In most worship settings, I have come to learn over time that my methods to cope with overstimulation is a social risk. What helps me (and many other people on the autism spectrum and/or with ADHD) stay focused and in-tune may come off to the congregation as disengaged, distracting, or even disrespectful. ... Often, I attempt to mask my discomfort by dissociating and building a world in my mind where I am safe and have space to be alone there.

You could never have imagined this in your grief, when we shared our sorrows in the death of your husband and your son, my husband. In those days I had only begun to understand the power in the bonds of family and in the God you knew so well. I now know the Lord deeply and intimately, as if the Lord was my birth mother who laid me on her shoulder and rocked me to sleep.