Tag Archives: stim

04/10/13

Wordless Wednesday

Except it’s not! Here are a few words, I love nature! I enjoy my yard very much and I am so excited to see the spring season because it has been years and years since, I have been able to witness the joys of spring. It is a delight and makes me very jolly to watch all the birds cluster upon the grass, hop around with dangling worms, ( I do feel sorry for the worms.) all the squirrels, rabbits, bugs, and flowers starting to bud and bloom. It makes me smile. I am going to stop now and share some images I have taken recently they made me smile, maybe they will make you smile too. :-D

Happy day to you! (It may not be Wednesday where you are and I am off to bed soon.) 

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01/17/13

Some Major Progress YAY!(Not Without Challenges) II

Continued from, Some Major Progress YAY!(Not Without Challenges) I

He has been putting in a lot of effort and energy at to try not to have outbursts. He does not want to have him. He has expressed that clearly to me. He does not like it, but this has been the only way he knew how to express himself.  He only started using complex sentences when he six, that is two years that he has been working on other language skills.

As he gains better language/communication skills, he is able to tell me these things more and more.

I do not expect past behaviors or coping mechanisms to change overnight. I do not expect it to one-day end. (I still have my own outbursts and meltdowns.) Yes, some of this started as a tantrum, but it escalated into a meltdown. There are moments that it can be controlled, to a point, and moments when it cannot.

It takes a lot of patience, empathy, and sympathy.

I do not always have them, but I try. Some days I am great other days I am not. This is hard for me because I do start to internalize and speak negatively to myself if I lose my patience. I know that Daniel does this to himself too when he has a meltdown or gets angry. I have learned to accept that emotions, reactions, and even behaviors cannot be thought of in extreme or black-and-white thinking. Daniel and I are both learning, thankfully, I have positive tools to help us.

When he woke this morning, it was as though he had a hangover.

Yet, he was still in good spirits everything was going well. Then, he and Joshua started talking about the toys, all I heard was Joshua’s innocent statement, “Well, Daniel you have the spider.” That was it. It took nearly two hours to get Daniel refocused and ready for school.

work_in_progress_by_dejco-d3hd34uDuring, that time Daniel expressed some very important things.

I was able to get confirmation of how I thought he internalized things. I heard firsthand how he was filtering through inaccurate perspectives, at least with this situation. I am certain that it is a regular occurrence, but I had not heard him say it aloud.

1. He told me that I caused him to become overloaded and that caused him to have meltdowns.

When I explained to him that I did not cause him to be overloaded, and asked him to recall all the times that he has responded this way, he realized the common trigger – these types of toys. It frustrated him, but he could not say that it was not true. I let him be frustrated and work through that.

2. He then, told me that he was broken. He did not understand why his brain was broken.

I explained to him that he is absolutely not broken. I continued to reassure him that none of this was his fault and that he had done nothing wrong when it came to the toys. I did address his behaviors toward me that were not acceptable. I made very clear distinctions.

3. He would calm down, but then, he would loop right back to the toys. He said things like, “I am never going to get it. I will always not have them.”

I told him the rule once again, about completing school and then, getting it for 15 minutes and that I did not say never or always.

4. He told me that he did not like that.

I told him his choices were 15 minutes after school was completed each day, or not at all.

5. He felt out of control again and I had to put him in his room.

It is an open area in the middle of the house, there are no doors, and it can be disturbing to everyone when he is upset. Joshua had a class that was about to start so I really tried to help Daniel calm down. It did not work, I needed a break, and David came in while I went outside for a minute. When I came back, Daniel was calm on his bed. I went to talk to him again.

6. He told me that I was too loud. He then, said, “I do not know why, I am broken. I do not know why my brain will not work.” and that he was afraid of daddy. (It is hard to know if I was actually too loud because he is highly sensitive to sound, Ariel and Joshua did not say I was so it could have been too much processing and sound sensitivity.)

He started to get upset with me again. I kept everything simple, direct, and reassured him. I then, scooped him up and took him to David’s office so we could take care of his fear right away. We explained again about the toys and that he did not need to be afraid of daddy. David reassured him and Daniel stayed and talked to him while I went to help Joshua with class. When I came back, David shared with me some other things that Daniel said.

He expressed again, that he did not know why his brain was broken.

David explained to him that he was not broken. He used the example of people who have a peanut allergy. He told him that they may like peanuts, but they cannot even get near peanut butter because it can cause them to swell up or get very ill. He told him that there is nothing wrong with them. Their bodies are just unable to tolerate peanuts. Daniel also said, “I do not know why I am different.” David told him how everyone is different. There is no one the same and it is good to be different.

When I came back, he seemed much better.

I asked him if he wanted to go eat breakfast, he agreed. I thought about what he was excited about this week. He was very excited about all of the items we got for OT sessions. I pulled out the putty and asked him to get the pennies out. I told him what a great job he did with all of those things he did with his OT. I pulled each thing he had done and told him what a great job he did and how awesome he is. He started to say things like, “I am so good at this. Look, mom, look at how I good I am.” Then, other things like, “I am good at a lot of things.”

I look at all of this and I have to say I am ecstatic.

I would prefer my child not to have to go through all of this. I would prefer not to go through some of this stuff, but it happens. I do not dwell on that. I am too happy that my son who has been unable to tell me how he feels IS telling me. I have the opportunity to help him! He does not have to go through life believing negative things. Well, they may continue to creep up, but if he feels able to talk about them that is one step closer to distinguishing between negative thinking and realistic thinking. I am so excited that he is feels comfortable enough to express himself. That he is gaining confidence. That he is excited about talking to others instead of, feeling as if he can’t. I cannot wait to hear what he wants to share next. It can be very challenging, but all of this is such wonderful progress for him.

It is too exciting to experience Daniel’s mind – it overrides any frustrations and gives me that boost to anticipate great things daily.

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01/17/13

Some Major Progress YAY!(Not Without Challenges) I

Since last week, Daniel had some significant changes happen with his communication. He has responded rapidly to his speech therapy. This past Monday, his OT session gave him a boost of confidence. The one-on-one time with the therapists has given him practice with communicating and he has immediately applied what he has learned.

He has been initiating conversation in his social skills group with the other kids and the teacher.

All of this has given him confidence in ways that I had not expected. It has given him the ability to articulate specific feelings or thoughts that he has been having that I was unaware of as well. His progression has been rapid and it is very exciting for him, his therapist, and ME! (Clap, clap, clap) Everything that we have worked on, such as other people’s emotions, past tense verbs, asking questions, and remembering names, things like that have opened up a whole new world for Daniel.

She has used stuffed animals and doll-like items to ask him their expressions, this works!

All of the other body language, moving eyes, lips, eyebrows, foreheads, voice tones, words etc… are eliminated and the expression is all that he has to focus on. This helps him a great deal. It has helped him express his own emotions, as well as being able to read some of our emotions properly.

fluttershy__s_yay_badge_by_zutheskunk-d3e8usbHe has felt so confident that he has shared with me what he is feeling.

I will get into that a little more in a minute. I want to share his amazing accomplishments with school first. During the first semester, Daniel would go to his virtual class, but refused to interact or participate. He seemed to get frustrated, but I was not exactly sure why. I felt that because he did not know how to interact and heard other kids participating, including Ariel who participates all the time that it made him feeling bad.

I was not sure, but now I know that is what it was.

I know that he had many thoughts running through his mind, but he could not get them to come out. He did not know how to tell me, or even what he felt himself. I know what that is like, not only is it frustrating, but it can cause serious self-esteem issues and anxieties. He is discovering his way of communication by using his special interests.

On Tues., he had his regular class, which happened to be math – we are doing geometry.

Daniel LOVES geometry. I used it to convince him to participate in class. He was excited and could not wait to talk to his teacher and answer some questions. It took a while, he waited (kind of patiently), but told me that it was taking too long. I messaged the teacher and asked if he could answer a question. She opened up the microphone for him to speak, BUT the connection would not work.

This problem has been happening off and on this week.

He has been frustrated, but worked hard each time to get refocused and try again. This was the last straw. He was so upset. It took so much for him to get to that point to try and then, the computer glitch just caused a spiral. I was so for sad him. I could do nothing else, but try to comfort him.

I reassured him and told him he could try again on Thurs. he agreed to try again.

I emailed the teacher what happened and told her that I was going to try to get him to try again. She was ready today. She let him answer the first question. HE DID IT! He said, “Hi,” talked to her a little bit, and then, answered the question. YAY! Woot! He was so proud of himself. His teacher told him how great he did and so did I.

These are some fantastic things.

I am so proud of him, more importantly he is proud of himself. However, there have been some rough times in the last two days. It opened my eyes to just how much he has been reading our emotions inaccurately. He has assumed any perceived negative emotions to be because of him.

Part of the reason for his rough time is because of all the progress he has been making.

It takes so much; he has been putting in so much effort, and succeeding. However, all of the processing leads to certain behaviors. One can be negative types of stimming. He was doing great, with the exception of the cotton balls.

That is until, yesterday after they received several boxes of gifts from one of their grandma’s.

We did not know what were in the boxes, had we known we would not have allowed them to open them until we could examine the toys. We were happy for the surprise gifts, but certain toys we simply cannot allow Daniel to have because of the unhealthy fixation that he has and the over stimulation.

There are certain types of toys that make him unable to control his behaviors.

They are like a bad drug. He cannot get enough, he will not stop until he makes himself sick, and he will spiral into meltdowns. I had hoped that it would turn out ok. I let him have two of the toys with the hope that if I regulated his time and he took breaks that he would be ok.

The toys caused him to become over stimulated and then, angry.

He stopped drinking, he stopped eating, he stopped going to the bathroom, and he refused to do anything else except play with the toys. It was a remote control car. It was loud, had wheels that lit up, and that spun very fast, along with a remote control spider that moved quickly and was very loud as well.

When they did not work the way he expected he got upset.

This happened several times throughout the day, escalating to the point of complete meltdown. I had no other choice, but to put the toys in the garage. I explained to him for almost two hours why he could not have the toys and the reasons that they affect him in negative ways.

He sobbed, screamed, and got angry with me.

He blamed me, claiming that it was my fault entirely. I continued to wait for moments for when I could explain and he was able to hear (understand) to me. Finally, I told him that I would let him see the toys for 15 minutes each, AFTER he completed his schoolwork. This was a satisfying solution for him.

He settled and went to bed for me.

I sat and stared at the TV because I was exhausted, but happy because he used new coping mechanisms to calm himself down. He took control of his actions on his own,chose to sit with me, and tried to listen. He also initiated an apology on his own.

I reiterate this is hard work for him.    

The rest of the story… Some Major Progress YAY!(Not Without Challenges) II    

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12/23/12

No Snow? Make Snowflakes!

The kids have been excitedly awaiting December 21st, the first day of winter this year. They get excited with each season, but especially with fall and winter. This year they could barely control their enthusiasm because this is the first year that they get to see seasons change. Where we lived before all of the seasons looked pretty much the same, maybe slightly colder, but no leaves changing and definitely no snow. For several weeks now they have been asking, “When is it going to be the first day of winter?”

They have been more concerned with that than, Christmas. 

The news had mentioned that it may snow on the first day of winter and that night there were little flurry’s that came. They all expected to see the ground covered with white, fluffy, cotton ball-type stuff when they awoke. However, they were disappointed to see only brown leaves still blanketing our yard. They all kept watching and asking when the snow was going to come BECAUSE it was the first day of winter AND there is supposed to be snow. I do have three literal thinkers, you know.

I spent the day explaining weather, also, why it does not always snow on the first day of winter. 

I know I am saying, “The first day of winter” a lot, because I have heard it at least a billion times a day. No, I am kidding, but it has been a lot. After a couple hours, Joshua and Ariel finally accepted that there would be no snow. Joshua took it upon himself to create his own snowflakes saying, “I will make my own snow in the house!” I thought that was great until I walked back into the living room, only a matter of minutes, to discover that Joshua and Ariel had plastered snowflakes all over of the walls with black duct tape!

Yes, they are that fast and yes, they managed to find duct tape somewhere instead of asking for scotch tape. 

Ha ha ha I had images of paint coming off the walls and my stomach had a knot, we rent so I had a moment of internal freak out. This quickly changed to the joy of how awesome I think my kids are. I moved all of the snowflakes to the front door that had the duct tape and let them put others up on the wall with scotch tape so they could enjoy some festive snow. I thought this would take care of any of the snow disappointment.

It did not. 

Ariel and Joshua finally came to terms with no snow and I thought Daniel had, but he has been somewhat anxious ever since. I attributed it to the excitement of waiting for Christmas. I try to keep it as easy for all of them as possible to not feed into the anticipation and anxiety, by not putting their presents under the tree until they are in bed on Christmas Eve. If I do not they cannot focus on anything else and Daniel will not be able to talk about or think about anything else. The present anxiety will cause him to be on edge and unable to enjoy himself.

It is just too much for him to wait. 

I can relate my mom had to keep presents hidden from me because I could not stand the waiting. It would consume my thoughts and one Christmas I managed to find all of my presents, I peeled open each one very carefully, but I was not that skilled so my mom figured out what I had done. She thought I was misbehaving – in reality I was so anxious, excited, and fixated on the presents that it was causing me to feel physically ill. The anticipation was all-consuming. She understands now, she did not when I was 8 years old. :-)

I did not know until this morning that he was having anxiety about no snow. 

He was having a hard time this morning and continued to bring up the snow question. It finally struck me and I asked, “Daniel are you anxious about it not snowing?” He said, “Yes, I do not know when it is going to snow and I do not know why it has not snowed.”

Oh, boy!

I asked him a few other questions and discovered that he has been anxiously awaiting for the snow to fall even before the first day of winter. Since it did not snow, he has been anxiously awaiting it for the past few days. It has made it difficult for him to focus or think about anything, which explains his sudden regression with certain things and his constant stimming on spinning things.

The poor guy could not think of anything else because he could not understand where the snow was. 

I thought I had explained it properly the other day. Apparently, I had not so I went into a more detailed explanation and reminded him that where we lived before it never snowed at wintertime. I shared what causes it snow and how it is too warm right now. I also explained that we could not know exactly when it will snow in terms that were very clear and direct. I watched his body and face suddenly change looking more relaxed and at ease. I asked him if he was anxious any longer and he said no.

He has been doing much better. 

I am glad that I figured this out because I do not know how long he would have been feeling such anxiety over no snow. It can be hard to explain to people about these things. Many people would not think that “snow anxiety” would be an issue.

It can be hard to pick up on these things.

When the holidays already make anxieties and sensory issues highly sensitive, it can be difficult to perceive what is going on. Daniel does not know how to explain these types of things and the only way I figure them out is by paying close attention to his behaviors and asking the “right” questions.

Some days I miss it, other days I do not. 

I do hope we get snow for the kid’s sake, but if we do not, at least we have some snowflakes! On another note, I am excited about all of the positive photo sharing that has been happening on facebook and I am going to share several facebook pages in hopes that others will “like” them AND share them!

Balanced Imperfection

Autism Shines

Disability and Representation

ThAutcast: Aspergers and Autism Community

I will share some snowflake pictures! 

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08/4/12

“Are we in control of our own decisions?” TED Videos

I am in research mode. My “societal confusion” has caused a huge looping spiral – connecting and distracting, filtering and observing, reading and watching, analyzing and crying. My brain has been spinning and spinning and I cannot stop it. I must consume this information to help me find balance. However, it causes me to become overwhelmed with emotions.

I want answers. 

I want to know why people behave the way they do. I want to understand why human beings insist on continuing patterns that have shown clear destructive consequences generation after generation. Why do we repeat instead of change? I am seeking hope in humanity. In order for me to do so, I am trying to understand. I am not sure I will ever have my questions answered. I am still devouring and sifting through the many resources I am consuming. I cannot get my other post out that I am working on; I decided to share some videos I have been watching. I find behavioral economics very intriguing.

I will leave you with these quotes and videos letting you ponder on your own.

“But suppose we are nothing more than the sum of our first, naive, random behaviors. What then?” 

― Dan Ariely, Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions

“The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation — a force for construction and destruction.” 
― Jonathan Haidt

 

Dan Ariely asks, Are we in control of our own decisions?

 

Dan Ariely: Our buggy moral code

 

Jonathan Haidt: The moral roots of liberals and conservatives (Be sure not to pass judgement before watching this whole video.) 

Oh, and I also wanted to share How To Disagree. I read this and it helped me a lot with understanding comments and some of the “comment confusion”  can have at times. (Comments that are attacking, hateful, disrespectful, damaging etc…  toward others and make no sense to me why another person would do that. Comments from all media outlets that are like this.) I am setting myself up for a troll here. Great! The author Paul Graham has many other essays as well. I have not read any others yet, but I thought I would share.

Wait other good news… Daniel got in the car today with no problems. I did have to sit next to him, but he got in on his own and wanted to try. He is still anxious, but is trying so very hard. He is doing a great job conquering his anxiety. Small steps, he is a happy boy right now. :-)

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08/2/12

Nathaniel’s Photo Shoot (Mr. Cat)

I have two posts rolling around in my drafts that I have started. However, I am unable to complete them. They require mental energy that I do not have at the moment. This past week I have become the couch potato when everyone is off to bed. I have enjoyed my solitude very much. Me and the cat chillaxin’ in peace on the sofa, watching whatever flick grabs our attention. Well, my attention, the cat is mostly sleeping, mostly… that is unless I am like a shark slowly crawling on the floor, camera in hand ready to get the best kitty shot!

Yes, if you were to look into my windows you would see me hiding on the floor. 

Stalking my cat with my camera. OH! Lightening just lit up the sky! It was all purple and crashing loudly somewhere – thunder, counting, waiting for the lightening… sorry that was a “squirrel” instance. Indeed, I managed to annoy my favorite feline so much last night that he thumped his tail at me and even grabbed at the camera to take it is away. He scooped it with his paw and then, sniffed it.

It’s my entertainment in the wee hours of the night.

I have not been able to sleep most of this week. I figured I would go ahead and share Nathaniel’s pictures because I think he is such a handsome fellow. I will leave you with the star of the show as we meander into the other room for some movie time. I will be chowing on some oatmeal with strawberries, while Mr. Cat tries to figure out why his water jug is moving before he casually glides across the floor, hops onto the sofa, and licks himself with an attitude. As if I am disturbing him by meowing repeatedly, come on! What cat doesn’t love that? :-) (It’s raining, thundering, and lightening…oh, lights flickering!)

I should take a picture of his perplexity with his water jug thingy. 

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07/29/12

Ramblings I Suppose

I have no idea if any of my posts lately are making sense, or if I sound like a babbling rambling fool. I need to write and get things out of my head though so I hope that I am not being too terribly off. I am in a massive information consumption, and book-reading loop. This morning I have been on a Psychology Today reading kick. I am fairly certain that I am reading obsessively to help calm my anxieties about going to my aunt’s house today. I do not “feel” all that anxious, but my mind is acting otherwise. She has put out a facebook invite to any and everyone so I have no idea how many people will be there. I do not know many of them, except family. I also have the lingering anticipation about the kid’s anxieties.

I have not told Daniel yet.

It seemed to be a better route not to tell him about this yet. I tried to in the beginning of the week, and he shutdown for a while then, came full force with a ton of questions. As well as almost tears, hitting his head with his hands and then, playing drums on everything in the house. Tap, tap, thump, thump, rad-a-tat, rad-a-tat, all over the place. The one question he repeated for several hours was, “Why? Why do we have to go? Why, is it there? Why are there people going? Why does the car shake? Why does the road go up? Why? Why? Why?” He was getting himself so upset that finally I told him that we were not going and not to worry about it. He would not have been able to function the rest of the week. I felt horrible because I wanted to prepare him ahead of time and discuss it with him. He was just unable to do so this week so I will do it about an hour before hand.

There are times when it is better to wait and tell him.

There are other times when I must prepare him ahead of time months in advance. It all depends on how he is responding, feeling, and determining what he is able to process at the moment. He has too much anxiety about getting in the car right now. The anticipation of thinking about it, worrying about it, fearing things like getting carsick again, would have been too much for him. There was no way to make him feel better about it. I do have a plan to help with today, and I am hoping it works. If not he may have to stay home with Daddy because Ariel and Joshua are excited about going – though they are having their own anxieties.

Ariel has been sharing much more about her social thoughts.

She talked to me about how people look at her funny sometimes when we are out and she does not understand why. I explored that in much more detail. I will not go in depth with it though. It was a great opportunity to explain to her that we never know what people are thinking. We may be reading people wrong when they look at us and there are many reasons as to why a person may be looking at us oddly. Such as we look familiar, they like something about us, they want to talk to us but do not know how, or they want to ask us a question, they like our clothes, there could be anything! I realized that everything I was telling her was positive. I had explained to her that in that type of situation it does not always mean a bad thing.

I then, thought to myself, “I need to listen to my own words!”

She explained to me as well that she feels more comfortable talking to people who are in business, or she knows what they do. The more we talked I discovered that she gets anxious about meeting new people because she does not know anything about them and does not know how to, or what to talk to them about. Oh, gosh! Me too! She wants all of the information about people beforehand so she knows what to talk about. That is exactly what I do. This is the reason I look up people and try to get to know things about them before I interact with them.

I cannot do chitchat very well.

At some point, I get annoyed and shutdown, or walk away because it makes my brain feel fuzzy and confused. My purpose in talking to people is mutual information sharing. I like to learn things in a conversation. Whether it is details about their work, their ways of thinking, or their lifestyle. I need concrete information and I can sit with a person who is willing to answer all of my questions for hours. When I am talking to them I am connecting so many other sources of information swimming around in my brain, and I add that information to the conversation. I do not talk to people just to talk. If I am going to invest my time in a person, I want it to be worth it.

If I invest any amount of time in a person, it means I want to.

If I see that, they are not giving me mutual information exchange I tend to walk away, or stop talking. I see no point in it. I can be silly, and say frivolous things at times. However, at some point I need to see that the person and I have something of substance to talk about otherwise I cannot keep up the conversation in the physical or in the virtual. I go back to my word productive. It needs to be producing something. I like talking and reading about people who produce thoughts in my mind, and keeps me connecting and wondering about all kinds of things. Ariel is like that too, I have watched her walk away from conversations when she does not get to contribute thoughts, or does not understand the point.

We all do this at home as well, but we are just as goofy as we are serious.

I think I just tapped into my anxiety. I have several different things making me anxious. I am anxious about Daniel’s response to the car, his response to being around a whole bunch of people, and how people will respond to him. I believe my other aunt who sent me a ton of letters out of nowhere causing me to spiral into social confusion frenzy, may be there. She is upset (through the family grapevine) that I did not tell her that we were moving here. To be honest, I did not tell anyone except my close aunt, my grandma and then, my dad and step mom about a month before. I did not have time or the emotional ability to get on the phone, or email everyone and tell them that I was coming here.

My thoughts, why would they care anyway they never talk to me?

What does it matter now? I am just going to be myself and try not to let that nonsense get to me. My kids are my focus and my cousin since he will be leaving soon. I still have the underlining anxiety quietly hiding that will manifest itself in other ways. I have to keep that in mind for the kids and me. We all do it even though Joshua has no problems walking into a place and talking to people. He is very social; he still has meltdowns/shutdowns in his own way. As much as he loves it, it still takes a lot out of him. I assume I needed to get this stuff out of my head to help me move forward for the day. I had planned to only share some links and pictures of what the kids have been up to! My head is so full of words. I have a story floating around in there as well. Need-to-get-it-out. Onto my initial quest!

The kids have been watching Lego engineers on Lego.com Creator.

Joshua is very animate about becoming a Lego Engineer when he grows up. Ariel has added that to her many occupations she plans on doing. Daniel however, well he wants to fly. No, not in a plane or helicopter, he wants to grow wings and fly. He asks me, “Why can’t I have wings like a bird?” at least one time at some point in the day. Who knows, maybe he will one day. They have been on Lego Universe for days as well. Not all day long, but off and on. They have been creating all kinds of things. Ariel has struggled in the past trying to be imaginative with Lego’s. She has always wanted to be able to create things the way that Joshua does. He thinks of something and the next thing you know he was created an entire movie scene and is playing out the story line that is in his head. She can do this with painting and drawing, or writing stories and poetry. She was so excited to discover that she could create things in her head too with Lego’s.

She needed visual instructions for Lego’s though!

I did not pick up on this, until after watching her create some things the other day. She had been watching the Lego designers give step-by-step instructions for building. It all finally clicked for her and then, once she started creating things she had to give me step-by-step instructions on how she build what she created. I have pictures of her doing this with her lamppost. She was very detailed and serious while giving me the instructions. Joshua and Daniel happily played with their Lego creations not desiring to instruct me on anything. They just wanted to play, while Ariel felt it necessary that she share with me how she did it.

Awesome! My kid’s rock!

I cannot help it I have to say it, I love how different they are and how each of them share. It makes me so happy. I better get busy and prepare for the day. I just realized going through this post that I am scripting in my head for social conversations today. How funny, I am telling myself what types of people to speak to and what types not to by reminding myself why I have conversations. Writing this stuff out reminded me that chitchat conversations confuse me, and peoples faces confuse me. I get anxious after-the-fact because I do not understand what, or why they were making a facial expression at me, said something that seemed odd to me, or are responding in a way that I do not understand. I had no idea why I was writing all of that stuff out. Preparation is the name of the game! I am always two-steps behind my brain, and two-steps ahead of my mind. Lol!

Reads others may be interested in also. 

Toxic Relationships in Eating Disorder Recovery

Overcoming Resistance in Binge Eating Disorder Treatment

Treating Mid-Life Eating Disorders

Myths of Forgiveness

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07/28/12

Could We Be Anymore Social?

I have had to take breaks from many online social outlets this week. I do not know how people do it. I do not know how they stay on read all kinds of things, comment, post, tweet, email, and continue in real life too. While, I am much better with online socialization, in the context of not having as much anxiety, stress, and able to read people without too much confusion for the most part – I still go into social overload.

Especially, when there are copious amounts of what feels like media stampedes. 

It feels like I am being assaulted from all sides with words, and images. It causes my brain to shutdown, and my soul to hurt. I have had to put into practice mindful thinking a lot this week. I have been sent into spirals about friendships, relationships in general, wondering about political agendas, personal agendas, people’s motives on a large scale, wondering what is productive, and counterproductive in society… humanity as a whole and how it still proves to be very similar to all of recorded history. Humans, myself included, can be quite the predictable creatures. (When it comes to certain patterns, but I do not feel like going into all of that.)

Mindfulness:

Mindfulness is a state of active, open attention on the present. When you’re mindful, you observe your thoughts and feelings from a distance, without judging them good or bad. Instead of letting your life pass you by, mindfulness means living in the moment and awakening to experience.

I tried meditating… again and again…and again.

I think I got about five minutes in! Lol! I keep trying though. This week I watched two days of videos and took the review quizzes at the end for the kid’s virtual school. TWO DAYS! I could not stop, I just wanted to get through it and make sure I understood everything. I got upset when I missed several questions – I made it clear in their comments section that the wording of the questions and answers were hard to comprehend at times. I am not sure, if it was the way my brain read and interpreted the questions, or if they were actually written poorly.

Either way I missed some and I did not like that!

Apparently, there is going to be teacher calls with me and the children about every two weeks. There may be more interactions for Daniel once his IEP is set in place. They may offer services online, or send us somewhere close by for therapies. I have not spoken with his teacher yet, he will have a specific special needs staff handling that. I will be quite virtually social. The kids will be too. They will have live sessions with the teacher and other children. About 45 days into the school year clubs begin, and there are field trips along with other forms of opportunity for socializing. I will pick and chose what opportunities will fit us best.

The three boxes of curriculum arrived yesterday.

The kids and I were ecstatic! My grandma was here, (Speaking of social, yesterday was quite a social affair, I will share later.) and she said, “It’s like Christmas in July.” She had never seen kids get so excited over schoolbooks. Ariel wanted to start right away. Their first day of school is actually the day David leaves for several weeks. I think that is good because they will have something to focus on and we can start our new routine. We pulled out everything, made sure it was all there, and explored. It is familiar curriculum styles – I used many actual schoolbooks that I had found on Ebay for homeschooling.

The math curriculum is one that I wanted to start several years ago, but it was too expensive. 

We have Discovery Education through the school resources - free!! (Well our tax dollars are paying for much of this stuff, I am ok with that.) We wanted to get that several years ago too, but we just could not pull the funds. I still love Khan Academy, Ted-Ed , and YouTube EDU - I plan on continuing to use them on a regular basis. Along with many other resources! Can you tell that I am a little excited? I read the school handbook, and I am now going over our state supplement for the handbook. Ok, I will stop before I go into complete details about all of the curriculum and the operating system that the school uses. Ariel already read her entire first reading book, and has started her second one – I am talking about her textbook. I told she is going to have to read it again and go in a much slower pace. She said she understood I hope she does not get annoyed with having to go slower and do the lessons.

My point, we are going to be more phone, and webcam social, as well as physically social. 

After several meltdowns/shutdowns from change, social overload, sensory overload, and emotional overload, we all seem to be moving in a calmer direction. We took some social time off last week – I still cannot get Daniel in the car. However, I will get him into the car this Sunday for a barbecue thing at my aunt’s house. My cousin is in town! He and several of my other cousins came over last night for a little while. I have not seen any of them for about five years. I am the oldest cousin so it was quite a treat to see them as grown men. One now married, the one visiting went into the Marines and has been doing an amazing job.

He is here for several days and then off to Japan in August for two years.

It is my aunts son, and I know she is both elated and heartbroken at the same time. There were six of them that came over last night, five of my cousins, (All guys ranging in age 13 to late 20′s, I believe, I am so bad with remembering age everyone looks the same age to me!)  And my Marine cousin’s girlfriend. She was in boot camp with him, if I recall correctly. I was excited and nervous I was anxious and happy. I enjoyed myself very much, the kids just ran. They ran all around the yard, while we stood outside and enjoyed the scenery – the AWESOME yard! So happy here, so happy. :-)  We have a tree swing too so of course; everyone had to try it out.

My one cousin said his wife bought him a trampoline and it has been the greatest thing. 

He mentioned that he has gone back to some childish behaviors like enjoying swings again, and his trampoline. I said, “I always engage in childish behaviors, and I do not care!” Lol! I think more adults should try to swing for a while, or get on a trampoline. I was very happy with how respectful they all were about coming over. My one cousin called a couple of days ahead of time to set up a good day to come over. Yesterday was agreed upon, but the time was still not set. I continued to prepare the kids, and talked to Daniel specifically. They were all feeling the same way I was, excited and anxious. It was a good thing having grandma here first because it helped alleviate some of the “anticipation anxiety.”

Then, when the curriculum arrived, that was a bonus distraction. 

I finally got the call for when they were coming, and at first, the plan had only been my two cousins, and the girlfriend, possibly my aunt. The plan changed to six of them, which included a couple more of my cousins. I was hesitant because of the change, and my cousin said, “If it is a problem I completely understand.” I only had to adjust my thoughts, and prepare the kids and myself. I told him it was no problem and to come on over. I am glad I did.

It is starting not to be such an intense emotional frenzy for me.

I am remembering that I do enjoy being around many of my family members, though I still need down time. I enjoy the diversity in my family’s beliefs as well, my Marine cousin is an Atheist, my married cousin is a Orthodox Christian, (I believe I have linked to the proper beliefs that he is following.) my other cousins are non-denominational Christian, and Baptist, or Methodist it has changed at some point.

We will see how Christmas goes. :-)  

Daniel helped himself all day yesterday with the anxiety by playing the iPad, (He and Ariel love this vectorpark.com on the computer and the iPad.) and playing with his hand recorder. I let them watch My Little Pony, (Any Bronies out there? :-) ) and then we had fun with our new school stuff. So far, today is looking good. Although, Daniel is stomping around the house, to make noise, and walking the perimeter of the house because the iPad battery is charging. I am going to take them swimming later that should help all of us. We all love to be in the water!

In a way, I very excited about all of our new social adventures. 

I am happy that we are having actual physical encounters that have been very positive. Even with some of the things that have upset me with family, the overall experiences have been positive for the kids. (Even for me.) My sister got the house she wanted for her and my niece and will be moving out here in a few weeks. More social adventures awaiting us in the future. I am very thankful that my fears are not gripping and causing me panic attacks like they used to with all of this stuff. There was a long period after any social encounter, which I would talk about it for days. My mind would be in complete confusion, or I would fear that I had said or done something wrong. In reality, this has only gotten better in the last year. It heightened when I was not in many social situations.

It gets easier the more I am social – as long as I remember that, I cannot push my limits to the extreme.

I need breaks, and I need to prepare – the same goes for the kids. I realized just this morning that the longer I cut myself off from people virtually, or physically the more my mind gets confused by the relationship and I start to feel like they are going to leave me. I begin to read into things that simply are not true, and create negative loops trying to prepare for the pain so it will not hurt so much when it happens. I may have expressed this before – my brain does forget… well it takes many things to connect in my brain sometimes for me to finally grasp it. I do have many negative scripts for relationships. However, going back to mindfulness – I do not know enough about it being path of enlightenment in the Buddhism context – I think it is a good way of thinking for my brain. It seems to be a healthier way for me to think.

I am reading information about it on a regular basis. 

I find it very interesting and helpful. I see many positive things about it. My main goal has been to keep my loops under control and not fall into spinning negative thoughts. I know my patterns – when I am overloaded, I immediately start to see things that could or could not be happening. I lose my ability to discern properly, and I lose my understanding of how people feel about me. The relationship becomes confused for me, and I begin to think that they care nothing for me or they are done with me. I am stopping these loops by staying mindful and directing my thoughts and energy on positive and productive things. I need to feel like I am being productive with my thoughts, and time. If I do not I tend to start feeling purposeless. I am not sure how my more socially active life is going to affect me – at least I am gaining tools to handle my anxieties better.

School curriculum pictures!  

 

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07/26/12

Delirious! Mind Dump Post & Clouds, Of Course!

I would categorize my mood as delirious. However, no one get too concerned, I am only trying to help my brain get organized. Sometimes the best way is to go research the random thoughts that fill my mind. I have been utterly chaotic in my brain. I am disorganized, unable to focus, feeling my emotions fluctuate from one extreme to the next; I have not been able to sleep – as a matter-of-fact I do not want to. It feels like I am being forced by my own body to go get rest and I have so many things that are gyrating around in my neurons that I want to get them settled and organized.

I have been annoying myself with not being able to get on a schedule. 

My consumption of documentaries lately has gotten my brain into a thinking, connecting, wanting to fix everything in the world frenzy. The last few days I have been working on the kids schooling and loving it! I have been in a state of euphoria with learning the virtual system, reading through the curriculum, checking out the resources, learning about the school’s operations in great detail, and it has made me incredibly excited for school.

I cannot wait for it to start. 

I was a bit a put out when I started the orientation not knowing that it was HOURS of video watching and then, short quizzes afterward. Now, I appreciate what they have done. It only helps my confidence in the school, but I was thinking, “Seriously, someone does not know how to use a forum, or how to use email?” and we need a five to eight minute video with visuals and someone talking, as well as a quiz at the end. I quickly reminded myself that not many people adore the computer or internet as much as myself, or their jobs do not require these types of skill. Others may not even have a computer!

People forgive me, I forget sometimes, OK!

I admit I have rather enjoyed watching the videos and taking the quizzes because I am getting them all right. HA! Seriously, the whole operation going on is quite user friendly and very detailed. Yes, yes I am completely sidetracked. It all ties into my delirious state. I realized that I am feeling like this because school has been our life. The past three to four years straight have revolved around me planning school, and working with the kids all day long, all year long with school. I did not have strict regiments, but school was an all day affair. It was my focus and direction for all of these years.

I have felt lost not doing school.

I have felt in limbo for the past few months. I have not done any school with them since we got here because I have been unpacking, getting the house organized, cleaning, helping the children to adjust, dealing with all of our social and emotional meltdowns(shutdowns), I have been too overwhelmed to even think about coming up with school ideas. I have let us all relax and play outside, or stim on whatever we want to. AND it is making me delirious in the context of the word’s several definitions.

What made me think of this morning? 

I had been looking at old pictures of the kids when they were babies, and around two years old. I found lovely pictures of them and of the sky that I obsessed over with the video and digital camera while I was stuck in our three-story apartment by myself for most of the day. (Evenings as well about two nights a week.) The balcony had an amazing view, and the storms that rolled in created some of the most brilliant art pieces I have ever seen. The rainbows would take up the entire landscape and some nights I swear I could reach out and touch the moon.

They were my closest friends – they have been my whole life. 

As I looked through the billion pictures I had captured, my eyes filled with tears of joy and sorrow. So many emotions I cannot describe. The happiness of that time with the babies and nature, and the sadness of isolation and feeling so alone. As I sat there looking at the images all of the memories flooded me, both good and bad. My exhaustion and fears, my jollity that I had captured so many smiles from each of them. The hardwired personalities that I saw then that are now manifesting into word and actions with clarity.

I just got delirious with emotion. 

I have so many thoughts flooding my mind and I have so many posts that I want to write, but I cannot. My mind is chaotic and unable to filter into a clear message. Until I heard, this song  Delirious by Prince (This is the only version I can find.) flood my brain out of nowhere as I sat at my computer only a few moments ago.  Have I written this before? I am having déjà vu – yikes! We know what that means, right? Then, I thought of Eddie Murphy Delirious stand up show and thought, “What was my mom thinking letting me watch that?” Of course, we spent many a Saturday nights watching SNL so I can see where it would not be much of a stretch. I did not understand most of it anyway. I just really liked Steve Martin being King Tut and would do the whole skit for my audience, whether real or make-believe. :-)

Speaking of Steve, here he is with Bela Fleck, Tony Trischka Banjo HDTV The Crow. (Awesome) 

See I keep going off in all sorts of directions. My mind is linking and laughing, crying and hurting, singing and quiet, and trying to gain some sort of balance. Which led me to look up the word delirious, wondering if people or even myself truly understand the definition and comprehend the word’s meaning? Here we go…

de·lir·i·ous  (d-lîr-s) adj.

1. Of, suffering from, or characteristic of delirium.

2. Marked by uncontrolled excitement or emotion; ecstatic: delirious joy; a crowd of delirious baseball fans

 delirious [dɪˈlɪrɪəs] adj

1. (Medicine / Pathology) affected with delirium

2. wildly excited, esp with joy or enthusiasm

Leading me to Delirium:  

Delirium or acute confusional state is a common and severe neuropsychiatric syndrome with core features of acute onset, meaning it has been present from hours to days, but not months or years. Delirium represents an organically caused decline from a previously-attained level of cognitive functioning. Delirium typically appears suddenly with a readily-identifiable time of onset, such as a time space of a few hours, or overnight. It is typified by fluctuating course, attentional deficits and generalized severe disorganization of behavior. It typically involves other cognitive deficits, changes in arousal (hyperactive, hypoactive, or mixed), perceptual deficits, altered sleep-wake cycle, and psychotic features such as hallucinations and delusions. Delirium itself is not a disease, but rather a clinical syndrome (a set of symptoms), which result from an underlying disease or new problem with mentation.

Definition

In common usage, delirium is often used to refer to drowsiness, disorientation, and hallucination. In broader medical terminology, however, a number of other symptoms, including a sudden inability to focus attention, and even (occasionally) sleeplessness and severe agitation and irritability, also define “delirium,” and hallucination, drowsiness, and disorientation are not required.

There are several medical definitions of delirium (including those in the DSM-IV and ICD-10). However, all include some core features.

The core features are:

  • Disturbance of consciousness (that is, reduced clarity of awareness of the environment, with reduced ability to focus, sustain, or shift attention)
  • Change in cognition (e.g., problem-solving impairment or memory impairment) or a perceptual disturbance
  • Onset of hours to days, and tendency to fluctuate.
  • Behaviour may be either overactive or underactive, sleep is often disturbed.
  • Thinking is slow and muddled but the content is often complex. [4]

Common features also tend to include:

Indeed by definition I would assess myself as being in a state of delirium. (without hallucinations and delusions… wait does déjà vu count? ) 

However, I am feeling deliriously free from negative thoughts, and limiting my intake of negativity, which is helping my brain to gain its proper and “normal” state, whatever that is. All I know is that I do not feel so sad, or helpless when in my brain’s proper state. :-)  I think I have gotten enough out to help me get back to a calmer mind. I enjoyed so much looking at my pictures. I am going to share some of them. I am sharing a few of the kids too, I only got up to Joshua being a few months old in my picture rounds – I had to start breakfast. I found a picture of my cat Alexa; she always made her head flat. I do not know why. She was a silly kitty. She looks kind of like a dragon. Click on the pictures to make them larger.

Hope you enjoy these photos! 

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06/26/12

Had To Share, Had To!

I have a tendency to feel like I have not accomplished anything so I took pictures of the garage yesterday. I still have more to load in there, but David will be here soon with the truck and we will be off loading all that is in there first.

So there is what I accomplished in the garage. 

I did not take pictures of the inside accomplishments – it is a mess and making me batty! Still after looking at the garage I asked David if I had accomplished a lot. I felt like I had not because I see all that needs to be done. I have to fight the overwhelming feelings of not being able to finish. Right now it seems impossible, too much, and it can derail me. I have had to fight my mind to keep focused. What has helped me this time around is writing. Instead, of cutting myself off from writing, or stimming by whatever means, I have allowed myself to continue. This has helped get my “Flash Lightening” skills on.

See if I am able to stim, I am much more productive in short amounts of time.

If I do not allow myself to stim, or get my words out through writing, I loop, get distracted, feel consumed by overwhelming feelings. It will feel like I am being swallowed up by chaos and I cannot think. That will cause me to search for other distracting things, and ultimately into a meltdown/shutdown. I will then be of no use to anyone, and will get nothing accomplished. The kids are all doing what they need to as well. Daniel has not been able to calm himself for days, but today he has found some sort of inner peace. I believe it is because he saw the truck, and now the anticipation is starting to settle.

He has been asking all types of questions. 

Joshua has engulfed himself with Lego building, playing, and going on the Lego site. He is watching Lego “The Lord of The Rings” videos they have on there. Ariel has been on the Visible Body website  studying every detail of human anatomy, how the body heals, how a baby is formed in the womb, and disease. David got this app Plague Inc. and he and Ariel have been taking out our human race left and right with viruses they create. Plague Inc. – Universal – HD Gameplay Trailer (It is a tad bit long.)

She has spent her time analyzing the body and and drawing what she sees. 

This morning she went into detailed descriptions with me about each picture she drew. She drew healthy lungs and lungs of a person who smokes. She drew the stomach, and explained to me how it works from beginning to end. I had to share her drawings. I peeked in on her yesterday to make sure she was ok. She had her arm up, and was feeling her muscles, touching places and saying the names of the parts, as she was looking at the images on the computer. Later, she showed me her drawing of the arm. She has also been drawing X-Men and Batman scenes. She went through all of those this morning as well sharing her stories. She drew pictures of the cat and of her as some sort of creature. She said she feels like a creature right now, both angry and happy. Hmm…sounds familiar. :-)

I just had to share what she created – so a billion pictures indeed! (Yes, I had to put a pic of the cat.)

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