Tag Archives: lonely

03/5/12

Stolen Identity – Getting It Back II

When I finally found a friend here she seemed so much like me I was ecstatic and thanked God for sending her. She seemed so bubbly and fun. She shared enthusiasm for learning about God and the history of the Bible like me. She loved to dance, sing, and pray. We seemed to relate so much. I noticed, but ignored that she was also very needy, insecure, hurt, and was an unbalanced soul. (Not that I was (am) balanced, but these were things I should have paid attention to.) I thought God sent her to me to love and accept to lead her to become strong in her gifts, and walk in her true identity. This is something that moves me very much. It can also be detrimental to me if people have wrong motives, or are not truly seeking what they claim to be. I had not realized how often I fell for people in all kinds of relationships who use me until I sat down recently to define what healthy relationships are and what they should look like.

I have been this way since a child naïve and gullible in relationships.

I always want to help people. It drove my mom batty — I didn’t bring home stray animals I brought home broken people. I thought they wanted help. I would see the potential in them and wanted to help them walk in that potential. It brings me great delight to see people operating in their talents, and expressing themselves freely even a tiny bit. This woman I am talking about knew how to play me with that…many people have. She would make it look like she had understood or grown in an area, but then confuse me when she seemed to be regressing. I would then loop with a billion questions running through my mind. I was spending a large amount of my time at church in the evenings with this new friend of mine. Who caused me constant confusion because her words were so mixed, and twisted. They sounded right and wrong at the same time. I do not know how to explain it. This woman had three children as well we both served in many areas. I would leave after dinner; the kids went to bed at 8 pm so David just needed to put them to bed.

I would stay pretty late some nights because she was like a vacuum.

She wouldn’t stop talking and I felt bad for cutting her off. She would call our house at all hours of the day to “pray”. She would claim to get “visions and prophecies” from the Lord that she needed to talk to me about. I was uneasy about all of this, but didn’t know why. I did not entertain her by validating them or speaking about them for long. I always directed her into a critically thinking process though I didn’t realize that at the time. It was actually helping me gain clarity for later events that were to transpire. I would feel sick and icky when she claimed to have something from the Lord. And that made me feel like I was being judgmental, or wrong. I thought maybe I was jealous or something. I felt like well she seems to have her life altogether and she is hearing from the Lord I am a mess and not hearing this stuff.

I must be wrong.

I did later discover that her “visions and prophecies” were nothing more than information she had extracted from others in the church. I did have my radar up, I am very skeptical and have been very skeptical of anyone throwing around prophecies and visions and claiming to speak for God. She would all the sudden have scripture that “must” be shared interrupting our dinnertime. She would need a ride, her kids would need to be picked up, she didn’t have a computer and she wanted to learn about all of the things I had shared with her. She wanted to complain about her husband, and would get upset at me when I did not participate in doing the same about David. I don’t care how angry or frustrated I am with David I will not speak ill of him. There is a big difference between venting about things and attacking a person’s character, and that is what was happening – attacks. Her attacks started spreading about other people besides her husband. I cannot handle that type of thing it was making me physically and emotionally drained.

I did not understand boundaries, especially when it came to spiritual matters.

I continued to do all kinds of things for her. I researched for her. I let her borrow several of my books, I lent her many of my worship CD’s. (By the way I never got anything back even after asking for them to be returned.) She had no respect for my time, family, or the fact that I had three young ones, one of which was seriously developmentally delayed and needed any additional care I could provide. I got to the point where I stopped answering the phone. I told her that the phone caused Daniel to go into meltdowns from the unexpected ringing, and he didn’t understand what it was. She continued to call. Eventually we had to turn the ringer off completely. The phone ringing would send him into an entire day of meltdown mode. I did start to put up walls a little bit at a time because I was too exhausted taking Daniel to therapy, working with him at home, doing preschool homeschooling, and I started writing Bible curriculum for kindergarten to 6th grade at church (for free). While still serving in the dance ministry on Wednesday nights, prayer ministry on Thursday nights, and 4-5 years old Sunday school class on Sunday mornings.

She never asked me how I was doing.

She never asked if I needed help with the kids. She would only ask if Daniel was showing progress because she was “praying” for him all the time. I would try to share what it was like during a meltdown, or how tired I was with her just because I needed to. I was not asking for sympathy. Any time I tried to share with her, or any of the other women I was told how other people had it much worse. I was made to feel like I was not spiritual enough to handle my life. They considered autism a spiritual matter so if Daniel was having problems it was an attack from the devil. This was not a small church. It was (is) filled with all types of people and occupations. I say that because for a while I wondered how I could have stayed in such a place, but the reality is they think that they are right and doing the loving thing. And for the most part they are decent, caring everyday people. They believe that their actions and words are loving.

My mind wanted to make it simple and make them either good or bad.

I do not think they are purposely being deceptive, or unloving. However, I think it is a harmful ideology and damaging to look at autism in such a broad and negative light. It does not help the parents or children dealing with autism issues. I have encountered many people who believe that autism is a spiritual issue and that I find scary. I want so much to look at all of this in black-and-white terms, and dismiss people who think that way, but I can’t. I have served with many people who think these things, I have family who think these things, and I know that they are not mean or evil. I cannot understand why they continue to think this way, but I know it is not meant to be mean. I hope one day they can see differently. I know, I got sidetracked. She would cut me off when I tried to explain anything about autism. Then, she would start on a spiritual tangent. I wasn’t being “unspiritual”; I just wanted someone to understand. I wanted someone to tell me that I was not alone.

I wanted a person to talk to about the issues with my little boy.

I wanted someone to understand how much pain it was to watch him suffer and not know what to do. I wanted someone to just listen to me. I wanted a friend who cared about me, and my family. I did try to find autism support groups, but it turned out to be a negative experience as well. I gave up. I take the fault with her somewhat because I didn’t listen to my gut, but I honestly have not had a clear comprehension about boundaries until the last several months. This all played into my social confusion. It all felt wrong, I felt violated, I felt used, but I also felt that I must be wrong. I thought that I was being unloving and uncaring. I thought I was judging her. I felt like I was not being spiritual enough. Things started to unravel the more she felt confident with the Biblical information I had been feeding her. I started to notice that she had taken on my personality completely. People started telling me things that she was sharing with them that was word for word from my mouth.

She started telling the pastors these “great” ideas that were mine.

She started to get so bold as to take my very words that I had spoken moments earlier and say them in front of me as her own to someone else. I was so confused. She started to dress like me. She started to talk like me. She started to pray like me. She started to dance like me. She had become me only a more frazzled, and chaotic version. And I didn’t think that was possible! :-) I started to get paranoid and wondered if I had been copying her all along. I started to feel like I was losing my mind because I could not determine any longer what was me and what was her. I became terrified that people would think that I was copying her.

That somehow I was a big phony baloney!

Thankfully I was not alone is my observations and I had David and my mom around. There were a few other people who pointed it out as well which helped me to know that I was no making it up. My mom and David continued to tell me that the woman had problems. They would point it out when she was copying me or stealing my words. They told me that I should cut myself off from her. They told me that she was poison because she was causing me so much confusion and disrupting our lives. I just couldn’t get my mind around someone doing that. It made no sense and it caused me to loop. To make matters worse I was not sleeping much at all. Daniel would be up all hours of the night and any spare time I had was spent on writing curriculum and preparing our preschool stuff. (Oh, and add OCD cleaning and an addiction to Enviga drinks that have aspartame that also make my brain get all kinds of messed up into the mix. I don’t even like green tea or carbonated drinks! I didn’t even realize it was a diet drink. Yes, I was losing my mind.)

I had been observing, analyzing, storing the data, and looping until finally it all clicked one day.

Coming up next Stolen Identity – Getting It Back III…(A little reflection and a lot resolve.)


 

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02/22/12

Facebook All Up In My Twitter

I chose that title because I think it is hilarious! Bwaaa Haaa I am totally on a Facebook rant I have no real purpose other than speaking randomly-chaotic-silly spews of pandemonium. Ok, the truth? I have been laughing at that saying all day and wanted to use it as a title and I wanted to use the word pandemonium because I have been fixated on words today. They make me smile. I have accepted that I am in yet another information consuming loop. This causes me to get all frenzied and I have learned how it can be fun instead of mind halting. I have also learned that if I do not let my silliness out all of the information will cause me to spiral into a serious mode and I will feel the need to change the world TODAY AT ALL COST! Welcome to one of my information overloaded mind nonsensical posts.

I have voiced my issues with Facebook before…my personal account not my MindRetrofit account.

I like my Mind account it is nice and quiet. There are no people on there making me socially confused, or giving me anxiety. I do not have to see family members play pretend nice. I do not have to filter through “reading” between the lines. It is simple, clear, and not a lot of hooey. I like my Twitter account because of that as well. I follow people who are clear, funny, and give me great things to read. I do not do much on my Twitter account other than post my recent blog posts or poems. I can’t really — I do not do that well at typing on the fly. I end up with horrible grammatical errors that send me into a panic. I also end up saying things that I either later regret or someone misunderstands.

At first I thought that this social networking would be a good thing for me. 

Overall it is not bad as long as I limit my interactions with people who confuse me. I am a little freaky about how many friends I have too. It really only has to do with numbers, not people. Hard to explain. On my personal account I started to get panicky when I exceeded 50 friends. People from my past started popping up and wanting to be friends. Some of them I ignored others I was happy to see. Now that I am at 111 I do not want any more friends it’s nothing personal I just want to keep 111. If I could get a round of people to friend me and get to 122 that may work. BUT that would be it 122 is my limit on my personal account. (Strange, I know.) I actually did not want to go past 99, but I was forced to because of family. Again some of them I do not mind, others um…no comment. I do have them hidden, but I know that they are still there. I hate the feeling of being obligated to keep someone as a “friend” who is not. I really hate it when I know for a fact that they do not care in the slightest about me or my family. Unless of course I am “failing”.

I sometimes wish I did not set up a personal account. 

At times I go through frantic posting phases with all of the new information that I find. Or posts that I read that I think are informative and awesome. I pretty much stopped posting photos now because no one cares. I get hit with the feeling like people think I am stupid, or something. It mainly happens when I have posted things that are my special interest about science or math (numbers) only to see other people post it months later as a new revelation. I find it ironic that they would miss my post when they were on FB at the same time. It’s possible, but after it happening several times it makes me wonder. The other thing is they do nothing at all, they say nothing. And I get all out of sorts because I cannot understand why no one would comment on something so amazingly, awesomely, way cooler than anything else going on in the world. Or at least click the “like” button.

Hello!

I do not know why I automatically think they must me ignoring me, or think that I must not understand what I am posting. I don’t know what my problem is. It is all social confusion, I guess. It does not help my “Angel is invisible and does not really exist” feelings; I will say. I cannot bring myself to defriend anyone though. It would hurt me too much to defriend them. (insert over-the-top eye roll here) I think my biggest problem is that I do not understand what people mean by their words. Let me make it clear this is a limited number of people that I am referring to, but it only takes one to send me into a mind spiral of confusion. I have gotten a lot better with this though it still can happen. The bounce back for my brain is much quicker now. It seems that I have a group of “friends” who use FB as a Passive/Aggressive Wonderland. On my dad’s side of the family there are hidden messages in their speech. I have always been confused by it and only figured out this was happening a few years ago without true comprehension…until this past year. However, the damage has been done. I ended up with friends and significant others who did the same thing to me. They would all get frustrated and upset at me when I didn’t do the “hidden” thing that I was supposed to do.

It is all so confusing.

It happened in other social dynamics too. I could not tell their tone, or what their non-verbal cues were so I did not do what was expected of me. I did not say what I was supposed to say. I find a lot of that stuff going on FB with certain personality types. I understand that now, some people I am perfectly fine it is the handful who throw me and get me all confused. I have learned my lesson and stay off of there when I am mentally, or emotionally exhausted. I know better than to read certain people’s posts or I just hide them when I’ve had enough. I didn’t realize why I disliked FB so much until today. It is not FB really it is the fakeness that comes out on there. It is the high school-ish feelings of being left out, ignored, not part of the “in” crowd. I have never been in the “in” crowd. I am all over the place. I am my own crowd with all my imaginations and whatnot’s. :-)

I like all kinds of people who are real and enjoy speaking their minds without judgment.

I get bent out of shape when I read comments that are judgmental, or condemning of other beliefs and ideas. It can send me into a frenzy. I recall one instance that happened with my cousin. (However, not limited to one that would be another reason for my lack of commenting or posting on FB.)They posted something about the U.S. being a certain type of nation — I pulled up a study with graph charts and everything and proved that they were incorrect. They deleted my comment. I emailed and asked why my comment had been deleted, they said that it “Deterred from the message that they were trying to make”. The message was unequivocally WRONG!

It did not matter to them at all.

What they believed, which is dividing and casts people of different beliefs into a “we vs. them” category, was more important than trying to bridge the divide. I was not rude about it I shared with a “Why don’t you think about this?” kind of attitude. This is another reason why I have to stay off at times. When people put up their views as absolute, but will not even consider a discussion. They will not consider in the least bit that there are other people who may be offended or even hurt by their posts. It makes me want to give a grand history lesson about our country, or send them the cycles of U.S. History  (The cycles is a theory, but it is very interesting and it helped me to see some of my black-and-white thinking.) so they can study for themselves where they fall into. Sigh…Not to condemn or judge, but in hopes that their eyes could be opened to seeing people instead of labels. I would like to send them a lot of different things. I will not share them all here today in hopes of not getting sidetracked.

It hurts too badly sometimes to see judgmental and harsh posts of any kind.

I know I can be too sensitive that is why I have taken to controlling my FB personal account when in “hypersensitive” mode. It drives me batty to see those things — it really sends me when I know information about their own lives that could be judged by the same harsh terms, but they would be deeply hurt if someone were to do so. I do not think it is right to judge them either, but I am making a point here. Despite all of that I still find some great pleasures on there as well. I “like” quite a few pages. I have my world of musicians, poetry pages, philosophy, sciences, various blogs, and other aspie’s that I thoroughly enjoy seeing on my facebook page. I like how I can go on there and see new music, see how my aspie’s friends are being silly, or autism parents sharing what their day is like with their child(ren) on the spectrum. It helps me to see that there are others who are experiencing the same things I am in a day. I like going to my Twitter account and reading great links, and finding new resources. My mind can get so consumed with things and I forget that I am not alone in this. Facebook and Twitter have helped me feel connected and for that I am thankful. Google+ well that is a little secret right now….

It makes me feel a bit better knowing that others are on Facebook all up in their Twitter too.

My recent FB interactions have stirred me to rewatch certain documentaries.

Purple State of Mind: Official Film Trailer

God In America

I cannot remember if I have shared about Generation Theory before I was fixated on it a couple of years ago and I constantly see connections to it. I find it very captivating indeed.

Life Course Associates (Strauss-Howe website theorists responsible for Generation Theory)

Generational Theories by Strauss and Howe


 

 

 

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02/6/12

Valentine’s Day Gives Me The Red’s

Holly Golightly: You know those days when you get the mean reds?

Paul Varjak: The mean reds, you mean like the blues?

Holly Golightly: No. The blues are because you’re getting fat and maybe it’s been raining too long, you’re just sad that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid and you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?

~Quote from the film Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Original quote from the book can be read here.

In the book the reds are compared to angst. Yes, that would be a good way to describe what Valentine’s Day has always been for me. It all started when I was but a wee little lad back in the hills of… Oh, wait. I mean it started in grade school. First off this “holiday” celebration has never made sense to me. It didn’t help that my mother thought it was ridiculous as well. I shall say it is ridiculous to us as we know it today, and the opinion is solely based upon the demand of cards with hearts, candies, or jewelry or whatever people do. I don’t know this is one of those times when I have been called cold and a BEEP! :-) I love reading about the history of it though. At History.com they had a good quick read on the topic.

I do not mind if others enjoy it and get all the lavish, lovely gifts they want.

It’s not about that at all. I will go back to my childhood. While in school starting from Kindergarten up to 6th grade we were required to get valentines for the class. This was a huge source of anxiety (angst) for me. I had several reasons for this causing such a panic. I would completely forget about it, and then the teacher would start talking about it the beginning of February. We would begin to do crafts, and talk about the party we would have on that day. I would begin to get panicky when we started the crafts. I would get so nervous because my mom would ALWAYS forget to get the box of valentines that I needed. I would have to remind her every night. I cannot think of one single year she remembered. On occasions because of my complete anxiety freak outs she would take me to pick out my own.

The majority of the time she picked them out.

My mom does not put as much importance into words as I do so the cards she chose always fell short. Plus she would forget what the “in” thing was for the year and I would end up with “blah” types of cards. All of these things mattered since I was already the odd one in the class, my valentines would be a source of ridicule. I would get anxious because no matter how long I was in class with these kids I never remembered their names. The only kids that I would remember were the ones that I sat next to the whole year — even then I would have problems at times. I usually did not say anyone’s name. Another source of anxiety was that the people who made fun of me throughout the year were forced to give me a card and I was forced to give them a card. I would get confused if they gave me a card that seemed too nice. I would give them the most neutral one I could find.

I would comb over the cards.

I meticulously pulled them all out and read them trying to find the exact words that I wanted to say to each kid. I may not have remembered their names, but I had already studied each one of them. I knew who I liked and who I didn’t even if they never spoke to me. I liked them based on how they treated others or behaved in class. I also would observe their quirks, and things that I noticed that they liked. I would choose my cards according to what I had observed. As I sat with my list of names — I could remember their face as long as I had their names written down on a list in front of me. It would drive my mom batty when I sat there for hours writing out these valentines. All I was doing was writing their names, but it took forever. I was putting a lot of thought into the cards, and I took my time writing out their names neatly.

It was very hard for me to write neatly so I had to concentrate to do so. (Still)

She would tell me: “Just write their names and be done!” She didn’t understand that I couldn’t. I HAD to do it that way. These cards were supposed to reflect my feelings about this person as good as possible with a Loony Tune or E.T. valentine. OK! There was the additional stress of me getting cards. I would get the cards and some kids would purposely leave me out, or make fun of the cards that I gave them. As I read my cards I didn’t know how to interpret them. I thought that they all did what I did. I thought that the cards were extremely important and it was a day to set aside any ill feelings and give some valentine’s niceness. I did have a couple of people play tricks on me and tell me that a boy liked me or something. I never knew what to do with that.

I was able to pull off my coolness in front of them, but would go home and loop about it.

I would loop about it for days. I wondered if they were messing with me or not. It didn’t matter if the boy liked me — I wanted to know if they were messing with me. I couldn’t tell and it would drive me to panic attacks that I had to hide because my mom would not understand. I would hide away in my room, and cry because of the confusion. The confusion was (is) the worst part of all social situations. It hurts me deeply to be confused. I have spoken of this before, but it literally feels as if I can feel the disconnect going on in my brain. I desperately want it to connect, but it won’t and the only thing that goes through my head is: “I don’t know!” I can’t make me know either, it feels like circuits are leaping and I see black.

When I became an adult I continued to give valentines.

I enjoyed being in control of them. I enjoyed picking out kids valentines and giving them to people. It made people smile. It doesn’t matter how old you are, it feels good to get a valentine on that day. However, my attention to the valentines did not change and I would start looking at them the second they hit the shelves. I would finally make my choice, and then go through them to pick out the perfect ones for each person. I did this all the way up to my last job. (Technically not my last the last one only had three of us in the office, and I did not buy a box of valentines.) I believe I picked out The Simpsons, if I recall correctly.

It was something like 10 years ago.  

It doesn’t matter the fact is, I combed over each one and chose them specifically for each person. I used to get them scripture cards too. I didn’t do it to be all “spiritual” on them — I did it because I thought about them. I cared about them, and I wanted them to know. I couldn’t say those things, but I tried through making fudge or giving little cards and other little ways. I think part of the reason I did that was so no one would feel what I felt on that day. I do not celebrate Valentines like others do. I never want flowers, candies, jewelry, or things like that. My dad would get me stuffed animals, he got them for me until David and I got married. I wish he would send me a big huge stuffed owl, raven, or black cat!! Hee hee

I do feel a little bad for some of the guys in my past who tried to get me something on Valentines.

I usually got so angry at them because of the gifts or plans they had prepared because they had nothing to do with my likes or interests. I am pretty easy I do not know why it was so difficult. (UM…easy in getting gifts for! Clarifying.) Music or books one can never go wrong, unless it is some cheesy romance novel or if they got some sort of mainstream type of music. Well…that depends too. Ok, poetry? :-) Alright anything black-and-white! (Almost anything) Ha ha ha I am just digging a hole here, I will stop.

I do try to make it a fun day with the kids, and we do some cool crafts and stuff.

I think it is so strange that I still get overwhelmed with that anxiety before and on that day. It seems so silly, but it was for a long stretch of my childhood. It did cause social trauma at times being picked on or being made fun of or tricked. It caused a lot of confusion. I would spend days reading the valentines I received wondering what the words meant based on the person’s previous actions towards me. That never helped. The party was frustrating because it messed up our schedule for the day, and every teacher would have it at different times of the day. As I got older it had added emotions that I did not understand. In high school it was a big deal for the girls, and they would receive crazy gifts like roses or boxes of chocolate. Then, they would act like they were all great or something because of what they got.

I found it all odd.

I do not recall what my boyfriend at the time did for me — I know it was not anything like that. It was all so confusing to me I blocked a lot during those few years in high school. Other people I dated tried to do nice things, but I know I said rude things about it not intending to be rude. I most likely said something like: “Why would you get me that? or “Why would you take me here?” or “I don’t even like that!” with a nice snarl face. Only to finally realize it at this very moment how incredibly hurtful that could be. Oops! Sorry fellas. :-)   Yes, well that does not help my angst in the least! I am finished with this before I remember anything else. Despite my strange anxiety for the coming Valentines, I hope you all have the best day and get or do what you like! Presuming you will be celebrating that day…

So Happy Valentine’s Day early so I can eliminate some anxiety here. Lol!  


 

 

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01/12/12

Faking Happy III

Part of the problem as well is I think everyone else has no problems. I fall into the line of thinking that people have not felt this sort of thing — I feel that mainly with people in my personal life. I look at them and think they have it altogether and want to know why I do not. I do not know how to separate my own feelings of not wanting to hurt anyone from expressing myself. It makes me ache so badly at the thought of telling someone what I am feeling and then see it hurt them, or make them angry. I do not know how to process my emotions or what I am feeling by hurting or causing anger in another person. I am willing to die a slow aching death inside instead of telling someone how I feel fully.

I have instead built walls.

Only later to explode with emotion trying to force people to leave or I become numb to them so that I can finally say what I need to. Then, I wait in anticipation because I do not know how they are going to respond. Somehow I have to train my mind to be able to speak up and say that my pains and hurts matter. I have to express it even if it does affect someone else in a negative way or they do not give a flying fahrvergnügen. (It popped in my head and sounded funny so I used it.) David has been exposed to my working through expressing myself it has been very hard for him at times. I seem to not be as affected when he expresses his emotions to me — I think it may be from my years of listening to others express themselves.

David had no idea that I have been so unhappy for all of these years.

He had no idea I had been depressed for years, especially when we lived out West. He had no idea I was holding on to a broken heart from a long time ago. He had no idea that I was hiding behind a shadow of him. He had no idea that I was hiding so much of myself all of these years. Honestly either did I. He has lived with me 24/7 for years now and he did not know. I did what I have done my entire life, I pushed back any of my doubts, fears, and questions for the sake of trying to make/keep people happy. It was not because he did anything to make me do that, I just assumed the role that I had been given since childhood. I pushed back all of my emotions because I did not think that they mattered, or that I was making them up. I am saying this again, that I would be rejected, or that I would hurt someone. I say “rejection” often because it is a big one, and as I have read around the blogosphere many people feel it.

I wanted everyone else to be happy, to the point of my unhappiness.

As I have taken a look at my past relationships with everyone I have seen many things with clarity. I have stepped away from denial and looked at them again — there have been true moments of understanding. This is hard for me to accept, but no matter how much they said they cared about me they still treated me like they didn’t. I have been an afterthought in many people’s lives that I have continued to regard as close and dear. The only way I can understand is by looking at them through a spectrum. One end of the spectrum is unconditional love the other end is complete hatred, most people fall into the middle even when they claim unconditional love. Maybe that is their definition of it. Maybe that is all they are capable of. Maybe my expectations are too high, but they have been too low for long enough so we’ll see how things go.

The focus has to be on the relationship.

Defining a relationship is a hard one for me since I have only known to suppress myself in them. I have read all kinds of things, I have written about it, and still my mind cannot grasp it. I guess I have to just look at the basics. Relationships are mutual in communication, trying to understand each other, sharing, being honest, and I believe acceptance is key. The other thing for a relationship to work is asking: “How does the other person define the relationship?”  I believe a lot of my confusion lies in, once again, my definitions of the relationships I have with people. I think my lacking theory of mind has caused me to believe that others feel the same way I do about them. The times that I discovered they do not or they do not place the amount of importance on things like I do, causes me to get hurt or confused.

I can confuse people because I am normally fine with limited contact.

I can go back and forth from not contacting at all to bombarding them with emails or fb posts. I don’t get upset if I do not hear from people all the time. I only get anxious when I am not sure what the relationship is. I can go months without talking to someone if I know how they feel about me. If I am unsure, I get loopy that is mostly with new relationships and family. An example is when I first became friends with someone online, both of us being Aspies with similar issues made it hard at first. We were both worried that the other would misunderstand, and leave. Or that we would offend each other, but after a month or so of us saying “I am not leaving, you cannot offend me, I fully accept you” we finally felt safe. (She rocks!) And that my friends is a loving thing to do for an Aspie. :-)

I do see my patterns, but it may take a while to implement.

I think if I define what a healthy relationship is to me it will be very beneficial. I have spent so many years focused on what relationships mean to others. I know that if I no longer want to be hurt I need to change some things. I found a quote the other day that said: “I don’t know how to be someone that you would miss.” When I first read it I felt like it rang true with me, I felt like I wish I could be a person that someone would miss. The more I thought about it I got angry, and thought that quote may have it wrong. It should be something like: “It’s a shame you don’t know that I am someone to be missed”, or something much cleverer. :-)   Actually Lisa from Alienhippy shared this quote the other day and I guess it makes it quite clear.

“Stop spending time with the wrong people. Life is too short to be with anyone who sucks the happiness out of you like marrow from a bone. If someone wants you in their life, they’ll make room. Never fight for a spot or sell yourself to someone who overlooks your worth. And, it’s not the people that stand by your side when you’re at your best, but the ones who stand beside you when you’re at your worst that are your true friends.”

 ~ Dr. Christiane Northrup~

I don’t know how to walk in this quote, but I will try…

I read this quote the other day too.

“The meek shall inherit the earth because the aggressive people of the world will trample their face into it!” Ouch!

Disclaimer: What I have shared may have repeating information about relationships, I cannot keep track of my roaming mind. If indeed you have read things from me that are the same or quite similar well just remember I can be very loopy. However, every loop I go through I get a bit more clarity so enjoy the ride. :-)


 

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01/12/12

Faking Happy II

Before I go into this post, I would like to share that my source of shutdown this past week was triggered by numerous things. I completely forgot how fragile I am in January. I have triggers for this month, and no matter how great I feel during/after the holidays it is inevitable that meltdowns/shutdowns are going to happen. I am writing this to say to myself and anyone else who may be feeling what I am feeling “It is ok.” Holidays are a lot and we need release. My emotions were triggered even further by the feeling of being left out by my family. It happens every year, it happens when I am with them or not. The fact is, I do not think that I will ever feel comfortable with them. I need to accept that. The exception being my aunt that I love dearly and who means the world to me. She does accept me and our family the way we are. When New Year’s weekend came and went I was overwhelmed with feeling invisible.

Every year the family meets at her house for the New Year’s weekend to celebrate.

They celebrate Christmas as well at that time. As I saw the pictures of everyone, I got engulfed with emotions that I am not sure how to describe fully. It brought about fears and anxieties about moving back there. Shortly after that I began to feel as if my aunt was angry at me, or upset for some reason that I concocted. I tried desperately to stop the loops, but the thought of losing my aunt and then not knowing how things would work with us moving back consumed me. I went into a panic and emailed her. I was devastated when I had not heard back from her fearing that she indeed was upset, and I was not making it up. I forced myself to work through it, and came to the conclusion that I was overreacting and to wait it out. I got resolved in my mind, after my panic and shutdown of course. Long story short, for some reason my email did not go through until later in the week.

This is part of my process.

I am looking at and discerning my irrational thoughts.  I am deciphering who accepts me fully, and deciding what types of relationships we should have. In the past my only options were all or nothing. This is a damaging thinking pattern, especially when it is based on irrational fears. Although I will say that many of my fears are not unfounded, I have been treated like crap. I do not need to make my choices based on social confusion, or feeling far too inadequate to understand. I am seeking to base it on a balanced mind frame. I have been unable to share with my aunt the past three months what I have been going through. When I finally could write out my words, I was fearful of the outcome. I had no reason to be with her, but because of me being overly sensitive this month with emotions, sensory, and working through everything that I have been sharing on here, I could not think straight. All of that being said here I go.

Starting from the end of Faking Happy I

I do cause myself much pain by holding in my words, and not expressing myself to certain people in my life. I do not know how, and until I feel comfortable I am not going to. This one is very hard to work through because I have managed to fake being happy and hide my feelings for so long that I truly do not know how to express them with clarity. It makes it even more difficult because I am still unable to know what I am hurt, angry, or frustrated by specifically. I am not altogether able to pinpoint what it is that has hurt me or is hurting me. The only thing I can determine is that it hurts or it feels wrong. The only thing I know how to do is write them through poetry or fiction. I still am not able to figure it out right away.

I am also learning how to express myself when I feel happy.

I felt real happiness this last month. I was happy because I conquered some pretty big giants that were in my life. Now I am facing other ones. I mentioned that David took me to a ballet in 2008, he had no idea how moved I was until the other day when I voiced it to him. He knew that I liked ballet, my mom and sisters made darn sure that I got to go by insisting that they would watch the kids. I had never left them with anyone at that point for any amount of time. They knew how important the ballet was to me though. David knew that I would be happy, but he barely remembered it because my response to him seemed very subtle. He said he remembered that I sat there quietly through the whole performance, which is very unusual for me. He had no idea that I was so happy that I had tears of joy, or that it meant that much to me. I thought it was clear how much it meant to me.

I wasn’t. I only thanked him and talked about it a little afterwards.

He had no idea that I studied the booklet from the show, and then researched the group online. I didn’t share any of that. He didn’t even know that I kept it and the tickets. I had waited my whole life to see a real ballet group perform, and I felt too vulnerable to share any joy. Possibly since I had only shared with myself my joys for so long I didn’t know how. More likely it is both. David mentioned the other day that I did not cry about anything except for people I was praying for when we met. I actually didn’t cry until two or three years after we were together. It was after the twins were born. I think my tears came from being completely overwhelmed and exhausted from the changes of being a mother, taking care of the twins, being completely isolated, and Daniel not sleeping, crying/screaming for hours, not eating and various other things.

I was sleep deprived and had sensory issues from everything.

I didn’t know how to express any of that either. I couldn’t understand why I was having problems when so many other mothers seem to have no issues, and that is a whole other story. I do not know how to express myself to a person and not feel guilt or fear that they will reject me or my feelings. The scripts that I have are of people getting angry at me for voicing my emotions, or telling me that I was being foolish for feeling those things. Those are forms of emotional abandonment. I also get struck with the fear that they will leave because they think that I am too much or that my problems reveal what a mental case I am. I do not mean that in a bad way, please do not get offended I do not know how else to word it. I have not felt safe to share my real joys, or how much I care about things because people have hurt me when they discover my passions.

My problems are not any different from a lot of people.

To be continued in Faking Happy III (This got much longer than I anticipated…sorry. :-) )


 

 

 

 

 

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01/5/12

Wait For it…

Yes, hello sadness cycle there you are…Ironically every time I am in my “happy” cycle I tend to fool myself into believing that it will last. I was debating whether or not I wanted to “out” myself since I have been on such a good run, but the truth is, I fooled myself. It is an odd occasion where I am not feeling both happy/sad at the same time. I should start charting the degrees of what I am feeling. Today I am 51.8% sad and 48.2% happy. I am being consistent. It was not until yesterday, when I felt completely overwhelmed and started to have thoughts of not mattering to people that I realized this is truly a pattern of mine.

The things leading up to my current feelings are very clear.

I have exposed myself with information that I feel is making me naked in front of the whole world. I then, felt foolish over the things I shared. I felt like it was silly to feel exposed over what type of music I like or that I always wanted to go to the ballet. Most people do not find that exposing at all. However, to me I am sharing things that by my now expression of liking them is more intense. I have the feeling that NOW everyone else will know what I am thinking or feeling. I have voiced my liking for things before with no real consequence to me because I kept hidden my true feelings in my mind. Once I openly confessed how much I cared for something in my recent posts it was like my words revealed the real me, but to other people they were just words. I tend to forget that people do not think of them like I do.

Words and music are very personal things to me.

Many times I feel like I have closer relations with them than people…Ok, I actually do. I have deep attachments to some of these things that I have been sharing lately. Then, after I have shared them I relived past meltdowns/shutdowns, and other experiences about some of the things that I have exposed. Once those enter the picture I feel guilt or shame, or the worst possible feeling in the world for me — stupid. If I spiral down to the point of feeling like an idiot, well then I have mastered my perfect point of depression cycle.

I am not there yet, but that is also the reason for this post – to stop it.

What makes me feel stupid? It is not the feeling of lack of intelligence about certain topics, or questioning my ability to think and reason through most things. It is not about my ability to be educated, or feeling that I lack the ability to regurgitate information acquired in an articulate manner. No, it is not that at all, though what I am about to say does trigger doubt in my intellect sometimes. It is feeling like I am being made fun of, being misunderstood, treated poorly, feeling like I am misunderstanding others, and I cannot figure out what it is true or not. It is wondering if my aunt is angry with me for some reason though I have done nothing to make her angry, and if she was she would tell me. It is feeling anxious because I did not call my dad and step mom on Christmas because I couldn’t from social stress. It is the feeling of being invisible with all of my family members on fb while they are all “living” it up with each other and nary a Merry Christmas or Happy New Year sent my way.

I did email my dad that was all I could do.

David skyped his dad and step mom and, then his mom and her side of the family and I could barely get off of the computer long enough to say: “Hi”. My mom was here when David skyped his dad so I could say: “Hi” and not have to worry about talking very much. David did thank me for my feeble attempts to be social though I am a good faker in that area it tends to eat at me and gnaw at my insides until I crack. I have another post that I have been working through titled “Faking Happy”. There is a statement in there from David that I believe is worth sharing more than once. He said to me several days ago: “You have the ability to stay in long relationships completely unhappy, and no one knows it except for you.”

Yea, that spun me into several paths of thought.

It also brought tears that were completely unexpected. I can go through all of my long-term relationships and see this, with family, friends, ex’s, and even in my workplace. I was willing to work to the point of my complete illness both mental and physical because I did not want to hurt my bosses or upset them. These were bosses who used my abilities for their gain and did not treat me right at all. I remembered the last boss I had at a major retailer. We had an agreement I would come to his store if he got me in to do another round of what they called “Round Robin” sessions. The Round Robins were a day involving three sets of interviews with usually three executives all at the same time including store managers, district managers, and the Human Relations district manager. The regional manger would be there for certain positions. It was very challenging, and not the best thing for a person with anxiety issues or Aspergers. If I had known then I wouldn’t have been so hard on myself, and felt like such a failure.

I had gone through them twice already, and felt I could finally do well through them and get promoted.

There is a whole story with all of that, but basically my anxiety would get the best of me and my true self would not show. They always commented about me “not looking them in the eyes” and felt that I was too insecure and timid. HA! Me timid? I may be a lot of things, but when it comes to work I have never been timid. I was good at every job I did there and I knew it. I was a good trainer and most of the time a good leader when I did not have to deal with social nonsense.

Back to the story, I had been working over night for several weeks and was out of the loop.

I came in one morning to discover that the Round Robins were going on that day. My boss failed to tell me, and he did not even sign me up. He forgot about me even though he had been walking with me every night, complimenting me, and was even amazed at the amount of work I had accomplished in such little time. The people who I was talking to could tell that I was beyond upset, I asked where he was and they told me that he was part of the interviewing sessions.

I walked out.

They tried to stop me and calm me down, but I was done and I was not coming back. I sobbed uncontrollably the whole way home. I sobbed for hours, and I did not leave my bed. I felt such excruciating pain in my body that I cannot even describe. I felt broken. I felt rejected, invisible, and I could not understand why someone could not care the least little bit about me when I had poured my life into that store for him. Well for the company, but I was devoted to him as a boss. It triggered every moment in time where I put my trust in an authority figure, proved my loyalty and abilities only to feel trampled on and ignored. He called me leaving messages for me to come back, I did not pick up the phone I heard his messages on the machine.

I did come back and he apologized over and beyond.

He was honest in telling me that he didn’t have a good reason he had just forgotten. He forgot me. Do you know what that did to a person like me? It solidified the already pounding voices that had told me I did not matter. My hard work and over 60 hours a week that I put in did not matter. The fact that I drove 45 minutes to work, was there on time, stayed as long as he needed, fixed things in other departments for team leaders who were not fulfilling their job duties, and spending my days off if needed there…did not matter. My reactions may seem a bit extreme, but it triggered a lot of emotions at the time. I was also still deeply wounded by past relationships where the men in my life made me feel as if I didn’t matter. I got over it, I understood his reasons.

He did have a lot going on.

The positive that came out of it was that I did not have to go through those series of interviews ever again! He felt awful, and since I had already gone through them twice, he was on the committee, and I had proved my abilities and how capable I was I got promoted anyway. They also could not locate my previous reviews that had stated that I needed more “growing”. It was strange. I look back on some of my situations where I felt completely devastated by things like that and see how a lot of the times they ended up working out in my favor. It does not take away the feelings of rejection, the feelings that I was not even thought of was extremely painful, I still feel it today. I do not know how other people handle these types of things. I do not know how people get over these thoughts, or when the sting of familiar feelings hit how do they not relive them.

My mind has to work double time to cope with this stuff.

I am nowhere near where I used to be, and that is a positive. I read several posts yesterday from the blog Life with Aspergers about Aspergers and depression. I cannot tell you how much these posts helped me. I combed through them and applied what I was learning. I discovered my biggest problem is much like my anxiety problem was I have not accepted this cycle. I finally accepted my anxiety which has helped immensely. Even though I have confessed my understanding of the cycles, I still have not accepted all of them fully. I had hidden thoughts that somehow if I had the information that it would miraculously disappear. I am not talking about being in severe depression — I know the difference between that and my cycles. I would go to a doctor if I was feeling that way. This is the depression that comes and is triggered by certain things, but I know that it will go soon enough.

I get negative thoughts, but mostly because I hold in my hurt, anger, or frustrations.

I also can cause myself a great deal of stress by fixating on my confusion. I will start to think things like I shouldn’t post ever again, or share my poetry, or walk out of my house because what does it matter anyway. I begin to believe that people do not want to hear from me ever again. I have images of family, and friends rolling their eyes at my emails or comments. I then think they only reply because they feel obligated. I start to tell myself that I need to clam up. I need to wither away into my own small world with no social contact so that I will not feel the social confusion, or anxiety.

It’s funny as I am writing these out and sharing them I see how silly they sound.

That reveals to me how I should not waste time on these kinds of thoughts or worry about things like whether my family even knows if I exist. I have accepted this cycle and I can already feel some of the silly thoughts leaving me now. I confess though they feel real, but I know that many of them are not. I am going to listen to this song for a while ACCENTUATE THE POSITIVE~Johnny Mercer & The Pied Pipers and work through some of these thoughts. I am tired of faking happy. Tomorrow I will shoot for 68% happy and 32% sad…my gradient of joy. My acceptance of the depression (sadness) cycle is a healing process for me with my acceptance comes the ability to think of new ways to handle and process it. I am exchanging unhealthy patterns for new healthier ones one layer at a time.

If you have not read these I highly recommend them they are great resources.

Aspergers and Depression

Asperger’s and Depression – Part 2

Asperger’s and Depression – Part 3

Asperger’s and Depression – Part 4

This post from another blog helped me too.

Managing Your Anxieties and PTSD

And another song because I think Kevin Spacey is tops!

Also because I was listening to the soundtrack of Midnight Garden of Good and Evil…maybe that made me sad? No, it was a series of things including sensory stuff. Without further ado I give you “That Old Black Magic” performed by Kevin Spacey who always makes me smile. (I loved him in Se7en, another favorite…Big surprise!)


 

 

 

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12/31/11

Music-Clouds-Happy New Year!!

I am utterly shocked at the news that David shared with me this morning. I want to point out that it may not be as devastating to others as it is to me, but it was shocking. He confessed that he did not like a band that I am rather fond of. A band that was pivotal in my life, during my heavy metal era. They were actually the only band that I was obsessed with, did not have a crush on any of the band members, their lyrics rang deep into my spirit, and the screechy vocals and guitar riffs soothed my aching soul.  I related deeply to the sounds and the songs, and they both comforted me in my isolated feelings and depression.

I liked a lot of different music, but heavy metal did something for me.

I believe now it caused deep pressure and was much like a hug machine for me. Even though I am not a fan of crowds I was frequently found at rock concerts. I spent a large portion of my teenage years and young adult life at rock concerts. When I became a Christian I traded my “secular” concerts for Christian music concerts. Many times the music was as much “rock” as I could get. The sounds and feel of concerts energized me. I loved watching people sing in unison at any genre of concert. There is something about people all singing together that moves me. I would normally have my eyes closed, or I would fixate on one of the band members singing or playing their instrument. But when I would hear the band stop playing and everyone would start to sing together, I would open my eyes and watch.

It is such a magical moment.

I can see waves flow from the mouths of people, the calm enter, and for a moment in time there is complete peace. It occurs with only certain types of songs, but when it does I am so happy to stand outside of myself and watch the dancing notes floats around. This band that I was talking about will be inducted in to the Rock Hall of Fame. I had every album, (except the 2008) I sat up all night listening to them many times, and I would lie in my bed and let my emotion’s work through the tunes. I did this with several other bands as well, but I am talking about this one because I just got their greatest hits off of iTunes (gift card, yea!). I have been listening to them.

I have allowed myself to listen to them.

When I stopped listening to anything except Christian/worship music I threw out their albums along with many others…tons. I threw out all of my concert shirts and ticket stubs that I had collected. I cried when I threw them all out, I felt like I was doing the right thing at the time. Maybe I was for that moment in time, but now I wish I had them all back. I never got to see this band in concert and I was sad about that, they are none other than Guns-N-Roses. I was so excited when I discovered during my still listening to them phase that my boss went to school with Axl Rose. He was not much impressed with him and told me so, but he knew my love for their music and shared whatever questions I had.

It was so ironic to me because we were both over a thousand miles away from our hometowns.

Yet, he knew the lead singer of one of my all time favorite bands. It really isn’t that ironic I guess, but we can pretend. I do not know how David and I got on the topic of music this morning, but for some reason G N’ R came up. He then disclosed his lack of enthusiasm about the band. Let me explain in a little more detail my obsession with the band, I knew every single lyric to every song even if I thought it was not that great. I could play air drums and guitar to perfection to each song, AND I had (still) Axl’s Rose’s dance down to perfection. I learned the majority of that dance first from Davie Jones of The Monkees — he does it quite well in this video of Daydream Believer. (Horrible sound quality, sorry…you can see it at around 1:26)

I connected to the band so much because it spoke my heart during that time in my life.

I read everything I could about them, and collected information about their lives. How could David not love them?? I know, I know not everyone is going to like my music. David is more on the punk rockish side, while I am more on the head banging side. Ha ha ha We do have different tastes in music for sure, but we are not limited to those genres. It is just funny to say. I bring this band up because I tried listening to them a while back and it hurt too much. I forced myself to listen to them, and write out what I was feeling. There was a lot going on in my life while I was listening to their music. It was between 1987-1993 that some of the most traumatic events happened to me, in regards to me listening to this band to sooth me. (I threw out all of my cd’s and tapes in 1999, and started replacing them with new music.). My favorite of their albums were Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II. I waited in excited anticipation for those to come out.

During that time my best friend got pregnant.

She moved in with her new boyfriend and the one time sealed at the hip pods that we were was now severed. I ended up moving in with my second boyfriend, who did not attach to me like my friend. My friend’s brother was killed in a horrible car accident, and I did not know how to process the loss of her as a friend. I lost her to her new man, and then she completely changed after her brother died. I didn’t even know how to process his death because he was my first boyfriend’s cousin, and his best friend in the whole world. He was also very mean to me, lied about me, made fun of me, got girls to go out with my ex while were together, he was just plain mean. He called me horrible names. I was overwhelmed with the sadness for them, and the conflict of my own relief that this bully in my life was gone.

I felt horrible, and like an evil person.

I didn’t understand how so many people could love him. He was not only mean to me either, there were plenty of people including his family that he was mean to. I witnessed several times his bullying or tormenting being lashed out on his sisters, mother, and various other people in the family. Apparently around the end of his young life he had changed, and started to be a lot nicer. He got back with his ex-girlfriend who was very sweet, and they got pregnant. His life was changing, and my friend even told me that he had said very nice things about me before his death. I do not know if it is true or not. I didn’t realize how much that all affected me because I am currently tearing up a little bit. I have carried guilt for my feelings toward him — I felt abandoned by my friend I have tried to not let anyone get that close to me again. I felt emotionally abandoned by my boyfriend at the time. I started cutting myself regularly at that time. (I stopped cutting around 1994 I forced myself to stop, but still had the urges.) It was a very lonely and confusing time in my life.

It is a huge triumph to be able to listen to this band without any of these triggers hurting me.

There are several favorite songs I have of theirs, but three stuck in me Don’t Cry, I held on to and trusted in the lyrics to get me through to the next morning on some nights. Civil War rang in my spirit, and still does, and November Rain because where I lived the November rain was so cold, and seemed to last a lifetime. Also, because I believed them, I felt the lyrics and believed in them. I sat many nights sending out my thoughts, fears, aches, desperate cries of isolation, and longing out into the universe to be heard. I felt somehow all of me would be caught with others in this musical connection and it made me feel not so alone.

I don’t feel those specific alone feelings anymore, even those feelings that rose recently.

I have listened to the songs, sang loud, and did my Axl Rose dance with vengeance! Woot! Maybe they will do a reunion…probably not. I can pretend, and create a whole rock concert in my living room like I used to. :-) I haven’t even started the New Year here and already I am making some great changes in my life. I am looking forward to 2012. I know I am still working through things, but I feel stronger and stronger every day in who I am…becoming. I am also feeling able to be myself without a care. I still cannot believe David doesn’t like Guns-n-Roses, pure silliness. I’m kidding! I shouldn’t be surprised he doesn’t like a lot of my music, I always forget! I guess I have a good memory for certain things. Lol!

I bid you Happy New Year, I am leaving with a lovely song, and some clouds!!

The song is not a Guns and Roses song. It is much tamer and French!

Carla Bruni – L’Amoureuse


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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12/21/11

Perfectly Worded!

I love it when this happens. If I am feeling some way or I am feeling a little insecure about what I share then poof another blog post is written by someone or I discover an article, book, song, or movie that takes it all away. The words articulate what I am feeling or confirm what I am feeling, and it helps me process. I was feeling much better after I wrote my last post about crying, it helped a great deal to write and understand myself. In the past I would waste time on negative self talk, asking myself what was wrong with me or tell myself that I was being ridiculous. I am not ridiculous, what I feel and go through many others do too.

This morning I went on fb.

I really do not know why I usually do not go on there very often during the holidays — I find all of the “new” loving, sweetness, and holiday cheer, to be disturbing at times. My feeling is that it feels insincere, and trite. Not everyone, just particular groups of people that I have to be friends with. Rant much? Anyway, I went on there and looking right me was this A Letter to the Lonely. It speaks with great clarity the feeling of the holidays for me.

This year is very different from my holidays past.

Despite still feeling alone, I know that I am not alone. I wrote the other post because I know this year that others do feel like I do even if I feel like I am the only one. This year I am happy, I have not felt any sort of happiness in past holidays for a very long time. I am happy because I know that I am not the only one feeling the way I do. I have people out there who I do not see or talk to on a regular basis, but I feel connected to them. The feeling of disconnect makes everything feel lonely. This year I understand that I get overloaded, and I am allowed to express it.

I am allowed to share my feelings, tears, laughter, and frustrations.

This year I am happy because I understand myself a little bit better, and I am ok. :-) I know that I am always going to feel like I do not belong because I don’t. No matter how much I try, I will not understand the world around me. I can get educated and comprehend to some degree, but I will never “get it” completely. Every holiday I am usually alone on my computer or cooking, and I leave David with the kids. The holidays are the only times that David stays down all day long. I get to do what I want…mostly. I still do all of my mommy duties, but I get a little bit of time.

I really don’t mind being alone, it’s the feeling like I am alone that gets me.

Gaining the perspective that others feel this way too somehow makes it alright. I just feel much better this year. I don’t know how to explain it, other than I am calmer and more at peace. I am alright with having a shutdown or a meltdown. I have shed a lot of tears over several months now, but all of them have been mixed with laughter. They have been healing tears, tears that I have held in for decades. They are happy tears from decades of confusion rolling off of me. I cried before, but I never released them. I still held on to all of the things that the tears represented. This year I have been letting them go, they took flight, and caught some other’s tears along the way.

I took back my holiday months so far, we’ll see how I do for New Years.

It will be 2012 and I am excited about a 20 and a 12 being in the picture they are both lovely numbers. :-)   I am happy about Daniel drawing some great pictures yesterday too. This is HUGE! I think around April he started drawing circle faces, and I was so excited about that. Now he has progressed to a bear, a Santa, a ginger bread house, and what he calls “my designs”. They are great! Joshua has progressed in his drawings as well so I must show his creations. And Ariel continues to get very detailed and expressive in her drawings.

Their pictures make me so happy! (I have a ton…big surprise!)

 


 

 

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12/15/11

Aspie Girl NT Guy Dating Guide Free Copy!

Interesting how things just seem to pop up when I have been pondering and thinking about them. Jay Blue’s YouTube video appeared on my facebook feed and I had to check it out, since I have been working through relationships and all. I have read through a great deal of it already, but I do plan on spending more time reading it since I am in an overloaded state and miss some things like this. From what I have read I think it is a very good guideline for Aspie girls looking for love with NT guys. (It could be good for men as well.) I WISH that I would have had something like this for me years ago. It would have helped me so much, and my mom would have benefited as well. It also would have helped a great deal if my peers were not pressuring me to date and focus on guys.

But that is in the past, moving on.

If you would like to get a free copy of the guide here is the information:

EMAIL introspectroom@gmail.com to receive a FREE PDF copy of “AN ASPIE GIRL’S GUIDE TO FINDING LOVE IN THE NEUROTYPICAL WORLD”

Here is the rest of her information as well.

JAY BLUE
Autistic writer & Public speaker

LIKE my page and receive autism-related news and events :-)
www.facebook.com/jayblue3000

See my blog on:
http://introspectrum.blog.com

You Tube:
http://www.youtube.com/user/CuriousColours

I have no doubt that I will end up discussing the information as I see my own patterns and relate to what she has written. I already had a moment of being overwhelmed with flashbacks of all of the wrong things that I have done in relationships. I would say my first mistake would be picking the wrong guys. There is an important question that she brings up in the first part. The question asked is “Why do you want to be in a relationship?” in hindsight had I thought to ask myself the reasons why I was in relationships, or wanted a relationship, I most likely would not have been in them. Another section she shares “Alarm Bells or signs that he is not genuinely interested or only “semi-interested” (i.e. he is “stringing you along” until he meets someone else or he only wants you for sex) I’ll had or “money”. :-)

Yes, that section would have been nice to have a long time ago.

I have gone through some of the guidelines sections and I think they are very good and helpful. So far, what I have read has been very good and the most important take home for the moment is to respect yourself, set standards, and boundaries. All of the things I did not learn! Blah! Oh, well you are never too old to learn. :-) I am looking forward to spending more time reading this. Go get yours!!

It’s free! :-) And check out her blog, there are some good reads on it!


 

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11/28/11

It’s Always Darkest Before The Dawn

This quote has popped up in several odd places for me in the past few weeks. I confess I am almost in a complete shutdown. It is not a good shutdown, I am highly emotional. I am trying very hard not to collapse into myself. I can’t I have to live life. It is hard sometimes. I know that there are several reasons for this feeling. I am anticipating a whole lot of invisible some things with no names. I wasn’t exactly sure what my problem was, but honestly there are too many things that are flowing through my mind to pinpoint anything. Usually October until January…no, February, possible it’s March until I feel the many past experiences leave me.

The holidays always remind me of how alone I feel and felt.

Every holiday was lonely. I was surrounded by people who loved me and still I felt awkward and alone. Plus this month represents one of the happiest times in my life and triggers into the saddest as well. I cannot stop the loops of rejection. I can only redirect them, I am trying and it is painful. It is hard to reprogram your mind. It is hard for me to try to believe something positive when in most instances the second I gave hope a try, it burst into a negative.

I am sure there are many reasons that made me feel like the outcome turned out negative.

I am positive that social confusion (a lot of family confusion), anxiety, and sensory issues played a big role, but I still feel it. It doesn’t matter if I misinterpreted things or people misinterpreted me, the words, the actions, and the emotions all exist. I am not trying to sound down and negative, I am sad though. I am feeling lonely. I feel hurt. I feel lost. I am faced with the realization that we are moving back to my hometown. We will be going possibly as soon as March or at least by the summer. I am scared for many reasons. I am nervous and anxious about following through on getting a diagnosis and facing other things that I have to do.

The thought of going forward with the diagnosis brings forth a lot of emotions.

The biggest one is the feeling of doing it alone. I know that I am not alone, but I am feeling lonely in this. I guess I just have to deal with it like I have my entire life. Especially during the holidays it is difficult for me. I am happy for everyone enjoying themselves, doing their holiday family and friend festivities, but I feel like such an alien. I don’t want to be sad or feel this way, I don’t want to talk about it because I do not want to feel like a burden. I don’t even know how to talk about it.

I don’t even know for sure what I am feeling, it is just familiar.

I will say that it just sucks. It sucks to feel this way. I really dislike feeling happy for others and aching inside for myself. I don’t know how to describe it. I really have no more words about this topic, I think this post “What I need and want” may sum up a lot of emotions that I am overwhelmed with right now. What prompted me to write this out was a song that I heard for the first time today. I am facing some of my demons and want to shake the devil off my back, cause I have a lot of dancing to do. :-) Here are the lyrics so you know what I am referring to if you don’t want to listen to the song. Shake It Out lyrics

Florence + The Machine – Shake It Out

I have never heard of them or listened to their music, (I just saw on YouTube that they were on SYTYCD last season, but I must have turned the channel, I do not usually watch the bands on that show. I only watch the dances, no voting either. :-) ) but this was a good song for me to hear today and it has “It’s Always Darkest Before The Dawn” in the lyrics. I discovered it from a series clicks reading several different blogs that led me to this awesome quote by Björk “You have 1,000 colors of emotion, and each album is one color exaggerated. It’s so exaggerated that it’s not me, but it’s one color, you know? And I feel like that color is in everyone.” from this interview.

In those terms it helped me realize that I am having one color of emotion right now that is exaggerated.

It is exaggerated for many reasons and I could list them off, but I am funneling all of this into a story and several poems so it will reflect this color of me right now. The emotion is not me, I am only feeling it at this moment. I know she was talking about her album, but it helped me place my emotion in its proper place. It also helped me give myself permission to feel it. I need to be reminded a lot that I am not alone and my brain is both unique and has similarities with many. The darkness passes and through it I find my words, and I find more light and multicolored songs.

“It’s Always Darkest Before The Dawn” this has been true throughout my whole life so I will trust in that. 

I want to share another quote from Björk “I think there’s a need for the theatrical. It’s very organic and ancient and human. I don’t think it’s artificial.” When I express myself I hear the words of many people in my life who told me constantly to stop being so theatrical. I am very animated and passionate about things, I also never learned how to express myself in any other way. All I ever knew was to hold it in and then explode. Or hold it in and harm myself. I admit I feel guilty for even sharing these feeling or implying that I am allowed to feel them. Dang! This really hurts. Ok, I’m done…for now. :-)


 

                     

 

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