And the day goes on

Or

[FLAG id: a geometric shaped flag of various green. A blue diamond in the middle, left is light blue, right is dark blue. End ID]

Spoon Generator Flag

A system member who generates spoons. Not necessarily while in front, but is most commonly used in that context.

Spoon generator gives us green vibes! So we chose green as a "generator" color! Blue is a good complementary color for green

UH WHAT

This might have been the bit that hit me hardest, actually:

it would be easy to misinterpret the following scenario as a standoff between two partners: Imagine that your partner asks you to pay the electric bill, and you say to yourself, “OK, I have time to do that today.” But when you sit down to do it, you keep getting distracted. The ADHD brain needs higher stimulation in order to complete this rote task with minimal payoff. Your ADHD brain says, “That task is way too boring, and I refuse to focus on it. Find something that interests me more, which offers me a bigger dopamine reward, and I’ll work with you.” It doesn’t matter that you know you should pay the bill as promised; if your brain won’t engage, it’s an ugly standoff. Perhaps, after a day of procrastination — when your partner will be home in 20 minutes and the bill is still unpaid — there may be enough of an adrenaline rush from a sense of crisis that your brain will engage and you pay the bill.

The ADHD brain and its owner are at odds with one another. It’s difficult to compel a disengaged brain to engage by force of will. In fact, much of the treatment for ADHD involves learning to psych out the brain, so that it will attend to necessary, low-stimulation tasks.

Appreciating the tug-of-war within that pits intellect against neurobiology increases compassion and acceptance for one’s hidden struggle.

I feel SEEN. OTZ

good day:

make coffee

regular day:

put water in coffee maker

put coffee in coffee maker

turn on coffee maker

bad day:

take pot from coffee maker

turn on sink

fill up coffee pot

turn off sink

pour water into coffee maker

put coffee pot in coffee maker

open cupboard

get coffee filter from cupboard

get coffee beans from cupboard

put filter in coffee pot

measure coffee

pour coffee into filter

close coffee maker

turn coffee maker on

It’s “normal” as in “many people experience pain, loneliness, anxiety, self-hatred, and other symptoms of mental illness that feel like they ‘don’t count’ because there’s no real Thing they can point to to explain it, but their pain and suffering are real and ought to be taken seriously.”

Basically, due to the stress of impossible expectations and the psychological issues that arise from that, a lot of “gifted” kids accumulate trauma in small bits. This is known as “complex trauma.” (complex/C-PTSD is a thing but the DSM doesn’t recognize it separately from other PTSD yet, if I recall correctly.)

Trauma shatters your sense of self. Picture the sense of self as a statue. People who undergo one or more distinct, intense traumatic experiences can crumble quickly, as if the statue is being destroyed in one or just a few blows.

People who have lived with a low-level background anxiety or sense of impending panic (especially throughout their childhoods) may not have a big statue-shattering moment. Instead, the statue is chipped away, slowly, over years.

me: 

- skewed sense of time eg; i can easily get there and back before my eggs cook!

- altered sense of reality//tendency to get sucked up in daydreams and temporarily lose track of real life

- extremely vivid daydreams// alternative realities

- feeling really lonely but getting the urge to isolate yourself for no reason

- getting overwhelmed by too many choices and freaking out

- hearing the instructions but not really being able to hold onto them

- people cant speak to you while you’re really focused on something because you can’t hold on to multiple things in your brain at once

- repeating things over and over in your head to try and remember them

- feeling like you never really appreciate things as much as you should because you get too sidetracked

- getting super excited by small things but sometimes feeling indifferent towards the things everyone’s raving about

- being self conscious from everyone telling you you’re annoying but being scared you’ll come off as boring

- getting hyperfixations on a certain person and getting really wrapped up on them regardless of if they like you back

- putting too much into things and getting disappointed when it’s not reciprocated

- constantly being told that you’re too intense and need to chill it out a bit

- ^ thinking you’re cool and desperately wanting to just be chill and laid back but your personality is just 24/7 overdrive

- building things up so much in your head to the point that it gets stressful because what if it doesn’t live up to expectations??

- extremely over-emotional (this includes when it’s inappropriate such as giggling at sad things and then feeling really bad after)

- feeling when you just don’t know when to stop

- getting increasingly uncomfortable in a situation for no apparent reason until you feel like you’re gonna cry or scream but you do none of that and just sit there

Due to popular demand, here is the Typography Final comic that I did at VCUarts, originally posted over here as simple illustations. It was an informational comic about Autism.

Please take into consideration that this is based on my own experiences and is meant to be light-hearted and very basic. This is not an official medical guide to autism and was instead a theme to an art project rather than a medical study.