Autism, Gender Diversity and Transitioning with Yenn Purkis and Dr Wenn Lawson | Transcript
CW: mentions of transphobia
Find the episode shownotes here!
Hannah Witton
Hi everyone, welcome back to Doing It, the sex and relationships podcast where have never been so nerdy, with me, your host, Hannah Witton. This week I am joined by the brilliant Yenn Purkis and Wenn Lawson, who co-authored the book The Autistic Trans Guide to Life. Yenn is an autistic and non binary author, public speaker, and community leader who also has a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Yenn is the author of 11 published books on elements of autism and is a regular blogger. Dr. Wenn Lawson is a psychologist and artistic lecturer, advocate, researcher, writer and poet who has passionately shared professional and personal knowledge of autism over the past three decades.
I wanted to get them on the podcast to share all their important insight on how autism and gender identity overlap and how autism also interacts with sex and relationships. We spoke all about what autism means to each of them personally, and they shared very interesting thoughts on why autistic people are more likely to be trans and non binary than non autistic people, and how that is rooted in autistic people being very grounded in their truth and not succumbing to social expectations as much. At the same time, they also spoke about why many autistic people do feel like they have to hide who they are to be able to fit into society, and how damaging that is to their lives. We spoke about navigating gender identity services and the experience of transitioning when autistic, and also what it's like being in trans activist spaces as autistic people. We discussed the stereotype that autistic people are asexual and Yenn and Wenn's own personal journeys of understanding how they want to connect and relate to others. When spoke about why he fears the impact of pornography on autistic people's understanding of sex and connection and therefore why proper sex education is so important for autistic people, who are more at risk of taking things they see online at face value. Yenn and Wenn also shared advice for people whose gender identity is not being taken seriously because of their autism, and the importance of surrounding yourself with those who understand and allies.
I found this chat so interesting, learning so much from Yenn and Wenn about what it's like navigating gender identity when autistic, and how service providers can become more inclusive to neurodivergent people.
As usual, you can find more info and links to everything we talked about in this episode in the show notes over at doingitpodcast.co.uk and please let us know what you think over on our Instagram, which is @doingitpodcast. If you liked this episode, please give us a rating and review over on iTunes and Spotify. It is really appreciated. I cannot wait for you to listen to this episode. Here is my chat with Yenn Purkis and Wenn Lawson.
Hello, Yenn. Hello, Wenn. Welcome to the podcast. For our listeners, do you mind introducing yourselves so that people know who is who when hearing your voices?
Yenn Purkis
Absolutely. My name's Yenn Purkis, I'm an autistic and ADHD advocate, author, and all round troublemaker. I also have a diagnosis of schizophrenia. So I have a lot of mental health sort of stuff going on. I'm the author currently of 11 published books. And I give talks all over the world, podcasts, conference presentations, schools, you name it, I do it. And I love every minute.
Hannah Witton
Oh, excellent. What a great intro.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, um, hard to compete with that, Yenn. So I'm Wenn, I also am an author and I lecture and contribute to a few courses around autism. I'm also autistic and ADHD plus a few learning difficulties. But I've been dispraxic and dyslexic, and so on. I have a wife, who's - she's autistic, we have grown-up offspring, they're autistic and ADHD, and the grandchildren are too so we keep it in the family. It's really very exciting.
Hannah Witton
Love that. So like you said, the two of you are authors and you wrote a book together called The Autistic Trans Guide to Life. And I would love to hear a bit about that and like how that book came about. Why was it something that you wanted to write together?
Yenn Purkis
I think I came up with the the idea for the book, I was writing a kid's book called The Awesome Autistic Go To Guide. And we've put in a paragraph about gender for autistic kids. And we thought that was a really important thing to add. And I was talking to my co author and I said look, "I think there needs to be more content on this." And I ended up approaching the publisher, my usual publisher, and saying, "Would you like this? Is this something you'd like? A book for transgender autistic people?" And they said, "Oh, yes, please." And I thought, well, I can't write this by myself. There are other experts in this space. And I'd known Wenn for some time, and we've worked together in a lot of different situations. And so I contacted Wenn and said, "Would you like to write this book?" And Wenn said yes, and so we wrote it.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
We did.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And what has the response been to it? Like who is it for? This isn't just for young people as well. This is kind of for trans and autistic - could be young people, but also adults, as well, isn't it?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Absolutely. It's for anyone who goes through that kind of experience as an autistic person, because transitioning from one gender to another has a heap of things that people have to negotiate and go through. And it's even more so if you are autistic.
Yenn Purkis
Absolutely. There's quite a few considerations that are specific to autistic and neurodivergent trans people. Things around what's dysphoria, what's sensory issues. You know, having clinicians say, "Oh, well, how could you know your gender if you're autistic?" And that one's particularly a problem for younger people and children. Just get doubted: "Oh, it's a phase." I think that's funny the idea of a phase because you wouldn't say to somebody who started a relationship, "Oh, it's just a phase." Or someone who started a new job: "Ah, it's just a phase." Yet, how many people do you know who've had the same partner or the same job for their whole life?
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Me!
Yenn Purkis
When it comes to gender and sexuality, that phase thing becomes almost weaponised, and it's a way of attacking people's identity, I suppose. And these things are really prevalent for autistic people.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And we'll get on to a lot of the kind of intricacies of how being trans and autistic intersects. But first off, I wanted to ask, what does being autistic mean to you both? And, like, yeah, how does that - what does that mean to you personally?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
For me, it's very much an exciting way to be, I wouldn't want to be anything else. It's very different in a world that does not understand autism in general. I'm very monotropic, which means I tend to be very singleminded. I can be quite literal, which can get me into a spot of bother when people are making a joke, or they're using metaphor. You know, someone has said, "Oh, you should pull your socks up" and I bend down and pull them out. And they didn't mean that. They meant you need to improve your game. I don't know why they didn't say, but anyway. Even today, at where I was today, going for an appointment. The person said something that meant sort of come here. But that's not what they meant. They meant go there. Anyway. So yeah, being literal. It means [inaudible]
Hannah Witton
There's so much in language, where we're talking in riddles as well.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
A lot of situations where I'm not believed or not trusted, or not expected to be able to do stuff, lots of things come up that I constantly have to challenge. And at the same time, I have to work at not getting into a state of ableism myself because I own that stuff sometimes where I think, "Yeah, I really do have these issues. I can't do that. I can't do this. What good am I?" Because of that very uneven disposition that autism gives us. But that shouldn't be the issue. We don't have that thinking for other people with a variety of disabilities. We don't think, if someone's in a wheelchair or hasn't got any arms, we don't think that way about them as people, we just see them as people with a disability. And as autistic people, I have lots of strengths and lots of skills, and I also have challenges.
Yenn Purkis
For me autism is - I can't really separate it from myself. It's a key part of who I am. In fact, it is who I am. It is me. So I can't really say "Oh, I like this bit about being autistic. But I don't like that bit." For me it's just who I am. It's my character, it's my personality, it's my very identity. I find myself getting in situations sometimes where people make assumptions about my behaviour and motivations, which are completely wrong. When I unpack it, I understand why they've reached those conclusions, but I've been in trouble so many times because people just misinterpret my intentions. I'm very much on one level. What you see is what you get with me. I I'm very honest, I don't really know how to lie. I guess I could technically if I really had to if my life depended on it, but I'd really struggle. One of the lovely things about being me is my passion and my motivation and my determination. And I've overcome the most horrific things in my past to have a wonderful life. Now I have a wonderful life. I was saying, before we started, today, I settled on a new property. I've bought a property, you know, it's so exciting -
Hannah Witton
So exciting!
Yenn Purkis
- and I've done so many amazing things despite, or maybe because of, my differences. So yeah, autism is me, it's just who I am. And I wouldn't -well, if somebody said to me, "I can cure your autism." I say, "Well, if you cure my autism, you've created something that isn't me. So no thank you for that cure. I don't really want it."
Hannah Witton
Yeah, there's so much that both of you talked about that I want to get into in terms of like how that impacts that dating and relationships, especially when so much of dating and relationships there are all of these assumptions being made, talking in riddles, not really saying what you mean. And like, Yenn, like sometimes lying or omitting the truth and things like that. And so, obviously then it's a different experience to navigate if you're autistic. But first on the language thing in your book, you refer to non autistic people as allistic. Am I saying that right?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yes.
Hannah Witton
Allistic. Yeah. And this is the first time I've come across this word, actually. And so I wondered why it was important for you to use that word and why having that language there is really important in terms of creating more awareness around - and acceptance around - autism and and neurodiversity?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
It's less stigmatising in so many ways, because autism implies separate from. Allistic implies together with. They both have similar kind of roots. So instead of saying, neurotypical, which is commonly used, implying that we're not usual, or we're not typical, we're autistic. If you say autistic, or allistic, you're using a similar terminology, just for different ways of thinking. So it's actually - well, the idea is that it's less stigmatised, so.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Is allistic - does it just mean not autistic? Or does it mean not at all neurodivergent? Or is it only specific to autism?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
It means not autistic.
Hannah Witton
Okay. I guess it's the same way that we would use cis. In terms of speaking of agenda? And kind of like, yes.
Yenn Purkis
Yes, absolutely. I was just thinking that of using that as an example. So you beat me to it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Because rather than it being like, that's autistic people. And then there's - in absolute scare quotes here - like "typical" or "normal" people. It's like saying, hey, we all actually have a relationship to this thing. And there is no such thing as normal.
Yenn Purkis
Yeah, it's that whole idea of a deviation from the norm. And it's like, "Here's normal, and then you're out here. So you're not normal." Whereas ctually, that's a really poor understanding of how human beings are. We're all diverse, we're all different. And to say - and when you have that deviation from the norm, there's always an assumption that norm is better. And deviation from norm is worse. So challenging those views is really important, because deviation from the norm is not worse.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
It's also that thing of people sometimes talk about being neurodiverse. And I had a teacher phone me to say she had a neurodiverse child in her class. My response was, "Hopefully you've got more than one because all children, all people, we are all neurodiverse." What - what do you mean? And then she said, she kind of whispered, "Well, this person is autistic." I said, "Oh, you mean neurodivergent?" And again, yeah, it's understanding that those of us who diverge from the accepted usual are as competent and as able in many ways, very often differently, just because there's this judgement on normal that's placed over everybody. So therefore, if you don't speak, then "Oh, well, you don't you're not intelligent." Which is a complete myth. And so many things that autistic people live with, live through, and are, as Yenn said, are intrinsic to who we are. You can't separate them from us. But there are so many things and so many skills that we actually have and are able to do, but we do them differently.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. So let's chat about the gender stuff. So the evidence shows that autistic people are more likely to be trans and non binary than allistic people and I'd love for you to tell us a bit about that. And like what's going on there? And maybe some theories as to why you think that is.
Yenn Purkis
I might leave that for Wenn because I think that's more your area than mine.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah and we have different - we might have different theories, and that's okay. But as Yenn said, we're honest people. Lying is actually quite a difficult skill, or it's not something we're naturally good at. We're better at being honest. So in some ways, the social pressures to conform to gender ideation, we don't - we don't - we don't - we're not impressed by those.
Hannah Witton
You see it as a form of lying?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and if I'm feeling - and a lot of females feel - they don't feel frilly, pink, but they're very much female. There are other females who absolutely adore frilly, pink, makeup, etc. It's a very wide spectrum, gender, male or female. But then there's a section of us that didn't feel either, or both. So then you got your non binary. And then there are others of us who know that our inner core of identifying is with male or female. So that transitional disposition. And I like Michael Mosley's thoughts about it, too, and might express some of those if you give me a moment, but that's that issue of being honest and of not succumbing to pressure and of connecting. Took me a very long time to connect with who I was. But for others, it's very quick, you know, they know before they're three, four or five years of age, even though they're autistic.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, I love that idea of like it coming down to honesty and it being like, honest about who you are.
Yenn Purkis
I also think autistic people are often quite different and quite proud to be quite different. And, you know, that it's not so hard to be yourself when you're autistic, because you already have to be yourself. And so we sort of have this lovely licence that we can work with in life that we can be whoever we are. Whereas I think a lot of other people are very limited by expectations. And something - like for us, gender diversity is just a thing. For me, when I came out, I went on Facebook. That was my - my first coming out was on Facebook, because my friends were on Facebook. It didn't occur to me that people might hate me. And some of them did, which was really hurtful. But for me, it wasn't being like, "Ooh, should I tell people? Should I not?" It's like, "Oh, this is a really important part of who I am. I want to share it with the world." And I think that's a very autistic characteristic, to be honest and open and, you know, to be proud of ourselves. And I think it's wonderful. And I think we're so used to not conforming with societal norms, throughout life, that gender diversity is just another part of who we are. And, yeah, it's actually really liberating. And I'm really grateful for my autism that I actually embrace my gender identity.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Having said that, so many autistic people mask and camouflage. They sort of adaptively morph - I call it adaptively morphing - as they blend into whatever their situation, so they're not bullied, so they can be accepted. So that a whole heap of things can happen, maybe they can get a job better that way. And it's - that's exhausting, that living up to other societal expectations, or family expectations even, is really, really exhausting. And it's costing many, many lives. It really is a huge danger. And yeah, if we are ourselves, as Yenn says, and we tend to - that's who we are at home. That separating of self at home from self out in the world is really damaging.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. So speaking about that, what I guess are some of the ways that, you know, if you're an autistic person, and you get to come to your own understanding of your gender and your transness and then it's about then accessing services or accessing support to kind of like help you on that journey and that transition -what, like, where are people coming up against challenges? What are some of like, the struggles there? And how can these services, the ones that do exist, be more inclusive of autistic trans people?
Yenn Purkis
I think there's a lot of misunderstandings, stereotypes, and assumptions around autism and gender. And I think these things are what we come up against as transgender autistic people - is those stereotypes and assumptions and people thinking we can't know our gender, or even coming to the whole discussion from a very cisnormative heteronormative sort of space. And so seeing our differences and diversity as a bad thing, and all of those, those prejudices that occur, I'm somebody that's had to access a lot of mental health clinical services over my life. And most mental health clinicians I've come across have very limited understanding of autism, which can make my experience in those services very, very difficult. Thankfully, we have a lot of really lovely people, particularly in the gender diversity space, you know, I've got some lovely people in gender clinics and clinicians and people like that making a really big difference, which is great and needs to be encouraged. But I think people providing services need to listen to autistic voices, I think that's really important. I always say to people, read content, view content by autistic people, by transgender autistic people. Educate yourself, you know, there's a whole wealth of information in this space. And the more you know, the better you'll be at supporting people who come to you for help. So that knowledge is power is really important in this space.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And as well as your book, maybe you could send us some recommendations of places that people can look at, and we can pop them in the show notes of the episode.
Yenn Purkis
Absolutely.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Totally.
Hannah Witton
So Wenn, you mentioned that you have a wife, and you've got kids and grandkids, and you're abig, happy autistic family, and I wondered how autism like impacts how you relate to one another as a family, all the different relationships going on there, and then also, if you don't mind sharing, like how that is perceived by wider society?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, no, I think I'm very fortunate, we are very fortunate, because there is understanding, acceptance. When I went to tell my daughter that I was going to transition from female, from being her mum, to being male, and she said, "I don't want to have a dad. I've got one of them already." I said, "No, that's fine. I'm just a man mum." But um, but when I went to tell her, she said, "Mum, we already know, we've known for a very long time. And you're just you and that's fine." So I'm very fortunate that my family accepted me. It was much harder for for my wife, having been together as a seemingly lesbian couple for 28 years so that was very difficult.
Hannah Witton
And then it's like, "Am I a lesbian still?"
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah. All of that stuff. Brings up all those thoughts. But actually, for several years, I've been calling myself middlesex, which used to be a county in the UK, middlesex. And unfortunately, that almost kept me bound away from transitioning when I really needed to, because it kept me in a place of still being a woman, a lesbian woman. And I'm not. I'm actually a heterosexual man who loves a woman. But it's, it's all very, very scary. I'm, I'm thankful that I've had the support from my family. I'm thankful that my adult children who, you know, my eldest boy is nearly 50 now and my daughter and my youngest son all accept who I am, all get what being autistic means. And with the grandkids, we relate very well, it really is something that I know a lot of people might not experience. So I'm very thankful. Even though we live a long way apart from one another, you know, it's a four hour drive, I reckon, from where we live to where they are, and that it doesn't, doesn't separate. I get, I get FaceTime with my granddaughter now and then and I get all sorts of surprise texts from them, which is really nice.
Hannah Witton
I love that. And kind of on the topic of relationships in general, back to what you both were talking about when you were speaking about your autism, the thing that stood out for me it was like that must make dating - especially like if dating in a kind of like allistic dominant dating world - quite challenging. Like, yeah, what's, what's going on there?
Yenn Purkis
Absolutely. So I'm asexual and I recognised I was asexual some years ago, but when I was younger, I assumed that I wasn't asexual because I didn't know that was an option. I knew that I didn't like sex with men because I tried that and it was very icky. And so I thought, "Well, women are slightly less icky than men. So that means if I like women more than I like men, I'm probably a lesbian." So I decided when I was 16, that I was a lesbian, came out to my family, all very traumatic, and then I promptly struggled to find a partner. And everyone else seemed to just naturally hook up with people. And for me, it just made I just didn't know how to do it. I'd think, "How do you convince someone to be your girlfriend? How do you do that? I honestly don't know."
And it took me years to actually find a partner. And I never really - I never really wanted a partner. I wanted the social acceptance that having a partner brought. So I didn't want to be in a relationship. But I wanted other people to think I was like them. And people like them, they all had a relationship. So the relationship for me was not about closeness or anything like that. I didn't like being in relationships. I didn't like sex, even with women, and it took me years to work out this is not for me, this is not my thing. And there is a stereotype and it's incorrect, as most stereotypes are. There's the stereotype that autistic people are all asexual. I can guarantee that's not the case. But a fair number of us are. There is a larger percentage of asexual autistic people than asexual allistic people. But yeah, it was always for me, it was just that I wanted social acceptance. And if I was in a relationship, I was socially acceptable. I think I've only ever had four relationships in my whole life. And most of them didn't go for very long. But yeah, no, dating was a very confusing thing. And knowing - how do I know if you're my partner or if you're just a one night stand? Like, where does the - where does the line blur with that?
Hannah Witton
And allistic people struggle with that, too. So it's only just going to be even more confusing. There was this excellent - I'm gonna have to find it again, but there was this YouTube video, where there was a bunch of different autistic people talking about different aspects of life, and one of it was around sex and relationships. And one of them had this beautiful analogy about how when it comes to like the lack of sex education, and like talking about how to navigate relationships, autistic people are the canary in the coal mine. So you're - like autistic people are the most vulnerable in that situation, and are going to find it the most challenging, but ultimately, it's a warning sign to everybody else that something is wrong here. And we're not communicating well. We don't know how to navigate relationships healthily. Everyone is just like playing a game.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, that's true for everyone. But as autistic people, I think, we really do want to connect to others. And I know, Yenn, you said you may not want to be sexually involved with another person. And dating would have - was very traumatic in so many ways, but you need and thrive being connected with other human beings. We misjudge, we misjudge what connection is all about as autistic people. So for me, connecting to somebody means having a similar kind of understanding with each other, similar interests, things that we can share, being able to relate, to talk, being able to let people know that some of my sensory issues mean - well, kissing, for example. We can do that for a few seconds, because it's overwhelming, makes my lips buzz. And all these other things with that we have to negotiate, navigate, and talk through. But young people who are out there just trying out for the first time to find their feet, and, you know, try on this relationship and that relationship, as autistic young people may not get it. They may not understand and other people may not understand them.
And then I worry that things like pornography are going to take over. And people will get hooked on that stuff and not necessarily separate it from, you know, people who are in pornographic movies are acting, they're using scripts. The sex is real, but they're using scripts. But they're saying to other people listening and watching: "This is what you do." And then some of the things that they do in those things are really not what you do. So you've got young people who are at risk of being detained by the justice system for stalking or for forcing or for rape or for a whole heap of things, which are not to do with sexuality. But as you said, quite rightly, Yenn, that sex education is so important, and it needs to be available in ways that relate to us as autistic people.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Yeah.
Yenn Purkis
I totally agree with the point about the porn. I think porn has a lot to answer for and not just for autistic young people, but for all young people learning about sexuality for the first time. And there's so much information, there's so much imagery online. But it doesn't teach about respect, doesn't teach about consent. It doesn't, you know, it doesn't teach about what a sexual relationship is actually like, but young people have got no - you know, this is - it's readily available. I've never accessed it, because I'm asexual. But if I wanted to, I could just sit here and type something into Google, and there would be all this stuff. And yeah, it really is quite problematic I think for all young people, particularly autistic young people.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
And it pops up, Yenn, when you're not looking for it. You might be a person who's really interested in, in railways and in trains, and they might type in, you know, 'hook up', they might type in a word associated with their interest, and then get all this stuff. It's invaded children's cartoons, it's everywhere.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. There's porn of everything.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
So it really is something that we need to navigate. And be quite clear with autistic people, when we're working together, use every opportunity as an educational one. It's so, so important.
Hannah Witton
And the alternative place that you'd hope young people are learning those things, like you mentioned, Yenn, like, healthy relationships, and consent and all of that - they're, you know, they're hit and miss, at best. And a lot is definitely lacking there to kind of provide the balance of that education to -
Dr Wenn B Lawson
But we should be doing it. As parents, we can be doing this for really small kids. "Is it okay if I help you with your buttons?" We can be teaching all sorts of aspects about consent without naming it as consent. Do you know I'm saying? We bring up our kids and our young people to be mutually respectful as we respect them, and that's being - should be being modelled all the time. So that when that conversation happens as they get older, it's not new. It's naturally part of growing up.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, it's just made me realise that I've just naturally - because I've recently had a baby.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Congratulations.
Hannah Witton
Thank you! And I'll always just be like, "Can I change your nappy?" Or like, "Can I put your vest on?" eEven though he can't answer me, like, he's a baby. But yeah, it's just like, if I normalise that with myself, then as he gets older as well, and just like, it's just a continuation of that asking for permission to, you know, change his nappy, or like, help him get dressed, or whatever.
Hannah Witton
I wanted to kind of go back to we're talking about sex education, and like some of the like medical spaces like to help with like trans people and transitioning. But I also want to talk about like trans activist spaces, and do you feel like they are inclusive of autistic trans people?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Generally, no, I don't think they are. But what do you think, Yenn?
Yenn Purkis
I'm involved in a few things here in Canberra that are very lovely. So one of them is a trans meet up that happens every month, and it's run by a wonderful trans woman called Jenny. That's lovely, and Jenny is not neurodivergent but she always asks, or says at the start, you know, if anyone wants to stim, please feel free to do so, this is a neurodiversity friendly space. So that's always quite nice. I don't have a lot to do with all the militant people except for the autistic and trans militant people who are quite inclusive aorund autism, surprise surprise. But I do think there are communities that are coming together, and it can be a bit fraught, can be a bit difficult. And some people, you know, might not like the neurodiversity sort of flavour of things and stuff like that. But I think, I guess it's intersectionality, and intersectional spaces can be really affirming but can be really problematic as well.
So for me, I haven't come up against that. I have come up against the other side, which is autistic people who don't like me talking about gender. I had someone on my Facebook page a while back saying "This page is about autism, not gender. Why are you talking about gender? This isn't relevant." And I'm thinking, "And you're transphobic." So that kind of thing I've had. I had somebody else, oh my gosh, somebody who was a friend, and for whatever reason became a nasty transphobic bigot and sent me really hateful messages, like - I had this cat called Mr. Kitty, who was my absolute world, and he passed away a couple of years ago, and this hateful person said to me in a private message, "Mr. Kitty died of a broken heart." You know, really hateful. And it was all about my gender. And so, yeah, I haven't experienced much issues from the trans community against autistic people, but I sadly have experienced a fair amount of bigotry from the autistic community because I'm transgender.
Hannah Witton
Wow. Okay. Yeah.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
And again, it's about people being a bit ignorant, not - people are scared of what they don't understand. So the more they get to know us, as Yenn said, listen to autistic voices, read about us, engage with us, then that fear gets lowered, or at least I would hope so. And then I'm - like you, Yenn, and I'm coming across more and more trans spaces where we can relate. But it's - at beginning of my journey, that was quite a difficult thing. Church in particular. I was asked to leave and things like that, whereas now I've found a sanctuary here in Warrrnambool, where there's a massive acceptance of people however they are, as they are. And that's, that's exciting.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Have you been able to find a new church?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
We have. Yeah, my wife and I have. Sanctuary here in Warrrnambool in Victoria in Australia. It is - it is a sanctuary. It has lots of autistic - lots of autistic people, lots of people with various things that they suffer with, and live with. Totally accepting, and it's just amazing. I'm very thankful that we found them. Yeah.
Yenn Purkis
I go to the Rainbow Church, which is through the Uniting Church, and it's for trans - I hate the acronym, but LGBTIQIA+ people who want to go to church and it's, it's just lovely. It's so nice. Yeah, my church that I used to go to kind of dropped me like a stone when I came out, so it's nice finding one that's, yeah. This amazes me with religion, because yes, Jesus was pretty accepting guy.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Yenn Purkis
And yet, lots of people who claim to be his representatives in the world are not very accepting at all. I have to share this because it's hilarious. So my parents are lovely. And they're very, very Christian. And so when I came out, I was a bit anxious that they might be a bit judgmental, and they really haven't been. And it was, it was - their acceptance and niceness and non judgmental nature was epitomised by this one thing they did when I went to visit them a few months ago. And they said, "Oh, we bought you rainbow bread." And I said, it's wonderful, I said, "Most people's conservative Christian parents, when faced with a transgender child, would be like, 'Oh, no, what do I do?' My parents are like, 'Oh, we must buy them rainbow bread.'" Wonderful.
Hannah Witton
Embodying Jesus there with the bread, but make it rainbow. Excellent. We have some questions from folks on Instagram that people would like to ask you both. Someone has said: do you think being autistic made it easier or harder to discover your identity? And I'm assuming they mean your trans identity?
Yenn Purkis
Yeah, look, I think it was and it wasn't. So the thing I said earlier about identity, and it's easier to embrace your trans identity when you're autistic because, you know, you're not abiding by social norms and things like that, that was definitely the case for me. But the hardest thing was actually articulating what was going on, because I have something that a lot of autistic people have called alexithymia, which is emotion blindness. And I also have issues with interoception, so physical sensations of what's going on inside my body. So those things all mixed up with my transness and it became quite confused and it was quite difficult for me to actually pinpoint "Oh, this is my identity, this is how I feel." And then even like, I came out as non binary in 2018. And it was probably last year - so three years after that - that I thought I know where I fit within the transgender non binary rainbow, I am agender and it had taken that long to figure out how I felt about my gender identity because I was so out of touch with my mind and my body. So in that regard, it's quite difficult to be trans and autistic, and to reconcile one to the other, but it was also immediately extremely liberating. I felt like dancing down the street for about three months. Probably still do sometimes.
Hannah Witton
Why not?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
I can only echo that, that as an autistic person, so many more things are available to me. But that sense of connection to the feeling. What is that feeling? Is that a sensory issue? Is that an identity issue? Is that, you know, and it takes a bit to sort out those things. And they're very clear guidelines - or another reason - we highlighted some of this in the book, because it's so important that people take us seriously and don't just assume, "Oh, this is a sensory thing." But they work with us to uncover and sift out and sort out - I mean, that's why we have gender clinics and people who will work with families. That's why we have things like, hormone blockers, to give people time before they make any commitment to something. Yeah. Ditto.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Somebody asked: I'm a primary teacher, what do you wish teachers slash schools knew about autism?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Everything!
Yenn Purkis
Everything, yes.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Especially, I recommend looking up the monotropism.org webpage, because being - it's a central characteristic of being autistic. Being monotropic. So if you read that it should inform school practice, and help them understand why we do what we do, and what to incorporate into into a school timetable, how to use things we're interested in to connect us to other things we're interested in, how to use interest to cross as a bridge between interests as well. So it really is an important understanding, and the sensory stuff on my YouTube channel.
Yenn Purkis
Interoception.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah, and the interception's a huge, huge thing. interoception we sometimes think of as our eighth sense. It's the inner senses of connecting to name when you're hot and cold, know when your mood changes, knowing if you're hungry or thirsty, knowing when you need the loo, or all those - that's a whole internal separate sensory system to our external senses. But they work together. And in theory, we are noticing the things we need, and the teachers and schools can take note of us, the fact that some of our behaviour is probably saying "I'm not noticing. I'm not noticing." So for example, in South Australia, more than 52 schools have interoception places and programmes run for the whole school, not just autistic people, rather than a sensory -
Yenn Purkis
Thank you, Emma.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yep. Rather than a sensory room, they'll have interoception. And it's made such an amazing difference to young kids lives. And 80% of people who were school refusal or were being kicked out of school for one reason or another, that went down 80%. That's huge. So all that stuff.
Yenn Purkis
And we should credit that the person who - Emma Goodall.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Emma Goodall here in Australia. And there's another lass in the States as well. But Emma is our guru in all things interoception.
Hannah Witton
Okay.
Yenn Purkis
And I've written four books with Emma, and she's just wonderful. She's one of the most lovely people you'll ever met, and knows more about autism and interoception than anyone anywhere. Also for kids, the PDA profile, which is pathological demand avoidance. That's really important for schools to know about that. And what's the alternate name?
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Can we say persistent drive for autonomy?
Yenn Purkis
Oh, I like that.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Take the pathology out.
Yenn Purkis
I'll even remember that because it's the same initials. Persist drive for autonomy. I love it.
Hannah Witton
There's so much good stuff here for like, not just obviously teachers and schools, but for people to look up. I'm just like, "What's this thing? What's this new term? Like, okay." A lot to look into. Someone has said: my friend is trans and autistic with a family using her autism as a reason to not take her seriously. You've kind of touched on that this can be something that happens but what advice, I guess, do you have for people who are going through this and then maybe the people who do understand them and do support them in life and how they can help?
Yenn Purkis
Okay, so I think it's a matter of surrounding yourself with people that like and respect you and get you and understand you and don't think it's just a phase. I think that's really important. It is very important to have allies and sadly sometimes families are not allies. That being said, people can change. I did have one person on my social media who was an Autism World person and was super transphobic when I first came out, and I had to block them. And then six months later, they contacted me and they said, "I'm so sorry, Yenn, I owe you a massive apology." And, and she made a genuine apology, and I accepted it. Because well, I have a lot of dodgy stuff in my history. If people didn't forgive me for that, then I wouldn't be very happy. So by the same token, I should forgive people that apologise genuinely to me, and this person showed that they respected me by reposting every meme that I put up for the next six months, so I think they were genuine. But people can change is what I mean.
And I think with families, it's important to know that you're on a journey, but they're on a journey too. It can be really difficult. But keeping in mind that people can change. And what I would say to the families is, if you reject your transgender child, the best outcome, the best outcome, is that you will lose their respect. The worst outcome is that you'll lose them. It is not that important. Your bigotry or prejudice or judgments or assumptions about gender are a lot less valuable than someone's life. So just put it on hold. I say that to any parent I speak to. If you have some bigotry and judgement and things like that, put it on hold. Your child is more important than your opinions.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
Yeah. In a nutshell. Well said. Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Well, thank you both so much for joining me and answering all these questions and sharing all of your knowledge and your experiences. Where can people find more about you and your work and also the book that you wrote together as well? Just like, plug away.
Yenn Purkis
I have another book about autism and gender that came out this year. And it is called - it's written with the wonderful Sam Rose who works with the I CAN Network. That's a resource, the I CAN Network, and this book is called the Awesome Autistic Guide for Trans Teens. doesn't really need any explanation. That's what it is. It's very cool. I just got my author copies last week. Yes! So check that one out. I have a website which is www.yennpurkis.com. Please feel free to check it out. I do need to get my web design person to update it because it's two books behind. Who else? Spectrum Intersections is a really good organisation in Australia that works with autistic and transgender people. Minus 18 is another great service for young LGBTQIA+ people. There's a book called Spectrums edited by the wonderful Maxfield Sparrow and that's stories of being transgender by autistic people. There's a book called Coming Out Again by Sabrina Simonton, which I would highly recommend. I've got another one called The Autism and Neurodiversity self advocacy handbook, with Bob cook. And I think that's all the resources. I could share resources all night but I'll stick with those.
Hannah Witton
Excellent, thank you.
Dr Wenn B Lawson
And again, for my website, it's www.wennlawson.com. And there's also a YouTube channel for Wenn Lawson, when we've tried to make little animations and talks and put them there for people just to explore, looking at all the things we've talked about tonight, actually.
Hannah Witton
Excellent. Well, thanks again so much. And thank you all so much for listening. Bye.