Published on 12, July, 2020
My name is [edited] and I am a support worker [removed by moderator]. I was late diagnosed at the age of 37 as being autistic and now have found employment supporting other autistic people.
My employment history has been quite varied and as such I have worked in retail, 12 years in the Royal Navy in a clerical role. Following my service I tried working as a bus driver but found interacting with passengers a challenge.
I changed areas again after this and decided I would look to become a registered nurse. I worked as a community care worker and in nursing homes supporting people with brain injuries and challenging behaviours. I studied an access to higher education course in nursing and healthcare professions prior to completing a three year undergraduate degree in nursing at the University of Southampton.
I graduated with a 2.1 in September 2019 and immediately moved to the North West and started work as a registered nurse. As a nurse I have worked mainly in acute medicine within NHS trusts, I was employed in the NHS until October 2023 when I took the decision to step back from nursing.
My own diagnosis came in 2021 when I was also struggling with severe PTSD from my experiences on COVID wards. I needed to re-evaluate my own career plans and as such I sought out employment [removed by moderator] in supporting autistic people as a support worker.
It is my eventual goal that I will return to academia to complete a masters degree in autism studies and eventually a phd (research) in how best to support autistic people within a clinical setting and look towards how co-production with autistic people can help guide and inform healthcare settings to improve the experience of autistic people accessing healthcare.
Welcome to the community.
It's always good to hear of an actually autistic person working supporting other autistic people. The caring and mental health professions certainly need more of that.
You will need to change you username here, as the forum rules don't allow personally identifying details such as full name.
https://community.autism.org.uk/p/rules
I love your budgie