Hey guys...

I know it seems like I have just gotten started on here and I am not abandoning this completely, but I am trying to find a way to consolidate all my blogs/ideas in one spot. That one spot has become erinmmckinney.com. As I try this out, I am not sure what may happen. I think it depends on how things are received and if people are more comfortable with the typical blog or with the website. So please let me know if you prefer on form or the other. I'm flexible. Tonight, I wrote a post on the Value of Routine on my website's blog. That is erinmmckinney.com/blog. Read it and let me know. Thanks guys.

Connecting the Dots

I graduated from college in 2012. I mean, I did lots of super cool stuff before that happened, but graduation was when things started happening crazy fast. The first thing that happened was that I got hired. Then I moved 800 miles away to start my new job and graduate school. Then my doctor from home sent me to my new doctor 800 miles away. Then after a lot of he said she said b.s., the new doctor said that I had Asperger's Syndrome, just diagnosed at 22 years of age.

Those words were the most terrifying and most freeing words to ever have been spoken to me. The new doctor gave me a lot of different resources to look at. The more I looked at them, the more comfortable I felt. I was able to identify with people (albeit over the internet) in ways I had been incapable of previously. There were people who understood. Growing up, I didn't know that I didn't understand. Eventually, I figured out that I didn't understand. Now, I had finally figured out that there were other people that knew they didn't understand but that we could kind of understand each other.

I am going to assume that the majority of readers know enough about Aspergers, me, and google to bypass all the boring stuff. But you can always ask if you don't know!

Oh. There's one other thing I should mention. I am a college basketball coach. But this blog is not about that. It creates an interesting environment and lots of really funny stories. I manage to mess up a lot of things around there, but my coaches are good about it. They help me a lot. If you want to read my personal story, the daily life, vacations, work, family stuff, then read the Shenanigans and Such Blog. If you want to read about basketball and coaching (my special interest...except legos aren't on there), read the Use Your Pivot Blog. This blog is something totally different. This is the third part of me. This is the Aspie side. The three sides come together extremely often, and often uncomfortably. No side is more important and no side is frowned upon. They are all different and simply must co-exist somewhat uncomfortably. I have nowhere to go with this Aspie side of me. I have lots of thoughts, questions, experiences, and perspectives that I need to put somewhere. They don't fit in either of the other two blogs. Therefore, we get this one. Asperwonders...Asperanswers. I hope that when I am having one of those nights (that occur quite often) when I have something to say but have no one to say it to or can't get it out of my mouth, that I can come here. Maybe you can come here too. If you do come here and you do read what goes on in this crazy brain of mine, I invite you to participate. Ask me questions, leave your experiences, be not ashamed. I am different, not less. I am perfect in my own parameters. Define normal. And finally, my favorite quote, from one of the first books I read on Aspergers (by Jennifer Cook O'Toole):

You are exactly who and how you were made to be.

You may make mistakes but you are not a mistake.

And the world is better already, just because you've arrived.