aesmael

This is a busy week for me. As well as classes, tomorrow I will be out all day for an endocrinological appointment. There will be the usual interview with the doctor to... what? Make sure my life is going okay and I am making acceptable progress in my metrics, not freaking out from HRT? Perhaps there will be measurements. Blood will be drawn. I hope not to faint this time; I will not be fasting and I will bring food with me. I will try to remember the advice I was given last time on how to remain conscious; the only part I can bring to mind now is to ask for a narrower needle. Hopefully that is not mixed up.

Fainting. That's an odd sort of thing. Perhaps I should hope I do, to have more experiences to draw from in trying to understand it. It seems a lot due to poor circulation on my part. My extremities cool easily and often when standing I find myself dizzy, with vision obscured for several seconds and needing to steady myself. It is easy to imagine this leading to fainting outright after a couple of vials of blood have been taken.

Then again, I have had a problem with needles as far back as I can remember. Childhood memories of quite a lot of crying and fear at the prospect of a vaccination, I think enough that it was decided not to proceed. I don't cry or scream when offered a needle these days, nor flee, but I do feel quite tense about it. Having fainted the last few times when attempting to move after does not help; I get anxious instead, worried about fainting again, and that probably exacerbates the situation. I am nervous now.

We will see what happens tomorrow.

On Friday I have an appointment with a psychologist. I am nervous about that too. I still want to withdraw myself from that and say I can, unassisted, manage myself. I feel like to go and ask for help would be an act of weakness, a failure.

I suspect more than a few reading this could empathise with that feeling. Some I have even advised to the contrary, that recognising a resource which could be of benefit to oneself and seeking it out is not weakness, it is strength (in the admission that something outside oneself could be beneficial in a society which demands we strive for the opposite if at all possible), it is self-care, and both of those are good things. Something I have not yet said is that if such aid were sought because of weakness on the part of the seeker, that would not be a bad thing either. If I say "I am weak and I need help" where in that is anything that I should feel ashamed or be condemned for, except that what I am is not what I am told I ought to be?

Not that simply uttering those words banishes such feelings. I do think ideas of 'strength' and 'weakness' in contexts like this (and much more broadly within society) serve mainly as misdirection pointing people at standards to measure themselves against as an arbiter of personal worth, or hurt themselves trying to meet. Far more important, I think, to recognise needs, or opportunities, or resources, and make use of them without worrying if this makes one weak or strong. And like I said at the beginning of the paragraph, this is far easier said than done. These ideas of 'strength' and 'weakness' are deeply engrained.

Well, I suppose I am weak by those standards. Though I think all persons have limits, it does not change that I found myself in a situation of facing mine. I could bear the situation I found myself in, at least for so long as I was there, but I could also see that if it grew worse it would break me at some point. Even if there were no increase of intensity, mere duration would have the same effect eventually - on two occasions how I would endure long enough for someone to come home, and only on the second occasion did I follow through on my resolution (made on both occasions) to make this appointment.

Perhaps I could endure, overcome, triumph without professional assistance. I would not attempt to guarantee this. Even if I could, I do not want to. I do not want to face such a dreadful thing alone. and that is why I made the appointment. My friends, my loved ones, they have been a tremendous help, but I do not want to rely solely on them for support. They have helped me with their support, their presence, insights which have shifted my beliefs about what is going on and how to cope with it. I am still hoping that with professional help I can avoid plunging into those particular depths again. To be honest, in the first half of this year I found myself in another situation which made me realise enough pressure would eventually see me break the vow I made to myself about suicide. And right now I am thinking I would rather face that particular hell if forced to choose between them, because it was only depression, only numbness, and pain, and eventually death. Relatively peaceful, and I wouldn't be screaming the same way[1].

That has been perhaps my theme since my psychological assessment and the argument following. Everyone breaks. They say so about torture, and it holds even if not performed by men in dark rooms with sinister implements. Under enough pressure... that sounds like an unfalsifiable claim, doesn't it? Enough. "Well I did experienced X and I did not break under that pressure." "Then clearly X was within your threshold and, had it pushed beyond, you would have." Enough. Perhaps I seek to bring everyone else down with me, say they can be no better than I - since I cannot honestly deny my own words, my actions, my thoughts - but I do believe it holds true. I think I hope it holds true too, those hopeful words "What matters is what you do after". Even if... but that is a different post.

I worry about presenting myself. Since I am not in that state of mind currently and do not expect to be on the day, how would I convey it? If I were, how would I? And how would I remember what it is I want to bring up, not only the details, but what they are at all? I have been thinking I might print out and give to her copies of my posts touching on the relevant matters as an aid. This was actually the original purpose of the post, to solicit people's opinions on the idea.

This has taken me four hours longer to write than I intended. I had better sleep now if I am to make my appointment tomorrow.

[1] Would I still think so then? I honestly suspect I would, though at least now I have perhaps greater fleetness of mind. In either case I am never entirely free of the other.

I think I have some insight now into what is going on with me over the past few days.

It has been less than 2.5 hours since I went to sleep and I am awake again. Scared, tired, trembling. Triumphant. I was not woken this time by a nightmare, possibly helped by a combination of increased awareness of the situation, overall improved mental state, and taking care to be thinking pleasing thoughts before sleeping. Instead I think I was woken by overheating, which is presently a trade-off so I would be able to sleep in the first place.

I think I am sick. This has been difficult to notice because I am not currently suffering from a cough or running nose. My ears, well. On Tuesday there were a couple of shifts as if their 'blocked status' had suddenly changed, leaving me feeling temporarily as if I were having difficulty hearing. On Monday and possibly a bit before I felt overheated and as if my body were radiating heat; I think I have had a fever over the past few days, but on Monday at least it was somewhat masked by the day itself being very hot. My joints have been aching too the past couple of days and my sleep has been fitful and easily disrupted.

The fever is very important. I have a history of some very unpleasant mental states associated with those; I am sure most people are familiar with the term 'fever dream' and suspect a majority have experienced this for themselves. When I was a child I had what have been described as night terrors; when I was sick I would keep my family awake through the night screaming uncontrollably from nightmares and sensory distress.

The nightmares would tend to focus, I think, on some story I had recently been exposed to. At least the only example I recall with an identifiable focus I can recall picked the first volume of The Death Gate Cycle even though that series has never been frightening to me. As for the sensory distress, that remains the most horrible experience I can recall. For a while now I have tried to find some way to describe it to others and found my attempts vague and severely lacking, but last night before sleeping I had an insight which I think will allow me to do a bit better now.

I do not know how much of this is commonplace among people, as I do not recall seeing it described anywhere. Perhaps it is one of those things so ordinary it is taken for granted and which I overlook. But since I do not know, I shall attempt to be thorough. Feverish states tend to exaggerate my experience of tactile sensations and what would ordinarily be pleasant or neutral can be found uncomfortable. Pretty sure that part is familiar to people. Actually it seems more a distortion than a plain exaggeration, with some parts of touch seeming missing and others intensified.

Last night while I lay in bed I attempted to shift my legs and found them not located quite where I had thought they were. This proprioception error combined with the tactile distortion (I wonder if both are related to the fever) to produce a definite sense of wrongness of sensation which echoed my former night terrors. It can become extremely painful and distressing when every tactile sensation is 'wrong' and my sense of the size and shape and arrangement of my body is distorted.

In this case it was helpful because I realised this sensation was probably what triggered the nightmares of the previous two nights, which were sufficiently reminiscent of my night terrors that I became afraid they were returning. Realising this as a likely cause has been comforting and I attribute it as a likely cause to my lack of nightmares this time, though I expect something like it will happen again.

I suspect also my feverish state has contributed to the other fears and paranoias I have been experiencing recently, although I do not believe it to be solely responsible, and still feel I may find it beneficial to see a mental health professional.

This is a comment I made in reply to a post of gentle_gamer's. It happened because I was having difficulty writing the reply I originally wanted to make and started thinking about why. This was hard too, but at least I knew roughly what I was trying to say.

"It is a mess in here. Someone needs to do some cleaning."

I have been struggling to write a reply to this post. Trying to put together words to say something. Doing this, something which might be a realisation happened.

Possibly I am not as good at talking - communicating - as I think I am. It is very difficult for me to say things directly. Gaps in typing this for apparently unnecessary reasons, to tap on the keyboard or look around or retreat inside for various lengths of time, often when the next thing to type is known or is classed as 'should not be difficult to find'. The previous sentence is not what I was trying to say, although it is reflective of it[1].

What I mean is, attempting to communicate directly with someone is very difficult for me. Most of the time I spin words together, poetic flights and allusions which hopefully carry implicitly what I mean, although since so often they are misunderstood this is doubted. The possible realisation is that much of my communication is pulled from a sort of library which is then assembled in a way which seeks to approach or reference the intention behind my communication but does not often match it. So I do this, which is like the 'classic' idea of aspie-type people compositing speech from television, radio, etc., albeit in a non-standard way and trying to... not do it, to speak in a direct manner, is far more difficult. Often that fails and I end up talking about what I want to say, instead ("I want to say how wonderful the colours in this painting are" vs. "The colours in this painting are wonderful").

This comment is another example, in which successive iterations of a communication attempt are made and refined. I hope this comment will be understandable to people but I cannot really tell; I am not actually sure I am typing English words rather than some other arrangement of letters (but I think I am).

At some point in the past I think you told me I was speaking too fast for you to follow well. If I were doing this I would be very slow indeed, but it would be nice for that to not be a problem.

I want to write about this and place considerations of it and other aspie/autie type things on my journal, but do not know how. Perhaps reposting this comment will help.

[1]as something allusive of what I am trying to say but not actually holding that meaning. The previous sentence was postponed due to being considered nonsensical in original context.

I think this is not always true*, but I think it is also true far more often than I have been realising.

*'true' here meaning something like 'an accurate description of my functioning'

There are questions which I have been thinking would be helpful to ask myself, so as to help steer myself into doing things which I think important and/or satisfying. So far I have had little success in making these - or rather the awareness it is their intention to generate - habits of mine and it was thought that, perhaps, the act of writing, or even of posting in a perhaps public way might help stir and fix this idea where it is intended to do its thing.

My intention is to be aware of what thing is most important and highest priority to be attended to, and to attend to that rather than idle amusements. My intention is to find things I can be proud of accomplishing and to accomplish them. My intention is to know things I would enjoy doing (e.g. writing, reading actual books again, learning html, learning Mandarin) and gain satisfaction from, and that if I have not engaged in at least one of those in the course of a day it should be because something more important or urgent took precedence, not because I have used my time for less satisfying pursuits.

This is considered a provisional step toward solving several problems along the lines of not taking pride in anything I do or accomplish, and of ending days feeling as if they have been wasted.

"I believe it" does not mean a thing is real.

"I do not believe it" does not mean a thing is not real.

The previous two sentences are beliefs.

If I could answer the question "What is a real?" that might help here.

If I could answer the question "What is an I?" that might help here.

We call this "Waking State" or something near to it. If another is needed the name might be appropriated from another language, not an oriental one. That would be stereotyping.

"Thinking is hard."
"When does one begin to think?"
"When one makes the effort."

( 1st: This thing here )

( 2nd: These things it is sometimes made of )