, my outfit - so I can just deploy those in an orderly way without having to think too much. All the planning tasks (and cleaning up after) are basically familiar, so not too much of a hassle. If I give one, at least I can be in a familiar environment and basically know who is going to be there and what is going to happen. Perhaps oddly, I prefer giving parties to being a guest. I want to hang out with my friends on my birthday, just not with the stress and presents and well-wishes. It’s actually my birthday party, only I don’t tell anyone it’s my birthday and they have never caught on XD. I have a party at the same time every year and invite my friends. Fortunately in my thirties there aren’t as many opportunities/obligations to party as there were, say, in college. ear protection, but it still makes me tired. It’s a bit better now that I can, ehm, “use protection”, i.e. Loud, random lights, people talking, sounds bouncing everywhere. I’ve never been a “party person” but until learning about autism I never knew why. Main reading: Anonymous shares from r/autisticwomensgroup members: Opening: Reading the declaration of group purpose and ground rules for respecting others' shares and experience The meeting will be guided with a slide show, with space for members of the group to share their personal experiences in response to discussion questions. We follow the motto, 'Take what you like, and leave the rest.' Rather than making it our business to change others' perceptions of their own lives and experiences, we agree to listen to each other where we are right now. And we can expect our own experience to be treated with the same respect. But by taking part in the meeting, we agree to respect others' understanding as it stands today. When we join this meeting, we may hear others describing their own experience in different terms from what we would have used ourselves. We come from a range of backgrounds and have many different ways of understanding and speaking about autism.

The purpose of this meeting is to allow autistic women to share on our own experiences as we understand them.

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