Ten facts about me, James Simms, you may not know 🤔 (Part 2)

Thank you for visiting the blog. This post is Part of a two-parter and you can access Part 1 here, which covers facts 1-5

Ten facts about me you may not know:

1. I’m a “proper” Northerner.
2. I’ve lived in a lot of different places.
3. I’m not married and never have been.
4. I find business a bit boring.
5. I’m a polyglot.
6. I’m amongst the world’s best players at an online game called WordGrid.
7. I was unemployed for a year in 2015.
8. I get obsessed with things.
9. I can “rap”.
10. I have a secret.
    
    

 Fact 6: I’m amongst the world’s best players at an online game called WordGrid. 

Uff, this one’s a bit embarrassing. As you‘ll read later, I am quite capable of being obsessive with things. On occasions, I turn this obsession to fruitful escapades like my work and, perhaps, even this blog. However, I also get a bit obsessed with other, more frivolous (pointless) things such as the game WordGrid. 

WordGrid, I guess, is a cross between Wordle, a Word Wheel and the word game in Countdown. You’re presented with nine letters and you have to make words with them. The longer the word, the more points. The more obscure the letters (Zs and Qs and that), the more points. The more you use an individual letter in an individual word, the more points. So, words like “razzamatazzes” or “gigging” score lots of points because they have repeated letters and are pretty long. Finally, in this game, you get 120 seconds on the clock but, if you make longer words, you get time back.

So, I started playing this game about nine months ago and I use it as a source of stress relief. I ended up getting quite good at it and, these days, I tend to be the world’s leading player on most days. In fact, I only play it if someone else has already posted a score that is worth challenging. Like a champion pole vaulter, I only enter the competition when the bar is set high enough. How sad!

I recorded my phone screen as an example:

Let’s be honest, this is pretty pathetic and, according to my kids, a complete waste of time (120 second game can now take me well over an hour). But I like it, so I play. I’m hoping for some kind of world championship soon so that I may be able to compete for some accolades. 

 Fact 7: I was unemployed for a year in 2015. 

I left full-time teaching in 2014. Wow, I just realised that was almost ten years ago! I was working as an AHT at that time. I wasn’t happy in my role and I was doing a very significant amount of work on my online publishing and PE resources, most of which were video-based and all of which were utterly free to others. Therefore, in April 2014, I resigned my AHT role to pursue my online work. I technically left the school’s employment in August 2014. 

My intention was to spend 12 months building a robust offer in PE and then return full-time to teaching in September 2015. It didn’t work out that way. Firstly, I got talking to two of the lads (men) in my football team and it turned out that they both built websites on the side of their full-time roles. I was involved in senior men's football for the majority of my adult life and, in this environment, everyone helped everyone else out with their skills should they be required. Together, we designed and built MyPEExam.org and published it by December 2014. It was a super basic website but it flourished and the user numbers –so I thought– were huge. I remember that, during busy weekdays (school hours), the site hosted over 100 real-time learners at a time. I was flabbergasted. I was “teaching” between three and four times more students than I had been during any typical school lesson. 

Then, in Summer 2015, simultaneously with applying for PE teaching roles in local schools, I offered free revision sessions for GCSE and A-level PE and the popularity was just ridiculous. It felt like every student in the country was using my revision sessions. 

I received no job offers. I was writing quite provocative cover letters about changing the classroom model and about introducing IT and I think this, combined with my perceived cost to hire, put HTs off me. I understand this but it left me in a very tricky spot. Therefore, with great reluctance, I caved in to the ongoing suggestion of those around me to commercialise the website from September 2015. September rolled around and, within days, I had a highly profitable PE business. I’ll never forget that experience. It is the closest I have ever been to being confident that I was dreaming when it was actual reality. Somehow, and entirely accidentally, I had built a PE business and one that, I hope, has a positive impact on the world around me.

 Fact 8: I get obsessed with things. 

If you have read all seven previous facts, this will not be a surprise. I get utterly obsessed with things. In many ways, it is a great strength of mine but, in other ways, it can be quite challenging, especially for those around me. My kids are always telling me off for wandering off from places or not actually listening to them because I am internally engrossed in something. 

Colleagues have described me as “all or nothing”. I’m either in or out. There’s little in-between. When my obsessions are focused on “good things”, I can be majestic. When they are focused on “bad things” (I mean frivolous things, really), I can cause quite a lot of confusion for those around me. 

This approach to life has been challenging for both me and those I care about. The problem is that I can be brilliant at specific things. But my expectation of myself is that I should be equally brilliant at all things and I’m just not. Moreover, because the switch is either on or off, I’m frequently hopeless at lots of things and this causes me quite a lot of anxiety.

 Fact 9: I can “rap”. 

Right, I can’t actually rap. I mean, I can but the musical quality of my rapping is so low that it is shameful. What I am specifically good at is lyrically freestyling. I reckon I have serenaded Marta tens of thousands of times during our relationship. I’ll see or hear something and it will trigger me into singing or rapping a completely novel song about it. The topics I sing about are beyond abstract. Marta told me once that my singing was “like a Dali painting” and I know what she meant by this. I struggle to remember any of the topics of my songs but one that I sang about today was the angle that a block of cheese always seems to end up with after a series of cuts. 

I can also do this through speech (rather than song) and through writing. I think the blog has emerged from this characteristic in me, in fact. I have always wanted to take part in that Just a Minute game on Radio 4. I don’t actually know the rules and if there is a rule about going off-topic (which I think there is), I may struggle but my capacity to just make up stuff would serve well.

 Fact 10: I have “a secret”. 

As I begin to type this sentence, I still don’t know if I am going to be able to say this thing publicly. What is to follow is something that is deeply personal to me and something that, until recently, has been an unknown ingredient in my life. If you have read the nine previous facts about me, you are probably thinking something like “this guy ain’t normal”. You’d be right. I’m not. I am anything but the average person. Sometimes I am brilliant. Often I am utterly hopeless.

A few years ago, I was having some significant psychological issues. Perhaps I could refer to them as mental health challenges. These challenges were impacting both me and my family and they had been going on for a very long time to a greater or lesser degree. My whole life, in fact. I reluctantly began to talk to professionals about my experiences and I was originally informed that I had an identifiable and diagnosable condition (which I am not going to write down because I do not have this condition). However, the issues continued despite the support I was receiving and, relatively recently, I sought further help in order to try and understand myself properly. I spoke with numerous psychological and psychiatric professionals and, during this process, a bombshell was dropped.

I was diagnosed with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and with Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). This diagnosis was beyond shocking to me. I had never contemplated the possibility. Like many others, I had a somewhat Rainman-esque view of what autism was and what it wasn’t and I had never once in my life considered that autism (or ADHD) could be an ingredient in my character. I now believe I was wrong to believe that. I now accept that I do experience both ASD and ADHD. I also accept that I have experienced these two conditions my whole life. 

When I was originally diagnosed, I largely rejected the notion because it was too shocking for me to believe. I was sure “they had gotten it wrong” and that “if I’m autistic, then everyone must be.” These reflections, I now believe, were a representation of the shock that I felt and the denial which is, perhaps, normal in such circumstances. I now accept the ingredients of autism and attention deficit in my life.

In the years since my diagnosis, I have accepted myself with much more compassion than I was willing to apply before. I treat my neurological status as a factor to be aware of but never ever an excuse for anything. In fact, seeing autism as an ingredient rather than a cause is significant in multiple ways because autism could, if I allowed it to, claim ownership of both my weaknesses and my strengths. I won’t let this happen. When I screw up, autism or not, it is my responsibility. When I succeed, autism or not, it is my success. 

I am so much more aware of my character than before the diagnosis. I know myself, even though it is a relatively complex self-portrait. 

I continue to have “problems” in my life and the biggest problem is that I know there is probably nothing I can do to prevent me from getting things wrong in the future. This is something that I really struggle with. No matter how hard I try, my relatively poor emotional regulation (a classic symptom of ASD) is going to cause an issue at some point. It feels like constantly steering around a blind corner. This, combined with the guilt I feel when I do get things wrong, does make life a challenge. However, it is who I am and I have to accept it. I am trying to do so.

So, why am I stating this publicly? Well, firstly, I needed a tenth fact for this blog post and this seemed a solid one. Secondly, I do believe I have nothing to be ashamed of and that putting these comments out to those who know me and work with me may challenge our collective assumptions about neurological issues. Finally, I also strongly think that “Well, why wouldn’t I? What’s the big deal?” As far as I can tell, everyone has their challenges and these happen to be mine. I am neither proud nor ashamed to have ASD and ADHD. I am just James. For better or for worse, I am what I am (cue Gloria Gaynor). 

So, there you have it! 10 facts about me with a revelation at the end.

Go give WordGrid a go and let me know how you get on. Perhaps, I might even see you on the world leaderboard! ;)

Merry Christmas.