Photo: Kellie Croft and Oscar
Kellie Croft, mum to a non-verbal autistic son and creator of the neurodivergent clothing company, Born Anxious, explains how she’s bounced back from adversity
by
Kellie Croft
As someone who’s suffered multiple losses in the last three years, I’ve had to take a look at my old life, the one I had banked my “forever on”, take a deep breath and realise that while finally moving forward I might not have everything that I want, but I can be present.
In 2022, my best friend of 35 years died suddenly of cancer. We had been inseparable. We had never fallen out and always spoke to one another daily so the loss was huge. Then in June of this year, without warning, my 18-year marriage ended in a way that you might expect to see in a soap opera. After 27 years of being together, that came as quite a kick but I then focused on a promise I had made to myself; when I’m my most afraid I will run towards things, and when I’m most unsure, I will have enough guts to stay in the space.
Regret isn’t something I’ve visited often and I don’t have time for it. When your life comes crashing down and you haven’t had any choice in that, you can fold, or you can flex, remember who is watching and get the hell back up.
My personal life is something that feeds into my advocacy; the two can’t be separate as I’m one person living and experiencing many journeys. It’s no secret that parenting a medically complex child, like my 11 year-old son Oscar, creates an abundant amount of stress that one person alone shouldn’t naturally be able to carry but this builds a resilience that’s alien to most, other than to those who have lived experience of it. That’s just how it should be. Special kids are not given to special people, they make special people and create unique families that alter the general make up to meet needs and make the adjustments they require not only to thrive – but just to survive. What can be optional is the power to re-frame aspects of our own mental health, what my kids call “headweather”, and that’s what I do every day as I celebrate the glimmers of light that are now present in our lives.
Born Anxious began as a way for us to communicate when we felt misunderstood. Our clothing line literally spreads messages of kindness and inclusivity, while also meeting sensory needs with organic, label-free fabrics. We’ve been running for six years and with incredible community support we’ve achieved so much. We donate to charities and are proud to be charity champions for Anna Kennedy Online and Work For Good UK. We’re also working with other local charities, like Tankerton Football Club, to create positive outcomes for people with disabilities.
I believe you have to meet yourself where you’re at, and the sooner you realise that life itself isn’t perfect (nor any one person), you also realise that truly accepting someone for every single thing that they are, and embracing them, is the loudest way to love them. In order to find real balance you have to be able to do this for yourself too.
What is strength? What do we do with it? Where does it come from? And how can we use it to best help others? I always lean on strength-based approaches for everyone I meet, celebrating skills that are set-based on someone’s unique ability while applying an approach that everyone is fragile, even if they are not.
After a much-needed short recovery break away from Born Anxious, we have returned reborn, and louder than ever in our determination to spread acceptance, awareness and inclusion for autistic people and their families. We are proud of having created an online and local support network for us all while promoting a sense of belonging, mutuality, reciprocity and respect. We’ve come a long way and though I don’t have full-time staff, I do collaborate with amazing people like our designer, Amy, and we receive great support from a PR company and tech experts. Born Anxious is a community effort, and I’m so grateful for everyone’s contributions. We strongly believe inclusion starts with our community. This can cause a ripple effect.
Prior to becoming a carer to my complex son, I used to believe that people who were perceived as strong derived that strength from part of their personality. As I travel through my journey with my son, which has both light and shade, I’m aware that I, too, am now viewed as someone who’s “strong”, but I also recognise this as the result of having survived difficult situations while navigating vital services for my son and living with the worry about Oscar’s future as a non-verbal autistic person. Whenever I have been given the title “strong” by others, I accept this as validation of my own journey.
Many of us have to find strength at our lowest moments. With the break-up of my marriage, I realised I was experiencing treatment that removed my voice while decisions were being made for me that I was not present for. This has given me empathy for any person who has suffered the same but I also recognise this often happens within the autistic community and for disabled people in general. As an advocate for these communities, I am now glad that I’m able to share this experience because I am also more able to apply it to my support of these people.
As Oscar’s primary caregiver, I strive to explore the world through his eyes and to protect his autonomy. I’m passionate about inclusion and believe in celebrating all abilities while challenging outdated norms, and shifting the conversation around disabilities. We must change the conversation for future generations so that there’s no fight required for equality and access to services. Disability is not a dirty word, and the more we normalise these conversations, the better our whole society will become.
Waking up feeling driven and ready for new challenges, I’m excited by the fact that we have new projects lined up this year, and I can’t wait to share them with you in due course. Though I’ve been approached to sell Born Anxious, it will never be for sale. It’s Oscar’s journey, and no price could capture its true value.
Our struggles can become our successes. Overcoming obstacles that we feel we will never overcome strengthens our sense of survival and resilience but I’ve learned to take time for myself when I feel overloaded. The past year has been traumatic but it has reshaped my outlook on life, and I now value relationships more than ever.
It will often be in our lowest moments that we find our own strength to navigate a way through. Today, my own lived experience tells me that all we have to do is to turn up, never give up, always take one more step, always take one more sleep, always take one more deep inhale and roar back at that voice in your ear, the one that tells you that you are not good enough, and not strong enough to handle the storm: “I am the storm”.
Kellie Croft lives in Herne Bay. The proud mum of three amazing children, aged 22, 17, and 11, her youngest son, Oscar, has a complex diagnosis of Autism & SEND. Kellie grew up in a fostering household and after 16 years of working for an independent fostering agency run by her parents, she had to leave her job when Oscar began his diagnosis. She is now training to be an Autism Peer Support Trainer, and is looking forward to incorporating this into her future work. She is the driving force behind Born Anxious – a sensory friendly organic clothing line that began with sharing life experiences through clothing and has evolved into a thriving community where countless stories are shared and celebrated.
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