Guarding My Peace and Frequencies

It took me a long time to understand that sometimes hiding isn’t weakness, sometimes it’s survival.

Back then, I didn’t have the language I have now. I didn’t have the words autistic, overwhelmed, protecting my inner peace. All I knew was that life felt loud, unpredictable, and sharp around the edges. And my partner at the time, my ex ,made it sharper.

Radio scanning wasn’t just a hobby for me. It was my way of breathing.

While other people turned to meditation, music, scrolling their phones, I turned to the quiet crackle of the airwaves. A world where everything made sense in its own frequency-driven logic. No sudden emotional storms, no judgement, no noise that demanded more than I could give.

But with them, even that needed hiding.

“What are you listening to now?”
“Why can’t you just relax normally?”
“You’re being weird again.”

Those words burrowed deep. And when you already feel different your whole life, already feel like the world is made for people who speak a language you never quite learned, comments like that don’t just sting. They tell you your safe place isn’t allowed.

So I adapted. Masked harder. Shrunk smaller.

I would wait until they were asleep before turning the scanner on, sound low enough that only I could hear it. I’d pretend to be checking emails, or working late, when really I was holding onto the only quiet thing that helped my brain settle. Their footsteps would send me scrambling, not because I was doing anything wrong, but because I was afraid of losing the one grounding thing I had.

It wasn’t about radios. It never was.

It was about needing a pocket of predictability in a life where everything felt overwhelming. A ritual of calm in a relationship where I constantly felt judged, misunderstood, and too much and not enough all at once.

When I finally left, it wasn’t just relief, it was rediscovery.

The first night on my own, I turned the scanner on and didn’t lower the volume out of fear. I didn’t listen through headphones like I was committing a crime. I sat there and let the signals wash through the room, and for the first time in years, I didn’t brace for criticism.

And it hit me:

I wasn’t hiding a hobby.
I was protecting my peace.
I was trying to keep a part of myself alive in a space that didn’t make room for me.

Now, I don’t apologise for the way I decompress.
I don’t apologise for needing quiet, structure, or comfort in patterns.
I don’t apologise for being autistic and needing the world to make sense in ways that aren’t always typical.

The airwaves still hum at night, and I still listen.

Not in hiding.
Not in fear.
But in honour of the version of me who held on when it was hardest.

I guard my peace now, openly.
And the world is clearer on this side of the static.