Susan60

Susan60, 4 months ago to ADHD

Thought. I have always run warm. I do feel the cold, but not as much as most people. I hate (detest?) overheated department stores. This got worse with the onset of perimenopause, & I was unable to wear jumpers for years, because I couldn’t get them off quickly enough during hot flushes, which threatened spontaneous combustion. This settled somewhat after finally going on HRT.

I’ve noticed a change since going on ADHD meds. I now wear winter pjs on a “cool” summers night, & a nightie on warmer ones & am more likely to don a jacket of an evening.

I’m wondering whether this is a consequence of the meds, & overheating is related to ADHD. #ADHD #ActuallyAutistic @actuallyautistic #Menopause #HotFlushes #WomensHealth

Susan60, 3 months ago to actuallyautistic

I spoke online to my English language student today. She took her 3yo to a kinder session & spent some time talking to other mothers, which was challenging . So I need to teach her some more English small talk language. Me. An autistic person. 😂 Ironic.
@actuallyautistic

Susan60, 19 days ago to actuallyautistic

What do people read?

I was an avid reader of fiction when I was a child. Novels about challenging issues or strange fantasy worlds. In many ways reading was an escape to a safe place, but those books were also places where I could learn about how “people” worked. How they thought, felt & behaved. The diversity in those things.

I loved The Little Princess and The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett, because they were about children who were different & how they coped. I loved The Chronicles of Narnia because, although quite dated now, the girls had real adventures alongside their brothers. There was a series of books about witches, good & bad, which I loved but can’t remember the titles or author.

I loved Ivan Southall’s books, where tweens & teens faced dangers, often without the support of adults. (Marsden’s Tomorrow when the War Began is reminiscent of Southall.)

And as an adult, I still like youth & YA fiction, probably for the same reason, because I’m still learning how humans work. I also like adult fiction, but the naivety of youth fiction appeals.

And TBO, I read much more non-fiction than fiction nowadays. Obviously there’s the Autism & ADHD stuff that is currently dominating my reading, but also social commentaries of all sorts, by feminists, sociologists, etc.

@actuallyautistic

Susan60, 5 months ago to actuallyautistic

Question. Some dogs can tell if a person has cancer, presumably by their smell. Does anyone think that some autistic people might be more sensitive to such changes in body chemistry? Not as much as a dog, but more than most other people? @actuallyautistic #ActuallyAutistic

Susan60, 2 months ago to actuallyautistic

I can sometimes be slow to notice the elephant in the room & the eggshells on the floor (the problem that everyone carefully denies and manages so as not to upset anyone), but once I do notice, I want to confront and solve it.

The problem in this instance is my MIL’s insistence that she & FIL continue to live in a house too large to manage on an acre of rambling garden in an isolated location at the top of a narrow windy road.

Of course solving such a thing is not always possible, & if I’m not the main person affected, the person doing their best to support & manage the situation, it’s not my problem. Attempting to solve it might just make the situation worse for that person & leave others feeling judged & hurt.

It’s a boundary issue, & one I struggle with.

@actuallyautistic

Susan60, 4 months ago to actuallyautistic

I was going to post this as a response to someone else’s post, but realised it wasn’t really relevant to their point.

Years ago, when doing my teacher training, we had a guest speaker come & talk to us about our role as teacher when dealing with sexual diversity etc. He was a very conventional looking young white man.

It was a seminar type presentation, with discussion along the way. As time went on, he slowly removed his “straight” mask, to show how many students can & do present as heteronormative until if & when they’re ready to come out.

I wonder how this would work for autistic advocates who can mask effectively, in small group presentations? Masking as in making eye contact, smiling, a self effacing introduction etc. And then, “This is how I can present when I feel the need. This is how I present when I feel safe or give up caring.” Followed by an explanation of the impact that masking has, the fact that many autistic people can’t mask, the fact that we shouldn’t need to mask etc as well as general autism education.

Of course this shouldn’t be necessary & it wouldn’t be in an ideal world.
We could make comparisons with women who have to play by the men’s rules in business & politics, the people of colour &/or members of other different ethnic/religious groups who try to “assimilate” to get ahead, & how many struggle to do so, feel like traitors to themselves & their peers, get sick of &/or struggle with pretending to be someone other than they really are. Masking autism is not the same, & this would need to be explained, but I think many people would relate to some of the similarities & the feelings involved.

There will always be some people who refuse to learn, who insist on a negative approach as part of their strategy to prop up their own ego. And it’s not them whom I would bother trying to convince. It’s the more reasonable but ignorant people who are open to learning that I think would be worth targeting.

@actuallyautistic #ActuallyAutistic

Susan60, 5 months ago to actuallyautistic

For many years I have been conscious of frequently swapping from normal glasses to prescription sunglasses & back again… much more than most people. Someone said something recently about their own sensitivity to light & the need to wear really dark glasses a lot of the time. I’m not so much really sensitive to light, as liking a very narrow range of light, not too bright, not too dark. But both, I’m guessing, are indications of light sensitivity experienced by autistic folk. Who knew? @actuallyautistic #actuallyautistic

Susan60, 4 months ago to actuallyautistic

@averagehousewife @Dr_Obvious @graphite @kevinteljeur @actuallyautistic @nddev

When I started investigating the possibility of being ND in some way, I’d come across “oh look, there’s a unicorn”, which I dismissed as plain silly. In my mind, the things that I took notice of were worthy of my attention, not mere “distractions”. And my “special interests” were deeply intellectual & relevant to my situation at the time. Social justice issues for example.

So I didn’t fit the rather shallow ways in which AFHD & autism are often portrayed, as if it’s merely about being distracted by unicorns & fascinated with dinosaurs.

Susan60, 4 months ago to random

If you want a truly decadent bread & butter pudding, use a panettone with sultanas & orange peel in it as the bread, with some melted butter, eggs & milk. Serve with pure cream. Not my fault, partner creation.

Susan60, 3 months ago to ADHD

Last night I listened to a podcast on Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, https://www.divergentpod.com/blog/ep-29
. It’s is common amongst ADHDers, & therefore some autistic folk. And I realise that it’s probably been the main influence in my life, the motivator for my masking, the cause of my fawning response that has sometimes made me vulnerable & often made me squirm, & the source of so much grief & anxiety.

I’ve learned some strategies over the years to help me, both to establish better boundaries & to be more rational in my thinking & less reactive, but have also been led to blame other people for my insecurity, rather than see it as a product of my ADHD (which hadn’t been diagnosed). And guess who was at fault? My parents of course, mainly my mother.

I have no doubt that my mother was AuADHD like me. She had her flaws, but was smart, witty, funny & had a good set of values. She was a bit of a snob, aspirational, but not a victim blamer. Her own health issues arose when she still had one child in primary school, and she died at 45, so she didn’t get the chance to do, learn & reflect as I have over my longer life, (& I’m not done yet!)

But I know her values from so many discussions about newspaper articles & Phillip Adams’ column in the Saturday Age. She, like many of her generation, was still shocked by the enormity & depravity of the Holocaust, even though she was only a child during the war. She judged the German people harshly, but could be very warm with individuals of any background. She befriended a Czech refugee family. She admired Don Dunstan, supported drag queens, loved filling in for a friend who worked for a gay intererior designer in his shop…

I wonder what she would have thought when my sister came out as lesbian, & my oldest as non-binary?

And I wonder how she might’ve responded when I started to explore my own neurodivergence?

#ActaullyAutistic #ADHD @actuallyautistic

Susan60, 5 months ago to actuallyautistic

Does anyone else feel deeply offended by scam text messages? @actuallyautistic #ActuallyAutistic

Susan60, 3 months ago to actuallyautistic

Such a long day’s travel yesterday, winding up with a family dinner, when all I wanted was to unpack, shower & go to bed. Managed to excuse myself from the conversation to do just that. Yay me! @actuallyautistic

A cow peeking through trees and underbrush at the edge of a field.
A lush garden with blooming flowers in raised beds, a green watering can, and a small blue shed with a heart-shaped cutout in the door. Trees and shrubbery in the background under a cloudy sky.

Susan60, 6 months ago to actuallyautistic

Okay, challenge. I can play basic computer games like Tetris for ages, but give me an audio only pod cast, & my mind wanders off. I’m about to listen to another Newsreader podcast, which I love, but it’s a struggle. Any hints? #ActuallyAutistic @actuallyautistic

Susan60, 2 months ago to ADHD

I forget who drew my attention to this, but thank you! It’s very long, so I suggest you stop at each break, (a chapter heading is displayed) & consider whether you want to come back to it later. I’d prefer it to be broken into several videos because it would be useful to share with allistic people, but I don’t expect them to watch a video thats over an hour long. @actuallyautistic #actuallyautistic #ADHD

https://youtu.be/WA9B4_e6sS0?si=6djOdxA4lOru4XxR

Susan60, 1 month ago to random

How do you “curate” your feed? I follow most followers, but that can result in quite a lot of stuff that doesn’t interest me, or an excess of US politics which does interest me, but only up to a point.

OTOH I don’t like to block or mute someone unless I find their posts offensive or hugely irrelevant to my interests. I have created a favourites list, but laziness means I’m sometimes slow to add people to that list, aggravated by the fact that I don’t bother to look at my “home” feed very often.

I love being on a platform that is free of algorithms, but there are drawbacks. At this point I must confess that I’m pretty slack about using hashtags. And I’m not into digitech. I use it to communicate, learn etc, but I like it to be intuitive & not require me to think too much about the mechanics involved.

Susan60, 23 days ago to actuallyautistic

I can’t remover who recommended this lecture, but whoever you are, thank you! #actuallyautistic @actuallyautistic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnU01HBN6zg

Susan60, 9 months ago to climate

Feeling very apprehensive about our approaching summer, given what’s happening in Canada & the Med right now. #ClimateChange

Susan60, 3 days ago to actuallyautistic

My oldest sent me this. My head just exploded. The first draft of my first 3000 word essay in uni was 8000 words long.

My history essays at uni were labours of love. I could never understand the concept of “pulling an all-nighter” the night before the essay was due. How was such a thing even possible? You had to do hours & hours of reading, note-taking, reflection…
And then write & write & write all that stuff that begged to be said, and then cull & cull & cull & then rewrite to knit the remaining pieces together fluently… And somehow end up with a piece that sent shivers down your spine & got you an HD.

Didn’t you? Or was that just me?

When teaching narrative writing to teens, I could only teach it in a formulaic way. I could only write formulaic model texts. They were quite good, with some character development, voice, interesting vocab etc, but the structure was formulaic.

I could never imagine myself as a writing a novel. Quirky short pieces maybe, but not a novel. And yet my oldest wrote their first novella as a teen.

I need to lie down. Oh, I am. It’s 5am and my cat adoption excitement has woken me. I’m discombobulated. Again.

#actuallyautistic @actuallyautistic

https://autisticphd.com/theblog/what-is-bottom-up-thinking-in-autism/

Susan60, 4 months ago to ADHD

https://theconversation.com/do-kids-grow-out-of-adhd-as-they-get-older-218692 #ADHD #ActuallyAutistic @actuallyautistic

Susan60, 8 months ago to random

It’s great that we’re making compostable plastic (is it really), but does any of it reach an industrial composter? #plastic

Susan60, 6 months ago to random

Here I am, in my 60s, & only really waking up to the extent that the values & attitudes of a dominant culture shape our actions. Even when the people who have set those things aren’t people “like us”. This is why it can take so long to throw off the ignorance & bigotry of the past. As children, we absorb those things, even if they go against own nature, or our own interests. Women will sometimes support the patriarchy. Aspirational working class people will sometimes support economically conservative politicians. A child who feels strongly about social justice might grow into a “well meaning” adult who does “good” things in a patronising or paternalistic manner. If & when we realise such things, we have to confront them & decide whether to shake them off & learn new ways, or respond defensively, fighting to stay the same. And if it’s the latter, who are we going to hurt? Those who need our support? Our family? Ourselves?

Susan60, 3 months ago to random

So I’m curious. When people write up a profile for the fediverse, & don’t include the country where they live, what is their reason? Is it because they don’t think it matters or is of interest to others? Is it because they assume that everyone lives in the same country as them or shares their geopolitical viewpoint?

Susan60, 7 months ago to random

@takane I’m finding your follow bot evil eye quite annoying. I’m getting so many duplicate posts now from it as well as the original source.

Susan60, 1 month ago to ADHD

I just had my 2nd session since realising my autism, the 1st since 5 weeks with my partner with his family. So mainly a catch-up & info dump. Will clarify goals next time.

In the past therapy has been about me info dumping & them validating, helping me to clarify & a few strategies, but I struggled with clear goals.

I feel so much clearer now.

Previous therapy focussed on the impact of external traumas, the loss of loved ones, sexual assault, divorce etc, but ignored my internal pan that wasn’t explained by those traumas. I learned a lot that was useful, but so much was left unexplained. I was still in survival mode.

She reflects back & asks questions to confirm, clarify & express her understanding, & her very expressive face helps with that. I used to feel that I must look the therapist in the eye for the whole session, but I now allow myself to look out the window.

The waiting room is dim lights, soft music…

I used to feel that I had to work hard to convince the therapist, to get them on board with me, to understand, & maybe to like me so they’d be motivated to really work with me.

I think that having a somewhat better understanding of myself means I’m much clearer about boundaries, & that helps soooo much.

@actuallyautistic #actuallyautistic #ADHD

Susan60, 1 month ago to actuallyautistic

The attacks on aid workers in Gaza should not surprise us. And I wonder why some people are more outraged by the deaths of these workers than the deaths of innocent civilians including babies. Am I being particularly autistic here? @actuallyautistic #ActuallyAutistic