Krysia Waldock Hello and welcome to this episode of the Autism and Theology podcast. I'm Krisha, and it's great that you've joined us this week. This podcast is a space where we engage with the latest conversations in the field of autism and theology, sharing relevant resources, and promoting ways that help faith and non faith communities enable autistic people to flourish. If you'd like to access the transcript for this episode, it can be found by the link in the show notes and today on our episode of CAT, we are - absolutely got the best episode. I think I'm doing. I've got the Christmas episode this year, which I haven't had before, and I have the Dr, Harriet Axbey, with me. So. Hi, Harriet. Harriet Axbey Hello. Krysia Waldock For listeners who don't know who you are, could you tell us a bit about you and what you get up to? Harriet Axbey Of course. So I'm a researcher with Swansea University and we look at autism from menstruation to menopause. I've also written two books, one for children and one for young adults. I'm a school governor, I do a SEN role for the school governor and I like reading bird watching, baking. You'll often see different kinds of bread that I've been trying to make on my Instagram story. So that's me. Krysia Waldock And what's really cool is Harriet and I get to work together in our “main” 9:00 to 5:00. So we see lots of each other, which is really, really cool. And Harrriet and I also have the odd conversation about faith and religion as well, which led me to knowing how much Harriet loves Christmas to invite her on the Christmas episode, so I wonder, Harriet, if you could tell me about what Christmas means to you? Harriet Axbey Yeah. So everyone knows that I'm a Christmas person. I think I'm your stereotypical Christmas person. The decorations go up in October. If everyone else let me. The rule is Harriet's not allowed to put decorations up until after Halloween, which we never really celebrated. Halloween as a family so seems a bit an arbitrary date for me, but you know these things about compromise. Christmas has always been very special. I come from a lovely family where we just do so many things around Christmas and it's always been a really sort of homely time. I associate it with warmth and food and decorations and songs, and seeing that family that you maybe don't see for the rest of the year because you live here, there and everywhere. So. Yeah, we always try and see lots of family around Christmas. We often have a really big family get together with the Irish side of the family, that which is always lovely. I think we're up to 22 people now. I think it will be. My aunt's table is getting ever bigger. Krysia Waldock That's impressive. Harriet Axbey And yeah, I think it'll be 23 next year because my cousin's got a little one on the way, so the ever growing Irish side and yeah, I've just, it's always meant a lot to me because it's, I associate it with family and time together and it's that little bit of sort of sunshine in the middle of a very dark winter, I think, which is probably why we celebrate it then anyway, I'd imagine. Krysia Waldock Definitely, definitely. And is there any particular kind of food or songs that kind of are particularly pertinent on Christmas for you? Harriet Axbey Well, I really like the classics. I like the classic Christmas songs. I like the sort of Christmas hymns I like quite a lot of them. We always like things like Good King Wenceslas, I always think my husband sounds a bit like that bodyguard in Love Actually, when he sings it and everyone turns around and looks like, oh, you can actually sing because yeah, he's a he's a baritone. So yeah, I always like that kind of things. Although, you know, when I'm decorating or wrapping presents, Ill stick - I'll get my robot, as I call her otherwise she'll turn on. I'll say, play Christmas music and they'll often be some new one by Justin Bieber or something, which isn't too bad. So I quite like that. But we're hopefully going to the Christmas Carol service this year, which will be nice at our local church because couldn't make it last year because we were with family. So yeah, it'd be nice to go along this year and join in. Krysia Waldock Definitely. So how - and you've said a little bit about this, but how is there anything particularly you do to celebrate Christmas with your family? Harriet Axbey Yeah. So we always used to go to the mass on Christmas Eve. So we'd have all of Christmas Day at home and just be. I mean, I say we'd be lazy. I say this when my mum is cooking the whole Christmas dinner, the rest of us would be lazy. So yeah, my dad would be there peeling all the potatoes and then she'd cook the meal. But yeah, we'd often be at home. We've had it away a couple of times. We're actually hosting for the first time this year, which will be nice, give my parents a break. We'll be cooking. And yeah, we've got lots of little traditions and little things that we do every year, I guess. Krysia Waldock What kind of traditions do you have as a family? Harriet Axbey Well, we always watch love, actually on Christmas Eve. Yeah, that is. And we always watch Life of Brian - just like good Catholics. So yes, we have our two annual films. Krysia Waldock Good choice. Harriet Axbey We always have got our stockings in the morning. The rule is you. You have Santa until you are Santa, and we then have, we've got a big meal. We have the really big meal and while my parents prepare that me and my sibling, we'll just read the books that we've been given. We always get books and we always give books. It's always a tradition. In the evening we normally watch James Bond play a board game. We like James Bond. We like laughing at how badly it's aged every year it gets worse, so we'll be like, oh, which is going to be the most politically incorrect one this year. Yeah. And we'll watch it. We never watch any of the new ones. Like, they're great, but they're not as funny. And yeah, we like I said, we often have that big Christmas meal with the Irish side. And yeah, again, we're not having it this year because we're hosting. I think they might be having it, but we're going to be, we're going to be hosting because we're about 7 hours drive from them. So yeah, and we'll often do a Christmas quiz as well, so. Get put into teams. Split all the kids up because sometimes they have good answers, sometimes they have good answers, but sometimes they just want to build the Lego they've been given. So. Krysia Waldock Yeah, I mean that that very much reminds me of when we sometimes used to play Trivia Pursuit at Christmas. It would be everyone on one team. And then my dad on his own on another team. So he got all the answers right without needing anybody else with him. So it was just Colin versus everybody else. Harriet Axbey We were on holiday. I think it might have been when we were in Ireland and there was a Trivia Pursuit and like me and my sibling, we've got quite good general knowledge. My siblings, normally quite good at like the science rounds, they've got a science degree. I might be quite good at the literature and things like that, so we thought, Oh yeah, we'll do this, we'll do this. We'll be great anyway. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey The game was like from the 70s, so my parents absolutely smashed it. It was all these TV programmes we'd never even heard of. My dad was like, Oh yes, and he was married to so and so. And then the science wasn't even correct. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey So my sibling was getting the questions wrong because it was things that have since been disproven and yeah, so I don't think we even got a cheese each like it was. Yeah. And my parents came away feeling very smug. Krysia Waldock I bet I can imagine what we - the Trivial Pursuit we had was like the 1990s version. So my parents used to rock it and then no one else knew the answers. Are there any other stories or traditions you'd like to share with listeners? Because I think it's just these kind of stories really help bring Christmas to life I find. Harriet Axbey Yeah. Well, there is the story of the ghost of Pigeon past. So my mum used to run the nativity at our church, which I'm not saying that's how I got to be Mary. However, potentially I think my sibling might have also been Joseph and. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey The Angel Gabriel, but yeah. So she would run the Nativity and one year they had a problem at the church and it was that there was a pigeon in the church and the father was trying to get rid of this pigeon. They tried to coax it out. I think they got some, like, animal welfare people to come in and they couldn't get rid of this pigeon. And obviously it's unhygienic. It was sort of, you know, pooping on the pews. So the father hired a marksman to go into the church anyway. The marksman is going at the pigeon, but the problem is the - He's using a sort of lead pellets, so it doesn't kill the pigeon. It just kind of fills it up with lead. So eventually this pigeon does die of lead poisoning, and it just sort of falls off and it dies. Anyway, my dad's in charge of the scenery for the Nativity and afterwards everyone was like, oh, it was lovely how you had, like a dove in the background. Krysia Waldock Oh. Harriet Axbey Wasn't a dove my dad had drawn the ghost of the dead pigeon, but was to haunt the church since it died with lead poisoning. So yeah, that was the scenery that I then I think that was used every year after that. Krysia Waldock That's - that's impressive. That's really impressive because I remember when we I had church nativities. So somehow at the Baptist Church I went to had different scenery every year and I don't know how they did this. So it's always impressive when people have- reuse and reuse and have those stories attached to it. Harriet Axbey Well, we did change the scenery up, so this was sort of the naughties and this is as you know, things like PowerPoint and technology as because do you remember those old projectors where you'd have sort of sheets that you'd put down on a? On a big light and then it projected, but then we had like an actual projector that you could, you know, it didn't involve sheets of paper or anything. So my sibling being very technologically minded, there are tech support. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey They came up with backgrounds for the for each of the scenes and it looked really good, so you'd have like the star above it. So this was in the church, and it was quite a traditional Catholic Church, and you'd have the, the background and everything. Anyway, it was all going very well. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey Until it ended and the priest got up to do the homily, and I don't think he was very happy about doing his homily while Star Wars style credits ran across his face. Krysia Waldock That's so funny. Harriet Axbey So, so weirdly, after that the Nativity took place in the church hall instead of in the church, and we weren't asked back. I think after that. But I've got this mental image of the priest standing there in his Christmas regalia while Star Wars style credits of created by Matthew Axeby; casting Samantha Axbey; Readings by Harriet Axbey, just slowly going through his head like the Imperial March. Yeah, yeah. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Is there any other anything else you'd like to share, kind of traditions or stories wise? Harriet Axbey I don't think so. I think we're quite traditional in terms of food. I know you asked about that before I, my mum, will always make Brussels sprouts, but she's the only one that eats them and then she'll have bubble and squeak the next day. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey And my only thing that I'm like, can we please have this is bread sauce. I'm obsessed. I know it takes ages because you got to, like, boil the bread and you've got to, like, keep adding milk. My sibling always makes the Christmas pudding, and we set fire to that. We used to make Christmas cake and then we kind of decided that I only ate the marzipan and the rest of it is basically just a Christmas pudding. So we kind of didn't do that. We often have up Norfolk, call it a picky tea. We called it bits and pieces. I don't know. Krysia Waldock Yeah. I mean, I'm from not that far away from where Harriet comes from. And we also call it a picky tea as well, interestingly. Harriet Axbey Oh, maybe it's just my family that calls it bits and pieces. Yeah, so, yeah. Crispus Eve will often have that. We'll have a big cheese. We dip stuff in. Oh, my mum makes these amazing things. They're like dates. And you stuff them with goat's cheese, and then you wrap them in bacon. And it's amazing. Like, I'm not a massive fan of bacon or dates, but when you do them like this, oh, I can't stop eating them literally. Krysia Waldock Have you? Have you got a recipe for that? Because if you have, it would be fantastic for us to put it in the show notes. Harriet Axbey I will contact my mum. Yes. Yeah. So they're amazing. She's a really good cook and she'll often make a beef wellington New Year's Eve as well, which our tradition for that is to sit down. We have our food. We then sit down and we argue about which building the countdown is being projected onto, and we have that same argument every single year. And yeah, that's that tends to be what we do. And then we watch the fireworks and we go straight to bed. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey I think we might have done one or two Christmas parties at some point. Sorry, new New Year's Eve parties, but mostly it's just just four or five of us. Yeah, so. Krysia Waldock Yeah. And what is your favourite part of the Christmas season? Harriet Axbey I think. Apart from the food, as you can tell, I'm very food orientated. I love watching people open their presents. I think that's one of my love languages. I think they're called is giving people presents. I love that. I often go over the top. I've tried to curtail my spending this year. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey But yeah, I love watching people get presents this year. I'm trying to go greener, so I'm wrapping them in fabric, which is harder to wrap, but they do look quite nice. But yeah, I love watching people open their presents. I love that. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey Feeling of making someone happy? But I think it's not all about presence obviously. And I think as I've got older, I've realised it's more like about the actual time you're spending together and it's the feelings that you're evoking from those presents rather than the actual presence. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey I think going forwards I quite like the idea of giving 4 presents, especially for children, and that's the something they want, something they need something to wear, something to read. Krysia Waldock Mm-hmm. Harriet Axbey And I really like that because I think there can be a lot of pressure on families, especially with cost of living and to just have, you know, those four presents that mean a lot. And then Christmas is about the time you spend together. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey I think that's important. Krysia Waldock Definitely. And I guess this question came from the fact that we work with lots of autistic people when it's in our jobs, but also the podcast is the autistic and Theology podcast, and we get a lot of autistic people neurodivergent people and people, other kind of - who support neurodivergent people. Is there anything you and your family do to make Christmas autism friendly or kind of centred around autistic people's needs particularly? Harriet Axbey So when I thought about this question, I thought no, we don't do anything. And then I remembered I just finished the scheduled timetable and kit list for our holiday season and then I realised maybe I do so yeah, we. Because Christmas often involves a lot of travelling. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey We will have a schedule which will be a sort of spreadsheet. It will have what everyone's doing, what time it's doing, links to tickets for things we're going to the pantomime this year. Durham does a really good pantomime. It's the same people every year. It's great. So yeah, we'll often be very organised. We often have lots of, I suppose, downtime, self regulation time. Like I said, we'll sort of read books and have a lot of time. Sort of quietly in the same room. Yeah, I think we're quite I think we've been having autism, friendly Christmases our entire lives, but we never called it that. Krysia Waldock Yeah, yeah, definitely. I think especially the for the last kind of couple of years we've done the podcast, it's been quite clear that some people have already had this stuff already kind of in what they do, but not really twigged that it's I'm actually doing it to meet my own needs. No one's really spoken about having a schedule and a kit list before there's lots of practical things people will say, like making sure people can have rest and adjusting kind of traditions and making things like that. But no one's ever spoken about a kick list and a schedule which I think is really, could be really useful for some of our lists, especially people who might need to travel long distances or do lots of driving or have lots of different stops and lots of different activities over the Christmas period. And I guess, the final question would be what advice would you like to give to others who want to enjoy Christmas as you do? Harriet Axbey I'd say to go all out like I think. Krysia Waldock Yeah. Harriet Axbey Actually, I don't think there's anything cringy about being a Christmas person, and if there is, I'll embrace it. I think it's a lovely time of year and I think it's centred around family. And while obviously my upbringing was centred around, you know, certain religious traditions, we're Catholic. I don't think that the season has to be overtly religious. I think you can enjoy the sense of togetherness that it evokes anyway, and I think, yeah, go all out. I think, you know, if you see a Christmas gnome and you want it or you want the mould wine Spice Mix, which no one else liked, so I drank an entire bottle. It's not very alcoholic. It's fine. But yeah, I don't think Christmas is about stuff and buying things. And I know that sounds very cliché to say. Oh, it's getting more commercialised every year. I don't necessarily think. That's true. I think people are trying to find happiness in the season, and I think that one way they do that is by buying things. And I think there's a lot of tat out there, a lot of plastic stuff that isn't reused. So I think, you know, buying Christmas stuff that will last making Christmas stuff. I love doing a bit of Christmas, Christmas origami make some Christmas ornaments Christmas wreaths to put around and then I just put them back in the in the box and put them up the next year, so I think it's about the thoughtfulness and the time together and making sure that everyone is involved in Christmas, I mean some people won't want to be and that's fine, but I think making sure no ones alone and including everyone. Krysia Waldock Yeah, definitely. And if people have any questions or they'd like to hear more about your books, we'd love to hear more about them, maybe a bit briefly. Could you let them know how to contact them and maybe say a bit more about your books that you've had written or that you're working on. Harriet Axbey 21:44 Yeah. So I'm on, I'm on LinkedIn. I'm on the website formerly known as Twitter, but I don't use that particularly very much. I'm on blue sky, I'm draxby, and my e-mail. I've got h.axby@outlook.com. That's the one I use for for my books. And yeah, I tend to be quite responsive to that. Yeah, my books. So my first one was a children's book. It was illustrated by the wonderful Jonathan Roseboro. I recommend you check him out. He's got some fabulous stuff. He's also autistic. And when he did the illustrations for this book, it's like he read my mind. He I kind of just gave him a bit of a brief and what he created was like, Oh my goodness. It was just, yeah. Like, he'd crawled inside my mind and done what I could never do, which is draw. So yeah, this book's called. My brother Tom has superpowers. It's not about autism being a superpower that is a common misconception. It's about a little girl called Grace, who is autistic coded. It doesn't say it in the book that she's autistic. But she believes that her brother has superpowers. She thinks he can read minds because he always gets the questions right in class. He's got lots of friends. He always knows what people are thinking. So she thinks he must be able to read minds and that he's got superpowers and spoiler alert, he doesn't. It's just coded that maybe he's not autistic and then she has a lovely chat with her mum at the end where her mum basically points out all the superpowers that she has, like being kind. So yeah, it's very cute. It's very cheesy and the illustrations are awesome. Like I said, check out Jonathan and then my second book is called University: The Autistic Guide. It's aimed at people starting university. Primarily in the UK, but certain advice could apply to others. And yeah, it's got lots of tips and tricks and lists. It's got lots of lists as well as advice for parents, carers and educators. And yeah, I'm really proud of both of those books. I think when I was younger, I always wanted to be an author, but I could never write stories ever. And yeah, I never thought that I'd actually be an author one day and have two books and hopefully more on the horizon. So. So, yeah. I'm very, very proud of them. Krysia Waldock Yeah. And it also, it's both books I think would be very useful for people perhaps in churches and other faith communities, especially with perhaps wanting to know more about what it's like to be autistic and also if you've got any autistic young people starting university or College in the United States and want to kind of get some coming, read Harriet’s books, the University Guidebook. It is very good and it's really practical as well, so it's definitely a really good resource and we'll make sure that both the books are in the show notes as well. Harriet Axbey Oh, thank you. Krysia Waldock Thank you so much. Thank you so much to our listeners for joining us this episode. If you have any questions, you can message us at autism theology or blue Sky or Instagram or you can send us an e-mail at CAT at abdn.ac.uk, even if it's just to say hi. We'd love to hear from you.