#EmmaTherapy on a plate. Brie and bacon Dutch pancake with cranberry sauce and drizzled with maple syrup… #ME #CFS #chronicfatigue

Yeah, that just about sums it up! #me #normalisboring

It took until I was 30 and put through workplace bullying before I discovered I probably had aspergers and it was another couple of years before I had a semi-official diagnosis and 1-2-1 coaching to overcome some of my biggest challenges. Since then, I have had progressed in my career and found my one-true love (and accompanying menagerie of furry, feathered, and fishy beasts), and I am so much better than I was at understanding the world and those unspoken cues. Sometimes I think I understand too well, and that it makes it all too easy for other’s to forget that sometimes Thomas, through no fault of his own, just doesn’t get as quickly as you might expect him too, what others understand straight away.

In my writing life, the thing that I struggle most with is showing not telling. Considering that probably the single-most lofted criticism at a writer is that they tell not show, this is unfortunate thing to be lacking in. The fact that I pull off the very personal story of Mr Tumnal is something that I feel very proud of, and if I can do the same with it’s forthcoming sequel, then I will be extremely lucky in deed.

Mr Tumnal is outwardly a story of a man who married his imaginary friend. How much that imaginary friend has to with fairy magic is something the reader must discover. At a more personal level it is a story of a man who is not friendless but without that one close friend; who is not alone but is lonely. It is a story of a man illequipped to deal with the complexities of ordinary social situations that most people take for granted. He finds comfort in his own company because that is where he is understood. Some might brandish him a weirdo. I would argue he’s just different. And like everyone who is ‘different’ from the norm he has his own gift to bring to the world.

In supporting World Autism Awareness Week and the work of the National Autistic Society, I would like everyone to find out a bit more about what makes some of us different, and the challenges we face, and to give us a bit of space of understanding in the world.

TE Shepherd is the author of Mr Tumnal and The End Of All Worlds. In support of World Autism Awareness week, from 27 March to 2 April 2017, he will be donating 50% all profits raised from the sales of his book to go to help support the work of the National Autistic Society.

I am creative. I am an author.

I got these wise words from Joanna Penn and her latest blog post about Lessons Learned From 3 Years As An Author-Entrepreneur. It’s weird to say this considering how much I love books, always find time to read, and itch to write but I think I might need to write this on a Post-It note and stick it over my desk.

Ever since May 2012, I have finally been able to say that I have earnt money from my writing – a three figure salary no less – but when it comes to paying the bills, its my job developing websites for the university. There’s something in my brain, I think, that when I am at a party and asked what I do, I still say I’m a Web Designer, or if I’m being completely accurate, a ‘Web and Digital Media Officer’.

Why do I never say that I’m a writer?

I guess it might be the follow-on question that always comes; that is variations on the theme of that question of what you have written? Have I read anything that you’ve written? And I still find that hard, admitting that my book is self-published, that sales only trickle in…

But I am a creative. I am a writer. Not a day, hour or minute goes by without me thinking, dreaming, breathing the life of a writer. I am compelled to write by a need to tell stories. I carry my notebook and a pen with me everywhere and find the oddest scraps of time to write. If I’m not reading, I’m writing. More often than not I’m writing. Maybe its because there is part of me that hankers after the need for validation of someone independent from my circle of friends of family saying yes they want to publish me? And yet, I can write. People who I don’t know have bought, and read, and liked my book. Isn’t that as validated as I need to be?

So next time someone asks me what I do, I must say first and foremost: I am a creative. I am an author. And if it comes out later that I also get paid to design websites, well, that’s what I do when I’m not writing stories…