04/30/12

Angel (@MindRetrofit) to “I Wish I didn’t have Asperger’s” #AutismPositivity2012 Flash Blog

The driving force behind this post is here please go have a look at the many voices who shed light on Autism Positivity.

To “I Wish I Didn’t Have Aspergers”

My heart calls out to you my friend – I call you friend because I already feel a connection. The search words speak volumes, and had I been diagnosed years ago I may have typed the very same words myself.

Only a few years ago I was praying for my son to be healed from autism. It was a confusing, lonely, and desperate time. The tears well up in my eyes right now because the most painful part was that I had not seen the amazing beauty that was flowing through my child’s eyes. He has taught me much more about life than any philosopher, or religious figure. He played a key role in helping me accept myself.

If it was not for him I may still be condemning myself for not being “normal.” Attacking myself in droves seeking answers to “Just fix my brain!” My son’s autism has brought healing that I am fairly certain would not have happened had our eyes never been opened to autism.

I am not denying the challenges. We have them and they are great. We share in sensory issues, social issues, anxiety issues, and eating issues to mention a few. All of those things can be very difficult and hard to handle on some days, but the positives can outweigh the negatives. My son is gifted with numbers; he has an amazing engineering, and musical mind. He sees things with a unique and intriguing perspective. He loves intensely – not necessarily people. He has passion and is hilariously witty!

When I think of you “I Wish I Didn’t Have Aspergers” I wonder about your talents. I would love to hear about your special interests and see where they could take you. My own special interests connect to many things. I love and have a great respect for words. I see connections through science and spirituality flowing into colors and numbers, creating poetry and songs. I hear the silence of the moon that reaches down to all of us who look upon it and share in its loveliness.

I say to you that you are not alone! We share in connection with the sky. If you feel alone, seek out those of us who share in your interests. Seek out those who share the reality of our pains from past and present. Seek out those who are older and have wisdom. Seek out those who are younger and can challenge you. Do not seek to wish that you would no longer be who you are.

There are days when it can seem bleak regarding autism. It feels like no one understands. That is not true. Many of us are sharing our voices and we are sharing them for ourselves, for parents and caregivers who do not know where to turn, and for people like you. We know the feeling even if some of us have never wished our Asperger’s to go, we empathize with the struggle to live in this world surrounded while drenched in loneliness and misunderstandings. We may not have wished it away because we didn’t know what it was, but possibly we did wish to fit in and to be/feel “normal.”

Personally, discovering a name for why I feel and do the things I do has been a relief, and a blessing. The way I think gives me great insight to my children. Each day I accept more and more of myself the good and the bad – with the knowledge of my challenges I am able to move forward. With the allowance of seeking my special interests I am healing from past hurts, and the all too confusing life ride that I have been on.

The future looks bright – I believe that one-day autism will be fully accepted and acknowledged into our culture. I do not know when, but the more we know the brighter it looks. The more we understand the more we can develop resources and attitudes to help each other. Also, leading into better helps for those who have different kinds of challenges in the autism community.

The more of us who utilize the resources available and change our minds to accept ourselves the greater the chances are. I confess I have my days when I cry and wish that my brain would just stop what it is doing, but I then go and read my friends blogs who understand my pain. I read the resources that explain my brain. I write poetry or stories to spill out emotions I do not understand. It brings healing, and it reminds me that I am not alone.

I look at my son and remember not long ago he couldn’t have a conversation with his brother and sister. He now plays with them on a daily basis. He is telling jokes. It wasn’t even crossing my mind that he would tell jokes two years ago. There is hope. Many of us share in similar pains – there are ways to find help in times of desperation. If I were to be able to speak to you directly, I would say:

“You are unique and have so much to contribute through your Asperger’s mind. You have something special that needs to be shared with the world. You matter and are who you are supposed to be. Find people to help you see that, and build you up in it. You do not need many encourages, only ‘real’ ones. Find a place that accepts you and where you can learn how to gain self-awareness and self-acceptance. Do not deny who you are – embrace it. Once you embrace your challenges and your gifts your life will change. You can do it. You are not alone. You are fully capable. Look in the places of hope, not the places of doubt or self-denial. Your voice matters too. Share it! And when the down times come do not fall for the voices that tell you that none of this is true. Go after the autism acceptance community with a vengeance and determination to remember who you are. We will all be here waiting to share and embrace you! Happiness is the understanding that you are not a disease, or defective – you are a remarkable individual who can achieve great things with the right tools, resources, and encouragement. Search upon those things.”

Autism Positivity

Our positive outlook begins inward. A good thing about our autism is that in our weaknesses we see with much more clarity just how awesome our strengths are. What may be construed as a weakness can be manifested into great strengths. They may hurt deeply, feel overwhelming, cause us to be immobile at times, but if we look at them as a way to grow and challenge ourselves, I think we can find the positives.

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04/28/12

Um…Not Gonna Do It

I had planned on finishing another post and putting it up, but no. I am coming out of a shutdown and feel like it is not a wise decision to share what feels very exposing. Not today anyway. I think I will wait until after Monday. I had too much fun with my mom and the kids today at the beach. I was feeling down, and my heart has been feeling achy. Some of that has to do with things that I have read. It is a mix of discovering answers, realizing that there are certain things that are definitely not going to change about me, and it is somewhat hard to adjust to. It is not a negative it is adjustment. I have another new book Asperger’s from the Inside Out by Michael John Carley. It looks like a very good read. An Aspie friend of mine read it and she liked it very much.

I am looking forward to reading it.

I am sure it will wake some things in me and bring about new discoveries. In the book 22 Things a Woman with Asperger’s Syndrome Wants Her Partner to Know, I am getting ready to start reading chapter 8 “She only needs one friend…and the winner is, you!” The title alone helps me. I am most certainly going to go through this book in some detail when I am finished and share my personal experiences and how this has helped me. I wish I could shout this from the top of mountains, but since I cannot I will say it here “OMG! GO GET THIS BOOK!” Aspie girls if you can get your partner to read this I think it would be very beneficial. I also recommend reading it yourself. As a matter-of-fact I think parents would benefit as well and could find it a useful tool to help their Aspie girls find the right type of person to date – if they feel like dating.

It has given me so much clarity.

Several of the things mentioned in the book have been deemed as negative in my life. It made me feel such guilt and at times wishing that I were just “normal.” The confirmation by another person that it is not just me, and that they are not negatives is life changing. I am not making things up, or completely absurd – it’s my brain! Oh, thank you God! It still makes me kind of sad though because I want so much to make others happy, but I realize I have to walk in my own skin. If I am going to truly accept myself, I have to make changes that will help me. It confirms that the directions that I am taking in my life are the right ones. I do understand my needs more than I thought I did. I have gained more of my voice, and am able to walk a little more sturdy in my own shoes. Am I rambling? Am I being evasive? Sorry.

So yeah, the book rocks.

I can apply many things in this book to friendships as well because I see numerous parallels. I have had few friends and I am not good at keeping them. The ones that I still have in my “real” life are NT’s who have not given up on me. I do not have many, but I have a few who come after me when I have been silent for too long. (Even though they are mostly online now I have had them in the “real” world as friends. ) They make sure I know that they are still there and they check on me, try to encourage me, and remind me that they love me. I get pumped up and excited when I am encouraging them though. I end up talking to them about all of the things they are doing or want to do and my enthusiasm tends to get them super stoked and I see them start to step out a bit more. I love that!

It is über awesome to see people thrive in their gifts!

I cannot tell you how happy that makes me. People sometimes don’t believe me, but it is true. That is who I am. I got distracted thinking about my one friend who has started a cake/candy business. I am all smiles now and forgot what I was going to write. Um…Oh, yes, yes. I remember I got kind of sad the other day reading this post Devoted but Dateless. It put into perspective the challenges that single mom’s with special needs children feel. I felt sad for her not in a pity way she is not looking for that, it is the sadness that so many people need companionship.

We all need it and so few are willing to do the work for it.

It made me think about how people can find those of us with special needs and our children to be too much work. That can get me onto a whole series of rants that I am not going to go into. However, I will say I have my own feelings of being a burden and too much work for people so I think it taps into those emotions. Hence, the reason I am not going to write about it. I am not going to go off on a tangent. Speaking of relationships/companionship, I think this connects to my train of thought Pity, Respect, and the We/She Dynamic. At least it did in my mind. HA! I also read these and thought they were very good.

Theory of Mind and Mindfulness

Body Images

I have Aspergers – Part 1: Who I am

I have Aspergers – Part 2: Getting the diagnosis

I have Aspergers – Part 3: Life after an autism diagnosis

Back to Rudy Simone’s book “22 Things.”

I am trailing full circle in my thoughts. I REALLY like how the book is clear, direct, and short in each chapter. No fluff talk! And how she shares a short blurb “Partner’s Words” at the end of each chapter. I think it is so wonderful to read positive words from partners. I loved this one the best so far.

“If you’ve dated mainly NT women in the past, you may have some habits that need to be unlearned. With NT women you have to think of a second layer underneath what they’re talking about and thinking, and do a little ‘dodge and weave.’ An AS woman is merely blunt and there’s less tact involved. Don’t look for the subtext or the game. It isn’t there.”

~ Rudy Simone’s book 22 Things a Woman with Asperger’s Syndrome Wants Her Partner to Know

YES! This helps me to understand some girls who are friends as well. (No wonder they are shocked by some of the things I say. Lol!)

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04/22/12

Bubble Fan “Almost” Meltdown

I have been trying to work on my meltdown post, but it is too long and I am not able to articulate exactly what I want yet. I need to keep working on it. It is exposing as well so I may be having a problem feeling so open and not realize it. Instead, I have decided to share about Daniel’s amazing job at self-control/ self-help. When Daniel has gotten upset, or gone into meltdown mode he has used me as his source of aggression release. Sometimes it is the house, or toys that he loves which turns into another ordeal. The majority of the time it has been taken out on me. I take responsibility for this to some extent because that is what I taught him to do. In order to protect the house, toys, Ariel and Joshua, and himself I guided him to use me as a punching bag. I did not know what else to do. At the time I would rather him come after me than pound his head against the wall, or destroy the house.

However, now that he is seven this cannot go on.

We have been working on self-help strategies without aggressive behavior for years now. He has progressed a great deal in this area, but there are times when he still is aggressive. A great resource that I found was Managing Meltdowns, (this is a quick read) and on this post Making our Way: Autism Video I have several other links to resources about meltdowns and tantrums. Deborah Lipsky has several resources that help a great deal with meltdowns, I have her book Managing Meltdowns. It is normally when he is overstimulated, and/or unable to verbalize what he is feeling. With his verbal communication and comprehension developing much more, we have been able to stop full-blown meltdowns before they turn into tornadoes bursting through the house. Not always, but much more nowadays. Daniel tries not to be aggressive — he is such a soft-spoken sweetheart that it is always a shock when he erupts. When he was younger, it was all day long, and turned into an everyday part of our life. I was constantly in protection mode for everything, everyone, and for Daniel. Because of this, I have residual anxiety about doing new things, or meeting new people. I do not stop trying new things or meeting new people, I try to prepare for it. He had no other way to communicate until we started occupational and speech therapy.

It can keep me on edge because of my own anxieties.

It can enhance my social confusion, and stress. Our play dates recently have been very good for all of us. I have been doing very well at not trying to explain every single detail of Daniel’s behavior. I have let him play and do his quirks and be himself. This has released both of us from stress. It is good because I have had to focus a little more on Joshua. He has been having confusion, and feelings of being left out. No one is leaving him out, but when he gets tired or overstimulated he has a hard time discerning the other kids’ behaviors. Geez! Where was I? Ok, we went out to play in the front yard on Friday with the neighbors. They had a wonderful array of bubble selections. When I saw the bubble fan, I had a slight panic. I have not let Daniel have a fan in a very long time. I do not know what it does to his brain, but he gets out of control, obsessive, and then very aggressive if the slightest thing goes wrong when he has a fan. Additionally, he was having the anxiety, and excitement of new people and being social. He also tried a Popsicle so add texture, taste, temperature, new food in general to the mix.

I swallowed my anxiety and decided to see how it would go.

He took to the fan right away and did not want to share, but he did and that was impressive. However, he was fixated on it. The kids all had a blast making bubbles all through the yard. I loved watching them play and have so much fun. Impressive things for me was that I had to continue to go in and out of the house to get water, band-aids, put things away, and take little ones potty, whatever else popped up. I left the children in the care of our neighbors! Yes, it may have been for a couple of minutes — a couple of minutes is huge for me! I felt comfortable enough to let Daniel be outside without me for a few minutes. It is amazing that I was able to do that with no fear. Granted I was only a few feet away, but Daniel can get in a load of trouble or harm only a couple of inches from me. The neighbors are very observant, and keep a close watch on the kids. Everything was fine and dandy until the bubbles started to run out. Daniel was starting to get too possessive of the bubble fan and I said it was time for it to go away.

He started getting angry.

He came toward me asking “Why?” repeatedly. He buried his head into my lap trying to push me over. When I stayed direct, and in control he got upset. He started raising his voice, jumping up and down, and wanting to come after me. I will say that it made a huge difference during this whole situation that the neighbors stayed calm, quiet, and let Daniel and I do what we needed to. I have had people interrupt, say things about him just needing “a whipping”, or that I needed to “nip that in the bud.” Those things do not help at all and it is not beneficial for the parent, or the child — it causes needless additional stress. I stayed calm and told him that if he did not stop he was not going to be able to have the fan ever again. He said: “Ever?” Because the “ever” word is a hard one and is hard to define since it is used often in a generalized context. I said: “I mean ever, as in you will not see it again.” He stopped, I watched his eyes as he processed everything, and about a minute later, he said: “Ok, I need white medicine.”

White medicine is about a 1/4 teaspoon of children’s Tylenol.

It is a long story how that happened, but it works and he believes it helps him to calm down. He does not get it every time he is like that only during extremely challenging times. However, this was the first time that he asked for it on his own. I usually suggest it at some point before he turns it into his idea. Not this time, it was all his. We went inside got a little white medicine, a cup of ice water, and went back out. He blew bubbles with bubble sticks, and played with the other kids. No meltdown the rest of the night, or the next day. Huge! Another thing I confess I was a little happy that he had a moment in front of them because he usually holds everything in until we get home. It is always frustrating for people to only see “good” behavior because then, they do not believe you when you talk about meltdowns. I do not want him to ever have meltdowns for his sake of course, but I also know that they are inevitable. Today has been a couple on the edge moments.

I think the weather is messing us all up.

I told him how proud I was of him. I gave him details of why I was proud and that he should be proud of himself too. I pointed out all of the positive things that he did, like keeping communication with me, asking me questions when he did not understand, walking away from me instead of coming after me, listening to what I was saying instead of screaming over me, things like that. I didn’t add things like “instead of screaming over me” when talking to him. I stated things simply and in encouraging word form. I showed him my enthusiasm, which helped him feel excited too.

Here are some things I said:

You kept talking to me that was great!
You asked me questions, wonderful job.
You walked away and took a break that was a really good idea.
You listened to what mommy was staying, high five!

Those are what he needed to hear.

Adding additional information can take away from the positive and make it feel like he is still being reprimanded even though what is being said is a positive. I know this from experience. People adding things like that negated many positives that were spoken to me. “Oh, Angel you did such a wonderful job on that project even though you took a little longer than needed.” What? Then, it wasn’t a good job, I failed because I took too long! He was very proud of himself and told David about the whole thing later that night. Daniel was all smiles when telling his story about the bubble fan. Of course, he has been thinking about it for days now, but we managed to fill the void of his fan love interest. He was surprised with the arrival of Bronzor a gear Pokémon! He laid with me in bed and told me how much he loved Bronzor. He also informed me that the lovely plushy gear he has devoted his love to has replaced me. It is a good thing I understand such deep object love. iPad where are you?? Oh, sorry I love you PC you are so faithful.

The bubble fan “almost” meltdown was a big moment for Daniel. (And for me too, we had several big moments really.)

[Show as slideshow]

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04/20/12

Tired Ramblings

I feel so fatigued and I am not sure why other than my restless sleep from last week. My body is still trying to catch up. My mind is fatigued too from all of the mental energy I have been using with socializing, trying to keep all of us focused with school, and my house that is a mess, and causing much stress! So today, I am rambling about whatever pops into my head. Like how I really, REALLY like…no love Udi’s Gluten Free Bagels. OMG! Those things are awesome! I haven’t been able to find some tasty gluten-free items like that around here. Until, the last few weeks. We had a nice and lovely Publix open right across the street. (Kind of across the street, ok a major highway that is practically across the street.) It is the most wonderfulest store in the entire world! (I have few to chose from here.) I am not saying that just because both of my sisters work at Publix, and my one sister happens to work at that very one with all of the lovely gluten-free items.

We have not had a store around here with many gluten-free items.

The items that are around here have been ridiculously priced. We have been limited to Amazon bulk buying, and limited items on there as well. I was making many of our items like bread, and pastas, but it started being more expensive so I went for the packaged noodles and bread. I really like many of the products, the kids do not mind so much, but David is not a fan of the gluten-freeness going on around here. He has his gluten-filled stash upstairs — some are down in the pantry. It helps to have it hidden otherwise the questions, my goodness the questions! They do not stop about gluten-free/gluten. What has gluten? Does this have gluten? What is gluten? Why can’t I have gluten? What happens when I have gluten? Why, why, why? Daniel absolutely cannot have gluten, for some reason it shuts down his communication and he goes into what looks like seizures. He does that with milk also.

Ariel and Joshua do not have that problem, I do have to limit their intake.

They go through emotional roller coasters when they have too many gluten-filled products. They also get very lethargic, and drained, sometimes with bellyaches. They are fine with milk. I cannot have gluten (much) or milk. I do not lose my ability to speak, but I do get very sick, moody, tired, and many body aches. Why am I talking about this? Because I was thinking about us moving and I am so excited that there are several restaurants where we are going that have gluten-free menus! Biaggi’s has gluten-free pizza! Pizza! AND Pasta! My eyes are rolling all around in food fantasy. I have not been able to have pizza other than my homemade pizza. It turns out pretty good, (after practicing) but to be able to go and eat pizza from Biaggi’s Yippie!!

AND Cheeseburger in Paradise has gluten-free buns!

Oh, I love those burgers! I am hungry and don’t want to cook tonight, can you tell? I do not normally give such attention to food. One restaurant here just started serving gluten-free buns and pizza, but their food is so-so. Plus I got offended at them for offering 10% or 15% off (I can’t remember) for people who bring in a church bulletin on Sunday. I looked at the sign and asked “What if I am an Atheist?” No one else seems to understand my issue with the injustice, but I am boycotting them on those grounds. I don’t think it’s right for me to get a discount if I go to church, or if someone doesn’t even go to church and they just get a bulletin! I just find so many things wrong with the whole thing. Lol!

All right enough of that.

I have no great insights today. I am very silly, and feel like playing. I have decided that I need a live-in house helper to help me stay organized because no one here is able to help me. I need planograms and I need everyone to follow them. I just cannot keep up by myself. I get overwhelmed and unraveled with the mess that is starting to creep into my clean cubby area of solitude. My computer is the only one faithful at staying organized, and the iPad. Speaking of iPad, yeah I am not getting one (yet). I’ve been debating on an iPod or iPhone. It looks like I will be getting an iPhone since I will be out wandering all over the town and such when we move. People apparently want to get a hold of me and want to hear my voice. Blah! I am sure that it will turn into my new best friend and I will love it dearly, and will get angry at it with its tiny little touch pad driving me nutty and spelling things all wrong! I need a nice sturdy case so when I get angry I can throw it without any worries. I used to be a phone thrower during fits of rage. I broke many of my phones. Poor phones.

I have been working on different types of poems.

I have several Haikus and Cheritas that I have written. That has been fun — I am not ready to share yet. I usually just go all free style because I am so fancy free you know. Hee hee Maybe that is making me tired too — trying to use a formula for creativity can make me drained. I have enjoyed pushing myself though. We have been learning all about poetry with school this week. They have not felt like writing too many, but we have been talking about the different types, and playing around with rhyming and songs. I think I have rambled long enough. I cannot remember the main reason for me writing this post. I had something to share I thought, but I got sidetracked with all of the gluten-free talk. I will leave with the video I took of the kids this morning. My silly birds! The boys will not let me cut their hair. It made me laugh flopping all about.

My Babies Being Birds

Oh, and this. Fun!

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04/18/12

You Down With EFD? (Executive Functioning Disorder)

Yeah, you know me… Ok, maybe a lame joke, song reference here. (Old school like “You down with O.P.P” Don’t ask me what it means — I don’t even know. Ha! I like dancing to it.) I love it when I am going through something and all kinds of resources, or other people share and it connects altogether. Last week my friend Lisa discovered resources (one of her other blogs) about Executive Function Disorder. If you would like a quickie visual before reading on I suggest this video (3:10) ADHD and Executive Function. I had been on a trail with seeking information about it, and I understood it to some degree. I had not applied it to a specific situation for myself until I started analyzing my behavior with my new social encounter recently. Let me say first, after my social outings with our neighbors I have not had any anxiety, or social/conversation looping with them. That is huge! I enjoyed myself, and genuinely like them. Bonus! Now comes the part for me to understand the degrees of friendship.

As I read this article Executive functioning and the troubled brain this paragraph popped out.

“Executive functioning, put most simply, is the ability to plan and complete a task. It is a higher cognitive process that involves communication and organization across multiple brain sites and pathways; it is the interconnecting virtual pathway that brings all aspects of brain functioning together. Executive functioning is involved in planning complex cognitive behaviors and expressing one’s personality. It allows individuals to differentiate among conflicting thoughts and filter out unimportant information; it also helps the individual anticipate future consequences of current activities and work toward a defined goal. And, most important from the judge’s perspective, executive functioning inhibits impulses that could lead to socially unacceptable outcomes.”

When I read this, I realized how much my brain is trying to process.

However, it gets all jumbled and unable to do any of it. This most assuredly happens with unexpected or non-scripted events. My brain does not know what to filter. It cannot determine what the most important thing is and categorize. Everything is important! All of the input matters, especially anything that is odd, or indeterminable. My brain does not know how to let those things go. It is not sure how to filter my surroundings, and/or people. The whole dynamic can trigger anxiety, which causes the executive function to be even more blurred. Then it can rise into faultfinding (normally blaming myself) or protection mode to try to stop the anxiety. In some cases, depending on other factors, I am able to pull out of this and get through the event. It does not stop the brain processing the event. It only delays it until my brain has enough time to catch up. From the 5 Executive Functions described in the video above I will try to explain what is happening in my brain.

I think others may be able to relate.

Inhibit Your Behavior: Simply stated “hold in check, or discourage from spontaneous activity.”
Visual Imagery: Non-verbal working memory. Mental maps to help guide/direct behavior. Hindsight, Foresight, Sense of time.
Talk to Yourself: Verbal working memory that helps with goal setting/problem solving.
Control Our Emotions: The ability to control/moderate strong emotions.
Plan and Problem Solve: “Mental play- the ability to manipulate information in the mind to discover novel combinations that might serve to overcome obstacles.”

All of these things are going on in the mind of any person that we are interacting with. In short-term these actions are taking place in a matter of seconds for a mind that is not hindered by multiple factors. I am only using myself as an example let me share what my brain is also processing while it is trying to use its executive functions:

Anxiety
Sensory input/overload
Social confusion
Word confusion
Tone confusion
Non-verbal confusion
Environment confusion/unfamiliar surroundings
Unknown/unwanted people in safe environments
Lack of positive scripts
Inability to forget negative experiences
Distorted self-talk consuming my mind with trying not to be/do anything wrong
Looking/waiting for an attack (On guard)

These all can contribute to multiple forms of anxieties.

Those came to my mind while going back in time replaying my first conversation with my neighbor. (I am sure there are more.) I was able to suppress all of these things to function at a “normal” level. I have learned to hide most of this, unless I have already had too much stress/anxiety/confusion going on. If I am already stretched thin I can seem very quirky/odd/and speak out of intense emotions. My neurons feel like they are a bunch of bumper cars, hitting the walls of my brain and each other, causing the inability to think, problem solve, or discern very well “on the fly.” What I have learned to do is shutdown.

Stop talking, wait, and observe.

If I am with people where I feel the need to manage their emotions or behaviors it becomes impossible for me to even have my brain focused on myself. If I am with others who are not calm, or cause me high-stress in social situations I have to focus on other people, things, distractions anything that will help me not have a meltdown or explode with emotions. (good or bad) This explains many of my shutdowns in social settings, I have to in order to survive. Hello, conversation loops explained! There are not only conversation loops, but it is a movie that is playing over and over again. Apply full on sensory to the movie, reliving the encounter. This can be for a good experience or a bad experience. My past pattern has been to mostly loop on the negative because I was trying to trace what I did wrong, or try to figure out what a person meant (confusion). Those loops would be all-consuming and take away from positive loops causing me to forget good experiences that I have had.

I need positive scripts to be repeated.

I have plenty — I am talking plenty of negatives scripts that have caused it to be very difficult to trust the good ones. My brain does not allow me to stop what I am doing to let my other functions to guide me into goal directed problem solving. I think this is why I have to write everything down, keep lists, blog! For instance, my neighbor suggesting we do something, but not giving a clear direct day or time was an impossible task for me. I was only able to come up with a day last week because I had been pondering it for about a week already. I had been scripting it for a while, and semi planning for it. If I had been surprised by it I would have gone blank and felt confused, not able to respond…again.

My visuals get jumbled when I do not have a script.

My brain does not seem to have mental maps guiding me into the next direction for social situations. I have mental images, and I seem to get distracted by all of the images filling my mind while a person is talking. My energy goes into trying to discover similarities so I can have some sort of guide to have a conversation. I need connections and similarities because those are my (positive) scripts. I am not sure what to do next in a situation most of the time. I am usually looking to the other person as a guide and I use them to tell me what to do. I mirror unless I feel completely comfortable and safe. The threats of verbal attacks are always lingering. I am constantly waiting to be told that my words/actions were wrong/hurtful/mean/ or rude. It is not the only thing that I am thinking about, but it has been a large part of my self-talk. Although, I have come a long way at stopping this self-talk, it still lingers with each new encounter.

My hindsight can come years later.

My foresight is limited and my sense of time is virtually nonexistent. I need concrete time frames otherwise — I can be filled with anxiety, leading into fears because of anticipation and the unknown. It feeds right into my lack of self-awareness. Some of these fears have been enhanced because of my inability to know myself. The only guides that I had were jaded words, actions, and my own misinterpretations to tell me who I was. I have the ability to self-reflect. I do it throughout this blog. However, I am not attached. I go over it and over it again because I forget who I am! Not entirely, I am getting better with each cycle that I am going through. There are so many things to filter through when I self-reflect that it can take a long time to process. My emotions can take years, in certain situations. Many things play into that as well, detachment would be one that has caused the most hindrance in emotional processing. I have had to detach because emotions have been too confusing, too painful, too overwhelming, too disturbing, and too whatever else you want to add here.

It is hard enough to be consumed by other people’s emotions.

To “feel” people is overwhelming and draining, to try to add feeling, and understanding to my own emotions was devastating at times. I have been working through this, and I am happy with all of my progress. I have faced many of my fears, I still have more, but I am sharing them and working through them. The ginormous awesome difference this time around is that I am gaining so many positive scripts that they are starting to drown out the negative scripts that have been ingrained in my head for all of these years. They started as a child and continued to pile on top each other year after year. It did not help that I was manipulated, and controlled by others, and could be extremely gullible at times.

I gave my trust to people who abused it.

I still had walls and did not give away all of my trust to people, but it was enough to instill fear of being hurt again. As I have been pondering all of this, it occurred to me that Executive Functioning Disorder could tie into lack of self-awareness. Having a faulty system distorts the ability to problem solve and set goals. Many times, it is hard to even reflect inward and seek out self-awareness, how do you even start problem solving things like self-discovery? (Wiki reference self-awareness page) “Moreover, a series of recent studies showed that self-awareness about cognitive processes participates in general intelligence on a par with processing efficiency functions, such as working memory, processing speed, and reasoning.^[12]” I found a basic list of self-awareness (excerpt below) here:

Why is self-awareness important?

Self-awareness is important because when we have a better understanding of ourselves, we are empowered to make changes and to build on our areas of strength as well as identify areas where we would like to make improvements. Self-awareness is often a first step to goal setting.

Examples of self-awareness:

Preferred learning styles
Aptitude for specific career fields
Natural academic ability (athletics, mathematics, English, etc.)
Personality traits (introvert, extrovert, sensitive, judgmental, etc.)
Religious beliefs
Political viewpoints
Values (ethical, with integrity, scrupulous, etc.)

All of these examples in my life have been blurred.

I received no direction, or my natural abilities were not encouraged. If my parents did not understand them, they did not exist. I was left on my own to try to discover my own religious beliefs — I was guided by none or condemned by the other. I wasn’t able to discover on my own perspective or views, I became mixed and stayed away from certain things and obsessive about others. I later adopted the views of those around me because I did not know how to process on my own to find my thoughts. Whenever I stepped out to try I was corrected, ridiculed, or rejected. My natural abilities were misunderstood because I did not do things the way others did, and they were not encouraged. I had only one person in my life who spoke words of encouragement to me about my writing until recent years. It was my sophomore literature teacher, unfortunately, her words were taken from me and distorted by all of the other people who dismissed, or ignored my writings when I tried to share.

I still struggle with writing as being part of my identity.

I understand that I am a writer because I live, breathe, dream, ponder words and write them out, but I have creeping negative thoughts about my abilities at times. I do not let them stop me – I face them head on and tell them it does not matter. Every new sentence is a step at getting better, even if I make grammatical errors. Life is about practice, not perfection. (Easy for me to say in the moment. ) This brings me to one issue that can cause my social confusion, and executive functions to go all awry when I encounter people I do not know how to keep my identity. I do not know how to stay me while interacting with others. I have gotten better with this, but what I have discovered is if we have things in common, my mind can drift into thinking we are the same. I do not hold my own identity because I have a tendency to think, “I am wrong” I can begin to adopt things about the other person without realizing it. I read this today as well “People with autism ‘have problem with self-awareness” and this popped out.

“Navigating social interactions with others requires keeping track of the relationship between oneself and others.”

I didn’t learn how to keep track of my identity I learned how to act. I have only become aware of my own identity in the last year. This is helping me to be more comfortable at being myself with others, still I have the jumbled words bashing with each other in my head. (Unless I feel safe.) I understand that everyone is doing some form of acting when in social dynamics. I am learning this stuff do not get me wrong. I have come a long way in my self-discovery, but I struggle with it. I think there are many components that Executive Function Disorder can play a role in with the issue of self-discovery. I am still pondering all of that. The Autism Discussion Page has helped me in so many ways and continues to do so. I gained so much from reading about Executive Functioning Skills. Also, The social and emotional growth through the 30’s and 40’s really helped me.

I was able to come to terms with my feelings about going through my teenage years at the age of 39!

I struggle with that so much because I am expected to understand certain things that I just don’t if it is not explained properly. The frustrations of others can make me feel so foolish for not understanding. I know that it shouldn’t, but it does. I will stop there and work on my meltdown post it will be addressing some cognitive issues. I think it is important to note that this list provided about Compensating for Cognitive Deficits can give great clarity to some of the reasons for shutdowns/meltdowns. The more I read the more I am understanding/accepting myself and feeling such relief that I can help guide and direct my children. Such a time as this to live in the days of information! Woot!

I linked to the full Google documents for EFS on the image below.

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04/16/12

Play Date…It Was Great!

Last week, no wait let me start from the beginning and try to tie it altogether. Several months ago, we had new neighbors move in next door. We are in a heavy house rental area, we rent, I want to always rent! I do not want to own a house for as long as possible! Houses are too committal I am not ready for that type of relationship bond. I believe I could only commit to a long-term relationship with a house that is the equivalent to an iPad. Oh! Imagine what that would look like. The possibilities…sorry I dosed into another world. It would take one magnificent house to tie me down that is for sure. Distracted much? The neighbors, yes they moved in. I peeked out the window, watched, studied, and HID! I freak out when new people move in. I never know how they are going to be, and I normally do not like talking to neighbors.

That is too committal too.

After they had moved in, and had been there a little while the lady came over and introduced herself. She suggested we get together. Well of course, I was already panicking because she had crossed over to our yard, so then the thought of meeting again was freaking me out. However, she seemed very nice, and I liked her vibe right away. Still I am always apprehensive with new people, especially those who live so close to me. It reminds me of the other neighbor next door. The first week we lived here I went out to the mailbox and there he was going to his mailbox in black satin boxers baring big red lips with the words “Kiss Me” (I am 98.6% sure they were the accurate words.) plastered on them AND no shirt! Oh, I forgot he did have black ankle socks to go with the attire, as he waved and said “Good morning” in a grumpy fashion. Believe me my imagination would never had made that scene up, those neighbors have proven to be not so pleasant on several occasions. They do not rent — we are stuck with them.

Focus Angel!

The nice neighbor lady (Most assuredly she is younger than me, but I use off words to describe people.) introduced herself, discovered that I home school, and wanted to get together sometime to talk about homeschooling. They have a four year old who is in preschool currently, and she is having a baby at the end of May I believe. (The mom, just clarifying.) She came over one day and knocked on the door. I am a freak about answering the door. I do not do it, and I do not care if the people on the other side hear me “Shh-ing” the kids or not. I hide behind the broken blinds (Thanks Mr. Nathaniel Cat), while the kids poke their heads right at the strangers. I don’t understand why they haven’t learned to hide properly. I had to answer the door when I saw her, it isn’t that I do not want to talk to her I get thrown off and don’t know what to say. (I will try to shorten this story.) She came over to suggest us getting together again. I was confused with the open-ended invitation and did not know how to respond so I did not.

A few weeks go by — I see her outside and apologize for not getting back to her.

Oh, wait there was another time that she came, but I was sick, and having serious neck/shoulder pain so I could not go to the door. David did and talked to her for a little while, she gave him a paper with her name and number on it for me to call. At first, I thought she gave me an email, which I thought no problem I will contact her that way. Nope, it was a phone number. I could not call. It was too open ended. I didn’t want to call when she was busy, I didn’t want to disturb her, I don’t know her plans, when is the best time to call, how do I know she really wants to talk to me? (A good indicator for the last question is that she continued to try to talk to me.) I did not call or show up at her house because I did not know the right time, or I could not work up the courage to walk over there. I was constantly flooded with questions. Even though she told me several times that she is home all day, she gets her little girl at 1:00 pm and is home after that.

I just could not come to terms with a time.

Finally, last week she came by again. (Yea! For her because I would have given up by now.) I was all flustered because the morning had been a mess, and I had just gotten all of the kids settled into school about an hour prior. I looked a fright, and all buggy-eyed from anxiety of trying to gather thoughts to talk on the fly. She asked to get together and I could not think, I tried to stop my brain from running in circles and noticed that she really did want to do something. I combed over the days and said: “Wednesday, how about Wednesday we go to the park?” Perfect, we set a date and a time. And began my social anxiety frenzy. (Part of the contributor to my meltdown the day before.) The kids did too. We were excited, and nervous. Remember I have had pretty much nothing, but negative experiences around here with other mothers. I did not have any good scripts — there are also the very fundamental views that play a major role in this area. I am too liberal for these parts. No offense, just the fact. (I am open to them; they are not open to me.)

She came knocking a little early.

It worked out, and we went to the park. It was fabulous! I had the best time. She was very open — I felt comfortable enough to share my views about homeschooling, and curriculum. I like to use “secular” home school materials mixed, with the Sonlight curriculum, STEM, Art & Music apprehension, unschooling type of methods, and multi-sensory as well. I am all over the place and I have encountered many people who believe it should only be one way. Each person has to find their own way to home school if they decide to do so, I respect their decisions — I wish those types of people would respect mine. I was also comfortable enough to share some about my religious views. Her daughter is wonderful, and a great playmate for the kids. Ariel had a blast being with another girl. She is younger, but I think that works well for Ariel. Joshua and Daniel like her very much too. Daniel did go off on his own and watched other kids on the playground. He was in observation mode most of the time.

He talked out loud about what kids were doing.

He did not talk to them, I asked him if he wanted to and he said: “No”. He was happy watching them, he was really happy. I can relate I think it’s the “people groupie” thing. We do not have to be involved or directly interactive to enjoy people. Make sense? We stayed at the park for a while. When we came home, all of us were super excited, and over-stimulated. We were all happy too. We plan to do it again, but I believe it was on Friday that they came knocking later in the afternoon. The kids and I had been snuggling in bed reading because for some reason I started to not feel well. The knock came and I was dreading who it was. When I opened the door and saw her I was feeling like I did not want to socialize, but then I thought about how much the kids needed it. The reality is, I need it too. The kids ran around our yards playing and having such a wonderful time. I sat with her and her husband and we talked and talked. I started feel much better instantly.

Come to find out we have a lot in common.

They are so pleasant, down to earth and have a great “take me or leave me” type of attitude. They had lived in CA for quite a while, even though they are not from there. I have found that many people from CA are very open and much more tolerant of differences. They had just moved from Washington though, which is another area that seems to be quite open. She went to school for her masters and is a teacher. (Not currently working) My first fears with our encounter were telling her about Daniel and autism. I cringe at the thought of telling people because I never know how they will respond. Again, I have many negative encounters that tend to drown out the few positive ones from around here (and family). She taught in a school with what sounds like an excellent program for special needs children.

She did not flinch when I told her that Daniel was autistic.

She and her husband both treated him so kindly and with his quirky behaviors, they had no problems. They let him touch them, get in their face, smile, and study them with no problems. They tried to engage with him, and he did several times. At one point, he came up to the three of us and said: “I like them” It was awesome. He has since shared with me that he thinks the “Mom and the girl are pretty.” He continued to pet the little girl’s hair, and it didn’t bother her at all. She doesn’t seem to notice anything different about Daniel. (Daniel does love the ladies.) He is very interested in the baby in the Mom’s belly too. I shared with her my home school blog, if she meanders over here I will feel a bit exposed, but it has been such a positive experience that I had to write it. I was filled with joy watching Ariel and Joshua enjoy themselves so much. They were so happy. I want that for them, I want them to have friends and be able to socialize. I wish it had happened sooner in this town, oh well.

Now our goal is to clean the house so we can invite them over to play.

The kids REALLY want the little girl to come over and play. Every time I have new (or uncertain) social interactions, I start to get anxiety. I get frustrated with myself, which adds to the stress. I want to be social, but then my anxiety kicks in and it causes me to feel like something is wrong with me. Thoughts pop in my head like “Why can’t I just have a conversation without freaking out, or getting too enthusiastic?” At one point she mentioned the Fibonacci number and I practicality jumped out of my seat, I may have clapped, I know I got overly excited and shared how I love the Fibonacci sequence. Then, I said: “If I begin to bore you, you have to tell me because I may go on and on.” I did control myself pretty well, but I was SO excited to hear someone mention it before me! Ariel found a snail shell that made her think of it. Yes!

It has been a very positive and I am looking forward to our next play date.

I have a second half connecting to this post talking about Executive Function Disorder and how it plays into my social confusion/anxiety. I needed a specific situation to apply it to. I am also rounding that straight into my massive meltdown, and all of the things that contributed to it being triggered. I forget how all of these different components play into why I behave, or respond a certain way. Others do not have a clue — they only believe that I am responding out of immaturity or emotions. There is so much that goes into it, especially when someone else is responding out of their projected emotions.

I need clarity, I need direct communication.

Generalizations cause me to be thrown into a black-and-white thinking of dizziness when I am not specifically told it is a generalization. Mainly if it is a topic of emotion I have a problem, other things I have a better ability to discern what is a generalization. I have learned to reason through those — I have not learned to reason through emotions. I understand that others can get frustrated, or exhausted because of this, but I can’t change it. This is what happens with my kids, and it is another reason why I have been apprehensive with play dates. I talk very direct and literal with my kids. People have given me looks, or tried to cushion my words to my kids. They don’t get that. They get clear, direct, and literal. I was so happy to be able to talk to my children, be myself, and talk to another adult without all of these judgments and fears soaring through my mind.

That is what I call a great play date, all of us being ourselves! (Well as much as you can meeting new people. )

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04/12/12

Inspired By…

Today I am sharing an inspiration collage. I am not creating an art piece in the customary sense for a collage to be made. I am creating this piece with people.

“A collage (From the French: à coller, to glue, French pronunciation: [kɔ.laːʒ]) is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole.” (Already linked to above.)

This past month so many new people have inspired me that I cannot possibly share them all, but I mention them now creating a visual of all that they share on their blogs. I speak of all the poets, writers, artists, musicians, spiritual influencers, science impacters, techy wonderfulers, math/number guiders, all of the TED video people who have influenced me so much, AND all of the people who share their life stories who are on the autism spectrum and/or have children on the autism spectrum. I know I have left people out, I read many blogs! Every week I take time to sit down and catch up on blogs that I have subscribed to, while discovering new ones. I usually take about an hour, two days a week to focus on people’s blogs and respond with my “like” button and/or leave comments. I have been trying to comment more because I get so enthused by people sharing themselves through their craft, yes blogging can be considered a craft as well.

I do not take it lightly — I think that it is important.

If I follow someone I put time into reading them, I know that a lot of people do not do that. It’s ok, this is who I am I invest in people as much as I can. I guess I am deemed a “fan of people” a “people groupie”. Today I was incredibly behind, I had almost 400 emails in my account, some of them were not to blogs, but the majority of them were. There are some that I am able to read on a daily basis and able to comment. Others I sometimes have to read come back later, reread, and comment. Unless I am unable to write a quick comment, then I only click “like”. As I sat down, I looked at all of the people floating in my inbox. I went through and read as much as I could. I spent about two hours off and on reading and commenting. Thinking and pondering, enjoying and delighting, my heartbreaking and feeling. I collected all of the people in my mind and my soul, then gathered up their words and images/art forms wondering how I could connect them all. I decided to write these words as they all soar through my mind their words, and life are acknowledged and creating a beautiful collage. They all inspire me.

Yesterday we had a play date with a new friend.

Our new neighbor has come over several times to talk to me to schedule sometime to get together. I was going to write about my weirdness, and the whole story with that. I am not today. She is a wonderful woman, and her daughter is so cute and such a smart little girl. My guys loved playing with her, and I enjoyed myself very much talking to the mother. However, I have been off all day from a new social encounter, but I do not feel like talking about that. Daniel and Joshua have been off all day as well, there was no formal school today. They were playing so well and they did all day I did not want to ruin it. That is a rarity for them to play well all day, no meltdowns, freak-outs, arguing, social confusions, and/or someone getting hurt. Ariel wanted to be with me all day. Stay with me I will come full circle to inspiration. She sat on my lap as I read my emails, blogs, and left comments. Until…

I showed her the Kitty Blogger.

At that point, she asked if she could go look at it on their computer. She was in there for a few minutes, laughing then asking me to come look at kitty stuff. I showed her my gravatar on some of the posts under “like” after that, she asked if she could read my blog. I asked her which one? She has sat down read my poetry blog before, and told me which ones she liked. She loves all of the images I find. This time she wanted to read the one that I have not shared with many people because it has so much of me on it. I post poems on the fly, music, links (a lot) about pretty much anything. The blog is a Hodgepodge of my brain. I pulled it up for her and off she went reading my blog, watching my videos, and looking at my images. She came in and told me that her favorite video was Akasha Project – “The Quantum Music of Hydrogen” video by Vigor Calma. She said she saw a dragon face fading, flowers, and a tiger face. You would have to watch it to see why. We talked about the video for a while, then she told me that she wanted to paint what she “felt”.

She however, informed me that she did not want to yet.

Instead, she requested to listen to my iShuffle because she wanted to listen to more of my music. She did paint a beautiful picture that I will share below. I share all of this because Ariel inspired me very much today. She is open to learning, she loves life, she is a delight to be around, she asks hard questions, and everyday something is new with her. Don’t get me wrong it is the same with the boys only in a different way. They inspire me too, but today I was not all that inspired by rowdy “Pokémon play.” Here starts the rest of my people collage, I am not able to give all of the ways that they have inspired me so I will share as much as I can. (I apologize ahead of time for not telling all of you that I linked to you — I hope you don’t mind! I am not sure what the blog rules are for that.) Ariel wanted to paint with me, and I have been wanting to try to draw and paint “Goth girls”. I love them. Here are some of my inspirations Mike and Jamie Best. (Robots and Goth Art LOVE!) I was so excited to see such beautiful collages on Lori’s blog A Quiet Week. (Hence, where I was inspired for the word.) She shared with me an artist who inspires her Suzi Blu. I instantly loved her art. This triggered me thinking about my dear bloggy friend Bruce. In the beginning of April, he made a YouTube video that stirred my heart.

I was so excited for him, and he encouraged and inspired me so much.

He is such a wonderful person and so very talented. Here is his video and you can see how he was inspired by Nina. This video has been playing in my head all month. The words he shared moved me deeply, and got me thinking about things that I have not tried because of my perfectionism issues. Nina shared with Bruce to pursue his art “even if it looked like a Pre-K kid did it.” You must go watch to get the full inspiration. This video flooded me today as Ariel asked to draw and paint with me. I decided to give my Goth girls a try. I will share the pictures below of what Ariel and I made, Joshua joined in later, Daniel didn’t want to. I will show you what he was doing too. Thanks to my good friend Lisa aka. Alienhippy who encouraged me to “try to paint and allow yourself to stim in whatever way you need to”, I have dabbled in trying to paint. I did not try much of any form of art before for various reasons. I will stick to my physical reasons, but negative interactions caused me to feel like I could not. I also have such a hard time with my hand coordination, and tasks like writing, painting, drawing, using scissors, etc… It can hurt or cramp my hands. I also can get freaky about paint or any substance being on my hands.

However, I decided to give it a try over the summer.

I have found a new and very helpful stim that helps calm some of my anxiety, and uncontrollable loops. In recent months, I have also been inspired to allow my silly side out more. I tend to hold my silliness in because I can be WAY out there sometimes, or a complete goof. I was inspired by Sam at Everyday Asperger’s , her friend “Crazy Frog” suggested I let my silly side out more. And I have listened to Crazy Frog and have gained so much understanding about others, and myself. I have felt such peace and have had great laughter from reading her blog. However, letting my silly out and being more social can trigger some serious anxiety, sometimes I am not even aware that I am feeling excited energy from being social on the internet. I think it is because I do invest time into reading people’s blogs, and I give a piece of myself every time I share my words with them. I don’t mind, I love it — I forget how much it can take out of me though. This leads into some others who inspired me this month, Inner Aspie has helped me in many areas, but one specifically has been my issues with anorexia and dysmorphia. I have not found many other Aspie’s sharing about this.

There have been some days that are hard.

I do not want to diet, or try to lose weight. I do not want to think about it, but my mind goes directly into “image attack” if anxiety, or random fears pop up. It is not about being skinny, and just because you are thin does not mean there are no problems. I am not tackling that cultural thing right now. She has inspired me to accept things about anorexia and dysmorphia issues. I was not facing them — I have been beating myself up because I immediately go there when things start to fluster me. My body refuses food — I have to force down bland noodles or rice, and broccoli on good days if I am overcome with confusion and anxiety. I lost almost 20 pounds over the summer, I did not need to. I did my best at forcing me to eat, but it was a struggle with my mind. I have to fight it, and I have gotten a lot better, but I also have held on to shame and guilt about it. I am done talking about this. Now it’s out there I am inspired to move forward and heal. Thanks to Inner Aspie I was led to Carrie’s post about meltdowns at Parenting with Asperger’s. Ironically, that very night after reading it I had the worst meltdown I have had in over 10 years. I may blog about it I don’t know yet.

I shared with Carrie in my comment that I still had guilt and shame after a meltdown.

That night I struggled so much. I was feeling social stress, and anxiety for various reasons. I was nervous, excited, and happy about our play date. There were many contributing factors, but what set me off in a rage was I thought David said I was acting like a seven year old. He did not, but that is what I heard and before I knew it my body was taken over facing all of my ex’s, my mom, and various other people in my life demeaning me telling me that what I felt or did was childish or juvenile. I had no control over myself, and thankfully, I had her blog to remind me what it is actually like when a meltdown happens. Of course, I apologized — he did too for his part in the whole episode. I will skip all of that for now. Then, today I was also inspired by Aspergirl Maybe, she has been inspiring me ever since I started reading her blog. Her strength, courage, honesty, and faith have inspired me in so many ways. As I read her post today, I was struck with how brave she has been to make the decisions she has, and the ability to follow through to take charge of her life. It inspires me to stay the course, and keep trying to stay focused on the directions I need to take in my own life.

Another person is Kirsten’s blog, quirky and laughing.

She shared the Autism Positivity Week post, and for the first time in my life I could actually write something positive about myself, share it with others on another blog and not feel guilt or like someone was going to come along and tell me that what I said was not true. Or accuse me of bragging, or being prideful. Rachel was one of the first blogs I found of an adult autistic she has inspired me in many ways on her personal blog, but the Autism and Empathy site has inspired me beyond words. It is packed full of a wonderful collage of people, and very beneficial information. My Goodness there are so many people I wish I could add on here, but I have made this far longer than I expected.

I forced myself to limit it to the last couple of weeks.

Plus, I am now teary-eyed and I hate crying so I am going to stop before the flood starts. I hope this post has inspired others, reveals what an impact all of you who share and write make in our community. Our sharing leads to more sharing, which leads to more people stepping out and trying. Creating magnificent pieces of art whether with materials or in each of our hearts. This to me shows our vast spectrum, our individuality, and our hearts to want to share, make a difference in our world, and help others. We can shake mountains with our inspiration. Thank you all for inspiring me in so many ways and helping me to step out. Who is inspiring you? How are they? Be sure you tell them, you never know how your inspiration can lead into unfolding a bunch of others to be inspires too. Now for some pictures! Even if they look like a Pre-k kid did it, I made some Goth girls and I love them! (I now have the courage to practice.)

Added 4/13/2012 (AM): Bruce has on his bulletin “Please pray for Nina! She is in the ICU.” Please keep her in your prayers, positive vibes, and /or happy thoughts!

You can click on the pictures for captions.

[Show as slideshow]

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04/11/12

My Wordi(less) Wednesday

The things that we love tell us what we are. ~ Thomas Aquinas

I never thought about that quote before, interesting I saw it on fb today. I do not do well at being wordless, but today I cannot get out what I would like to get out. My brain is frazzled. Happy yellow day, ended in a cloud of grey, but rose to semi-indigo working into a nice burgundy. That is my color forecast for the day. I did have a strange visual as I lay in bed last night (actually 1:38 am) it involved a dragon, a puff of purple, and some mountains. Strange, but still a pretty image…maybe I can write out the scene. I wish I could draw it the dragon was SUPER COOL! Maybe I shouldn’t share that. Oh, well I did. Today I went on fb and Inner Aspie had posted a Pearl Jam song. I am not going to go into detail, but the song means a lot to me on many levels and I had not heard it in a very long time. I will share the video I found below. The music is soothing to me, the lyrics penetrate my heart, and it brings back memories.

It triggered the memory of the first time I heard Pearl Jam.

It was 1992 way down in South Florida — I had been working for months and made no friends, until a few weeks earlier. This group ended up being the best group of friends I had. They taught me a lot. The group gradually broke up and went separate ways, moving away, going off to school, transferring to other stores etc… Sorry sidetracked. My boyfriend at the time went home to visit for a wedding. I was invited to a party, for the first time with my new friends. I was nervous, anxious, and in order to help ease my worries I made plans to stay the night with the girl who lived in the apartment. When I walked into the apartment, I was struck with the song Jeremy. I was gone — literally, I stood stuck in the music. I do not know why, but the lyrics soared through me and stirred something I could not explain. Once I woke from my other world, I realized people had been talking to me and were looking at me in a strange way. I responded with: “Who is this?” Thankfully, they enjoyed my quirks, and one of the guys was a fanatical Pearl Jam fan. He was happy to oblige all of my questions.

I studied the CD case, and fished through reading everything I could.

They played it several times for me before other people arrived, but then told me gently that we could not listen to this one album all night. I was already excited to discover the album title being “Ten”. Love the number ten. The night went well, and my first social event seemed to be a positive…until a certain guy showed up. I didn’t like him from the get go. His behaviors and actions triggered my past experience with my abusive ex. He was a next-door neighbor, not invited, and loud and rude. He made me swell with rage, and I wanted this bully to “Get Out!” I could not understand why no one was doing anything. I will shorten the version of what happened, he was a complete jerk, he was being degrading to women, especially his girlfriend. I had enough of him and told him to leave. It was not my apartment so he refused, my friend was afraid of him. Eventually I ended up in his face telling him what I thought of him and demanding he leave or I was calling the cops. (I forgot the reason why they freaked out about the cop threat some of us were under age and drinking. Yeah, I would have gone to jail too.) The guys at the party were pulling me away from him, and another group was blocking him from hitting me. My cutting words caused him to punch a hole in the wall instead of me.

That sent me and I was ready for a death match.

Now he damaged my friends apartment! He was going down! Needless to say, I was pulled out of the apartment until they got him out. It was all a blur at this point and his girlfriend was terrified, she and several others came outside begging me to stop. I did not realize that he was an abuser, and I was making things worse for her. I just wanted him out of the apartment, he had such a horrible presence and I could not take his vileness. He left, things settled, and my friends learned rather quickly that I loved music and did not care how big, or bad someone was if they were not invited and were rude I would go in a blind rage to get them to leave. Yes, I have several stories of me doing this with people — for some reason I have never been able, to sit back and allow monsters force people to endure ridicule, and meanness. Some of my life stories scare me to death in hindsight. I cannot believe some of the ways I behaved, and dangers I put myself in. I wish I would have had the same passion to protect myself at times. Oh, let me add this whole episode would be another reason why I should not drink alcohol!

Other things on facebook today, randomly chosen for my whatever reasons…

www.facebook.com/AutisticPeople

Hmm…I was happy to see this because I am having some problems with cognitive distortions today, sometimes they are so hard to see as distortions.

www.facebook.com/autismdiscussionpage

www.facebook.com/Hahahalaughitout

And now some random pictures! If you scroll on the picture you can see my titles. Whoop!

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04/10/12

Speaking Of Self-Awareness…

According to the wiki page, (I am not going to search very hard today because I do not have the time.) Self-Awareness is defined:

“Self-awareness is the capacity for introspection and the ability to reconcile oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals. Self-awareness, though similar to sentience in concept, includes the experience of the self, and has been argued as implicit to the hard problem of consciousness.”

Before this last summer, I had lost virtually any self-awareness I had. I know that I had a small amount of understanding, but I was unable to detach who I was from the people in my life or my environment. They were my mirrors — they reflected and scripted for me how to act, how to respond, whom to be friends with, how I should live my life. I absorbed them trying to discover who I was. Social confusion, a faulty executive system, and no authority throughout my childhood able to guide me left me to wander around observing social dynamics in my circle of relationships. I had several women who were obsessed with weight, looks, approval seekers, and constantly hiding their intelligence surrounding me. I found my mother so confusing in this area because she would be freaked out about whether she was attractive or not one day and the next she didn’t care at all. I can pinpoint some of these events now to social confusion and anxiety.

She would only think about her outward appearance if someone mentioned it.

Same here, I normally do not think about whether I am attractive or not, unless someone makes me feel a certain way. I have additional issues because of my birthmark. (Those of you who do not know about my birthmark can read this post if you like.) Both my mother and I were ridiculed in school about the way we looked. My mom had additional abuse at home (though she will not call it that) she was abused physically, and emotionally. She was called names and made fun of by her father. From an early age for some reason, I did not put up with grandfathers hooey, I got in trouble a lot, but I was too fast and I was a good hider. He made fun of my name often, when my mom told him my name in the hospital the day after I arrived he said, “What did you name that kid? Angel-leaky? What kind of name is that?” However, with all of the ugliness there were great qualities about him too. I speak of him because unfortunately he helped pave the way to my mother’s dysfunctional view of herself — stripping her of self-awareness and self-acceptance along with his family and my grandmother’s lack of attention. My grandfather was abused as well, and since his behavior was not as horrible as what he had been raised with he did not see himself as an abuser.

It can trickle down, generation after generation.

My mom loved fashion, and being made up, she was a model for some time and loved it. No thanks! She learned how to dress and keep herself up through modeling classes. Later as I was a child, she started aiming for more managerial roles in her company. An assistant store manager who was a very confident woman took my mom under her wing, and taught her what she needed to do to work in a “man’s world”. She also had a great kind man who was her store manager who helped her. He and his family were very good to us and thanks to him; my mom was able to pave the way to her career. My mom still did not have self-awareness in an embodying sense — she now took on the identity of her workplace. That became her for over 23 years when she left she had a nervous breakdown, alone and shared with no one what she was going through. She is still seeking to discover who she is. I rejected what she was — I knew that it was not my mother.

I resented the fact that she constantly tried to make me into that mold.

Especially when I started working at the same company, for a season I became just like my mother. The day I realized what I had become I decided to quit and changed the course of my life. (It was not the only deciding factor, but I have written about that elsewhere.) I wish I would not have done it in such haste — I seem to do so many things in haste. It does not go with my character though, I am very systematic, I like to plan, and think before I do anything. There are certain instances for some reason I lose that part of me and go off in what seems like a whim. Only later left staring at the mess that I have made, and I have to pick up the pieces. I believe had I been instilled with some understanding of self-awareness many of my decisions would not have been so destructive. Many times, I was doing it because I was searching for me. What was I about? What did I like? What kind of people did I want to hang out with? My interests did not seem to mesh with most people so I felt as if I could not connect to people.

It did not occur to me to seek out like-minded people.

I managed to fall into situations with people, and then thought “Well we must be friends, or in a relationship.” It seems to “just happen”. I cannot explain it very well. If only I would have known that I was good with numbers, that I am an excellent researcher. I can dance, I have the ability to write, and I have a knack for picking trends music or otherwise. I can understand and teach science, I do not have to pretend that I am not smart, and I am fully capable of being self-sufficient in all areas….had I known! I did not. I knew nothing of this about myself. I wish I could explain it better, it sounds kind of strange to say these things. I have been so disconnected from myself — I knew these things about me. I did not know that I was allowed to do them. Even though I was the closet to me, I somehow took on the rule that someone needed to tell me that it was ok for me to do it. My reliance on others to tell me who I was distorted even more of my self-awareness. Most children do look to their parents to help them discern who they are. This is a normal part of development — they mimic and try on their parents for size until they start to discover themselves. I did not learn the “capacity for introspection and the ability to reconcile oneself as an individual separate from the environment and other individuals.” Since I could not see myself I could not reconcile self without others informing me. Does that make sense?

My parents never knew who they were.

Their parents had some great qualities, but they also did not equip them to discover how to be the person that is inside of them. Both of my parents were severely abused, and I am not sure how that plays into all of this. They were not allowed to be themselves, which is multiple posts that I am not going into…at least not yet, maybe next year. They did not place many aspirations on me. Their aspirations however, did frequently involve appearance and morality. When I failed to discover myself on my own, I took to religion to tell me who I was. I had been using boyfriends as my guide without realizing it — I mixed my identity with work, friends, and boyfriends. I did not know how to pull from within and continue in that self-strength. I never trusted it because everyone in my life had told me that I was wrong in some form. Now there is a mix of my own distorted perceptions and actual events when people continued to tell me what was wrong with me. It really doesn’t matter the fact is it caused me to question myself, feel rejected, reject myself, and adopt whoever I thought knew what the heck they were talking about.

Wrong, wrong, wrong!

This is one reason why it is so important to teach children how to have self-awareness, and it is never too late! (It seems that I am clashing self-awareness and self-identity together — to me they feel the same. This post is a processing post anyway.) Some folks may consider me going through a mid-life crisis, or being pre-menopausal. It is possible, but the funny thing is as I have been combing over my thoughts and where my thinking is at right now, I am entering my teenage phase of true rebellion! Lol! I am stripping off all of the ideals of the generation that raised me, and I am determining my own thoughts, beliefs, and self based on how I define it. I have read that this type of development normally starts from teens onto the end of people’s twenties at times. I am being kind of cheeky here, but it does seem spot on. A few months ago, I made list of goals that I wanted to achieve this year, my number one goal “To become self-sufficient in all areas.” I want my own identity, I want to be able to trust and rely on myself. (Not in a narcissistic way, we all need people.) I want my own income again. I hate being so dependent financially. I have always had this fire inside of me to be independent, but everyone told me how incapable and dependent I was.

I didn’t realize that many of those people were projecting their own self-talk onto me.

I didn’t know that I could reject those words, and trust what I felt about myself. It is so strange how I was raised to be so dependent in one sense, yet so independent in another. I have been thinking about this stuff for a while, I would like to go into greater detail. I am not sure that I will, but this morning I was triggered to get this out because I read this article by Ashley Judd Slaps Media in the Face for Speculation Over Her ‘Puffy’ Appearance. While at first when I read it I was trying to weed through whether it was her insecurities speaking, or if it was a good article. It turns out that I found many, many excellent things in what she wrote. She is tackling our perceptions of women in society, as a woman this is very close to me. As an autistic woman, I have additional factors that play into this. My lack of self-awareness and confidence in my own “gut feelings” has led me into the hands of predators that have used and hurt me.

I speak of male and females alike.

I not only have had the confusion of men reading me the wrong way, which quite frankly if my heart is set on someone they will know exactly how I feel. I normally do not stay quiet about my feelings toward people I care deeply for. I have never played games, in romantic relationships or any other relationships. However, I normally stay quiet until I know how they feel — I never like to show affections for people first EVER! My interactions with women and the “appearance” issue have been just as confusing as it has been with men. People can read wrong signals — they are their own perceived signals, whether through desires or insecurities. I don’t understand that. If you like me tell me, if you don’t tell me it saves everyone from grief. Had some of those girls asked me if I was flirting with their boyfriends, I would have told them directly…I did not want their man. (Believe me!) Instead of asking, they would attack my appearance, or me. With this type of banter that other women have done, or how men have treated me it makes me aware of my looks. At times, it made me feel inadequate in my appearance. I do not like people to see me because I have been attacked either way.

My self-esteem was damaged because of others lack of self-esteem.

It makes me filled with questions. Why does it matter what I look like? Who am I to you? Why do you feel the need to point out what you deem as flaws, or give backhanded compliments to confuse me? I now have questions for myself as well. Why didn’t I tell that jerk off when he told me that I was fat? Why did I listen when the guys in my life compared me to other girls and constantly told me what I needed to fix? Why did I stay with them when they clearly found other’s much more attractive, enough to cheat? How did I manage to end up with guys who were always fantasizing about blondes when I am a brunette? Why didn’t I shrug off anyone who did not value me? Why did I allow my mom’s own negative self-talk conform my own image — when I knew how damaging and wrong it was? Why is our culture so confusing sexualizing everything, but condemning us for being sexually active? Oh, I have so many questions! I have to stop myself, or I will keep going.

I am going to leave with the last paragraph of Ashley Judd’s article and say thank you to her as well.

“If this conversation about me is going to be had, I will do my part to insist that it is a feminist one, because it has been misogynistic from the start. Who makes the fantastic leap from being sick, or gaining some weight over the winter, to a conclusion of plastic surgery? Our culture, that’s who. The insanity has to stop, because as focused on me as it appears to have been, it is about all girls and women. In fact, it’s about boys and men, too, who are equally objectified and ridiculed, according to heteronormative definitions of masculinity that deny the full and dynamic range of their personhood. It affects each and every one of us, in multiple and nefarious ways: our self-image, how we show up in our relationships and at work, our sense of our worth, value, and potential as human beings. Join in—and help change—the Conversation.”

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04/7/12

About Lonely III (The Novella-I kid!)

Continued from About Lonely II…

I feel happy surrounded by my objects they do not replace people, but they sure are more accepting and less confusing. I want to interact and have more friendships. I am not sure how to keep long lasting relationships… maybe I can as long as they accept my ways and me. Honestly, I have not had very many people accept me. They have a preconceived idea about me. It is partly do to how I behave in situations with new people. I have had many people see me as a snob at first. It depends on the environment, but normally I try to stay out of sight, and quiet. One of the reasons for this is that people have misunderstood my personality for being an “attention seeker”. The truth is I am very animated; I get excited in good and bad ways. People have assumed that I am trying to be in the limelight when in reality I do not like being the star of the show. I like everyone to be seen, but many times, it does not work that way.

I like to share the stage — I admit the stage is fun, but not alone.

When I feel safe enough to let my guard down a bit people get to see that I am not a snob at all. I am a very accepting, and open person at times to my detriment. The good thing about me is that I never need much. I am always good with small gestures. Extravagance can make me feel awkward and uncomfortable. It is a lonely place to feel the need to stay on guard, know that people think you are stuck up, but do not know how to change it. It is a lonesome feeling to have to weed through social dynamics along with learning a new environment. I find it lonesome because others do not seem to have these same issues, so I have had to go through it alone.

I have observed others, and they know what a “look” means.

They understand a smile, or comment, someone’s tone does not confuse them. They laugh at things that can take me days to get. They remember to say “good morning” everyday. It can make me feel lonely when I do not understand what is going on. It makes me feel lonely when I am surrounded by people who seem to get everything that is going on and I haven’t clue. It seems many of my lonely feelings have to do with other people’s perceptions, their inability to read me, and/or my inability to read them. I am not alone; I do not feel lonely until it is brought to my attention how “different” I am. I find it interesting that my mom does not have the same feelings. She does not experience the same emotions that I do when confronted with being different.

If you have not guessed, I have been doing a parallel study.

Yes, I have been studying the differences between my mom and me. I have done this my whole life – the difference now is that my mom is answering my questions! She would not talk to me about this stuff before, now that she has an understanding of autism she is willing to discuss things she would not have in the past. She does not feel lonely when surrounded with a group of people who do not get her. She is aware of it, but it does not concern her. She has many rigid scripts though. They trump certain feelings — much like my “help trump” thing, my mom has mind trump cards that deal with social situations. I think hers is different because she is not as social as I am. She also does not put the same kind of importance on a relationship. I don’t know why I do this – I do have to accept it though.

I have friends, but I do not talk to them often.

I do interact through facebook sometimes. In my defense, (Not that I need to defend myself.) I am rather busy, and my priorities go to my children. I have taken to giving myself time to write, and blog because without that time I am no good to anyone. I email one friend on a semi-regular basis she does not get upset with me thankfully she understands. I have not been with or talked to my friend here since the last Bible study at my mom’s house, but we could not talk much then anyway. I enjoy reading, and commenting on the blogs I do. I am trying to be more social online, but I also know my limits. I also have to feel safe. When I feel safe my silliness comes out.

I can be quite the goofy lizard!

I do want to take a moment and talk about how I get taken aback in friendships. I have times when I shut down. My shut downs (or meltdowns) have been known to come on unexpectedly. In the last few months I have learned to watch for my triggers, and either start my own shut down, or prepare myself for what is about to happen. In the past, they seemed to come on suddenly and I would cut myself off from people completely. When I returned, the relationship seemed to change. It would cause me to be filled with anxiety and confusion because I didn’t understand what had happened. I tend to think everything is fine even with limited contact. I expected everything to be the same as it was the last time we had contact. This is where I can get sideswiped with confusion and hurt. I have encountered this on several occasions when I thought everything was fine, but the person had moved on and replaced me, or had no interest in me.

I perceived them as being finished with me, but not telling me.

These types of interactions caused overwhelming bouts of loneliness. It led to major negative looping because it didn’t make any sense. It was a rejection that seemed without cause. I have experienced this type of thing my entire life with numerous types of relationships. The worst ones were when my two live-in boyfriends (Not at the same time!) both planned to leave me, but did not tell me until the last minute. One I actually discovered that he was moving to another country because his new employer called and talked to me. If I had not gotten that phone call I am not sure when he would have told me. We did end up staying together while he lived there, but trust had been broken. My father did the same type of thing when I was around 11 or 12 I cannot remember now when he moved to another state. He told me the weekend before he was moving.

He didn’t understand why I was so upset.

It was a huge change; I had been going to his house practically every weekend since I was little. He was leaving, and I did not know when I would see him. I also felt like he didn’t much care that he was leaving me. The feeling I always had was that I should be happy for him. It was the same way by boyfriend responded when I discovered that he was going to work in another country. The first boyfriend to spring this “side swipe break up” on me acted as if I should have known. However, he hid it from me for over a month. He put in a transfer and the people at work (We worked at the same place at the time.) knew before I did. When he continued to keep contact with me and shared his life again, it was an attitude of “You should be happy for me.” Every time I encountered this, I experienced the other traumas on top of it. I didn’t want to, my mind seemed to attack me, my thoughts were uncontrollable, and I felt the emotions over and over again. These experiences made me feel exceptionally lonely. I had no one to talk to, and since all of them acted as if it was ok, I thought I had no reason to be upset.

My mom was not much comfort in this area.

She does not have much sympathy when she considers people to be jerks. She had empathy, but her way of handling it was different. She felt badly for me, but to her they were replaceable. When I think of lonely those were lonely times. I was terribly alone in my feelings, and hurt. Still I entertained myself, I talked to trees, birds, bugs, animals, the sky, and I went on adventures during the wee hours of the night. (Not too smart – no sense of danger.) I spent many days at the pool, and many nights spent with the moon and stars on my balcony. I also poured myself into work. During those times, I had my cherished books, movies, and music. They were my best friends and the only ones who understood me. Some people thought I was so strange. They thought something was wrong with me because I enjoyed riding my bike by myself, or during breaks instead of talking about people I was busy examining lizards or I would change the subject to vampires!

I may have felt lonely, but I was never alone.

Lonely sounds like such an awful thing. Sometimes I think it is good to feel that deep lonely feeling. If we didn’t feel that, how could we find our self? How can we ever discover our true inner strength, if we do not see what it is like to have no one? I am not speaking of long periods of depressed isolation, which is definitely not a good thing. I have gone through that it normally does not bring about healing. I am referring to what I felt at the symposium. I sat surrounded by people who look at my kind as studies, enigmas, puzzles to figure out, preconceived ideas about how people like me think. I was an alien in a room full of medical professionals. It freaked me out for a moment, but then I realized nothing had changed.

I was alone, but I wasn’t truly lonely.

I understood that the only reason why I was feeling lonely was that they were saying how much I needed people. I needed to adapt in order to be in this world if I do not want to be lonely. All of it was based on their perception of what lonely means and as I have been thinking about it, here I am once again debunking someone else’s idea of whom I am. They had great resources and ideas to help integrate people on the autism spectrum. They could explain how my brain works in the area of social confusion in so much detail; they gave me great understanding and clarity that helped me. They had very positive things to say about people on the autism spectrum, but they also were generalizing and making assumptions based on their own personal feelings.

I want friends.

I want to experience people. I want to share with people, and enjoy people. I want to be able to share myself without fears of rejection. It is happening. I am very much a social Aspie, but I also cannot be too social. I have to have limits. I get over-stimulated. I can get obsessive if I am confused by a relationship. I do not feel like I am missing anything though because I do not have a bunch of people in my life, or because I do not go out all the time. Those things made me feel very lonely. It does not make me a lonely person. All of these years my feelings of loneliness have been stemmed from being misunderstood, and having people in my life who were constantly telling me how I needed to be. Discovering more about whom I am, and how I see and process my world takes away a lot of my loneliness.

The feelings of isolation and deep despair have dwindled.

I understand that I can have that type of negative loop, but my looping is not the same as actually feeling that way. My loops are usually my brain trying to help me understand something. I think the saying is true you have to love yourself before you can know how to love others. It never made sense to me until I started actually liking myself for the first time in my life. I have spent a large amount of time trying to love others with all of my heart because I did not know how to love myself. (I do not mean to sound all cheesy here, but I have to confess this stuff.) My coming to terms and accepting more of me has given me the ability to step out more and comment on other blogs.

It has given me the ability to share more of me with others.

It has revealed how there are people who know what I am talking about. They have felt similar things — we truly are not alone. Though we may feel lonely out in the “real” world, the internet world seems to bring me much comfort, even if I do not have “normal” relationships with people. I am still very hard on myself, and question at times, why anyone would want anything to do with me. This is not out of insecurity it is out of the inability to see who I am. It is my “self mind-blindness.” My self-awareness has been lacking, and I have been looking to others to help me all of these years. I do not see what others see in me. I do not understand what attracts people to me. I do not know why anyone would want to be my friend, or love me. I am a little teary eyed at this point and I do not know why. I partially think it is because I am seeing some good things about myself. I am accepting that I am good at things. I believe that I am a person of worth, and I matter. I cannot tell you how incredibly painful it is for me to write those words. I felt like nothing for so long.

I felt invisible many times.

The feelings like no one would notice if I just left this world, feeling completely unlovable and rejected for so many years stripped me of self. My mom felt all of those things her entire life as well, but she never shared that until our weekend together. Again hers is in a different way, it has to do more so with talent than self. However, her self-image does stem her feelings, but I will not go into that. Discovering why we do things the way we do, and that there are others who share and understand has given us a new perspective on life. We have also had many things cleared up gaining the understanding that no two autistics are alike. We are not a simple label, you cannot fit us into a box, and we are our own unique vessel. I do not understand why people have to be categorized. That is a sure fire way to make someone feel lonely. I am wondering what others think about the word lonely. I wonder why people write so many things about it, but never really tackle the subject. Lonely…there is so much packed into that word.

If you are feeling lonely, remember you are not alone.

The end!

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May 2012
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