In a few weeks, I’m going to be teaching a class at Morbid Anatomy about unicorns. (There are a few spaces left, if you want to sign up!) The class explains some of the ways in Depth Psychology that we might approach or work with a symbol of the unconscious, and then we work together on the unicorn as such a symbol.
I have 2 chapters completed for two books, and I’m working on a book proposal about unicorns at the same time. I’ve done a number of articles and stories about unicorns!
What is an Autistic Special Interest?
The short answer to the question “why do I talk so much about unicorns?” is because unicorns have been an autistic special interest of mine for a very long time. It’s probably one of the most enduring and among the oldest interests of mine.
What is an autistic special interest? To over-simplify, it is an area of intellectual curiosity that creates a space of comfort, joy, well-being, and stress reduction. When an autistic person spends time with their special interest (also known as a SpIN online), there are biological markers of lower stress – blood pressure goes down, cortisol decreases. The most stereotypical autistic special interests include trains, space, cars, technology, or the deep ocean. However, special interests are as varied as human beings are!
Not only are special interests widely varied and diverse among people, each individual might have a series of interests (this study says the average is eight at a time). These interests may be closely aligned, or entirely unrelated to one another. Often, interests experience “seasons” where they are deeply engaging for months or years, and then fizzle out, only to return years later.
That’s what happened with me, and unicorns. As a young girl, my unicorn interest was part of pop culture. The Last Unicorn was in the movies, Lisa Frank and Sue Dawson were designing the folders inside my Trapper Keeper. Unicorns were everywhere in the 1980s.
My unicorn interest morphed into an interest in horses over time, and I engaged more heavily with “Horse Girl” interests for most of my teen years. I had a horse at the time, and she was far more soothing, interesting, and engaging than an imaginary creature.
While my special interests have ebbed and flowed from early childhood ones like Mickey Mouse and unicorns, to tween and teen interests in horses, then to teenager and young adult interests of world cultures and languages.
My adult special interest in mythology should come to no one’s surprise, really. I just decided to get a degree in it. The Mythological studies program I attended folded in my interests of mythology and religion as well as world cultures and languages, it grew an interest in folklore and storytelling, and it reignited my interest in unicorns.
This whole thing started as a stress reliever.
In the late summer of 2021, I was living in a hotel with my pets while I house-hunted in New Mexico. I was writing my dissertation proposal against a September deadline. And I was working almost full-time from the hotel wi-fi. It was a stressful and uncomfortable place to be.
I was trying to brainstorm any and all sources of stress relief, self-care, and self-soothing. When I re-read a few articles about autistic special interests. I realized that when I was about 8 years old, one of the things I collected and was very invested in was stickers (also pretty normal for a kid in the early 80s). So I sent one of my friends a request. I asked her to please mail me a packet of unicorn stickers. I figured that by sticking unicorn stickers on the boxes against the hotel wall, or on my day planner or journal might give me a glimmer of stress relief, a giddy little bite of joy.
Of course, the friend who I asked was not going to send just one packet of stickers. She sent hundreds. Over the course of the next 2-3 months I got package after package in the mail of various shapes, sizes, and themes of unicorn stickers. (I still have hundreds in a basket, yet un-stuck!) She rose to the challenge, and the good news is that the silly things worked! I actually did get a little stress relief. I could give myself stickers for doing the hard thing. I could add stickers to a lot of my environment. Which helped to claim it in a way, but also served to give me that little Hershey’s kiss – sized surge of dopamine whenever I laid eyes on my unicorns.
By the time I moved into my home, the childhood special interest had caught hold once more, and this time in the light of my graduate program. My degree offers a number of new ways to think about, research, and engage with unicorns as symbols, as an archetype, and as a potential area of scholarly expertise. I’m excited to be sharing these in my class in April!