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May28
Aspie Pride: Respecting Our Strengths, Respecting Ourselves
16 CommentsI saw my new AS-literate therapist for the first time on Tuesday afternoon. We’re going to have three sessions and then evaluate whether we can work together, but I’m feeling very good about her already. In many ways, seeing her was a very intense experience, and it has sent my thinking in very positive new directions.
The Experience
The therapist is in New Hampshire, about 35-40 minutes from where I live. I found the drive on Tuesday to be very challenging. I was anxious about meeting a new person, and I was desperately hoping that she wouldn’t say something clueless or patronizing about AS. I had sent her a link to my blog so that she’d have some background on where I’m coming from, but still, you never know.I was also afraid of getting lost, because like many of you, I was born without any discernable sense of direction. I had given myself extra driving time in case I misread the directions she’d emailed to me. Fortunately, at my request, she had taken care to add a lot of detail, so I got to her office with 15 minutes to spare.
Within five minutes of my arrival, the therapist saw me parked outside, came out, introduced herself, and invited me to come in and get the session started early. Of course, on this basis alone, I liked her immediately. How many times does a health professional get your appointment started on time, never mind early? So I started to feel optimistic.
She began the session by saying that she really liked my blog, and that I was doing a great service with it. She was very straightforward and sincere when she said these words, so I had no choice but to believe her.
That was a good start. I began to feel even more optimistic.
Since we hadn’t talked on the phone, she asked me what I wanted from the therapy. I said that I wanted to work on accepting myself just as I am, which includes having the disabilities that come with Asperger’s. At this point, she very gently stepped in and said, “You know, I think of Asperger’s as a different way of thinking and being, not as a disability.”
I know that I should have felt even more optimistic in the face of this statement, but I was determined not to let her sugarcoat my experience. (I don’t think that’s what she was doing, but the fear was there, so I went with it.) I started my shpiel about feeling that on some days, Asperger’s gives me lots of strengths, and that on other days, it’s a really debilitating disability. I described some of my sensory deficits, my difficulties going shopping, cleaning my house, driving, and so forth. I expressed my frustration and the low self-worth that emerges when I’m not able to do basic tasks without feeling cranky, dizzy, and exhausted.
She acknowledged my frustration, and then she said the most amazing thing. “Well,” she said, “it’s true that you can’t go grocery shopping very easily, but on the other hand, how many people who go grocery shopping easily can write the way you do?”
I had to acknowledge that there was truth in what she was saying. Then, when she asked me about what I do out in the world, I talked about working in the thrift store. Once again, I focused on how hard the sensory overload felt, and said that I didn’t feel that I could do much at the store at all. When she heard that, she once again put my Aspie strengths into focus and said, “Even in the short time you’re there, you’re doing a great service at the store, and the staff values it. How many people can just walk into a place with your kind of focus and start organizing things?”
This type of interaction kept happening over and over. I would mention something I was doing, and then proceed to devalue it by bringing up all the things I couldn’t do. She kept turning my statements around to give me a different perspective. Her respect, and even admiration, for people with Asperger’s was palpable. I finally broke down and said, “You know, I just feel so badly about myself, even in this room with you. I can’t maintain eye contact with you because I need to look at the floor in order to think. I feel like I talk too much and get disoriented and exhausted by it.”
At this point, your average therapist would have given me that benign therapist look. You know the one I mean. It’s that look that says, “There is something deeper here you’re not seeing. I know, because I’ve studied psychology.”
But this therapist said, “It’s perfectly fine that you don’t make a lot of eye contact with me. And if you need to be quiet at different times during our session, that’s fine, too. By the way, is there anything in this office that is visually distracting to you?”
It’s a good thing I was sitting down, because if I’d been standing up, I probably would have fainted. It’s so unusual that anyone asks me that question that at first, I was shocked. But then, I realized that I’d better seize the moment, so I said, ”Yeah, actually, that stuff piled on the bench over there is bothering me because it’s kind of random, and that book over there is bothering me because it’s kind of tilted and the color on the cover hurts my eyes.” She said she’d get that fixed for next time, and that if I felt distracted by the environment in any other session, I should speak up.
Before we finished the session, she talked about how Jung believed that mid-life is an opportunity to truly become ourselves—an opportunity that takes a lot of courage to embrace. At that moment, I felt very grateful to have Asperger’s, because its challenges and its strengths are giving me the impetus I need to find that courage and to be myself.
New Directions
So, I’ve been thinking: What can I do well, and what are my difficulties? Consider the following:What can I do well?
I can write in a way that has meaning for me and for other people. I can sing in a strong, clear voice. I can make beautiful art from found objects. I can dig up a whole yard using a shovel, a lot of muscle power, and a ton of sweat. I can plant beautiful flowers, vegetables, and herbs that bring enjoyment to my family and to my neighbors. I can de-clutter my living space and organize my house so that it feels calm and restful. I can do all the dishes and the laundry (although my husband and I compete over the laundry, because we both enjoy it so much). I can be a good listener for Bob and for Ashlynne. I can give them honest, constructive responses to the challenges they face in their own lives. I can focus like there’s no tomorrow. I can get upset with injustices that other people never even notice. I can advocate for my kid when she needs it (although, these days, she’s quite good at advocating for herself). I am highly empathic, hard working, fair minded, honest, trustworthy, and without guile.What are my difficulties?
Cleaning my house, food shopping, cooking, driving, making small talk, being around a lot of people, and working at a conventional job.Anybody notice anything?
1. The things I can do well far outnumber the things I can’t.
2. No one can do everything on both lists.
3. The things that I can do well are just as important than the things I can’t. After all, what would I rather do, make small talk while feeling desperate to be understood, or write a blog so that none of us has to feel so alone? And at this point, I don’t need to have a conventional job, so why should I feel so badly about it? I should be happy!
I used to think that all the basic tasks I find so difficult were the most important things. I used to think that all the things that I do well were just self-indulgent hobbies and useless oddities that were helping me pass the time between now and the moment of my death. I kept looking out into the neuro-typical world and feeling “less than” because I couldn’t shop and socialize and get invited to parties, or even get noticed by most people at all.
I now realize that when people ignore me, it’s not because they don’t see me, it’s not because I’m not important, and it’s not because I’m missing a piece. It’s because I’m putting out very intense signals that aren’t the ones they’re expecting. My husband has told me as much. All those many times that I’ve been ignored, or patronized, or laughed at, I thought it meant that there was something wrong with me. Now I realize it means that there is something very right with me. I’m very intense, I’m very focused, I’m very loving, I’m very sensitive, I’m very empathic, and I do not suffer fools graciously. I think that’s all very good. In fact, I think it’s better than very good. I think it’s great.
I’m not like most people, but there is nothing wrong with me. For the first time, I am beginning to feel that I have value. I have my strengths and I have my difficulties, just like everyone else. I don’t have to apologize for the things that are difficult. I just have to assert my strengths and ask for what I need.
So, for example, when I go to work this Monday, I’m going to ask that someone turn off the speaker above my head while I’m working on the jewelry. I’m not going to say that I’m sorry to trouble them, and I’m not going to feel small and scared. I’m just going to say that I’m very sensitive, and that everything comes into my senses at the same volume and with the same intensity, both of which are very high. I’m going to say that listening to the music, hearing people talking, and trying to concentrate on the jewelry is more than I can do at once. In other words, I’m going to ask for the staff’s assistance in making the environment work for me.
This is who I am. I get to be here, too. I don’t have to pretend to be neuro-typical anymore. I just have to be myself, the way I was made. It’s the most important thing I’ll ever do. And like most important things, it’s also the most difficult.
© 2009 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg
16 Responses to “Aspie Pride: Respecting Our Strengths, Respecting Ourselves”
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well rachel, sounds like you have found a good one. that is exactlyy how it should be. My ASD psych is very similar. He has the blinds drawn and i come in to his room and am allowed to rearrange where my chair is facing – so it does not face him but is side on. I am accommodated and respected for my differences. I am allowed to assert my needs. every other therapist has told me these things are PTSD related and defective and need “healing” . And we both know – they never heal.
My therapist recently acknowledged we work hard at life and we get ten times tireder than most people.
And a good ASD specialist or therapist understands we need to be encouraged to embrace our gifts and the way we do things.Your post here is so uplifting and positive. good on you.
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I’m so happy for you! And I’m going to live vicariously through you, if you don’t mind.
I’m still so delighted I found your blog (thanks, Millie!). Kindred spirit.
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John Dale Lyons May 28th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Great piece. It’s hard to maintain pride when our self-esteem is battered by our disabilities. Also, I belong to other communities: ADD, depression. But your piece has wisdom and points the way towards a new beginning for us all.
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I’m jealous. I think I need to move back East to MA lol. Maybe I should have gone to Greenfield after all….Just kidding. The humidity would have killed me. It’s just about killing me here and the west is not nearly as humid as the east. Oh well. 2 weeks and I’ll go to Bend and I’m sure find something to complain about there too. Haha Im feeling negative tonight. I did really like your post. And I would love to find a therapist like that. I think it is great to have these insights. But I have to ask: People have tried to tell me these things before. And I almost believe them, and you. ALMOST. But then there is a little voice in my head that says “It’s all well and good but those things I can’t do or don’t do well – what if I need them to function in the world?” It’s find to not do stuff well but for example I need to do the housekeeping stuff and all the little stuff well if I’m going to be able to live with a roommate who expects me to be able to do them….and so on I can’t even think of al the examples. I just feel like I would be okay with msyelf and my weaknesses if I felt like I was functioning in thr world better. Maybe I just need to reframe some stuff. I seem to have the same strengths you doi and same weaknesses, for the most part. I liked it when you said no one can do both. That is true. I shoild be glad for my srengths but few people appreciates strrengths like thatr mor,e people appreciatwe hthe other, so that bothers me a bit. Anyway sorry to ramble but Great post as usual!
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Kate – that’s something I struggle with, too. I mean, great, I’m a math whiz and I write well and I can spend *days* at a time doing one or the other without moving except to pee….but those aren’t talents my family needs from me. They need me to be able to keep them in clean underwear and socks, and to be able to keep food in the house. It’d be great if we had a full-time housekeeper who took care of all that stuff, but we don’t, and I *need* to be able to manage it. I *want* to be able to do these things for my family. So the feeling of disability persists, and it isn’t really mitigated all that much by these other “free time” skills I have.
Plus the general lack of respect for the mundane work in life–what it takes to run a household–makes it feel all the more wretched that I’m not good at it. And since I’m not Einstein or Hemingway, there’s no public acclaim for my talents, only a messy house when friends come to visit.
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Kate and Saja: I had a long talk with my husband yesterday about the very issues you raise regarding basic tasks. Like you, I’ve worried long and hard about them. During our discussion and afterward, I tried to imagine how I would get by if my husband weren’t here to pick up the slack. Everyone’s situation is different, so my solutions may not work for anyone else. But regarding my own situation, my husband and I came to the following conclusions:
a) People want an opportunity to help. The problem is that I feel so embarrassed by not being able to do basic things that I don’t ask. So, for example, if I were by myself and having difficulty getting to the supermarket, I have no doubt that if I told a neighbor what was going on, they would help me. I have known elderly, housebound people who have found that neighbors were able to help them keep body and soul together, and this is in a rural area in which the houses are few and far between.
Another solution would be to buy a ton of staples once a month and keep the cooking very, very simple, which I have always done anyway. I’m pretty good at living a low-maintenance life when I have to, and my daughter has never seemed upset with it.
b) While I have no trouble organizing my house, it’s difficult for me to clean it. Given that I can afford to pay someone to clean my house, that worry is gone. If I couldn’t afford to pay someone, and wasn’t able to keep the house as clean as I’d like, I don’t think that many people would notice. My daughter has never cared. When my friends came to visit, they’d be coming to see me, not my house. After all, that’s what I do when I visit people. I’m interested in what they’re doing, not in the state of their houses. And if people didn’t like the state of my house, they’d be lacking in empathy for my challenges, and it would be a good indicator that I shouldn’t be hanging around with them at all!
c) I love doing the laundry and the dishes, and there’s always plenty of each, so certainly if I had a roommate, I’d be able to carry the load on those things in exchange for the roommate doing other things. And as kids get older, they can help with those things, too. In the old days, the children helped keep the household together, and I think it’s a very good thing for kids to have that experience.
d) Most of the parents of my daughter’s friends do not mind driving. In fact, strangely enough, they enjoy it. At the moment, they do a fair bit of carpooling and my daughter generally has a way to get where she wants to go.
For me, part of the problem is that I always think of myself as acting alone, and all my life, I’ve worried endlessly about what would happen if I couldn’t keep all the plates spinning myself. I’m now realizing that no one goes it alone, that we all need each other, and that human life couldn’t continue if everyone had to do everything themselves. I also remember what it was like when my husband’s late wife became progressively unable to do basic tasks. People couldn’t do enough for them, and if she’d lived another 10 years, they still wouldn’t have been able to do enough. I watched people thrive on helping, because it gave them a sense of purpose and community that is all too often lacking in people’s lives.
Everyone’s situation is so different, and I’m not trying to come up with solutions for anyone else, but perhaps there’s a tidbit or two that might be useful here.
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Woo HOO! ” I don’t have to pretend to be neuro-typical anymore.” Good for you, girl friend! What a life changing affirmation! Make sure when things get rough, you say this as a mantra!
To Rachel’s comment I say, “What happens if the plates all don’t stay spinning?”
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A lot of the plates have already fallen and broken to pieces in the past few years, and lo and behold, I’m happier, my family is happier, and my friends and family members still love me.
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Rachel – LOL. Love that. Hoping to break some plates soon.
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Saja—Enjoy!
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Teghan May 30th, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Hi Rachel,
And hello to everyone else here :0) I have only very recently come across this blog within the past few days. I was Googling Asperger’s and depression as i was going through (well, what seemed like) a breakdown. By chance Rachel i came across this website and started reading. I was in tears in the first 10 mins. I could not read fast enough!I didn’t know other Aspie’s felt so overwhelmed and tired, i didn’t know Sensory Overload existed. I always felt hampered by the fact that, when i walk into a room, my own emotions and thoughts are ’scooped’ out and replaced by others. But now i see it as an insight into knowing how they are feeling, seeing as i can’t ‘read’ body language. We have been dealt another hand in exchange for having one taken away.
You are an inspiration….even to me who is all the way over here in Australia!!
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Hi Teghan, and welcome! There are at least a couple of others from Australia here, and from other countries in addition to the U.S. We’re quite an international group; I’m so glad you happened upon us!
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Moksha June 1st, 2009 at 4:37 am
Thanks for sharing this; I, too, have felt like pulling my hair out in my search for a therapist who doesn’t sound like an ignorant bumpkin when I try to explain why I think I have Asperger’s. I also love how your ‘blog sounds like it’s describing my life. I have a lot of Aspie guilt too; there is a constant dialogue in my mind about whether I should assert my sensitivities or sweep them under the carpet, suffer silently, and spare others the work of having to look after me. More often than not, when I did have the courage to tell people that something was bothering me, they either patronized me or ganged up on me to put me back in my place. I am carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders all the time, and on top of all that, people preach at me to “be more positive”. (I feel like strangling them!)
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Hi Moksha,
So glad you found us here!
The experience of people trying to “put me back in my place” really resonates. So often, when I have experienced an injustice and tried to make it right, I’ve found that the only way to be accepted is to sit down and shut up. Since I’m not terribly good at either of those things, I tend to just stand up and vote with my feet.
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How uplifting and grounding too… you write your wise insights beautifully and I can see why Saja and the other AspieLasses on WrongPlanet recommend reading your blog. Thank you, it helps (a LOT) to know even if we don’t connect with others, we ain’t alone!
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Hi Sally,
I’m so glad my Aspie sisters from WP sent you here. Every time a new person comments on this blog, I feel so happy. We are definitely not alone!
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