- I always have a worry that something like that will happen
to me and people will go,
"Oh, she really is autistic."
- What did your parents and your family think of you
when you were a child and a teenager?
- "Oh, we just thought you were an asshole."
- You write that your part-time job as a stripper-
- Yeah, good times. - was the best,
best part-time job that you had.
- There was a lot of weird women working there,
so I felt like I fitted in with them.
You basically have to be absolutely insane
to get fired from a strip club like.
(laughing)
- So Fern, thank you so much for joining me to chat
about your brand new book, "Strong Female Character."
So I wanted to start with what your early coping mechanisms
were for being autistic before you'd been diagnosed.
- I used to learn a lot about people in books,
which is weird because the old diagnostic criteria
with autism was they said that autistic people
couldn't possibly enjoy novels
because we don't have the capacity to put ourselves
in other people's shoes.
Whereas tons of autistic girls,
tons of autistic people love reading,
and it's a really safe place to learn about people.
My mom sent down a box of photos
while I was writing the book,
and it was just one photo after another of me
at all these different social events reading books.
And my parents said I used to read multiple books at once
and have them all on my bookshelf.
So that was a really good way for me to learn about people.
But it also meant I was learning about quick,
rather than picking up what my peers were doing,
I was copying what women in books were doing.
But because I grew up reading stuff like Jeanette Winterson
and all these lots and lots of books about girls
who come from a working class background and go on to uni,
that was a really positive influence on me.
- Yeah.
And why do you think it took so long
for you to get a diagnosis?
- A lot of people say that their book is a love letter
to their hometown.
This is my poison pen letter to doctors.
(laughing)
I have a really intense dislike of doctors.
Because the signs I was autistic was so staggeringly obvious
from early on.
And I even told, because I got put in a CAMHS unit,
a Children and Adolescent Mental Health Unit when I was 16.
And I remember saying to my psychiatrist,
they diagnosed me with OCD, and I said to my psychiatrist,
"I've read about this thing called Asperger's,"
which is what they used to call it,
"I think I've got that."
And he said, you can't have that
'cause you're making eye contact with me
and you say you've got a boyfriend.
Well, yeah, it's really easy to get a boyfriend
if you're Catholic. (laughing)
That doesn't mean you're not autistic.
And then the place that eventually diagnosed me,
through this amazing place called the Lorna Wing Center,
and they specialize in diagnosing adult women.
They were like, we get told this all the time,
we're constantly told women aren't diagnosed
'cause they've had partners, boyfriends, or girlfriends.
I did this podcast during lockdown
called "Wheel of Misfortune."
It was a really silly podcast with me and my mate
telling stories about like pulling ourselves
and just stupid stuff.
And one of the weirdest things was we found
that a lot of our audience were doctors.
We would get like surgeons writing in saying,
"Oh, we listened to your podcast while we're doing surgery."
So I thought if I can write a book that doctors read
when they're off duty.
They're not gonna wanna read it now
'cause I said I didn't like doctors, right.
But still if I can write a book that is entertaining
and teaches you about autism almost in a tabloid way,
like that's why I put stuff about stripping in it
because I know that people are voyeurs
and they want to read about sexy stuff.
So I thought if I put things like that in
and then put stuff about autism in,
I'm gonna trick people into learning about autism.
So yeah.
- And what did your parents and your family think of you
when you were a child and a teenager?
- Well, my dad still says, if I try and bring up autism,
he says, "Oh, we just thought you were an asshole."
(laughing)
'Cause I used to have these violent meltdowns as a child.
And my parents were really religious
so they'd just think I was a bad child.
I don't know if that would've been different if I was a boy.
- And are there other experiences that you've had to unpack
in later life once you knew in yourself
that you were autistic,
that you've then had to look back on
and think, oh that's why that happened.
- When you get diagnosed you really have to look it
in the eye, which is quite a mad turn off phrase
for an autistic.
But you really have to like.
It's like you spend 18 months to two years just going over.
Oh yeah, and I did that, and that, and that.
Like, I had so many times where I hid in the toilets
to eat my lunch.
Like, when I was at primary school, secondary school,
university.
I even, I hid in the toilets at a work party the other week
for a TV show I've been on.
So yeah, things like that.
And then there's been other autistic people
who've been reading the book before it comes out,
and they're like, oh my God,
I did that all through school as well.
- Are there things that are positive in kind of not seeing
the societal subtext in everything?
- I thought one good bit about being autistic
and a point I made over and over again
is that I didn't have any regard for gender norms.
So there was one thing in the book
where when I lost my virginity my mom cried for a week.
And she thought something was wrong with me.
And I was like, but the guy was really fit
and it was a really positive experience.
So why is this a bad thing?
And that kind of thing would happen over and over again
where you just thought,
why are women always trying to stop you
from having a nice time?
Or why is it if you enjoy food,
they all police what each other eat?
It just, I just constantly felt out of step
with what other women were doing.
- [Holly] Yeah.
- So I thought that should be interesting to anyone
who likes reading feminist books
rather than just autistic people.
- Yeah.
And you write that your part-time job as a stripper-
- Yeah, good time. - was the best,
best part-time job that you had
of all the other things that you tried.
- Yeah.
- What was it about being a stripper that that suited you?
- It was a good job in the sense
that there was a lot of weird women working there.
So I felt like I fitted in with them.
There was low lighting.
And I hate the fluorescent lighting that you get
in office jobs and supermarkets.
The uniform was pretty comfortable.
(laughing)
They're like,
it was the hours were flexible.
It was almost impossible to get sacked.
You basically have to be absolutely insane
to get fired from a strip club.
Even then like
(laughing)
there actually was so much mad stuff I couldn't put in
about strip clubs 'cause I would run outta room.
- And what was it about comedy that felt
like it was a good fit for you?
- People say this all the time and I find it really odd.
Do I get nervous about gigs?
And I'm like, "No."
I'm saying the same pre-prepared scripted thing
that I've said night after night.
It's so comforting.
Like, I'm coming up to doing a tour now,
and it's so comforting to know that every night at 8:00 p.m.
I'm gonna say the same words.
There'll be room for flourishes
or room for new lines here and there.
But I'm gonna say the same words,
and they'll either like it, or they'll hate it,
or they'll be in between.
Whereas like, I went to a wedding there at Christmas
and things like that terrify me.
And my boyfriend says I'm so different
when I'm not in my comfort zone around comedians.
Like, I have to really concentrate on what I'm gonna say.
I rehearse what I'm gonna say to people
before I go to any social event.
So by comparison comedy's a dream.
- Yeah.
What about the kind of the travel side of it?
Because you mentioned earlier that airports
are like hellish.
So how do you kind of deal with that?
- I had a meltdown in Montreal Airport in July
'cause I got stuck in, what's it called?
I didn't fill out some forms properly
and they took me off behind this little screen that,
and kept me there for ages.
And I thought I wasn't gonna be allowed into Canada,
and I fucking howled like a baby as I was coming out.
I was like, I'm so glad I'm not known in Canada.
And it was when you could still,
like you were still wearing masks.
So I just pulled the mask up over my face and was like
(mimics crying)
just crying and hysterics.
And I always have a worry that something like,
that I'm gonna, 'cause I've just started
getting recognized more from comedy,
and I always have a worry
that something like that will happen to me,
and people will go, "Oh, she really is autistic."
- Since your diagnosis, have you been able to work out
the things that help or help to improve things?
- Yeah, yeah, massively.
So I got diagnosed 'cause I wanted to get advice
on what to do about my meltdowns.
I kept looking for the information
and I was either getting advice on how parents should cope
with their autistic kids, which doesn't make sense,
'cause all autistic kids grow up into autistic adults.
So where's the advice for autistic adults?
Or I was getting my advice from these amazing,
I follow a few 20-year-old girls on like TikTok
and Instagram who are doing staggering, amazing work
in terms of spreading information about autism.
And it's kind of just going unnoticed-
- [Holly] Yeah.
- 'cause they're 20-year-old girls.
So I thought this can't be right
that this is where I'm having to get my information from so.
- How have that kind of internet communities
been helpful for you?
- So initially the book was this angry response of like,
this is what I think when you say I don't look autistic,
or like that kind of thing.
There's a lot of that in the online autistic community.
There's a lot of very angry, newly diagnosed
autistics venting.
And then my motivations changed halfway through the book.
'Cause I saw what all these young girls were doing online
and I was like, if we can just get more of us
to be empowered autistics.
That sounds so lame.
But if we can get more of us to be empowered autistics
rather than physically and mentally ill autistics,
we're gonna be a force for good.
So I just focused on writing a book that was gonna empower
autistic women so that we can create change,
rather than try and get non-autistic people to change stuff.
- Yeah.
What was it like, obviously you spent a long time
writing this book and and crafting it,
what was it like to then narrate it?
- I wrote the book thinking,
remember you're gonna have to read this out
in front of a guy one day,
and think how embarrassing that'll be.
So, but I, it's mad, I ended up like becoming pals
with the producers, he's so sound.
And from like early on in the book, he was like,
in fact from day one he was like,
"Oh, a lot of this stuff sounds like it might apply to me."
But then by the end, once we got to the meltdowns bit
he was like, "Yeah, I don't think I've got this."
(laughing)
But we had loads of good chats.
In fact we had to be like, let's stop talking now
'cause we would keep stopping to chat about things
that had happened to him.
And it was so much fun.
And then he sent me a little message after to be like,
"That was my favorite audio book to do."
So that was good. - Oh, so good.
Well, I hope that you do get to a point
where you feel happy that lots of people are reading it
because it is really good.
- Oh, I'm proud of it, like-
- Good.
- Yeah, I'm pleased with it.
But it's more, I don't like anyone I know reading it.
I don't mind strangers reading it.
- Right.
- Anytime a stranger reads it, I'm happy.
- Okay.
- It's more just people that I work with or I don't know.
I wouldn't want, like imagine if someone I really fancy
had read it.
That would be awful.
(laughing)
- I don't think it would.
- Well, my friend wrote a book that had loads of sex bits
in it and I said to her like,
"Oh, someone I fancy read it
and we'll never get together now."
And she was like, "Are you joking?
Men love a mental horny bitch.
It's like catnip to them."
(laughing)
I'll end on that.
- Yeah, of course. (laughing)
Fern, it was such a pleasure to chat.
- You too. (laughing)