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Monday, September 8th 2025
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Welcome to the second installment of my new phlog, where I
do my best to intelligently discuss the nuances of a
late-life autism discovery, balanced with what I hope is a
lighter look at my attempts to improve my abilities as a
musician. In my last entry I gave a bit of a backstory, so
to speak, on my autism discovery and the change it's begun
to effect in my life. Today I wanted to talk about one of
the biggest and most immediate impacts it's had on me: a
sense of community.

Early on in my ASD research I was given the advice to seek
out other people with autism and seek support from, as the
author put it, my "tribe". After some time looking at
different options around the Internet (websites, Facebook
groups, even some message boards) I decided to opt for a
Discord community. Text-based Chat has always been my
preferred method of communication, since finding the
Prodigy service when I was 16. It allowed me to compose,
edit and refine my thoughts at will before presenting them,
and that was something I found invaluable even back then.

To be clear, I hadn't had any social activity in years. Not
even chat. I had attempted to break into a guitar playing
Discord community a few weeks prior, and while they were
nice I was kept at arms length, to my great frustration.
That had been my first social interaction outside of my
gf's friends in a long, long time, and the experience had
been extremely frustrating because it instantly reminded me
why I had given up trying to make friends to begin with. So
I was joining this Discord with more than a fair amount of
skepticism, even trepidation.

To my surprise, the advice I had been given was proven
immediately beneficial. Within a few minutes of explaining
my reasons for joining, I was welcomed with open arms by
not just the server owner, but many a random member as
well. One of my biggest concerns at this stage in my
discovery process was approaching the community with
"self-diagnosis", as it were (a descriptor I don't
particularly care for, but that's a topic for another
entry). They were far more kind to me than I was to myself
on this subject, and I was given a brief education on how
important it is to accept the validity of self-diagnosis.
As it turns out, almost all cases of late-diagnosed adult
ASD are self-diagnosed and my story was a familiar one.

More than their acceptance of my words, though, was
something much deeper that has taken me some time to put a
finger on. I'm not one to get too purple with my
spirituality, but it was a profound acceptance of spirit as
well. There was a kinship, a sameness. A belonging I had
spent my entire life desperately searching for, never
understanding why it came so easily to everybody else.
Indeed, the power of this connection immediately broke me
and I wept. Just recalling the moment now has my eyes wet.
If you've ever experienced the famous ASD "wrong planet
syndrome", you might understand - I was finally on the
right planet.

These poor people. They had no idea what they were
unleashing. I had been starved for any form of contact
outside of my gf for so, so long and I am afraid I turned
the full force of my desperation, relief, elation and
insecurity on them all at once. I was like a seive from
which poured the sands of years of quiet agony at my
isolation. For days I flooded the various channels with the
enthusiasm of an autistic puppy dog, an image that amuses
me very much but one that is quite accurate. 

The experience didn't come without it's caveats, however.
In my haste to make friends I inadvertantly ignored some
channel rules, and it became enough of a problem that I was
(lightly) reprimanded several times. It became enough of an
issue that my conflict avoidance kicked in and I almost
bailed from the server completely one night, awash in a
flood of negative emotion and feeling like I had ruined my
one chance to belong to a like-minded community. But I took
a night away to practice some mindfulness, and I came back
to the chat the next day, and wouldn't you know it? One of
the more active members anticipated that the situation
might have been difficult, and asked if I was well.

I can't describe to you how that moment felt. Not only had
I not alienated these people in the ways that I have always
alienated everyone else I try to reach out to, but they
were so in tune with *who I was at my core* that they
anticipated my need for understanding before I even had a
chance to communicate it to them. When you've gone your
entire life feeling like an outcast, when you're closer to
50 than to 40 and you've never once felt a sense of
belonging, that kind of connection feels profound. In fact
it did feel spiritual. It had only been a matter of days
and these people understood me better than many of my
long-time friends.

The Neurodivergent Community is a special one. If you're
going through your own ASD self-discovery, or any other
neurodivergent journey, I think reaching out is not only
beneficial but absolutely imperitive. There is a lot of
emotion, and a lot of ups-and-downs to ride through while
going through this and you need to pull in people around
you that understand. Even if you just have questions, I've
found most are more than willing to educate. So many people
don't care to be educated at all, we jump at the chance.

That's not to say every single ND individual is a wholesome
bag of sunshine. The world is a diverse place, and like it
or not there can be a lot of darkness associated with
neurodiversity. But most, indeed the overwhelmingly vast
majority, are lovely people looking just as hard for
connection as you are.

Next time we'll try to get to some guitar stuff!

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Record Time
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For today's Record Time I wanted to present a long-time
favorite, and a huge change from our inaugeral entry. "Fair
Warning" by Van Halen, an extremely underrated effort from
my all-time favorite band.

Van Halen is one of the biggest hard rock bands of all
time, and their guitarist Eddie Van Halen is considered one
of the greatest to ever live, defining an entire genre of
the instrument and inspiring decades worth of copycats.
When I was first learning (and still to this day, really) I
was absolutely enamored with his playing and he stands as
my greatest influence.

Released in the early 80's nearing the peak of the band's
Diamond Dave era, this record eschews the lighthearted
summer-rock vibe of the previous entries and delves into
darker territory, exploring the dredges of fame and it's
effects on the human condition. The lyrical content is
dark, sometimes sensuous and always provocative. Eddie's
guitar work is at it's very best here, displaying fretboard
antics on a previously unseen level even for him. The
opening track explodes with a barrage of tapped harmonics
and rhythmic string-muting, immediately turning heads not
unlike the legendary "Eruption" from their Freshman effort.
I've been playing guitar (poorly) for 30 years, and believe
me when I say this intro seperates the men from the boys.

This album is a massive tonal shift for the band, one that
while shortlived, echos through the rest of the Diamond
Dave era. The next release is a mishmash of party songs and
pop covers in an attempt to reclaim casual listeners
alienated by the dark subject matter of this album. Indeed,
their greatest commercial success of the era, '1984' is a
direct response to some of their own philosophies expressed
on the album. It was a critical success, but a commercial
flop by the bands lofty standards. However to this day it
is one of their most beloved albums by longtime fans.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I.

- Freakuency