ABSTRACT
COVID-19 has brought about major changes to the lives of people around the world. How people engaged in their daily routines, worked, shopped, socialised, and spent time with family shifted. Changes in nearly every aspect of daily life became the norm with no time to adapt. Face-to-face appointments were swapped for online consultations, face masks and physical distancing requirements were standard, and nuanced social interactions changed. People stopped shaking hands and kissing cheeks. They touched elbows or waved from a distance. People fanned out candles on birthday cakes. Sometimes people did not leave the house. With COVID-19, life has become unmistakably different, and adjusting to these changes has required a degree of cognitive flexibility, adaptability, and resilience. But what happens when, as an autistic person, tolerating change is your least favourite thing to do? This chapter has been co-authored by a young adult with autism who struggles with lockdowns, an autistic academic with a quirky sense of humour, an educational and developmental psychologist who loves staying in her pyjamas all day, a therapist who works with autistic individuals (and appreciates her children just a little bit more when they can physically attend school), another educational and developmental psychologist who has been taught a lot about autism from the young people she has assessed and counselled ("How can you sit and listen to people talking at you all day?”), and an inclusive education researcher and behaviour analyst who has the lived experience of psychosocial disability and prefers the company of her dogs. Together we explore the experiences of lockdown through the lived experiences of autistic people leveraging research to create a new and novel perspective. The chapter presents a unique way of integrating research evidence to shed light on the experiences recalled. Living life during a global pandemic calls for a need to deal with unpredictability and change. But what happens when you wish COVID-19 would be quickly eradicated? This chapter will address this question and more. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.