I changed my domain again. 🫣 It was for extremely great reasons this time! And I’m going to try to go without changing it ever again, from here on out. 👀

…is what I said. I ended up changing it one more time.

This post was first updated November 17, 2023. Its most recent update was on January 26, 2025.

Autistic Jane: Before & during

Before Autistic Jane, I had a super short, mostly generic blog name that ran into some issues:

• 80% of my blog traffic comes from search engines
• Short, vague domains aren’t always searchable or memorable
• Emails @ short domains are often invalidated as a spam precaution
• I needed a more trustworthy domain
• I wanted people to associate my autism with me

2022 was a tornado, however. I learned I’m the scapegoat in my narcissistic/enmeshed family, who weaponized everything I shared about my autism to prove to other people that I was mentally unwell.

That kind of pain cuts deep, and I began noticing microaggressions directed towards me from strangers as the result of putting “autistic” in my domain name.

Being autistic shouldn’t affect my ability to land freelance clients, but the number of people who think autistic adults look and behave per the stereotypes is astonishing.

I’ve been fetishized, stereotyped, discriminated and invalidated because I didn’t measure up to what autism looks like to them.

The worst part was when people would reply to my social media comments to say ish like, “Found the [r-word],” and other cruel things (like how I burden my family and don’t deserve to exist).

I couldn’t take it from both relatives and strangers.

Why I switched again

Becauseeee ambiguity is an autistic trait.

1. I have DID.

My blog + main online channels become their own place. Despite me not wanting them to become like an identity themselves…they do.

From a legal standpoint, I think my brain naturally compartmentalizing like this is good…even if it’s frustrating.

I think using my system’s names complicates our ability to carry on with the blog, because of switching, dormancies, etc.

We put the decision to change the blog name to a system vote — as you can see, the vote was in favor.

2. I want my blog to be viewed as separate from me.

My blog is mine, and so is my body’s — but they’re not just mine.

I need people to see my blog as an accessory to me, not directly me. It’s still me + mine — my channels, etc. I need this boundary for myself and to use in my interpersonal relationships.

When people quote/cite me (it happens!), I want them to include a blog name in addition to my name — not just my name.

I don’t want people to look at my blog or content and go, “Oh, that’s Jane,” instead of, “Jane wrote this!”

I want people to look at my blog as an extension of myself instead of me specifically.

Enmeshment can happen with things we do or enjoy, too, and my enmeshment with my blog was unhealthy. It’s also negatively affected relationships because people struggled to separate my content calendar from what I’m going through.

3. Too many identity crises

See #1. No, seriously.

Even if I don’t want to have dissociative identity disorder, I do. Ignoring or pretending I don’t have it only makes the DID worse.

Working through DID is the only way to heal. It’s the only way to stop questioning who TF I am at any given moment.

Naming my blog my own name felt like I was trying to live a stranger’s life at times.

The enmeshment prevented me from feeling safe to explore things outside my blog or deviate from how I blogged.

I felt unable to grow.

Finding a new blog name

My new blog name needed to meet the following requirements:

• easy to spell & remember
• googlable
• social media handles available, with minor adjustments
• had “Lively” in the name
• represented me, collectively speaking
• I loved it

A few brainstormed blog names:

• Frankly Freya
• Girl Meets [State I move to]
• Girl Meets Gloss
• Girl Meets Glow
• How Lively!
• Living Like Lively
• Fem & Freya
• FemFreya
• Lemon & Lively

Of those, I only liked Girl Meets [State] and Lemon & Lively.

Girl Meets [State] would tie me to one state and prevent me from deviating from that?! so it’d be the same problem all over again.

The latter is most like Cupcakes & Cashmere and Young & Hungry, a blog name and TV show name I really liked.

Unexpected words in the format of Blank & Blank is catchy. There’s a ring to it.

Lemon & Lively has my chosen last name.

It doesn’t matter if people forget the “and”, because I also registered LemonLively.com. (True me fashion.)

I love the name itself for the alliteration. The “lemon” part can go sweet and sour. Collectively, the name feels like sunshine.

Life gives us lemons…you don’t have to make lemonade. It’s okay to feel your feelings, want more for yourself, etc. Sometimes, relationships turn sour.

Toxic positivity not necessary.

Lemon & Lively moving forward

This is the part where you expect me to be pretentious, only to find I’ve already done one of the “forward” things:

• I deleted 500 old posts my system kept so we wouldn’t forget, regardless of consciousness

I don’t know if there will be any stark differences between my blogging now and before.

Little by little, I’m learning how to love myself — more than I love anyone else — and how to be okay with that.

Unmasking my autism is a long journey to unveiling who I am, so I’m choosing to not define what that looks like before I even know. 💖