iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

I white-knuckled parenting for so long, and way more suddenly than I ever anticipated, I’ve come to the era of parenting I’ve been looking forward to since I realised I was pregnant with Arthur. Turns out it’s just as awesome as I imagined it would be?

040

Also: I get to be the mother I always dreamed of being. I get to provide a safe, happy, calm space for them and their friends. I get to provide love and acceptance and good advice and firm but reasonable expectations. I get to cook for a grateful crowd. It’s so much fun to be this version of Mom.

This new school has been so good for them. This house has been so good for them. This routine has been so good for them. Things were so chaotic for them for so long and they had to be resilient when they shouldn’t have had to be. And now it feels like magic, seeing who they have the chance to be.

130

I’d actually bought enough ingredients for dinner tonight to make enough sausage and veggie gnocchi to feed a small army. They played hide and seek while I cooked, ate dinner and cleaned up after themselves, and have ridden their bikes to at the park to play until bedtime. They’re flourishing. 🥹

130

The kids have been back in school - at their new school, around the block from our house, finally at the same one - for two full weeks now and today they came barrelling in with a couple friends after playing at the park and asked if they could all have dinner here. I smiled and said of course.

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

The kids go back to school the day after tomorrow so I’m taking them to this funfair on Parker’s Piece to let them run around. We’re gonna squeeze all the last drops of juice out of this summer.

Two children, a girl in shorts and a long-sleeved pink top and a boy in blue shorts and a yellow tee, are seen from behind as they walk across the grass towards a funfair filled with inflatables and rides. The grass is green and brown, and the sky is a brilliant blue dotted with fat white clouds.

020

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

We were at a B&B last night in a cute little country village where I took no publicly viewable photos. We’re now at a nice restaurant drinking a lovely rosé sparkling wine and being insufferably sweet.

030

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

It’s the weekend before my 41st birthday and my beloved has been taking me through all the activities he’s planned for me to enjoy, and good lord I’m a happy woman. I get to spend another year of my life being loved and cherished and celebrated and cared for and uplifted by this gorgeous person. 🥹

Eliza, a white woman in a red linen dress with with long brown hair, stares up lovingly at Olí, a white man with long brown hair pulled back in a bun wearing a white and green striped linen shirt. She leans back against a red Istanbul streetcar as he steps in, cupping her face delicately. The effect is one of a romance novel cover.

180

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

(hi ILU too!!!!) I mean I believe it!

000

Reposted by Eliza Eaton

Autism in Adulthood @autisminadulthood.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Doherty 2026 explores how shame may be an overlooked factor linking stigma & poor mental health among autistic adults, highlighting the need for affirming approaches to reduce shame & support self-compassion. NEW FREE to Sept 3 @autisticdoctor.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Abstract for the paper: Autistic Shame: Reflectionsd on an Underrecognized Determinant of Autistic Mental Health. It reads: Shame is a deeply painful emotion that is underexplored in autism research and autistic community spaces. While we commonly discuss stigma, we rarely examine how it is embodied and experienced as shame. This perspective piece argues that shame is a critical, yet largely unrecognized, determinant of autistic mental health outcomes, operating as a hidden link between societal stigma and the elevated rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicidality among autistic adults. Drawing on research with autistic psychiatrists and personal experience as an autistic clinician–researcher, I trace how shame became visible as the overarching theme in my doctoral research – so pervasive it was initially invisible. The recognition of autistic shame has proven challenging to disseminate, with resistance to these findings illustrating the very dynamics being studied: when research exposes uncomfortable truths about shame, defensive responses often follow patterns described in Nathanson’s Compass of Shame. Autistic shame is the internalized sense of defectiveness tied specifically to one’s autistic identity & traits. It is externally imposed through lifelong exposure to neuronormative expectations where difference is misinterpreted as deficit. It manifests in multiple contexts: Reciprocally shaming social interactions, health care settings where autistic patients are dismissed and disbelieved, and community conflicts where heterogeneity is weaponized to silence advocacy. For autistic people, alexithymia can make shame difficult to recognize. Addressing autistic shame requires explicit therapeutic attention, self-compassion practices adapted for autistic cognition, and neurodiversity-affirmative approaches that reframe difference rather than deficit. Understanding shame offers tangible pathways toward improved mental health & authentic autistic flourishing.

0125

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Oh shit she did it! She found the worst person in Colorado!

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

Seriously tho, I may be the luckiest woman alive.

Eliza and her children, Arthur and Evie, stand on a rainbow staircase in Türkiye.

071

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

Am I the luckiest person in the world, do you think?

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

hey have you ever felt so in love and so fucking lucky that you just burst into tears????

160

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Evangeline, chomping noisily on a nacho: ‘Mom, you’re great at boring stuff.’ Me: ‘Aw, thanks, Evie.’ Evangeline: ‘That wasn’t a compliment.’ The sass levels are off the charts, I fear.

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

The kids are as happy as I have ever seen them. I’m almost two proseccos deep and working through an excellent book (This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me by Ilona Andrews). I get to play mermaids with my unspeakably hot partner later. (I smooch him and then pull him under the water.) Life is pretty ok.

070

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

I’m in Türkiye for a little holiday with my kids and partner, and today is our first full day - so, beach. It is PERFECT.

Eliza sit in a beach chair and lifts a glass of prosecco in her hands, showing a bright red manicure, as she toasts Oli, whose shoulder-length brown hair and tan shirtless chest are damp from the sea. He looks through black Ray-Ban wayfarer sunglasses towards the sea, with water as blue as the sky.

1100

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

My daughter had her big performance as Peter Pan this afternoon and she was brilliant! She had everyone else’s lines memorised along with her own, sang her solo beautifully, and made the audience laugh. Her teachers told me afterwards that she was also just so kind and encouraging to everyone. 🥹

A 6-year-old child in a green Peter Pan costume with a feathered hat smiles proudly, holding two bouquets of flowers and standing confidently next to a classroom door.

080

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Being inside when it's like that outside is so damn cozy though...

000

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

One of the funnier developments from this is showing up to theatre camp this morning to be grilled by the private school mums about why my daughter was cast as the lead. "So, does she go to one of the programme's... other sites... during the school year?" Nope, sorry, she's just a charisma bomb.

060

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

My fantastically talented daughter got the lead role (Peter Pan) in her theatre camp’s production of Peter Pan!!!! 🥹

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

My mom was an exceptional hostess who knew how to make everyone feel comfortable and welcome and seen and at home, and she prided herself on having a house where my friends (and let’s be real even people who didn’t actually like me all that much) wanted to hang out. I want to be that for Arthur.

080

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

Tonight will be my first time hosting a sleepover as a mother, as it is my son’s 10th (!!!!!) birthday tomorrow, and wow does it have me thoroughly in my feelings. He didn’t want a big event-style party, just a sleepover with a small group of friends and the chance to stay up as late as he wants.

150

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

Just saying: the process of getting diagnosed with and learning to heal from CPTSD is a real mindfuck for someone who built a whole self-image around being deeply competent.

070

I’m out at the pub with my partner and there’s an older lady who, every time he leans over to give me a snuggle or kiss my cheek, gives me an approving and appreciative nod. At one point she did a little gold clap. Having an extremely hot partner is really, really fun. Highly recommend.

060

“Was Cleopatra a good babysitter?”

010

This would be a lot less funny if I were at all sensitive about aging, but I get carded for buying wine at the grocery store at 40 and got mad at my hair stylist for pulling out my one (1) grey hair, so as it is I’m delighted.

040

👻madeline bOoOoOoOodent👻 @oldenoughtosay.com · 22/07/2026

My children have recently begun to try to roast me about my age. A selection: “Mum, was the world in black and white when you were a kid?” “Mum, did you get to see the Wizard of Oz in theatres when it came out?” “Was Jesus still alive when you were a little girl?” “Do you speak dinosaur?”

350

Reposted by Eliza Eaton

there’s an entire essay in how ‘historically accurate’ and ‘nostalgia’ are just weaponised to mean ‘the world bigots wished they lived in’ and not something that has actually ever existed but i haven’t had enough coffee to write it yet

1144472

Anyway, I came out of the movie having decided to reread the Wilson translation and probably make it my whole personality for a bit. I’m only wearing drapey neoclassical silhouettes and Zendaya-inspired goddess makeup this summer. It’s gonna be great. So, uh, thanks Chris Nolan I guess?

150

It’s gonna sound from this like I didn’t like it, which is absolutely not true - I really enjoyed it! Visually it was stunning, and most of the acting was masterful, and Ludwig Göransson has never made a dud and probably never will. Hell, I cried at one point. (I’ll let you guess what that was.)

I also think Nolan fundamentally misunderstands the role of Athena in both the Odyssey and the broader ancient psyche in general, but that’s a rant very firmly connected with my love of Wisdom/War/Weaving as a tripartite domain and Odysseus and Penelope as Homeric figures specifically.

A lot of his authorial choices around trying to make a broader social point felt heavy-handed and clunky. The shifts were at their best when they were making points about the internal nature of trauma and the way it shifts our relationships with the concepts of home, safety, and care.

I get using the Sea Peoples and the Bronze Age Collapse as a looming existential threat to reinforce the consequences of selfishness and the dissolution of trust-based social norms. And also, like. Do you have to tell us outright that’s what you’re doing? Can you please trust your audience?

130

It was also one of the strongest self-contained bits of storytelling that Nolan achieved in a movie plagued by some extremely clunky writing that was kind of unnecessary given the plethora of options for adaptation - Nolan made some capital-C Choices that didn’t always work for me in that regard.

The Odyssey is, by its nature, a story that lends itself well to self-contained vignettes, and the strongest of these by far (my beloved and I were in agreement on this, btw) was the encounter with Samantha Morton’s Circe, who was spectacular and compelling.

I went into it determined not to be pedantic about historically inaccurate costuming, and while I felt myself slip into annoyance at a few things I did sort of file it away into the file labelled ‘Bronze Age Mediterranean equivalent of Bridgerton’ in my head and it didn’t bother me too much.

I saw The Odyssey with my beloved last night and we chatted about it over pints afterward, and while we broadly agreed on our rating (4/5 🌟, good-not-great) we had different objections and annoyances. I’m on a train now, so I’m gonna process it a bit more with y’all here.

A pint of cider and a pint of Guinness on the bar of a pub, resting on green Timothy Taylor’s branded towels. An image of the smiling faces of the author and her partner has been printed in malt syrup on top of the creamy foam head of the Guinness.

Mad Dr. Jimbosaur, Espooky. @jimbosaur.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

Reposted by Eliza Eaton

My favorite way to put this, as someone who studied Classical History in actual college (not just on Twitter): If you told an ancient Roman or Athenian that his culture had "more in common" with a German or Briton than with an Egyptian or Ethiopian, he'd punch you in the throat.

12999227

Reposted by Eliza Eaton

Rachel Holliday Smith @rachelholliday.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

literally do not speak to me about ANYTHING else

121081152

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

we didn’t really advertise it but yes we decided it made sense to do so and it has been pretty much the best thing! (we also bought a house!)

100

Eliza Eaton @elizaeaton.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

this is absolutely spectacular and i hope you make a million bajillion dollars