Autistic Anemone

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I sometimes get overwhelmed and fold up like an anemone.

Part of it is being on the autism spectrum, part of it is M.E., and a whole lot of it is also my family history.

This year a lot of it was also about the anti-depressant I was on having some rather severe side effects, ugh, gone back to the old one with its more manageable set of problems, and me getting hearing aids.

In the last decade I actually had a two year period or so where I basically didn’t answer my phone, or even listen to my voicemail, it was all too much.

As a kid, and to a lesser extent even as an adult, I wasn’t really allowed to have my own space, or a right to exist separately, or even have my own emotions.

When I was going through my divorce, a phone call from my mum is burned into my memory. On one hand she wanted to try and fix my marriage from 200km away, but then she said “I need you to be happy, so I can be happy, and then so I can paint happy pictures, for God!”

I have a right to my own emotions, and I can’t take on the responsibility for hers too.

She also upped the number of phone calls from just one a week to several.

My whole family (including me) are control freaks, and but it is also too easy for me to slip into people pleasing and give my ‘power’ away and then I lose my grounding in reality.

With the help of people in my therapy group I put a ‘No Contact Boundary’ in place with my mum, and as she just called more in response, I gradually made it harder for her to call me

Over Worked

Back to the present though.

I did a workshop through the Canberra Innovation Network earlier this year, and even though it was many hours face to face a fortnight, it required a lot more after hours, and the way I pushed myself through it was too much for my somewhat precarious health.

My hearing got damaged way back when I laboured after school, and I was finding it difficult to be present in the meeting room where we met, particularly with some speakers, and found it more tiring than usual, straining to hear them. So I bit the bullet and got hearing aids.

Over Stimulated

The audiologist encouraged me to where them as much as possible during the day, and I began doing so. I did mention I’m on the Autism Spectrum and noise sensitive, and I think he made some adjustments to the hearing aids to factor that in, but I’m not sure. They are supposed to have noise cancelling, but it is nothing like my old over the ear headphones.

I started putting them in my ears when I woke up and left them in until I was rolling over in bed trying to sleep.

I also didn’t realise how much extra stimulation this gave my senses, or that it led to being overwhelmed by them, or what was going on at all.

Just to ice the cake, all those extra hours, I started listening to audiobooks or other input constantly, leaving no break for either my senses or even for my regular mindfulness practices. Which became much less regular.

And I knew too much was going on, but I didn’t really twig how to take care of myself, and lots of people were trying to contact me, and each text alert and phone call that were too much to cope with were jangling and resonating deep within my ear canals.

Every time I felt a little better, and thought about re-engaging and then suddenly arghhh my whole body wanted to curl up like a sea anemone again.

Overloaded

These all combined and mixed together and culminated in leaving me even more wiped out than normal, let alone being physically strained by trying to do more social things than normal.

Burnout.

Just couldn’t cope with anything beyond the very bare essentials of living.

Wish it hadn’t taken me so long to work out what was going on. Well I hope I have anyhow.

Metamorphosis

So, I need to slow down, and pause more often. Reduce stimulation, wear my hearing aids less, and probably get them adjusted too. There have been some noise issues I’ve been meaning to get looked at, for well months.

I think I probably need to pay attention to the carpal tunnel pain in my wrists too, not just push through it, but actually use my computers less?

Hmmm, guess I need to prioritise me, and when I relax, don’t numb out my senses, but spend more time in nature, even if it is winter.

I probably need to have better boundaries earlier, not go into total emotional *and* social withdrawal.

And be more consciously mindful, not mind-full up of noise.