MELTEM ARIKAN

  Türkçesi Aşağıda 👇 "One minute." In preschool: "Son, you need to put your shoes on." One minute. In secondary school: "Hurry up, the bus is here, you need to leave!" One minute. In sixth form: "Dinner is ready, we're waiting for you." One minute. As a thirty-year-old man: "Your coffee is getting cold." One minute. In our house, a "minute" is not a unit of time. It is certainly not sixty seconds. It is a concept. A vibe. It's a vague, flickering promise sent from another galaxy, much like a train cancelled due to a "signalling failure", that never actually arrives. I used to go into full "Come on, come on, for heaven's sake, HURRY UP!" mode. My AuDHD (Autism + ADHD) brain and my son's PDA brain are essentially two different types of chaos trying to occupy the same hallway. During these "one-minute" standoffs, my patience would melt faster than a dropped ice cream in the summer su...

Türkçesi Aşağıda 👇 For those unfamiliar with the term, PDA stands for Public Display of Affection. To most, it is simply a romantic choice, a matter of personal style or a way to show the world they are happy. However, for a neurodivergent person, it is often far more than a stylistic choice; it is a complex matter of sensory regulation. There is a rather tiresome stereotype that autistic people simply "dislike being touched." This is a lazy assumption that misses the nuance of our experience. In reality, our nervous systems often process the external world like a blender, mixing every sound, light, and texture into an overwhelming slurry. Because of this, my "touch dial" is never static. At times, a simple touch acts as an anchor, tethering me to the world when everything else feels too fast. At other times, however, it can be the "final tab" that causes the entire system to crash. When I find myself in a crowded, noisy, or unpredictable environment, hol...

Türkçesi Aşagıda 👇 Sometimes starting something feels easy. If I’m interested, if it doesn’t stress me out, if I even enjoy it… sure. But other times, starting anything feels genuinely impossible. So I start putting it off. In a bit. Tomorrow. Later… As those laters never arrive, the stress builds. It rolls into a big tangled knot. And then comes the next layer: trying to get out from under it. Focusing on something I don’t want to do is ridiculously hard. Like when I need to write invoices, but end up alphabetising the bookshelf. Then I spot a book I’ve been putting off for years and somehow start reading it. Standard behaviour. My brain works differently. It’s part of being neurodivergent. Things like starting, switching, focusing, they all run on a separate system. Not always, but it really kicks in when I’m bored or the task feels pointless. It’s that my brain genuinely doesn’t care why it’s supposed to. Since I started understanding how my AuDHD brain works, it’s been easier to s...

  Türkçesi Aşagıda 👇 Not all healing speaks in words.  Some of it flows in curves. Some settle in colour. Some rest in the quiet between lines. For me, Neurographica® isn’t just drawing. It’s a conversation with something beyond language.A way the soul speaks in shape. A way the hand translates emotion into form. The mind shifts as the ink moves across the page. I’ve drawn every day for over a year now. Each page has become a companion. Sometimes grounding. Sometimes, like meditation. Sometimes unexpectedly magical. But always transformational. There are moments when I see myself clearly again.  When something deep inside moves. Not slowly, but all at once.  It can feel unreal, but it happens right there. Pen on paper. Breathe steady. Line by line. Not all maps are made of roads. Some are spirals. Sharp turns. Tangled threads that begin to loosen as you trace them. Neurographica is that kind of map. A way back to yourself. You draw what hurts. You soften what feels ...

  Türkçesi Aşağıda 👇 If you’re autistic, you usually hit overload before you even register it. If you’re ADHD, you often don’t notice until you’re already reacting. If you’re both, like me, you learn to say “I’m fine” while your nervous system carries out the sensory equivalent of flipping tables and setting small fires. We don’t miss the signs because we’re oblivious. We miss them because attention is already working overtime: tracking every flicker of light, every micro-shift in someone’s tone, the typing six metres away, the sock seam that feels like barbed wire, and the fact that it’s suddenly Tuesday again and the furthest you’ve gone is the fridge. By the time capacity is exceeded, the system is already snapping, shutting down, or grinding through whichever socially required situation you accidentally said yes to. I’m talking about the Body Scale: simple, refined, and actually useful. A functional measurement of load, somatic, sensory, and cognitive. Ten points, based on wha...