Uncategorized

Long Time…

Uncategorized, , , , Leave a comment

It has been nearly 2 months since I was able to write anything. I have gone back and read my work, and edited it, don’t get me wrong about that. But I have not been able to focus well enough to create in a while. I miss it.

Part of my difficulty has been low level depression. When I am overwhelmed, and near shut down for long enough, depression kicks in. I have had to deal with this before. I am not alone in the autistic community facing it.

I get rest each day. That resets me to just above shut down. Then I work my way through the day. Sometimes when I get home, I cannot function. I need rest, but my over-whelming sense of responsibility keep me from doing so.

My family needs me to work for our survival. The kids I care for at work need me.

I need rest.

Today as I was walking with my family, my mind began wandering. I remembered a situation from about a decade ago. I had a co-worker who was a friend of my wife’s. Her child was in my class. In general he was a good kid.

My family had gone to a swimming pool and My wife’s friend and her son had been invited along. I think there were other friends invited too, I’m not sure.

A long time ago I mentioned my sensitivity with my face. But to reiterate: I cannot stand water splashing on my face or wind blowing on my face. Wind is not as bad as water, but both cause a panic attack on me. I can’t even face my shower. I have to wash my face with a wet cloth.

Anyways, while swimming, the boy began playfully splashing at me. I asked him to stop. That seemed to encourage him, and he splashed me more. I gave him a big splash and dove under the water to swim away. As soon as I came up, he splashed me in my face again. I asked him to stop again and tried to get away, when he splashed my face again, and I called out (unfortunately loud enough for the entire swimming pool to hear) “I SAID STOP!”

His mom came and took him, and the following year they moved him out of our school. I hope that this had nothing to do with me calling him out like that. But I was at my wits end. An 8 year old boy had nearly incited a meltdown from a 40 year old man.

I sometimes wonder why people do that. When asked to stop something, they push harder. I understand he was a child, but I find adults do similar things. Sometimes, it’s easier to avoid people. Trying to talk to them can be exhausting. Often times, I don’t even have the energy for the initial request to stop. It’s just easier to hide.

Years ago, the school I was at brought a psychiatrist to the school to talk about Mental health. I admitted publicly that I was tired. I was responsible for so many things. These included finances, the well-being of my wife and children, and caring for my in-laws at the time. I didn’t want to insinuate that I wanted help. I just wanted someone to know that it was exhausting. The psychiatrist took it to mean that I wished that the others would go out and earn a living. I did not want that. I knew the situations made it impossible. I understood why it had to be me at the time. So, I felt again misunderstood and looked over.

I have been feeling like in my exhaustion, I am making a lot of stupid mistakes lately. Like above, I am not able to communicate my concerns and feelings well and others are misunderstanding them. This makes me feel worse and deepens the depression.

Sorry. I am not making a clear focused article today. I just need to rest and clear my mind.

Hopefully I will be able to think straight again before another 2 months pass.

Lost in my own Mind

Autism, Daily Life, Musings, Uncategorized, , , Leave a comment

I have been stuck in my own mind lately. Too many things need to get back up and running, and I am falling behind because I get stuck.

In my Novel Gateways (Coming out Soon~ish). I had to write a chapter about my main character being stuck in her own mind during a shutdown. I am not happy with the way it turned out so far and I will be rewriting it soon. But it’s not an easy sensation to explain or show.

The stereotype, or trope is to have them floating in blackness and hear the voices of the outside world, maybe have them enter memories and interact with them. But that is not what it really feels like.

During a shutdown, my mind goes blank. I don’t see blackness, at least not anymore. I used to black out completely, but then my body would go into flight or flight mode. But I don’t do that anymore. I just shut down.

As an adult, my mind goes blank, mostly. I don’t see black, I don’t see anything really. I am aware of light, and can feel that things are happening around, but I am not truly aware of what. Sound exists, but not focus. There is no sense of me. I don’t see memories, or feel floaty. I don’t feel anything really. But just like my youth, my body may react while my mind is absent.

I may run, be violent, or just sit there, all depending on what is happening. I have not been violent in many years, and if I am, it iis always defensive, not aggressive. I think the last time I was violent, I was living in Korea. I apparently was hit in the face by someone during shutdown, and responded by knocking him flat. I have no memories of this, but a friend told me what they saw. I don’t even remember what shut me down that time.

The last time I ran away during a shut down, was in college I believe. I was stuck in my mind, and apparently there was a loud noise or someone yelling, and I ran smack into the closed fire exit. I woke on the floor next to the door.

Usually I just sit and stare at something. If it happens to be a person, or if a person sits where I am staring, it can cause some confusion, or even accusations. Nothing like rebooting and coming back into focus with someone screaming at you because you have been staring at them for the last 10 minutes.If they had moved, they would have realized it wasn’t them I was staring at, but anything in that direction….

During a shutdown I can sometimes direct my gaze in a direction. But sometimes I can’t as it comes on unexpectedly, or too fast.

This is not easy stuff to explain in a novel. But I will endeavor to do so.

As for me, I hav not completly shut down yet, but I have been close to it for a few weeks. I just need some time to over sleep, and do nothing to realign my brain to my new reality.

I am reminded of my old E-mail Signature from When Hotmail was independant of Microsoft. It went something like:

REALITY.SYS HAS FAILED-(R)EBOOT REALITY OR (E)XIT

Books

Uncategorized, , , , , , Leave a comment

I whole heartedly believe in the power of reading. Reading is a great way to learn things. It is a great way to escape your reality and enter another. Reading helps you peer into the minds of other people, even people who passed away centuries ago.

Reading is a very important skill, and I try to help where I can.

I have just spent the last 2 months leveling all of the books in my class library. I took them one pile at a time and went through each and every book (I have 8 books left). I leveled them by the Raz-Kids level system.

I know this is not the standard, and I know this system is very niche. But here is the thing. My school uses Raz-Kids for all of our reading assessments. We use it for our digital reading library. It is the system the children know.

So how did I level books by Raz-Kids?

There is a chart supplied on their website that give extremely broad strokes, a comparison of their levels to Every other leveling system. The chart shows a conversion to ATOS, to F&P, to Lexile, you name it. So I began scanning the books with an AR-Book finder to find the ATOS level, and convert it over. If it doesn’t show up there, I used AI to search for the best fit.

It was a projet I felt was important. but here’s the thing. I’m a terrible reader.

I can read out loud quite fast. But I don’t retain any of it. I read quite slow if I want to understand it. Sometimes rereading a section 3 or 4 times to think about it it as I go.

One of the methods I have used is the reformat method. If I am reading digitally, I will copy the text into MS Word. Then I read through line by line and reformat it as I go. I will fix the indents, adjust the spacing, and moving the cursor along as I go is a safe speed for me. It keeps me focused on the text and gives me enough time to analyse, it. It also gives me something to fidget with while I read: The keyboard.

If I cannot do this, or if I am reading a paper book, I need isolation. I cannot read with any distractions. Music helps me focus, but if I hear people talking, or the sounds of the tv, or someone needs to talk to me, I have to go back and reread the last 2 or 3 pages to catch myself up. If several distractions occur nearby, i may have to go back a whole chapter. And this is if I like the book I am reading.

Research materials don’t work so well. I often find I have to skim the pages, espacially if I have to work in a research group or discussion group. I can’t go full slownedd to understand the text as the rest will be waiting. So I have to skim and give my best guess about the contents.

I really don’t like this method. If it is worth reading, it is worth reading well. But that means I need my time to do so.

This has come up recently as I was talking to some coworkers about difficulties some of my students face. and I realized 1/2 of my grade 2 class reads for comprehension at my speed or faster….

I can read a lot more difficult passages, but when it comes to reading basic children’s stories and understanding what was said, I am slower. I always pre-read the files before reading to the class for this reason.

But still.

I love books.

We need to accept all of the children and adults who have difficulty with this though.