Imagine navigating life's complexities with the vibrant mind of an autistic individual, then channeling that experience into a beacon for others on a similar journey. That's precisely what Nigel Rising, founder of Autistic Women Emerging, accomplished with the launch of Autistica Palooza, a conference celebrating autistic women. In our latest episode, we're honored to host Nigel as he shares the leaps and bounds from his personal diagnosis of autism and ADHD to spearheading a groundbreaking event. Delving into real-world issues like the workplace struggles faced by autistic individuals, this gathering promises to be an enlightening forum, featuring speakers such as Jennifer Cook from Love on the Spectrum and Ludmilla Praslova with her Canary Code.
Transitioning to adolescence can be a tumultuous chapter, even more so for autistic teens navigating a world that often misunderstands them. In the heart of our conversation, Nigel and I discuss the pivotal role of mentorship and community in providing support during these vital years. With an enthusiastic preview of Autistica Palooza’s panel aimed at connecting these youngsters with successful autistic professionals, we underscore the importance of role models in diverse fields. Additionally, we celebrate the fusion of art and autism, showcasing Amanda Hebert Hughes' artistic contributions to the conference, further testifying to the power of inclusive expression and practical support for the autistic community. Join us for this compelling episode that uncovers the dedication behind a conference intent on amplifying autistic voices and fostering empowerment.
Imagine navigating life's complexities with the vibrant mind of an autistic individual, then channeling that experience into a beacon for others on a similar journey. That's precisely what Nigel Rising, founder of Autistic Women Emerging, accomplished with the launch of Autistica Palooza, a conference celebrating autistic women. In our latest episode, we're honored to host Nigel as he shares the leaps and bounds from his personal diagnosis of autism and ADHD to spearheading a groundbreaking event. Delving into real-world issues like the workplace struggles faced by autistic individuals, this gathering promises to be an enlightening forum, featuring speakers such as Jennifer Cook from Love on the Spectrum and Ludmilla Praslova with her Canary Code.
Transitioning to adolescence can be a tumultuous chapter, even more so for autistic teens navigating a world that often misunderstands them. In the heart of our conversation, Nigel and I discuss the pivotal role of mentorship and community in providing support during these vital years. With an enthusiastic preview of Autistica Palooza’s panel aimed at connecting these youngsters with successful autistic professionals, we underscore the importance of role models in diverse fields. Additionally, we celebrate the fusion of art and autism, showcasing Amanda Hebert Hughes' artistic contributions to the conference, further testifying to the power of inclusive expression and practical support for the autistic community. Join us for this compelling episode that uncovers the dedication behind a conference intent on amplifying autistic voices and fostering empowerment.
too, Well, hello everyone. We are live from StreamYard, thank you so much. And today I am joined. It's like when I get onto this little screen then everything changes in my background. We're live here today at the SJ Child Show and I am here today with Nigel Rising and so excited to talk about. Today is World Autism Awareness Day, so it's wonderful that we're bringing up this topic and talking about what we'll be talking about. So thanks for joining me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm super excited, and I've actually changed the name of the day, so I'm excited to share that with you too.
Speaker 2:Good, okay, oh, that's fantastic. This is going to be a great live today. And, of course, you're welcome to leave your comments over in the comment section. I will try to get to any that I see there, but if not, then I will get to them at the end. And if you have any questions, please also leave those so that we can respond to you there. So first of all, give us a little bit of an introduction, for those people on my channel know who I am, but let's talk about who you might be my dear, and let's go in that route.
Speaker 2:let's talk about who you might be my dear and let's go in that route.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's start, okay. Well, I am Nigel Rising Esquire and I am the founder and CEO of Autistic Women Emerging. It's a brand new 501c3 public charity. That is literally what is this. February, march, three months old today, as a matter of fact's our. That's our anniversary, and we are the event organizer for Autistica Palooza. I say we, but up to now it's me, and my office is the kitchen and my beanbag boardroom that I call it in the bedroom, but that's that's who I am. I was diagnosed autistic and ADHD in February of 2023. Started getting into the community in December of 23 and decided to throw a conference for autistic women. And here I am.
Speaker 2:Isn't it amazing how you can take just this, you know, walking along and you have this thought, and then, bam, it turns into a tangible event where you are, you know, collaborating and meeting with others and learning and giving and taking all of the good stuff, tell us a little bit about, kind of what inspired you to start creating Autisticapalooza.
Speaker 1:Well, I was when I moved to Colorado in May. When I got here I found a autism conference that I wanted to go to. I had just been diagnosed a few months earlier. I wanted to learn all about myself. I found this conference and when the agenda came out right before it started, I was really disappointed because I was hoping to find sessions and talk to other autistic women where I could find out more about myself from talking to other autistic women.
Speaker 1:Because it's really like I've fallen through the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland or like Dorothy the tornado has whipped me up into Oz and I've just found this new community of people that I literally did not even know existed. So I just dove right into contacting a lot of the authors of the books that I had read that were helpful to me. They were all written by autistic women and, short story, there's a conference building being built across the street. I foolishly got it into my head when I saw the conference I wanted to go to didn't have any sessions. I wanted to see that I throw my own conference, and then I just started calling people and they all said yes. And then I just started calling people and they all said yes. And here we are.
Speaker 2:That was going to be. My next question was what was the response and how did that look?
Speaker 1:The response was super outstanding and crazy, because when I decided to put the conference together, I was not on social media. I got off of everything when 45 ran and through the dark ages let's just call them and I was going by my legal name, which is Monica Moya. That's what my license, my attorney license, is under in the state of Texas. But through my journey I have adapted this pseudonym, Nigel Rising, because I feel like I'm really rising. And over the holidays. I tell you, if it hadn't been for Christmas and New Year's Eve, this would have come together a month ago too. But I basically caused, as I said, authors of books in my living room who that really helped me, and none of them should have said yes, I'm not ready. I don't have a social media account. I changed my name to Nigel Rising in the middle of it. I don't have a podcast media account. I changed my name to Nigel Rising in the middle of it. I don't have a podcast, never wrote anything.
Speaker 1:All the people, just about all the people that you see on the homepage that agreed to speak, said yes by basically me calling them up and saying hi, I'm autistic too. This conference kind of sucked. Will you help me make one that we can actually use as autistic women and talk about topics that we can actually use and actually need, like what to do at work, so that I don't think would ever have been able to happen if this were an illicit community because they're so distrustful. But I literally called these people up and said hi, will you come talk at my conference? No one said no. Everyone that I talked to on Zoom said yes and I'm just honored to have everybody have said yes and have agreed to speak at the conference. It's just wild. I can't believe I'm here today, Two months short of five months from my idea, to tickets are on sale, actually right now.
Speaker 2:Incredible. Well, this is such an incredible feeling and some really big names too that you have coming. Tell us about some of the amazing speakers and maybe some of the session names or presentations that we can look forward to.
Speaker 1:Well, you know Jennifer Cook, who her the autism expert on Love on the Spectrum is going to be there. Um, ludmilla Praslova, she's coming out with the Canary Code. I believe their release date now is May 1st. She's an autistic organizational psychologist at Vanguard University. That book, I would bet the Farm, is going to be on the New York Times bestseller list by the end of May. She's writing outstanding articles about belonging at work and so many other things that I won't go into just because I don't have her knowledge. But who else? Sarah and Larry Nannery, the couple she is autistic, he is not who wrote the book what to Say Next, which is A perfect title?
Speaker 1:I was always calling my wife saying what do I say next? I don't know what the heck is going on here at work. We have AJ Locascio coming. She's going to be doing a session on sex, and not only sex. She's also going to be doing a session on kink, which I don't have listed on the front page. It is listed in sessions because I'm trying to be respectful of parents out there as well.
Speaker 1:But what else? Dr Angel Durr, autistic AI person, is going to be talking on imposter syndrome and uncoating for people of color. Who else do we have? We have a couple of life coaches that I'm calling in because of their experience dealing with autistic clients and I think it's cognitive coaches. Now they kind of changed their name. Who else do we have?
Speaker 1:We have a family, hopefully, that the daughter is coming from Canada and the son and mother are coming from Kuwait. It's an Arabic family that has gone through their family renaissance because they've all come to realize over the last three years that they are actually autistic. So we're going to bring them in to speak. We're excited about them. Lisa Morgan is coming. She is an expert on autism and suicide. So all exists to help reduce the suicide rate exists to help reduce the suicide rate. Autistic Apalooza is being held because the suicide the reason cited for women attempting suicide is lack of belonging, depending on which research study you read is a top three. So that's why I'm really wanting to bring women together in a space like that. And all of these writers as I mentioned, they've got books or a reputation out there that makes them experts at what they talk about, and in my mind, an autism expert is a person with autism who also writes on a particular area.
Speaker 2:Isn't that the truth? Because there's nothing more, I think, cathartic than to get that experience from someone living in those shoes. And through those experiences and day to day you can just learn so much. And by bringing all of these different mindsets and perspectives together there's, oh my gosh, just so much exciting. I can see your desire.
Speaker 1:I am so excited, I'm so excited, yeah.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about because I've noticed that you've been posting about a teen kind of presentation. Let's talk about that and what that looks like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, you know, I was diagnosed autistic in February of 2023. And when I was diagnosed, I just had an automatic flashback to elementary school, going up to high school and we're all going through puberty and that's where we're supposed to have these innate biological ability to understand what's going on in the social world. And I did not get any of that, what was going on, and so I remember my 12, my teen years being excruciating really. I mean, I never got invited anywhere and if I did, it took all I got all. I had to even ask my parents if they could go out of their way to take me there, which might be like doing Christmas carols on the river walk with my class or even going to a schoolmate's birthday. My parents really didn't have a lot of time for things that weren't absolutely necessary, so I did not have a social life, and that's when I started becoming suicidal and going into dark places and really questioning a lot and I don't have children myself.
Speaker 1:But because I just remember the pain of that time so deeply, I wanted to do something for autistic teenagers going through their teen years so that they can see and hear sessions that will actually be helpful to them in going through their lives at their age. But also I'm really proud of our careers panel, where we're going to put autistic women in front of those teenagers and we're going to have a medical doctor, a lawyer, a software developer I'm trying to look for a veterinarian an artist, Amanda Hebert Hughes. I want these women, to these youngsters, to see the people who are actually doing what they aspire to be and I'm just super excited about that too, Even though I don't have any teenagers, like I said, I remember the pain that they went through. I'm so excited about it.
Speaker 2:I made myself the moderator of that session.
Speaker 1:So I can't wait to. Just I'm just going to be goofy, looking like my face, like this through the whole that particular session. So it's 13 to 18. And of course, the 18 year olds can attend either one. A lot of 18 year olds are still in high school. So you know, depending on what your family dynamic is, wherever you go is up to you if you're 18.
Speaker 2:go is up to you if you're 18. I love that you know such a valuable space to hold for such a fragile time period of your life to go through. And having meaningful mentors to be able to look up to is just there's no words that can describe how you can get that, and it's so hard for number one kids to know that they can reach out or you know what's even available for them. So this is a wonderful way for parents who are really intentfully trying to help their teen going through this time period of their life. Check this out. Bring you know your 13 to 18 year old to these sessions and help everybody kind of get a better understanding of how we can support one another. Like you said, of course, the wonderful quote we rise by lifting others, and isn't that the case? And I personally feel so much joy when I'm able to bring autistics on the show, highlight them, showcase them, the confidence that it builds, the connections that are able to be made with people it's just the most phenomenal gift.
Speaker 1:It really is. It's just the most phenomenal gift it really is. And I and that's the whole, your whole sentiment there has gone into the way I feel about calling this month world autism acceptance month. Here, here's my card and how I feel about that. I have like just scratched out acceptance. I've been waiting all my life to be accepted, first as an indigenous American to be accepted into Anglo culture, or as a woman to be accepted into work, and I'm really kind of tired and over waiting for people to accept me. So I have to actually change the name here I'm doing, I have to write all my cards down, because that's how excited I am.
Speaker 1:But here, it is actually Autistic Women Hear Us Roar Month at all, and the exciting thing about that is Roar is actually a promo code for the month of April. I'm celebrating this sense of belonging that we want to create and the sense of community that you were just talking about, and with promo code ROAR you can go on to Eventbrite and buy your tickets now for $100 off of Autistic Apollosive Fee. So for April, our month, our Autistic Women Hear Us ROAR month. Roar is the promo code to get $100 off and there'll be $10 off of the lunches for each of the days and I'll be absorbing the Eventbrite ticket fees only for the month of April, not for Autistica Palooza teen, because I priced that as low as I could go, but I really did that because we're not making any money. But I also just wanted to make it possible for as many people to come to Autistic Kapalooza as possibly can, and that's also why we're only able to do it for about a month.
Speaker 2:Here we go, change that so it says the right thing. That's fantastic, oh my gosh. And what an opportunity to be able to go right now and go and get your tickets. And you can also go, probably, to your website, autisticwomenemergingorg. Find out more about the event, look at the speakers, learn more about them, learn about the sessions that are going to be held. What other goodness stuff are you looking forward to?
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm just so glad you asked, because it's all literally in the cards. I'm going to toss a few aside. Amanda Hebert Hughes is an autistic artist. You can see her work at Sensory Gated Art. I believe she's over in North Carolina, if not South. She today is beginning the commemorative artwork for the conference. She'll be creating a painting for us and she'll be kind of diaring it on her LinkedIn page as she paints it. She is going to be the featured artist of the public of the art exhibit, featuring I just don't know how many yet, but over 50 works of art created entirely by autistic women or non-binary folks. And we're doing that in conjunction with TACT, which is Teaching Up to the Autistic Community Trades here in Denver that's Danny Combs, and they've agreed to make our displays for the hotel to put the art on. And also we're working with Access Gallery, which is an art gallery that all of their artists are New York Divergent, so they have given us the names of just some fantastic autistic women artists whose work will also be on display during that exhibit and the exhibit itself will be open to the public and we're super excited about that and to unveil Amanda's commemorative art piece there at the event. And so, again, I'd invite everybody to follow her as she creates that.
Speaker 1:And second, just last week, these last two weeks have been a blur trying to get the tickets on sale. We, these last two weeks, have been a blur trying to get the tickets on sale. I've spoken to several autistic women researchers that are going to have some things to do there as well. I'm working with Shannon Palma, phd. Amber Michael, phd. Duda Milopraslowa, phd. Jessica Hickstead, phd. Again, all autistic women with excellent academic credentials who do autistic research. They will be be there. There's going to be a social event that one of them is doing. She's got a grant to study that. So, um, the idea there is to flip the power dynamic, as shannon says, about what, what, what are we actually researching and is actually, is it actually helping us? You know, and then I created last week, in my effort to get as many people to have a presence here as possible, there's actually going to be a book called Smash. It's a booklet that I'll be handing out at the event, and Smash is short for Shattering Mindless Autistic Stereotype Handbook. And yeah, that's what we're all. There's so many things that we're all about, but this is a good one.
Speaker 1:I was interviewed by Philip King Lowe, his podcast Today's Autistic Moment, and I want to find a way for smaller autistic owned businesses or entities to be able to have a presence at this event our autistic-owned businesses or entities to be able to have a presence at this event. Prices for that are like $150 for a quarter of a page, so I want them to have a presence and I want us also to be able to afford all the AV equipment there. So I'm trying to make it a win-win situation for both of us and I'm actually going to have something special for actually autistic podcasters as well. They'll be able to advertise on our intro session AV slide presentation very inexpensively. Again, I want to make it affordable and I want people to start listening to their podcasts. That's the whole point. So those are the three main things I'm working on. Now that the tickets are out and hopefully everything's going right with the Eventbrite system, I'll be able to build out exciting things to do on top of the speakers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sound like we have some feedback there there. Oh, just incredible. And you know I think that um, it's, it's so good to to showcase and especially where you're coming from, you know in kind of newly diagnosed in in these last few years and you have so much to kind of uncover and discover, um, and learn and learn and grow and stuff. I am so excited for you in the future of what you have to come and everything. Thank you so much for joining me to tell me about this. Is there anything else you want to share before we head off today?
Speaker 1:A couple of quick things. Number one the agenda will probably be out by Friday. That will include a hotel link for the discounted rates at the hotel I will. I also have a sponsorship packet that's available. If there's someone out there who would like to sponsor us and what we're doing at Autistica Palooza, give me a holler. I can be contacted through LinkedIn at Nigel Rising Esquire, and also through the contact page of my website, autisticapaloozacom. And yes, in closing, here's my favorite Help me, help you. I'm looking for volunteers and I will be selecting 10 volunteers through whose help they will be able to attend Autistica Palooza. That's the fee and the hotel and maybe travel expenses as well, but so we're hoping to get the autistic community actually involved and, at the same time, offer a way that some folks can make it to Autistica Palooza through work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and tell us again before we get off where will it be held, what the dates are and all the key details.
Speaker 1:Key details. Okay, it's going to be held at the Marriott Denver South, which is South of Denver in Lone Tree, colorado, october 18th through the 20th, and we're going to have over 20 actually autistic speakers. Again, invite everybody to go onto AutisticaPaloozacom. All the session descriptions are there as well, but at $2.99, it's a really good price. At $3.99, it was $13.30 a session to come to Autistica Palooza, but I've really worked hard to get sessions there that we can actually use to make our lives better, and the price of course, involves paying actually autistic speakers, which unfortunately, a lot of organizations refuse to do. That's not going to be us. We're going to compensate our speakers and what they have to say at Autistic Kapalooza is going to be information you can use again to make your life better right away. And I just welcome everybody to start spreading the word so we can start attacking that reason of lack of belonging as being the number one reason autistic women cite to attempt suicide.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that is a really important reason to bring more understanding and perception and tear down those stigmas of what it's like to be an autistic woman today and find out more about us and, you know, uncover more about us and be able to share our stories with one another and with the world. So yeah, here we are and here here is roar.
Speaker 1:Exactly, we are autistic women. Here is roar. We're over acceptance. It's like here us roar.
Speaker 2:Thank you so, so much for your time today. Thank you for putting this together with, like I had said before, only a thought that is now come to fruition and is building a beautiful, beautiful, meaningful event for so many to come. So we'll have you back on again as it gets closer to the event. I'm looking forward to it Very excited. Always love talking to you. Yeah, you as well. Thanks so much. We'll talk to you soon, okay, bye-bye.