I've yet to research this, but in therapy yesterday I came across an interesting insight into my thought and language process: sometimes, when I want to recall something I want to share, I need to go "the long way" through a series of steps that get me to the point.
For example, J asked, "Tell me again what that idea [you shared yesterday] about the weekend was?"
In order to tell him, I will think and say something like, "So, as I was telling you yesterday, because I have been feeling lately that we aren't getting enough exercise, I was thinking about maybe this weekend going bike riding".
This is a theoretical example (and may be understating the way I do this), but it does convey something about my speech and thought process. I actually need to start where I started, and reiterate the thought in almost the same way I shared it before. If I don't do this, I can experience a kind of "speech impotence" where I just. can't. get. words. out.
From the point of view of people with "normal" cognitive processes or speech abilities, I used a whole lot of extra words to take a long time to "get to the point". It may be entirely frustrating to listen to me, with all my redundancies and circuitous speech.
Interestingly, I can be more "clear" with the lights off, and with some grounding physical contact. I've noticed that some people with AS close their eyes when they speak. This could be an adaptive strategy to reduce input. As annoying as it is to listen to someone who has their eyes closed and therefore is taking in no information about their listener(s), I can see how it'd be useful if the words just aren't coming as fluidly as I wish.
I'm not sure what this circuitous language process is called, but my therapist said she has known other people who do this kind of thing, and at this point, I can't change it but can develop strategies to deal with it. In the meantime, I hope the people around me continue to have patience as I take "the long way".
Showing posts with label challenge. Show all posts
Showing posts with label challenge. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Everyday Needs
Many peers have written about the sheer exhaustion of being out in the world every day. With autism, the demands of social interaction, modulating sensory input, and the extra work to decipher and integrate all of it can leave us collapsed and overloaded at the end of the day.
Ultimately, I am seeing how important it is to make choices, set limits, and give myself permission to pace myself.
I have an everyday need, for instance, to shut out the world at the end of the day, to turn off the lights and wrap myself in a blanket. To completely relax. The tougher the day, the more this is necessary. Like each activity or environment I encounter has a certain "debt" level. Some things incur little energetic debt, like going for a hike (in fact this can be beneficial to integration and renewal). A movie on opening night incurs a lot of debt. So does work as a cashier. So does trivia night at the bar.
I choose to not limit myself. I prefer a movie not on opening night, but if my husband really wants to see it and it's opening night, I'll gauge how prepared I am to deal with it, and will often go. I'll sit near the front to minimize the number of illuminated cell phones and other movement in my field of vision.
I'm working on getting parts of my life together related to executive functioning, and am going to be working with a social work student intern on day to day living. I have to be mindful of how much debt I'm incurring, so that I can focus on building skills. It means a bit more isolation than I'd like, but I have to spend my energy wisely.
Ultimately, I am seeing how important it is to make choices, set limits, and give myself permission to pace myself.
I have an everyday need, for instance, to shut out the world at the end of the day, to turn off the lights and wrap myself in a blanket. To completely relax. The tougher the day, the more this is necessary. Like each activity or environment I encounter has a certain "debt" level. Some things incur little energetic debt, like going for a hike (in fact this can be beneficial to integration and renewal). A movie on opening night incurs a lot of debt. So does work as a cashier. So does trivia night at the bar.
I choose to not limit myself. I prefer a movie not on opening night, but if my husband really wants to see it and it's opening night, I'll gauge how prepared I am to deal with it, and will often go. I'll sit near the front to minimize the number of illuminated cell phones and other movement in my field of vision.
I'm working on getting parts of my life together related to executive functioning, and am going to be working with a social work student intern on day to day living. I have to be mindful of how much debt I'm incurring, so that I can focus on building skills. It means a bit more isolation than I'd like, but I have to spend my energy wisely.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
burnout and the long walk
Life and its complications unfold
But it is a struggle. I get burned out. I limit J in his need to connect in the world as a couple. The difficulties we have with each other in communicating and connecting has placed a strain on us. Rachel at journeyswithautism.com talks a lot about how her husband supports her and also sometimes struggles with things. I perceive the fortitude required to be in relationship.
I feel empty sometimes. J wishes for more connected 'adult' communication, that isn't about tv shows or dinner (artichokes!), that isn't just endless amounts of silence that increasingly make him think that there really isn't anything going on 'in there'. My defense response is that OF COURSE there is. My defense response is 'but this is only really a strength, that zen-like ability to be only in the moment without monkey mind messing up the serene landscape of my being.
But all those defenses come falling down, and I'm left wondering -- am I really vacant? I know I have ideas and thoughts lurking in there. I know that in the past I experienced sharing them as an exercise in inviting sometimes ridicule, invalidation, being dismissed, or just alienated. I feel stymied. I married a skilled orator, in that he can formulate complex thoughts, hold a conversation, remember different threads and synthesize complex themes into original thought.
I have trouble tracking each sentence, struggle with object relations, use incomplete sentences and get lost when I'm trying to verbalize a thought.
I really understand his frustration. I understand his drift toward giving up because it requires a mountain of patience to slow down that much and even help me work out what I'm trying to say and say it in a way that makes sense.
Spending time with a friend recently, who has two kids, prompted a moment that brought this all into a broader light; we were sitting having food, the 3 year old, mom and me. The three year old suddenly asked her mom, 'why is no one talking?' Her mom explained that sometimes there isn't anything to say and there are pauses in conversations and there is no need to talk all the time. But I left that interaction realizing that while I can be quite content spending shared time in silence, not everyone feels the same way about that.
Later I told my friend in a somewhat apologetic way that I was aware I'm not always the best conversationalist. She responded reassuringly that another friend of hers talks non-stop and this is far more tiring and annoying than a relaxed quiet presence. This was helpful, but when I shared it with J it was also an opportunity talk about how we feel alienated from each other because I don't communicate much.
It's not just silence. It's not just me. He spends a lot of time lately on programming projects, and I hang out beside him doing my own thing. But what I'm doing isn't all that mentally stimulating. A lot of what I do hints at some absence in me of internal drive and an intrinsic desire to keep exploring and growing.
I want to learn social skills. But I'm increasingly becoming afraid and isolated, preferring to hide out that fraak up yet another potential relationship. They start off fine and then they fall flat. Because they never get past a surface level of positive interaction. Once a person wants something deeper, it becomes evident that I don't quite know how to do that.
J and I have developed a deep connection over 3 years. He's sympathetic to a lot of what I'm trying to sort out. He's even sorted out some of the same autistic issues I'm dealing with. He can be a guide, breaking down some of the rules and directions/opportunities for learning. He can also get tired. Or wonder, how much is he supposed to just accept it all and forget about me changing, and how much can he push me toward change? Is he allowed to feel lonely, and angry about feeling alone?
I think he is. But my own tendency to take all of this insight and become overwhelmed and lost and then isolated, further pushing myself into a vacant place of understimulation and depression, means that our desire to hold hands for this long walk is perhaps waning. Our fear that we will be unable to prevent a kind of drift apart until our marriage is just an empty series of motions, that we aren't peers but roles, of functional male and helpless hapless female who is never sure of what parts aren't disabled, whether any direction that pushes beyond the safe borders of autistic comfort is even worth trying.
Burnout makes me scared.
The path -- the long walk -- makes me hopeful that there is somewhere to go.
I'm having a bout of debilitating pain that rules out doing much of anything.
I'm looking forward to a support group on Thursday (the pain should be gone by then)
For it's a group of other women with AS and generally I can relate with them and find useful insights that help me with some of the more troubled thinking above.
I'm not there at acceptance. Neither is my partner. I'm not sure I want to just accept everything (in the sense that none of it can change). I think some things can change. They have to change. They don't work. Like, pretending to hear someone when I haven't, just doesn't work.
I'm lost.
not so joyful, I guess.
- Moved to a new country and all the unknowns/changes/isolations
- Married to a wonderful American
- Reconnecting with the Aspergers Assocation of New England (AANE)
- Dealing with an entirely new health care system
- Unsure of how my Aspergers diagnosis will be affected by upcoming DSM change (and my hope that it just gets folded into autism, not wiped off the board as an irrelevant waste of funds and affirmation.
- Finding day to day tasks variously difficult
- Not having a heck of a lot to do that involves contact with other people
- Painful awareness of of my limitations with social relationships.
But it is a struggle. I get burned out. I limit J in his need to connect in the world as a couple. The difficulties we have with each other in communicating and connecting has placed a strain on us. Rachel at journeyswithautism.com talks a lot about how her husband supports her and also sometimes struggles with things. I perceive the fortitude required to be in relationship.
I feel empty sometimes. J wishes for more connected 'adult' communication, that isn't about tv shows or dinner (artichokes!), that isn't just endless amounts of silence that increasingly make him think that there really isn't anything going on 'in there'. My defense response is that OF COURSE there is. My defense response is 'but this is only really a strength, that zen-like ability to be only in the moment without monkey mind messing up the serene landscape of my being.
But all those defenses come falling down, and I'm left wondering -- am I really vacant? I know I have ideas and thoughts lurking in there. I know that in the past I experienced sharing them as an exercise in inviting sometimes ridicule, invalidation, being dismissed, or just alienated. I feel stymied. I married a skilled orator, in that he can formulate complex thoughts, hold a conversation, remember different threads and synthesize complex themes into original thought.
I have trouble tracking each sentence, struggle with object relations, use incomplete sentences and get lost when I'm trying to verbalize a thought.
I really understand his frustration. I understand his drift toward giving up because it requires a mountain of patience to slow down that much and even help me work out what I'm trying to say and say it in a way that makes sense.
Spending time with a friend recently, who has two kids, prompted a moment that brought this all into a broader light; we were sitting having food, the 3 year old, mom and me. The three year old suddenly asked her mom, 'why is no one talking?' Her mom explained that sometimes there isn't anything to say and there are pauses in conversations and there is no need to talk all the time. But I left that interaction realizing that while I can be quite content spending shared time in silence, not everyone feels the same way about that.
Later I told my friend in a somewhat apologetic way that I was aware I'm not always the best conversationalist. She responded reassuringly that another friend of hers talks non-stop and this is far more tiring and annoying than a relaxed quiet presence. This was helpful, but when I shared it with J it was also an opportunity talk about how we feel alienated from each other because I don't communicate much.
It's not just silence. It's not just me. He spends a lot of time lately on programming projects, and I hang out beside him doing my own thing. But what I'm doing isn't all that mentally stimulating. A lot of what I do hints at some absence in me of internal drive and an intrinsic desire to keep exploring and growing.
I want to learn social skills. But I'm increasingly becoming afraid and isolated, preferring to hide out that fraak up yet another potential relationship. They start off fine and then they fall flat. Because they never get past a surface level of positive interaction. Once a person wants something deeper, it becomes evident that I don't quite know how to do that.
J and I have developed a deep connection over 3 years. He's sympathetic to a lot of what I'm trying to sort out. He's even sorted out some of the same autistic issues I'm dealing with. He can be a guide, breaking down some of the rules and directions/opportunities for learning. He can also get tired. Or wonder, how much is he supposed to just accept it all and forget about me changing, and how much can he push me toward change? Is he allowed to feel lonely, and angry about feeling alone?
I think he is. But my own tendency to take all of this insight and become overwhelmed and lost and then isolated, further pushing myself into a vacant place of understimulation and depression, means that our desire to hold hands for this long walk is perhaps waning. Our fear that we will be unable to prevent a kind of drift apart until our marriage is just an empty series of motions, that we aren't peers but roles, of functional male and helpless hapless female who is never sure of what parts aren't disabled, whether any direction that pushes beyond the safe borders of autistic comfort is even worth trying.
Burnout makes me scared.
The path -- the long walk -- makes me hopeful that there is somewhere to go.
I'm having a bout of debilitating pain that rules out doing much of anything.
I'm looking forward to a support group on Thursday (the pain should be gone by then)
For it's a group of other women with AS and generally I can relate with them and find useful insights that help me with some of the more troubled thinking above.
I'm not there at acceptance. Neither is my partner. I'm not sure I want to just accept everything (in the sense that none of it can change). I think some things can change. They have to change. They don't work. Like, pretending to hear someone when I haven't, just doesn't work.
I'm lost.
not so joyful, I guess.
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