Bit of a break in my blogging, I know! Back around the time of my last post things began to deteriorate quite badly, until, 2 years later, Iona was diagnosed as autistic. We believe she actually has a type of autism called Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA), but few health authorities will actually diagnose that (although following further problems the Clinical Psychology department were willing to describe her as very demand avoidant). A few years down the line she was also diagnosed with ADHD and in 2020 she achieved the hat trick with a diagnosis of ARFID (Avoidant and Restrictive Food Intake Disorder). The latter led to her hospitalisation for 10 weeks and being given a nasogastric tube, which she had for 8 months (she recently had another 4-week stay with an NG tube for 3 months). In amongst all this she decided to try an autism school, but unfortunately that didn't go well, leading to a resurgence of her (already high) anxiety. Thankfully, the Local Authority allowed us to deregister her and return to home ed, albeit with a tutor supplied by them to focus on English and maths.
Through all this, Iona has grown very close to a fellow home edder, nearly the same age as her, and also demand avoidant autistic, who lives near us. Together they write stories based around their favourite Minecraft YouTubers, and cheer each other up.
Last week Iona asked for my help (mainly as phone holder) making this stop-motion animation about her experiences and feelings about the past few years. When I posted it in some Facebook groups there were a few requests for a downloadable version, so here it is. Our only request is that she is given the credit, so please leave on the final credit screen. Thanks.
