By Trevor Pacelli
The Christmas season marks the time to give your kids all sorts of gifts, many coming from the ever-evolving video game industry that brings kids and adults much joy. Throughout my childhood, I only recall the grownups around me dismissing video games as nothing more than mental junk food for kids, but that didn’t stop me from asking my parents to get me plenty of games for my Gameboy Advance SP and Nintendo DS. Back then, I had a special interest in Pokémon, which was why I got the Gameboy and DS games in the first place, and today, as an adult with mental health problems like autism and anxiety, my continued special interest helped me reconsider my practices of self-care.

By Trevor Pacelli
Family and friends are essential in helping you remedy your traumatic memories; sharing those thoughts that are hardest to bring to light will lead you to the path of healing. Anyone on the autism spectrum especially should know this, as contrary to common stereotypes, those with ASD can feel sorrow and empathy.

By Trevor Pacelli
I recently took Michael Pollan’s Masterclass, Intentional Eating, which included Pollan's three philosophies of food:
1. Eat Food
2. Not Too Much
3. Mostly Plants
I came up with three similar philosophies about consuming artistic media:
1. Enjoy Art
2. Embrace Your Tastes
3. But Don’t Force Them

By Trevor Pacelli
Twenty-five years ago, this iconic yellow sea sponge debuted on Nickelodeon and is currently in his fourteenth season with no signs of slowing down. The series has spawned three theatrical feature films, two spinoff series, a Broadway musical, a Netflix film, and another Netflix original expected in 2025. Yet the first three seasons and the first theatrical film were the most influential time for the franchise; the kids who watched SpongeBob during those years carried the funniest moments into modern internet culture, complete with over a hundred different meme templates.

By Trevor Pacelli
The world of Pokémon has long been a favorite of both kids and adults on the autism spectrum, like me. I joined the Pokémon fandom at ten years old, my first game being Pokémon Ruby on the Gameboy Advance SP. Although I drifted away from the games once I hit adulthood, I still couldn’t help but keep up with the franchise. Eventually, I felt the urge to play the games again. In 2021, I bought a Nintendo Switch, and became the proud owner of four games: Pokémon Brilliant Diamond, Pokémon Legends Arceus, Pokémon Shield, and Pokémon Scarlet. While I admit the games’ quality is lackluster, and there are problems with disability friendliness, the chill environments of these Pokémon worlds with the diverse 1,000+ Pokémon delight me as much as when I was twelve. But unlike back then, I got sucked into a component of Pokémon that in turn sucked out what originally drew me to the franchise: competitive battles.​

​By Trevor Pacelli
​After college, I found myself waiting for travel opportunities to come to me. I didn’t want to face the awkward loneliness of traveling alone and I believed traveling with a wife or in some group were my only options. I even did a mission trip to Spain five years ago, but I was put into stressful social situations, and the fact that I couldn’t connect well with my team made me feel even lonelier than being there by myself.
Then when I adopted a dog three years ago, I was motivated to travel to the ocean for an overnight trip with her. It was the first time I booked a hotel room on my own, and had a great time. After that, I went on two separate overnight trips to Portland, which got me more comfortable with traveling on my own. But I still hadn’t gone on a big solo vacation that required an airplane. I had been feeling a strong urge to return to Disneyland, since I hadn’t been there since 2008, and it reached a point where I finally said: “That’s it. Time for a Disney vacation. With or without somebody else to do it with me.”
So, for the next several months, I did a lot of planning on what to expect. My mom gave me a Disneyland vacation guide on Christmas. I booked a hotel room, I made reservations for Disneyland and California Adventure, and two months before my visit, I made restaurant reservations. I looked up which park attractions would have the longest wait times. I researched the most critically acclaimed food items and planned my meal and snack times around them. My sister also gave me some advice, since she had made the trip recently.
As a result of all I did before the vacation, I can proudly say that my Disneyland 2024 trip turned out to be monumental, even life-changing. I truly had the time of my life. Surprisingly, I never felt lonely the entire time, not even at sit-down restaurants on my own. I spent three full days in the parks, pretty much from opening to closing, which might not be possible with other travelers.
The attraction highlights for me were the Indiana Jones Adventure, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Adventureland Treehouse, Mickey’s Runaway Railway, Rise of the Resistance, Radiator Springs Racers, Toy Story Midway Mania, Web Slingers: A Spider-Man Adventure, Soarin’ Around the World, the Incredicoaster, Grizzly River Run, and the Mad Tea Party (which I found is best to go on at night). It was perfectly fine riding by myself, and sometimes an advantage, since a few of these rides had single-rider lanes.
I even found a strong appreciation for the gentler thrill rides like Astro Orbitor and Golden Zephyr, which allowed me to be in the air and feel the relaxing breeze through my body as I took in grand views of the park. It was nice to take my time through any rides I wanted to try. This trip was also my first time seeing Galaxy’s Edge, which is so detailed and perfect for any Star Wars fan, like me. Cars Land was amazing to see as well, it was just so immersive and beautiful to be in at night. The only slight sadness I felt was finding the Haunted Mansion was closed for refurbishment, and Splash Mountain was still in the process of being renovated into Tiana’s Bayou Adventure.
I love good food, and the best thing I ate was the Monte Cristo at Café Orleans. I also loved the raspberry rose macaron at Jolly Holiday Bakery, the bacon at Carnation Café, the chocolate peanut butter sandwich, and of course, those famous pineapple Dole whips! Although I was excited about it, deciding on what food to get was the most disorienting part of my trip. It was a challenge to figure out the best of the best in both parks and make sure to get my money’s worth, and some of the places weren’t always open. The pineapple Dole whip, for instance, I couldn’t get on my last day at Disneyland because of closures, but ended up finding one at the Disneyland Hotel before flying home!
And of course, as a lover of visual arts, I have to mention the World of Color, the water and light show at California Adventure that plays at night outside Pixar Pier. It’s one thing to hear about it and watch a video of it, it’s a whole different thing to see it in person. Watching the showcase of lights, music, and water put into perspective why the Disney brand remains so relevant even after a hundred years. It’s a corporation full of passionate artists who pour their whole souls into pushing the mediums of animation and visual effects forward, innovating new storytelling techniques that enable anyone the chance to tell their own stories.
I’ve come back from Disneyland a changed man, and now instead of waiting for someone else to do trips with me, I’ll always have a major vacation I’m looking forward to year after year. The question is, where will I go in 2025? I’m thinking New Orleans.
Thus, I believe planning a vacation can be one of the most important accomplishments an autistic adult could ever achieve. Not only is traveling alone so much cheaper than traveling in a group, but it’s a benefit to not have to plan each day around anyone else. I’ve been on family vacations where stressing over what to do next and working around hiccups in the trip can take the fun out of it. Yet when I was in California by myself, stress was never a problem! It was easy for me to readjust to plan B whenever necessary (partly also because of my extensive research).
So, planning a solo vacation is a fantastic goal for other adults on the autism spectrum to set for themselves, it’s an enormous step forward in independence and is perfect for rediscovering your potential.
Trevor's latest books are What the Movies Can Teach Us About Bullying, and What Movies Can Teach Us About Disabilities. Meet him at Indie Author Night at Brick & Mortar Books in Redmond, Washington on June 3 from 6 to 8 p.m.

Trevor Pacelli talks about how his traits of being direct and honest have allowed him to have an impact on others in mentoring and other roles.
 From Seattle Children's Hospital Autism Blog,
Being autistic, I have always been a very blunt person. Back when I was a kid, I often blurted out straightforward, even disrespectful comments when meeting others, . . . Read More  ​

​Similar to others my age, I watched Avatar: The Last Airbender on Nickelodeon as a kid. While I did enjoy the show, it wasn’t necessarily one of my favorite things to watch, not like SpongeBob SquarePants. Yet once I revisited the series on Netflix years later, I saw it with a new perspective I didn’t have when I was twelve.
As a person with autism, I have come to greatly appreciate the cartoon world’s religion, politics, cultural differences, architecture, and philosophies in depths unheard of in entertainment for kids, or even for adults. I can now see how the show’s character with a disability parallels me and maybe others.
Most shows for grownup audiences wouldn’t be mature enough to create an empowering character with a disability while also showing their weaknesses. In Avatar, Toph Beifong is a blind twelve-year-old girl who claims to be the world’s most powerful earthbender. She uses her bending abilities to feel the earth through her bare feet, which compensates for her disability by giving her a mental map through seismic vibrations of where everything is around her. As the series progresses, her earthbending only gets stronger, and she even invents metalbending by detecting the earth particles inside metal components, something no other earthbender could ever do. Since she grew up with parents who only saw her as weak and helpless because of her disability, they sheltered her from the world. They never allowed her to leave their house, so to get any semblance of the life she always needed, she had to secretly escape her parents.
Because of her upbringing, Toph is fiercely determined to prove how capable she is. That means she refuses any help, and soon after joining the Avatar’s team, she intends to only look after herself without helping the others with various tasks like setting up camp. She believes that if she relies on anyone else or does anything to make herself look reliant on others, it makes her weak. It’s not until she has a talk over tea with the wise Uncle Iroh that she understands how needing one another is a basic human necessity. The rest of the series validates this point, as Toph is vulnerable in many locations because of her blindness. In the desert, the instability of the sand makes it difficult for her to form a mental map of her surroundings through her feet. She needs to cling to someone’s arm when at sea or riding on the Avatar’s flying bison, Appa--places she can’t feel the earth through her feet. In addition, because she’s blind, she can’t read, so people have to read things out loud to her.
As an autistic person, I often feel similar struggles when others think little of me. I believe I must prove that I'm not just a dumb kid with a developmental disorder and that I can do whatever others without autism can do. So, if somebody asks me if I need help with something, or if I know what a certain word or phrase means, I get offended, because they wouldn’t ask that same question to someone without autism. However, there are some things I simply do need help with, more than most others my age. For example, my parents had to help me with securing a place to live and finding a job. Factors like home size, cost, location and renovations overwhelm me, and never really cross my mind. Even when I’ve moved in, I don’t ever think about making any kind of changes. I’m a simplistic take-it-or-leave-it kind of guy.
I would certainly be lost if I didn’t have my parents guiding me through living on my own or getting a job. I’d probably be homeless by now. Likewise, plenty of others with mental or physical disabilities need extra help with certain tasks that those without disabilities don’t need help with. It sounds discouraging to know that at the age of thirty, some people will still be reliant on their parents. They may have to watch their peers and siblings enjoy far more freedom from mom and dad than they’ll ever get. Unfortunately, that’s just how things need to be at times. Some with disabilities are simply going to need this type of extra assistance their entire lives, just like Toph with her blindness. However, just like in Toph’s case, that dependency on others doesn’t make you weak, it just makes you human.
Toph is mentioned in my book, What Movies Can Teach Us About Disabilities, as an example of strong disability representation I was exposed to as a kid, one that I at the time had taken for granted. I have also recently written the book, What Movies Can Teach Us About Bullying. 

Like other twenty- and thirty-somethings, I grew up watching the Harry Potter series. Every kid around my age was all over the books and movies from grade school through high school. The first movie premiered when I was in third grade, and the last one premiered the summer after I graduated from high school. Each of these eight films was a massive theatrical event, so the series heavily influenced the childhoods of my generation.
I believe one of the key reasons the books and movies have been so influential is the way author J.K. Rowling defines the characters, all of which are broken up into four houses at Hogwarts’ School of Witchcraft and Wizardry:
              Gryffindor, where brave students are sorted into.
              Hufflepuff, where loyal students are sorted into.
              Ravenclaw, where intelligent students are sorted into.
              Slytherin, where power-hungry students are sorted into.
In Harry Potter’s first year at Hogwarts, the sorting hat is put on his head, and it struggles to decide where exactly he would be best suited. Although he requests Gryffindor, it’s later revealed that Harry, having almost been killed by the evil Lord Voldemort (a Slytherin) as a baby, still has a piece of Voldemort’s soul inside his body. Thus, Harry would be a better fit for Slytherin. Yet that doesn’t mean he’s not courageous, because he never hesitates to stand up for what he knows is right, even if it means going face-to-face with death more than once.
Harry’s not the only one who has personal traits of more than one Hogwarts house. Ron Weasley is a Gryffindor, but also has immense loyalty to his family, like a Hufflepuff. Hermione Granger is a Gryffindor, but also has an encyclopedic knowledge of spells, like a Ravenclaw. Draco Malfoy is a Slytherin, but also isn’t afraid to put his safety in danger to get his way, like a Gryffindor.
There are many online quizzes you can take that tell you which Hogwarts house you would best fit into. But playing this game for you or a friend doesn’t have to be done by a questionnaire. You could simply observe someone and take note of their actions and personality. That brings me to my main point:
Fantasy worlds and special interests can help those on the autism spectrum.
Here’s what I mean. Most people in a casual setting can pretty easily know the unspoken signs of another’s personality by watching them. They don’t need the personality traits spelled out for them—reading the room is second nature. People with autism don’t usually have that. They can’t tell what another person’s intentions or thoughts are simply by watching them; they need to be told directly if someone is being disrespectful or manipulative.
Someone on the autism spectrum might not relate to other people very well, but they can relate to their special interest extraordinarily well. This can include any fictional fantasy world with a fanbase, such as Star Wars, Pokémon, The Lord of the Rings, or Harry Potter. The latter of these examples can help with the use of the four Hogwarts houses. Somebody with autism could take on the task of figuring out which Hogwarts house they think a friend or family member would best belong in. It could turn into a fun game of detective work where the person with autism has to carefully think about the other person to decide whether they have more traits of a Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, or Slytherin. This in turn could encourage social interaction between that autistic person and the one they’re trying to place in a house. While using others for your own game could sound questionable, it may be the best motivation for autistic people to think more about what others are like.
I suffer from anxiety, so I’m not a Gryffindor. I couldn’t manipulate people even if I tried, and I’m relatively content with where I am in life, so I’m not a Slytherin either. However, I do have hints of Hufflepuff because I’ve proven myself to be a hard and loyal worker. Yet because I’m dependent on my creative mind in work and in hobbies, I’m the best fit for Ravenclaw. In thinking of others, I know a church pastor who has been immensely courageous amidst the challenges he’s faced, and while he has book smarts, he’s mostly motivated by community-building and his family. Thus, he seems to be the best fit for Hufflepuff. That’s just an example of how using something an autistic person is already interested in can help develop an interest and understanding in people.
But full disclaimer: This is no means to an end in getting to know people. It’s unhealthy to get overly caught up in your fantasy, especially when trying to force others into your own imagination. The exercise I described can be a great motivator, but deciding whether a friend or family member would be best for Gryffindor or Slytherin is not a permanent solution to overcoming personality blindness. When learning about one another, nothing can replace simple conversation. While there can be ways to get there based on the individual’s current strengths, human interaction with one another should always be the end goal.
Trevor Pacelli is the author of Six-Word Lessons on Growing Up Autistic, What Movies Can Teach Us About Disabilities and other books on Amazon.

By Trevor Pacelli
2023 is ending, so I figured now would be a good time to share some of my upcoming projects for 2024, as well as how working on these projects has given me multiple opportunities to be a storyteller. Read the full post