My Facade is Slipping...

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Day 3 in the new space... it's amazing to me how much difference a little noise can make to an Aspie. I didn't realize just how draining it was on me to try and tune out all the chaos around me all the time. I had no idea how much physical energy was expended in just trying to pay attention to my job.

Now that I've been up here for 2 full days and most of a third, I can see a marked improvement in the quality AND quantity of my work. And I go home at the end of the day feeling like I got something done, rather than feeling like I'd been sucked dry for 8 hours. I am so glad I spoke up. It was VERY hard for me to do, and I sat at my desk and cried while I typed because I was feeling so miserable and hopeless.

My new space is right next to the corporate legal library, which is really just a glorified storage room for loads and loads of archives of legal documents from the company, but there is a scrumptiously dark nook I can go hide in if it gets to be too much again.

I made an album about people with autism. I hope you like it. It will make you feel better. http://nibirunon.bandcamp.com/album/nibirunon

Budfarmer that’s good news about your workplace. I’m happy for you.

Cheers

Also late to the party :-/

This is one problem I've been thinking about a lot lately. I moved away from home for a year, didn't have much contact with my family, and since I lived at home and hardly did anything but my job (where I mostly just socialized with high schoolers and middle schoolers - who are so much more fun than adults!), I ended up with a lot of alone time. I really had the chance to just be me...as much as I can be. When I came back home though there was this gap between me and my family. My brother and I hardly ever talked anymore, and finally we discussed why we had grown so apart. Apparently he hadn't expected me to change much, and instead I had a life altering experience and am a completely different person! Except that person isn't a doormat, she's brash and opinionated and makes social faux pas all the time. Now my problem is that I don't know if I am I acting like a better person, or would it just be best if I kept my facade up? I honestly don't know if I even know who I am anymore!! Sometimes I feel like I'm living someone else's life. It's not that I don't like my life, I just feel like it's wrong, like I'm constantly being someone else who I've made up over the years so I could be 'normal'. How does one even go about trying to find out who they really are? At this point I don't know if I can even turn off my masks, they're just so integrated

~K

Sorry to be away for so long... life ran up and slapped me pretty hard the other day.

But KittenKat, that sums it up so much better than I've been able to. But I'm not going to get the opportuntity to be alone for long stretches to see who I can become. At least not for several years yet.

I had just begun to make some progress on carving out some "me" time each day when the fecal matter struck the indoor oscillating wind generator. I had a whole room in the house with nothing but what I wanted and no one entered my room without asking (all were welcome, so long as they asked first). This lasted about six weeks.

My son, his fiance, and their 9 week old daughter got evicted from their apartment. And of course, they had no where else to go... So now my wonderful room is filled to the brim with their stuff and the three of them are sleeping on a blow up mattress on the living room floor of my 900sq ft, 2 br mobile home. I already had my husband and two cats there. So we are packed to the gills at home, everything is in chaos, and I am only marginally maintaining. Having people and screaming babies and the TV and the computer and cell phones and talking and everything going on all the time is so physically exhausting for me. No matter how hard I try, I end up curled up in a fetal postion in my bed before 8:00 every evening and I get up at 4:30 am so that I can at least be alone in the quiet for a little bit. I hate my life.

that's awful. *invisible hugs* You're in my prayers. It's so hard to find quiet time, and I'm seriously missing living alone right now. I'm managing, I think...but I also have a 45-min commute one way, so that helps me decompress before I get home, and means I get to bed early and up before everyone else too. I hate when other people are awake when I am. That's not how my morning should start off! My brother is starting school at the college I work at this Fall, and with gas prices, there's a good chance we'll car pool. He's not talkative in the mornings, but it's just the fact that there's someone beside me. He could not say a word and I'd still be agitated. I know financially I won't be able to leave for a few years, but I've got a plan, and that keeps me going. Most days I know that I'll be able to actually be myself then, craziness and all. That is, if I get the nerve to tell my family I'm moving a thousand miles away. I love that we're close, but sometimes it's the hardest part of my life.

Maybe you could find a small activity to work on each day? Just go into your bedroom, lock the door, put in some headphones (even if it's just of crickets chirping or the wind blowing!), and spend a little time doing something of your own. Remember, it's your house, and they're your guests. Set up some house rules, and if you can't enforce them, maybe your husband can? Or the cats could? My cat is awesome when it comes to protecting me. He also might from Narnia though sooo....

Does your son and DIL work? Can they get section 8 housing?

~K

Thanks for the moral support... I wish I could say I miss living on my own, but I never actually had that for myself. I never had the nerve. I did manage to cut down on some of the family chaos by moving with my hubby 1600 miles from the rest of my family. And it was just us and our son for several years but now my son has grown up and has adjuncts of his own (sorry... too much Star Trek... I think of my grandaughters as 3 of 5, and 5 of 5, secondary and tertiary adjuncts to Alpha One).

But I like the idea of projects and headphones with crickets... wonder if I really can find a decent recording of crickets for my ipod? LOL

To their credit, they signed up for Section 8 housing and are now on the waiting list. They got some temporary assistance from the state, they do get food stamps, and they are receiving WIC for their infant. AND, when I got home from work yesterday, they had done a lot of cleaning and organizing, including returning a large portion of "my room" to a usable state. I think hubby explained the importance of my room to them.

I totally feel you about having someone in the car with you on your commute. I too have a 45 minute commute and that is some of my most valued time. I enjoy munching my McD's sausage burritos and large coffee while listening to my audio book all the way in to work each morning... and I absolutely NEED my Pandora time to have a coke and a smoke on the ride home.

The thought of having someone in the car with me, ever, distresses me. "Daily" would put me over the edge.

{invisible hugs} back to you!