I'm so tired of everything. A lot has happened. I'm reminded lately how my life could have been if I'd stayed in Greenville instead of letting my family coerce me into moving to Kaufman. There, I had a cushy asset protection job, $10k in savings and a dream. At the same time, I have grown so much and met people I'm glad to have met.

Autistic characters are nothing new. I can identify at least one autistic character in nearly every show or movie I watch. It's not like it's hard. Deliberately writing autistic characters, though? I can see that being hard. Especially when bad autistic representation is no longer acceptable representation. As an autistic person, writing autistic characters comes naturally to me, so these are my best tips based on what I'd like to see in autistic characters by allistics.

Autistic traits are described so negatively by default. That's because the historic perception of autism continues to control the narrative despite us having autistic people sharing their perspectives. Once I imagined what life would be like if autism was the default and allistics were the outliers, everything changed. Reframing my autistic traits in a neutral or positive light helped me truly accept and love myself.

Autistic adults exist. Not only kids. Not only "quirky" side characters in someone else's story. Real adults -- living, working, loving, failing, thriving. And yet...misconceptions follow us everywhere. People assume we'll "grow out of it". That we don't feel. That we don't truly exist -- that we're not real people. Their misconceptions are wrong. The stereotypes don't hold up. What stereotypes, you ask?

How to I avoid becoming a worker found dead at my workplace? That's what I think when I wonder how I will survive working in retail. This job, it threatens to steal my soul. Some days, I catch myself feeling dead inside. I don't want this job to harden me. Nor do I want to dump whatever work dumps on my psyche onto the people I interact with.

After panicking, I postponed my jury duty summons. If I'd known I could postpone up to two times, I'd have done it. I didn't know. So. I went in on a Monday like, "Okay, chances of me being called are slim. It's okay. I can go home and sleep! Conk out with diphenhydramine and forget about my allergies and pain!"

Most people think blogging is as simple as jotting down your thoughts and hitting publish. However, the reality of blogging as a business is far more complex and involves mastering various skills beyond writing. From planning content and creating eye-catching visuals to promoting posts and engaging with readers, blogging requires a mix of creativity, strategy and technical know-how. Whilst it might seem overwhelming at first, these are all learnable skills that transform your blog into something that truly impacts people.

Should you reconcile with your estranged mother? That's not a choice anyone else can make for you. I'm writing this post from the perspective of someone who decided not to reconnect with her mother. I realized doing so would complicate and decrease the quality of my life -- which I can't even trust her with. You feel pressured to reconcile.

Sweet, sweet family time with my youngest sister...but then I got sick.

I do my job...by which I mean, "I work per my job description, not like I'm eager to level up." 'Cause I'm not. I seriously have zero interest in becoming a manager at my store. I work a retail job where expectations are unrealistic, coverage is insufficent, and I highly doubt management genuinely thinks my working my wage is worse than their high turnover rate.

Are you doing too much at work? You're probably doing too much at work. You know, going above and beyond for your store. Helping other people do their work while forgetting that "helping" them might a) not even be your job or b) be related to your job because "helping" at work is still working. Acting my wage has completely altered my attitude about…

It depends. I didn't name a blog "Survive Retail" for giggles and purrs. As with everything, there are pros and cons. Some people thrive in retail. I've met a store manager who started at 16 and never left -- and associates who've worked the same role for 20+ years. I'm not here to tell you how to think; I'm here to help you make your own call.

You're clocked out, but it feels like work comes home with you despite being on hourly pay, am I right? That's where releasing yourself of the responsibility and guilt surrounding your responsibilities and actions after you clock out comes in. Off the clock, your job is not your job anymore. It's over until your next shift. Even if you're shopping around as…

Being a people-pleaser is not the right path for you. Who am I to tell you this? A former people-pleaser. As a people-pleaser, you will be walked over. And because this is retail hell, you will not survive it people-pleasing. But also? People-pleasers don’t seek to please other people, but to mask and avoid the shame or guilt they feel…

Retail is a common first job for teens and college students. Ashley Tisdale worked a lot of retail jobs alongside being a child (well, teen) actress and model. It taught her the value of money, how to save money, and to be respectful of stores even as a customer. She knows what it’s like to fold a table and have a customer mess it up the second you turn around.

As an autistic woman in retail, I've noticed a pattern: Men are automatically respected in the workplace. Customers often look to men as if they know more, even if they're new. Women are expected to be agreeable, likeable and passive. The point of work and working together is not to be likeable. There's this saying in retail: "You're here to work, not hang out with your friends."

I work 40 hours a week for a retail company. This is but one step on my path. Blogging alongside a full-time job has its challenges. (If it didn't, I'd have gotten farther with my blog before now.) If I wanted to turn my blog into a business, I needed to be doing more than the bare minimum, otherwise it wouldn't have happened.

January is the biggest month of the year for fresh starts inspiration goal-making lifestyle changes motivation personal development People may turn to Pinterest, where they will find blogs, as a source of inspiration. So I'm providing you with creative blog post ideas to cover for January search traffic. Best time to publish new January content After analyzing my own blog traffic, I've found seasonal-based content traffic starts picking up again 2-3 months prior to that season or month.

I caught COVID last month. How? Not sure exactly, but my immune system was already under attack by an allergen and chronic stress, so... The odds were not ever in my favor. My housemate told me she had tested positive for COVID and recommended I test myself. I took a test, then two more because all I could think was, "No way is this happening to me right now."

How do you befriend someone with DID? Like you befriend people without it: respect for their boundaries leading with empathy connecting based on common interests We're not that much different from other people. Something that is unique to people with DID, though, is what you might consider saying but would be better off not -- because saying anything from this list would do more than offending someone with DID.

Allistic people frustrate and annoy me. Probably...for the same-ish reasons I, and other autistics, annoy them. Like, okay. I know autistic people annoy others. That's literally everyone, though -- everyone has potential to annoy others... Some groups of people with specific behavior patterns can annoy other groups of people with other specific behavior patterns, though... There are some behaviors non-autistic people take part in that remind me I'm autistic.

What can I do when I don't want to write a new blog post? I've been hitting these moments a lot lately...probably because I started a new blog that I've got a lot of inspiration for and am spent by the time I open Lemon & Lively. Working full-time and blogging full-time is quite a doozy. I don't always want to work on my blog, but I…

Who am I outside of being my family's scapegoat? Outside of who my family decides I am? I struggled to answer this question since I left my abusive family. The answer, which I continue to navigate, is more of a journey than a quick, simple solution. Because first of all, you have to work through who you want to be so you can start developing yourself.

"I blog." Those two words open doors to someone else judging or perceiving me a certain way. I used to be ashamed of having a blog, but then blogging went mainstream. Now, I spend a lot of time differentiating myself from social media influencers and hobby bloggers. Disclosing I'm a blogger often feels a lot like disclosing I'm autistic. 'Cause what people say after I share about blogging is...well...