Sheila Schoonmaker

November 29, 2008

A Monotracked Thanksgiving

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Life — Sheila @ 10:20 am
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Since I recently began a self-evaluation program I created for myself to observe where my limitations are and understand why they are where they are, Thanksgiving Day required a novel idea that would emotionally crush most neurotypical family members. The person I could have offended would have been my 26 year old daughter, especially since she has provided me with two beautiful grandchildren whom she may have envisioned enjoying a traditional Thanksgiving Day dinner with a grandparent of theirs (I’m one of many). Thankfully, God arranged the ideal mix of Aspies, neurotypicals, and autistic relatives to help her understand this new ‘project’ of mine¹ and why I need to do this now before my nervous system erupts (smoking and/or tremors can even be useful if not ignored, but exploding² like Mt. St. Helen’s can leave irreparable damage).

What my daughter doesn’t know yet (but will in time) is what I did do on Thanksgiving Day. I created a mock traditional Thanksgiving Dinner so I could gauge its effect on my body as I was preparing it. I already knew it would require approximately 11 hours of my time for food preparation (dessert not included) and 4 hours for cleanup. That’s to be expected when a mono-tracked person is preparing such a task alone. (If anyone regularly watches the tv show Monk,³ they can imagine the same scenario happening to Adrian Monk if he was cooking a turkey dinner).

Here’s what I noticed occurring while I was busy that day with turkey stuff:

Soft classical music playing in the background was fine, except when talking began. Then I had to turn off the radio because it was distracting. I needed the house to be so quiet that the only noise heard was the clock ticking and the refrigerator occasionally going on.

I had to clean the kitchen floor as soon as the turkey went to roast, because the grime on the floor was too distracting. That required opening the windows afterwards to air out the stink from the floor cleaner. While the cleaner’s smell was leaving, I made my bed and walked the dog. 

Every mess made from some step of cooking that I could clean up before moving on helped to calm my nerves. I wasn’t feeling tense while cooking, but that was only because I kept telling myself, “There is no time limit for any step I’m doing,” and “No one is around to complain (or laugh at me) about the way I’m working.” 

I could NOT allow myself to be paying attention to the time, because if I did, then I would be destroying my motivation I needed to keep going. The sole purpose of preparing the food was because nobody else would make this meal to taste the way it was going to under my care. Normally, what I cook doesn’t taste too good. That’s because normally I hate to cook. It is possible for me to prepare good food, but that’s only under an ideal cooking environment that meets my needs.

By not having others around, especially children who might make noise, my anxiety level remained close to zero. My brain could remain calm because I could mono-track my steps throughout the day. Adding another cook into the kitchen (even a NT who can multi-task) would help in one way, but in another way it would decrease my ability to mono-task because of not knowing when I would need to pay attention to a conversation that might begin.

Many NTs I know would laugh at the whole concept of mono-tasking and say it’s an excuse to work less hard. After all, they can multi-task and have no ability to ‘get’ what a mono-tasking person is. It makes sense for it to be beyond them to understand someone who isn’t a multi-tasker; they don’t have enough of an intellectual ability to think deeper to understand such things because they cognitively function in multi-task mode (especially if they’re females). I equate it to skipping rocks on the surface of water—NTs being the pebbles and the water being life’s activities—NTs bounce over things, while Aspies (non-medicated, non-’counseled’) travel slowly at the ‘bottom of the lake’ and come up ‘for air’ after each task has been completed. I need a little bobber at the surface that says, “Don’t talk to me while I’m busy with something down under. I’ll let you know when I’m up for conversation.” What’s the point in having company if you’re only able to talk during break times (that means being 100% off duty from dinner preparation)? I would prefer companionship, but I can’t have both. If I attempted to combine the two, it wouldn’t be just my body that would be in pain. My anxiety level would hit the roof and most likely I’d have my sleeping ability ruined for days (that’s if nothing else added to making my nerves more raw).  

Here’s what I wasn’t noticing while I was busy cooking on that day:

In spite of taking 6 ten-minute breaks during the whole affair, I was not aware of the pain in my feet, legs, hips, and back building up over the day. It wasn’t until after I ate and was cleaning up that I began to feel pain first starting in my hip and feet. By the time I went to bed, the pain was crippling. The next morning, I was not even able to walk. I did manage to get walking again after the day progressed, but I knew I had to spend that day on my back or side (sometimes it was okay to sit up for awhile).

My guess is that I should be able to walk again without too much pain by Sunday or Monday, depending on how well I rest.

Here’s what I cooked and what was in it (all organic, of course):

Salad ~ Green leaf & iceberg lettuce, large tomato (chunked), baby carrots (sliced long), chopped celery, purple onion slivers, cucumber slices, raisins, olives, blue cheese, olive oil, vinegar, Italian seasonings, salt, and pepper.

Rolls ~ Large buttermilk biscuits w/soft butter.

Wine ~ Red, from a private French réserve of Margaux bottled in 2005. (White wine makes me ill.)

Turkey ~ 13.4 pound free-range bird.

Stuffing ~ made up of toasted whole wheat bread chunks, butter-fried onions and celery; seasoned with chicken broth, rosemary, oregano, sage, ginger, marjoram, thyme, and pepper.

Cranberries ~ jelled sauce.

Mashed Potatoes ~ with eggnog (instead of milk), salt, and pepper.

Candied Yams ~ baked in granulated maple syrup, molasses, brown sugar, butter, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Turkey Gravy ~ made from turkey drippings, flour, salt, and pepper.

Creamed Curry Corn ~ corn, green peppers, onions, soft cream cheese, milk, curry, salt, and pepper.

Coffee ~ Hazelnut flavored with stevia and half & half cream.

I ate my desert on Thanksgiving Day morning for breakfast. I had a slice of warm, moist pumpkin bread with butter. That, with a tall glass of cranberry/pomegranate juice diluted with seltzer water, was enough to keep me from picking at the meal before it was done.

¹When the first day of winter (Dec. 21st) arrives, I plan to gradually re-introduce a ’semi-normal’ routine back into my life. That means returning phone calls, grandchildren coming over to visit, etc. (i.e., I won’t be so extremely reclusive).

²Anyone who thinks he doesn’t have it in his nature to explode (given certain circumstances lasting long enough) is either good at deceiving himself or is close to his death and too weak from illness to erupt.

³He’s known as the obsessive/compulsive detective. Rarely does anyone spot how much of an Aspie he is because his O/C characteristics cloud out just about everyone’s ability to notice the bottom core of the way he thinks in this role he plays. I almost never watch tv, but when Monk is on, I tune in and then feel less alone with the way I think. I’m not exactly like Monk, but darn close in many ways (that are not visible).

November 23, 2008

Explaining Self

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Faith — Sheila @ 5:24 am
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I’m writing this post on autopilot due to exhaustion. Why do I not wait until I’m less tired and write then? The answer is simple. I don’t know when that will be and most likely I’ll forget what I want to say by the time it does happen.

I’m realizing how much work it is to be constantly explaining myself to people. I even have to explain myself to my fellow Aspies in my support group.  That’s because I’m a lot older than most others there¹ and because I’m the only practicing Christian in the group that I’m aware of. Admittedly, in that environment, I do a heck of a lot less explaining than when dealing with the rest of the world.

Why must some people who think different feel like they have to explain themselves (seemingly all the time)? Why can’t such a person just live life like everyone else? I don’t think I need to explain that to other Aspies and/or parents of children on the autism spectrum.

Well, you can imagine then the surprise I got when reading today’s message from Oswald Chamber’s classic My Utmost for His Highest devotional.² All of what’s said is so true; especially→ “Beware of ‘the cares of this world,’ because they are the things that produce a wrong temper of soul.”

I never before realized that my constant habit of explaining myself goes against God’s will. It’s been referred to as being the lust of vindication. The effect it has is to destroy faith in God. No wonder then I feel so drained! I’ve been locked into that same temper of mind which says, “I must explain myself; I must get people to understand.” I never noticed that our Lord never explained anything; He left mistakes to correct themselves.

¹I’m the oldest regular member. It’s a different world now (too fast paced and chaotic) than it once was and young people have not lived long enough to know how things used to be. Plus, God’s wisdom can be confusing to those who are not saved from enjoying the lusts self has. God sure loves to destroy the pleasures of lust and replace them with something much better in His children.

²Keep in mind, if you’re following the link, the devotional will be for the current day. So, if you want to read the whole message for November 23rd, you need to go the navigator and choose that date.

November 21, 2008

Precocious Developmental Delay

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Humor, My Thoughts — Sheila @ 9:51 am
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They talk like adults and often have sky-high I.Q.’s, but their social skills are nonexistent.¹

Bla, bla, bla… a mysterious condition known as Asperger’s syndrome — a neurological disorder that disproportionately affects males and is often connected to a striking precocity with language. The Learning Disabilities Association of America defines Asperger’s syndrome as “a severe developmental disorder characterized by major difficulties in social interaction and restricted and unusual² patterns of interest and behavior.”

So now we are supposed to call the characteristic of having an exceptionally early development or maturity (especially in mental aptitude) a learning disability and developmental disorder?  Why not say that neurotypical children have a developmental disorder since they can be vastly slower with their mental aptitudes in vital areas?³ The reason Aspies relatively lag behind socially is because the social behavior of NTs is so illogical!

[Edited by adding on 11-23-8:]

Aspies not only can have a striking precocity with language; they can have a striking precocity in any area (art, music, inventing, etc.).

¹Why not be specific and say that these social skills are nonexistent among a neurotypical environment, but DO exist in an Aspie environment?  In an Aspie environment, the social skills of NTs are atrocious!  NTs don’t know how to verbally say what they mean, because they’re too focused on following whatever is popular.

²That’s relative to whom you’re asking and what your priorities are.

³Then people wonder why the educational system is failing when society puts greater importance on being socially correct within its major population rather than giving higher priority to the more important things like math and science?  Every culture around the world differs socially, but every culture around the word competes in the arena of mental aptitude.

October 21, 2008

Dentist Shopping by an Aspie

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Life — Sheila @ 9:55 pm
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I’m doing a ‘two-for-oner’ by posting a file I forgot I created years back that I recently came across.

First off, I’d like to show how ‘unemployed’ aspies (who don’t work) ‘earn’ money by preventing greedy people from taking it. This particular temporary ’special interest’ of mine in dental research (that lasted for a season) kept $23,000 in the bank account (which later enabled hubby to have his lifetime dream of having a new truck fulfilled), even though $10,000 did get withdrawn. If I’m not being direct enough, this translates to mean there are some dentists who would take $33,000 to do a $10,000 project.

Secondly, I’d like to share my criteria I used when I began my several month long tour in search of a reliable, skilled, well-educated dentist who would take pride in his work. This list is for anyone interested in knowing what to consider for such a decision making process, especially those who must pay out of their own pocket.

I created this outline for myself after I made my decision to go for a major dental overhaul. Beside suffering the consequences of being raised without going on a regular basis to the dentist as a child, it was becoming evident that mercury poisoning from the large volume of amalgam fillings in my mouth was only getting worse with age. 

I created the list in outline form. Because of the outline program I used, transporting the file to any word processing program, followed by cutting and pasting it here, turns the outline into a list. That’s why I had to resort to screen shots and saving the file as jpegs.

Remember→ Even if this is not interesting to you, it doesn’t mean it can’t be interesting to anybody.




October 20, 2008

Projects by Projection

Filed under: My Aspieness — Sheila @ 11:27 am
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Self-pitying neurotypical anthropomorphites WILL make contented Aspies their personal project to fix, especially when they are “the Lion” and the Aspie is “the antelope”! [Stand back if the Aspie is also a lion rather than an antelope! That combination is deadly!] Why must these types of neurotypicals do that? Here are a few reasons:

  1. NTs are hyper-social animals and have a difficult time understanding and accepting a different social structure that’s more sedate. The Aspergian community is typically a highly sedate cultural environment and most NTs don’t like that. It’s too foreign to them.
  2. Projective identification causes NTs who hate the Aspies they know to mistakenly believe that these Aspies hate them, along with all the other NTs the discontented lioness is fond of. She will attack any Aspie whose behavior is beyond her comprehension, because she feels the urge to protect her pride of neurotypicals. 
  3. Anthropomorphites (in the widest sense of this term) tend to conceive the activities of the external world (Aspies are an external word to them) as being a counterpart of their own. NTs see Aspies as being fellow human beings, so therefore they believe that Aspies should think, act, dress, move, talk, sleep, eat, breath, and feel sensory data like NTs do. The neurotypical culture refuses to nurture an inter-species respect with the Aspie counterpart society. 

I expounded upon the hyper-sociableness of the NT culture when I used the analogy of NTs being pack animals like dogs and Aspies being an “independent” species like cats. If you haven’t read it, go to my post Cats, Dogs, and Aspergers.

Left out from my above list of reasons was the factor of self-images. Most people compare levels of self-esteem by labeling them as being either high or low. I feel that can be misleading, because people who have a “low self-esteem” actually esteem themselves too highly and this can cause some who feel “worth less” (i.e., inadequate) to be able to “hide” this part of themselves. This pride in disguise becomes evident when you see them trying to take other people ‘down a peg or two’. If they can belittle you, they seem bigger to themselves. They want you to “be little” so they can “be big”.¹

True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less. How can one with a “low self-esteem” be esteeming himself at a low level if he is always busy looking for faults in others to fix?

Self-pitying people think about themselves a lot. They are the ones who will be offended if their birthday is forgotten or they don’t receive the praise they believe they should get (e.g. “nice haircut”, “great shoes”, “delicious cake”, “beautiful house”, etc.). They want to be on the pedestal of fame to be admired and honored.  The word ‘esteem’ means to ‘think much of’. Thinking much can be done at both high and low levels, so it is an oxymoron to use the term “low self-esteem”. A healthy self-esteem² reveals itself in people who live by the principle ‘to each his own’ and they are the only ones who can truly have the same kind of love towards others as what they have towards themselves.

All people naturally love themselves, but not all people like to hear that or believe it. Rare is the person who loves all others (even ‘enemies’ like so-called ‘homophobics’ and ‘conservative Republicans’) with the same kind of love that is held for self. Mankind can love those who are lovable (who and/or what matches their tastes and likings), but only those born from above have the nature to love who society feels are the ‘un-love-ables’. Adult aspies (for the most part) fall into the category of the ‘un-love-ables’. If this wasn’t so, Aspergers would not be labeled as a ‘disorder’ or ‘disease’ and society would be putting forth effort to become acquainted with Aspies and be friends with them (i.e., accept and respect Aspergers as much as neurotypicals are!).

Last, but not least, anthropomorphism needs greater mention. I’m going to quote what Dana Herron says on her site PetOwnersGroomShop.com to use as an analogy for a role reversal exercise neurotypical people should practice in regard to how they perceive Aspies:

“Lets do a little role reversal. Think about how you would feel if your dog tried to treat you like a dog instead of a human. You come home and the dog sniffs you all over. (He probably does this already and is makes you uncomfortable, doesn’t it?) The dog makes you eat the same food every day in a bowl on the floor. The dog asks you to fetch the paper and pee outside. Doesn’t this sound foreign and crazy? Wouldn’t you feel awkward and out of place to have the dog making you do dog behavior because he wants to treat you the same as himself, a dog? It is the same when you superimpose human qualities and human rights on your dog. Your dog is not the same as you. When you give a dog human rights you are in denial of how a dog was made to function.” 

Normally I place all links where extra information came from within my body of text in posts. This time one is at the end. I could especially relate to this writing because of the attitude I pick up from jealous oppressive people who resent that I don’t have a ‘job’ (they also resent that I don’t like to throw parties) and would also would like to say to me, “No, you HAVE to work.” It’s from yahoo’s collection of answers to the question, Do self-pitying people project their self-pity onto those they resent for being content?

¹My words chosen are the same as someone else’s by coincidence.   

²God’s view on self-esteem:

Luke 16:15, “And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.”

Romans 12:3, “For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.”→Why ‘measure of faith’? Because as faith increases, so does humility. Spiritual maturity means getting familiar with, “therefore but by the grace of God go I.”

October 19, 2008

It’s either me or the other guy.

Filed under: My Aspieness — Sheila @ 7:18 pm
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What happens if a person acknowledges that someone may actually be suffering (the suffering is only from her perspective—not the Aspie’s) from this so-called Asperger ‘disease’ but still doesn’t want to learn anything about what Aspergers really is? Will she still be feeling superior or will she pity the ‘poor’ Aspie? Both will happen.

How could she feel superior? What would be evidence of it? For starters, when such a person believes she knows what’s best for the ‘ailing’ Aspie, it shows that she isn’t about to examine her own thinking to consider the possibility that just maybe the Aspie might know more than she does. 

How do pretentiously compassionate people think? They think pills will come to the rescue to fix what they don’t like and/or understand. The alternative of self-examination to look for ways to truly be accepting and understanding of an Aspie by becoming properly educated requires genuine compassion. Genuine compassion doesn’t pity or give condescending sympathy (naturally, the one doing it isn’t aware of being condescending—heck, they’re not even aware of how little they’re thinking!). Real caring requires self-sacrifice and time. That isn’t too likely to happen in today’s fast-paced world of instant gratification that’s crammed full of over-activity.

Another foolish belief of neurotypical ‘do-gooders’ becomes evident when they think an Aspie needs to socialize with them on their terms after the Aspie’s meds have had a chance to do its magic.¹ You’d think they would be satisfied to forget about that Aspie who wants nothing from them and is content to mind her own business, but that’s not the way it works. To live by the rule To Each His Own doesn’t register in their brains. If it did, it would mean they have to stop trying to control what isn’t any of their business.

If I sound irritated, it’s because that’s how I feel. Anyone who is trespassed upon feels the same way. If the people who need to hear what I’m writing would even take the time to listen to me (instead of wishing to vomit nonsense they’d insist I swallow), I wouldn’t be needing to write this. Their unwillingness to listen speaks volumes.

¹Thanks to television commercials, they now have convenient drugs to name for others, but wouldn’t dare take themselves. Oh, they’ll consume bodily ailment medications, but the ‘mental health’ flavor is presumed to be manufactured for ‘other’ people.

October 18, 2008

Disclosure of Aspergers

Filed under: My Aspieness — Sheila @ 2:55 pm
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Here are some problems which can come along with the disclosure of aspergers:

  1. You can be perceived as being a needy person, because you’re volunteering information and that causes people to think you want something from them. How does an aspie know if an NT will not interpret his disclosure as being a cry for pity or sympathy or attention? There is no way to tell someone you’re an aspie without eliminating the possibility of them thinking you’re needy.
  2. People can doubt there is something “wrong” with you, if you were able to graduate college, become married and have children, and don’t appear to be “retarded”.
  3. Those who quit futilely trying to “adapt” into society, will be interpreted as being defiant.
  4. Prejudice because of stigma and/or wrongful assumptions about aspergers puts an aspie at risk when he associates with those who don’t want to make any accommodations for him.
  5. Embracing aspergers syndrome can be taken as making an excuse to not accept the challenges to be “socially correct” in the manner neurotypicals see fit.
  6. If an aspie earned an income by being an artist or some other creative career, then he could possibly keep silent about being an aspie. People don’t have the same expectations for ‘artistic/inventive’ aspies, because of the reputation creative people have for being further out of the mainstream. Add to that, ‘artistic/inventive’ aspie females are not permitted to deviate as much as their male counterparts are.
  7. It can invite condescending thoughts and remarks. An example of this is→ ”Even though it took you a long time to accomplish it, you now do the job well.” The insinuation is→ ”Aspergers slowed you down.” Ignorance speaks→ ”If you were not an Aspie, you could do the job just as well; except without the delay.” 

The list could probably be longer, but thankfully I haven’t been hit with all the repercussions yet to know what I’ve left out. It’s either that or I’m too tired to remember them. Here are some other things I’ve learned about the disclosure of aspergers:

The only reason someone will not try to learn what she can about an aspie in her life is because she doesn’t want to. Aspies know it’s beyond a NT’s ability to fully comprehend them, so we don’t expect that. NTs need to realize that aspies can only know just a few minute samples of what’s expected of them (which is more than what NTs can know what aspies expect of them!). Aspies are as hard pressed to find logic in NT behavior and thinking as NTs are to find logic in aspie behavior and thinking. Regardless of all that, it is no excuse for either side to not try to learn as much as they can about what they don’t understand. So, when someone constantly excuses herself from putting forth any effort, it shows she is preferring to hang onto her version of the situation. She will resent an aspie for disclosing this information to her, because to her, it is like having a thief breaking into her house to steal her misbeliefs. After all, how can you feel superior if all along you believed that so-and-so is an unfriendly bitch, lazy, spoiled, and stupid; only to have the covers pulled off to reveal that so-and-so is actually compassionate, kind, hard-working, abused, and highly intelligent. When mistakes like that become evident, it’s too much shame for such an NT to handle. Just because I say ’she’ does not mean men cannot be covertly malicious too. Women tend to enjoy gossiping about other women more than men do about other men.

I thought I did the “How Not to Tell” people you are an aspie because of my “one-shot” mass disclosure by blogging it. My timing of reading about this, along with recently being stunned by someone holding unjustifiable malice towards me, threw me way off course recently with my blog. That really triggered hastefully backtracking while looking for a way to do a ‘do-over’ with my blog. I intended to separate my publicized name from aspergers. It’s not that I felt shameful of aspergers. I thought I made a big mistake because the only aspies I know who indiscriminatingly declare aspergers are those who reap financial rewards for doing so. When people pay you to talk, obviously you’re respected. When you’re not famous and you willfully attach your real name to something most ignorant people view as a disorder and/or disease (without being monetarily compensated for it), you are highly likely to be viewed as extra weird.

I understand what aspies are saying about needing to use caution with who to tell verses not to tell. I would not disclose my aspergers to everyone who crosses my path offline. Online however, I cannot filter out the coarse sediment which may flow in my direction. All I can do is ignore it the best I can and close up whatever holes may attract the rats to weasel through. I avoid them like the bubonic plague, because that’s what they are to me. 

My daughter teaches me what a friend is because she does things like gently pointing out to me that a blog is not like sending a detailed email to everyone I know. I tend to forget that no one is getting his arm twisted to come to my blog. Emails can be intrusive. The only way a blog can be intrusive is when things happen like a visitor becoming disturbed by being exposed to honesty he finds disagreeable to his tastes.

My husband agreed with me→ people will either like me or not, regardless of whether or not they know I’m an aspie. If my disclosure causes them to turn away from me, then that just simplifies my life. If it causes them to want to learn more, then that’s even better. :)

October 16, 2008

Undergoing Major Changes

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Life — Sheila @ 8:12 am

I’m always changing as I learn new things every day. Hopefully everyone does. The difference though with me is that I respond intensely to new information. For my regular readers, if you’re still patient and curious, you’ll soon see what I mean. By soon, I mean any time between one day to one week.

I wouldn’t doubt that there may be many who will find me laughable. Maybe those who won’t laugh might pity me. Whatever anyone decides, that’s their prerogative. I am going to do what I do on my blog for those people who want to learn more and try to understand things which might stretch their imagination. Now I know that only those who care will be the ones who won’t misjudge and who will respect what I do. It’s the nature of caring people to care about others. The rest just pretend and really only care about themselves.

October 7, 2008

Those Who Have It Don’t Get It

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Thoughts — Sheila @ 5:46 am
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Those who have more money (usually the white-collar workers) or someone else’s money to spend (e.g., government controlled health insurance), don’t seem to know how some of us on the other side think.

I’m not complaining about having less money to spend than others or about not having man’s health insurance (God’s plan isn’t corrupted). I am actually quite thankful for my lot in life. The Prayer of Agur¹ might not be popular, but what can you expect when there are more fools than wise men?

I’m reading Michael John Carley’s book Asperger’s from the Inside Out. Like most books, it needs to be read cautiously. I can understand why he says what he does. Most Aspies would think and feel like he does, but not all do. I won’t get into every part of his book where I deviate, but I will bring up one statement though. It bugs me whenever I see subjective claims being expressed as objective ones. Here is an example:

I agree, support groups can create good feelings. I don’t agree with Carley’s blanket statement (on page 54) that Aspies need individualized therapy. Aspies can want this and maybe non-Christian Aspies do need it, but he should not speak for me. God only knows what I need and He always faithfully reveals it to me. When other agents enforce upon me what it is they think I need, they create problems in my life and then leave me to clean up the mess.

Whenever people corral others into their penned opinion, they can cause problems for those who are of a different herd. What makes this especially upsetting is the problem behind who gets to decide who are the appropriate therapists.² Yes, people get to choose their therapists, doctors, dentists, etc. (usually, but not always!). But… politics get the upper hand behind the scene. [Look at how the government's schools deal with issues they won't admit being unable to handle.] Laws get made like the Senate bill 6527-B, which directs the Commissioner of Heath to establish best practice protocols for the early screening of children for autism spectrum disorders (this was passed on July 27, 2008). I don’t know about anybody else, but to me, I see a lot of loop-holes here and vagueness that opens the door wide for people (who love money) to use people. Add to that potential chaos, misdiagnoses and hastily prescribed meds.³ What if it can be proven later that Aspergers does not belong on the Autism Spectrum and Aspie children are forced into the same treatment mold as Autie children?…then what? The repercussions could be enormous.

I can see that those (e.g., psychologist) who have it (i.e., money) don’t get it (comprehend) when you try to tell them you can’t afford to pay them what they are asking for. Usually they want $100 an hour, but they may settle for $40 instead if they think they’re not going to get the amount they’d like. That’s fine, but what isn’t okay is to assume that $40 a week (how many weeks is enough?) wouldn’t be missed from the ‘grocery’ money. Only the people living in the household know if $40/wk would be cutting into the entrée rather than desserts. It’s not for someone else to decide.

I know some (maybe all?) of what I’ve said here will be taken the wrong way, but I can’t do anything about that. To whoever may be upset by my words, I don’t mean to step on your toes. However, keep in mind I have just as many toes as any other person and they have feelings too.

Now that I’ve written this post, I’d like to delete it because of seeing all the different ways my words can get twisted around and used against me. No wonder I can get stuck editing the same thing over and over again! Sorry folks… it’s all part of the package when you don’t want me to quit writing. ;) This ‘ol hamster wants to go find another wheel to run in.

¹Proverbs 30:7-9,
“Two things have I required of thee; deny me them not before I die:
Remove far from me vanity and lies: give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me:
Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the LORD? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain.”

²Those who know the blessings learned in Psalm 1:1→ “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.” ← would not find appropriate therapy in humanistic psychology for their life… useful information yes, therapy no.

³Long-term effects will reveal mistakes when the pharmaceutical industry doesn’t want to.

October 6, 2008

Instant and Long Lasting!

Filed under: My Aspieness, My Faith — Sheila @ 9:52 am
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

I don’t know if NT (neurotypical) moms pay more attention to their NAT (neuro-a-typical) child’s physical environment than they do to what might be going on inside that child’s mind. Mind reading isn’t possible, but possibly these moms realize already that hyper and hypo sensitivity exists just as well from what thoughts are occurring as it does from what senses are being aroused by a child’s surroundings?

It’s always very important for me to understand as much as I possibly can. Logic is my hero! I can’t imagine life without it. I am exactly as The Logic Boy is described!

Sometimes though, logic isn’t enough. That’s where faith comes in.¹ Truth is the best medication for a troubled soul! I got a good reminder of that late last night.

Most people know you shouldn’t drink coffee, soda, eat chocolate, or have anything containing caffeine, close to bedtime. However, never underestimate what a disturbing thought can do before bedtime, especially if you’re an Aspie!

Darcy couldn’t have known that God would use perfect timing to lead me to her blog shortly after midnight. I used to say the same thing she did, “God never gives you more than you can handle.” God bless Darcy for naming her blog What We Need to pass along what a woman once said to her. It was, “No, God gives us what we need.”

After reading that powerful statement, I remembered I read that page of hers before and forgot that God gives His children exactly what they need. When you trust God implicitly, that’s all you need to know sometimes!

Anyhow, that thought, God gives us what we need, instantly put my mind and body to rest. I slept peacefully and can now enjoy today because I feel rested! :)

¹I choose to be misleading by saying faith can lack logic, because few people would believe that I can actually see the logic behind everything God gives and does. I’m not saying this was always the case though. This (super?)-natural ability is something only God can give to a person. There is no way I can teach it to others. Either God gives you it or He doesn’t. I can’t know why He chose to give me His gift of faith which happens to include logic. The only logical explanation I can come up with is actually quite simple→ That is what I need.

King Solomon prayed for wisdom. He got that and financial wealth; we got the book of Proverbs. I prayed for the gift of wisdom too (since being gullible is an Aspie characteristic, Godly wisdom is a must have). I received what I asked for (but I don’t always remember to use it!). However, instead of receiving financial wealth as a surprise bonus (which in my cause would probably destroy my life and make me miserable), I got a wealth of logic. Logic and wisdom are my best friends!

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