Hello! My name is Michael!

I am 6 years old, and I live with my Mummy and Okaa and our dog Henry. I like to call him Honry!

I have autism and something with a long name called pathological demand avoidance. I think autism causes me a lot of stressness, and it feels really weird most of all. Sometimes I get very stressed and then I "hedgehog" where I curl into a ball on the floor and go "hhhhhhhhh" (Mummy says this is called hyperventilating but I prefer my word). I struggle with it and I thought it was quite negative until my Mummy and Okaa started talking quite recently about the positives of my autism. I think being autistic means I love things more as well!

I have over 30 stuffed dogs! I love my dogs so much and Doggy especially! Doggy was made for me by my godparent Darcy and he is my favourite dog of all and I take him everywhere. I have always loved all kinds of trains but steam trains especially! I love Thunderbirds too much! We have watched every episode of Thunderbirds Are Go twenty times! I love fresh air once I've been inside for a really long time, and to me, this is a perfect world.

What I mostly like most of all is family. I love love love love love love love cuddles! I love my Okaa's weighted blanket!

My main special interest at the moment is Minecraft. Everything in Minecraft is made out of squares, I just love squares! Mostly I just love mine carts, which are trains on our Minecraft server, and furnaces in minecarts are like steam trains!

I don't like Soreen, or being told what to do, or loud noises, or going to bed, or spicy food.

Hello. I am Michael's Okaa. I think even though he is often plagued by “stressness”, his autism makes him unique and who he is, and we love him exactly the way he is.

His Mummy and I are both also autistic and whilst this sometimes results in a clash of needs it mostly means we all understand each other in a way the rest of the world doesn't.

We may not have PDA like Michael does, but we do hope we have some insight into his experience from our own.