anxiety | Margaret Jean

Nov 17 2019

Aspies: Challenge or Opportunity? Your Choice!

We all know about challenges like climbing Mount Everest or crossing the Pacific Ocean on a raft. If you’re up for that kind of challenge, you may read no further. Congratulations!

For some Aspies, the word ‘challenging’ may seem to be synonymous with ‘anxiety-producing’, creating stress.

Experts tell us that whether stress becomes a positive or a negative factor in any particular situation depends upon how we respond to that stress.

Worrying creates unhealthy stress, whereas allowing stress to spur us on into action in a challenging situation ensures that it leads us forward into a positive learning experience.

For some Aspies, ‘challenging’ may even refer to those activities which for many people are common, almost daily occurrences.

For instance, what if you would like to go to a certain shop but it’s in an unfamiliar area of town; one into which you have never ventured. You don’t know how to get there, let alone how to get back!

Maybe you’re hesitant to take a bus because the numbers, the routes and the schedules can be quite confusing.

Breaking down a challenge like this into its relatively simple components will allow you to realize that you can resolve each of them, separately, quite successfully.

You could download a schedule for the number of the bus you need to take to get to your desired location. When you are ready, go to the nearest bus stop. When that particular bus comes, take it.

Carefully observe what roads the bus is taking, what shops and restaurants you are passing, or which other points of interest are along the way. You could make a mental, or even a paper or e-note of them.

When you get to your destination you may not wish to initially venture too far from the bus stop.

Familiarize yourself with the three or four blocks around the bus depot, note the street names and any other unique or ‘landmark’ buildings, parks or memorable natural landscape features.

Once you have experienced the bus route and the nature of the surroundings at your desired destination, you can take the bus back home again.

You might find it helpful to do this two or three times until you feel comfortable in your knowledge of the route, how long the trip takes and the nature of the area surrounding your destination.

What will you have accomplished? Just this: you will no longer need to wait for someone else to have the time to drive you where you want to go. You will be able to move about based on your own agenda, not that of your parents, your siblings or your friends.

You will be in control of your day, and just a little bit more in control of your own life.

And you will feel a sense of success, maybe even of triumph!

Becoming more knowledgeable about your community and its surrounding areas can increase your confidence, giving you a greater sense of independence.

You will find that knowing where you are going and that you can get there on your own can be exhilarating and liberating.

The result is that your sense of self-respect will receive a tremendous boost, encouraging you to undertake similar challenges, in a similar manner, with far less anxiety in the future.

It is important to realize that falling into the trap of simply avoiding the initial anxiety which may accompany a novel task will not get you where you want to go. But meeting the challenge will enrich your life.

When we decide to take control of a situation in our lives, we ask something of ourselves.

When we respond positively and successfully we present ourselves with an opportunity for growth, which involves meeting, accepting and overcoming challenge after challenge.

Ultimately, we become our own heroes, infusing ourselves with the courage, even the desire to face whatever challenges present themselves. In this way we can view new challenges as opportunities for enhancing our experiences.

Our reward is a life fully and joyfully lived, with gratitude for challenges which come our way.

Tagged anxiety, challenges into opportunity, personal growth, stress

Mar 25 2019

1 Comment

Adult Aspies and Social situations, anxiety, Asperger's diagnosis, Asperger's research, camouflaging & autism

My Asperger Personality Unmasked.

Research published online on May 19, 2017 examines the notion that Aspies and others on the spectrum camouflage their autistic personalities in order to manage social situations.

The study entitled, “Putting on My Best Normal”: Social Camouflaging in Adults with Autism Spectrum Conditions* looks at a number of issues ranging from:

why females in particular are often diagnosed later in life,
if the fact that so few females are diagnosed is due to the feminine personality being more successful at camouflaging, and
that perhaps camouflaging can be detrimental to our mental health.

Before I read the study, I wrote this blog in an explosive mood after experiencing severe anxieties about taking a bath. I didn’t post it because I was afraid of what my partner would think if he read it.

**After what I read in the study, I realized that by not showing him the blog I was camouflaging, masking my anxiety–though honestly, not very well.**

Why did I take a bath? Because it’s such a normal thing to do, and I felt that I must be weird to be so resistant to sitting in a tub.

What follows in the resulting blog are my true feelings about the situation. Looking at it now that a little time has passed, I realize that while some of the blog sounds reasonable, logical and fairly intelligent, other aspects simply seem to be the rantings of an angry child.

Here it is then, one Asperger personality, my own, unmasked and unleashed!

The Bath: A Source of Anxiety for Asperger Me.

As an Aspie, maintaining a relationship can be a challenge.

My partner thinks of baths as sensual, delightful, peaceful and meditative experiences. Candles, essential oils, music, time for reflection.

There is no music in my bathroom, I told him.

To break the ensuing period of uncomfortable silence, I spoke up. I said Baths are boring. Which, granted, was probably rather inconsiderate. That’s when he brought up the essential oils, candlelight, reflection etc.

You have to sit there. I said. Doing nothing.

People who take baths seem to think that to truly enjoy bathing you have to sit in the water … like forever. I am not tall, but my chest is always out of the water. It gets cold. I soak a cloth in the warm bath water, but it quickly gets cold too.

I could catch a chest cold. Not to mention the other alternative: die of boredom.

You haven’t learned how to let go, he says. How to be one with the water, breathe in the aroma of the oil, enjoy the sensual texture of the water against your skin.

It’s tap water, okay? Tap water.

You want me to be at one with the water? Take me to a warm ocean, where the air is fresh and salty, the water buoyant and in constant motion. My body, floating, swaying with the sea, caught up in the ebb and flow, me at one with the sea responding to the universe. Now that rocks! Moving in tune with the moon’s gravitational pull … that’s a sensual, soul-saturating sense of unity.

But a four-foot tub filled with tap water? Come on!

You have to learn to relax, he says. He means be STILL. Unfortunately to actually be still is a physical impossibility for me.

I have a familial tremor, which means my body is in constant motion whether I am consciously moving it or not. It also means my adrenalin is always, to some extent in fight or flight mode, under which circumstances, unless I’m sleeping or comatose, it is pretty much anxiety-producing to be still.

But okay. I had a bath. I believe I stayed in that tub for ten whole minutes. Maybe eleven.

Because I know it’s important to him. I just don’t know why it’s important to him that I have a bath. I shower every day. Sometimes twice a day. I’m a bit of a clean freak. But it’s important to him that I try, so I’ll fill the tub, light the candles and sit there as long as I can bear it.

Next time? If he brings in a portable CD player and puts on some Celtic music, I’m going for twelve minutes.

*More about this study can be found at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5509825/

Tagged anxiety, Asperger's, relationships

Oct 05 2017

Aspies: Ten Ways Volunteering Can Help Us Learn to Adapt.

When someone else changes plans which also affect us, as Aspies we may become temporarily stuck in a “this is unacceptable!” zone. How can we become more adaptable?

What activities or new experiences may best help us handle change so that we might adapt to other’s needs and acquire a healthier focus; one which does not lead us to a feeling of dread when we must deal with a changed agenda?

Save The Children’s Marc and Craig Kielburger give a possible solution in a recent newspaper article*:

“Youth who volunteer through our service programs…are more comfortable adapting to change…”

Renowned for creating the Save The Children Foundation as a young teen in high school, Craig Kielburger still operates the organization that was originally entirely run by and for children.

In their article, the Kielburger brothers note the following ten ways in whiuch volunteering helps teenagers adjust to school and other stresses, including aversion to change:

When you do something for others, your stress levels are reduced. This is proven by research**.
Volunteering may give you an alternative social scene, in which you can find a sense of community and belonging.
Volunteering for a cause you’re passionate about will connect you with mentors who have similar interests.
Helping others puts your focus outside of yourself, encouaging you to see your own situation in a different and possibly more positive light.
Volunteering broadens your outlook. Your own problems may seem far less significant when you come face to face with the plight of others.
Seeing other’s problems, Kielburger says, can help you build both perspective and empathy. Kielburger also notes that doctors state that empathy is a powerful antidote to stress.
As a Volunteer you enjoy increased self-esteen. According to research done within the Foundation, volunteers for Save The Children are 1.3 times more likely to “have a strong sense of self”.
The kind of stress found in volunteering — that is, helping others with their problems — can be an opportunity to overcome challenges, to build resiliency and to develop self-esteem.
Volunteering can build leadership skills.
Volunteering helps develop a life – long habit of giving back.

Find a cause you are passionate about, Aspies and get involved!

Maybe sorting clothes at the local hospice society thrift shop won’t do it for you, but perhaps volunteering in a Wildlife Preservation Society or starting up a chapter of Save the Children will.

Whatever you choose, if you give it your all you will find yourself thinking about situations, people and places beyond your own inner world. Go for it. And, most importantly, enjoy!

*According to an independent study by research firm Mission Measurement.

**See: https://www.randomactsofkindness.org/the-science-of-kindness

Yours truly,

Margaret Jean.

Tagged anxiety, stress

Oct 28 2016

Anxiety: the Big Muscle in Aspie Brains?

Are we anxious because we unintentionally develop the anxiety muscle in our brains? My recent reading has led me to consider the possibility.

Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home and School by John Medina offers fascinating insight into the molecular processes that occur in our brains.

Although Medina is a developmental molecular biologist and research consultant chapters like “stressed brains don’t learn the same way” and “we are powerful and natural explorers” capture and entertain those of us with a more elementary knowledge of neural science.

In the chapter on “Wiring–Every brain is wired differently”, Medina tells us our brain is like a muscle: the more you do the same activity, the bigger and more complex that part of the brain that is utilized can become.

For us Aspies. this poses an interesting possibility. Can it be true then, that the more we experience anxiety, the larger and more prominent our anxiety receptors become?

Temple Grandin, in her book The Autistic Brain,states that neuro-imaging shwoed her brain had a larger anxiety receptor than “normal”.

And does Medina’s conclusion explain why forcing ourselves to think positive, to build and maintain positive images of ourselves in social situations, can result in having a better day?

Is it because we are strengthening that part of the brain that builds confidence, feeds positive feelings and reduces our levels of anxiety?

If so, let’s go, Aspies! Let’s exercise the positive neurons, or as Willie Nelson once sang: accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative!

Let us build our brains in a direction in which we are all longing to grow!

Yours truly,

Margaret Jean.

Tagged anxiety

Aug 10 2016

1 Comment

Aspies and Anxiety, Aspies volunteering

Aspies: Five Ways To Lower Anxiety

What is the difference between anxiety and fear? I’ve heard it said that fear is a specific dread–for instance, you might be afraid of the man next door because you have heard he’s a pervert or because he always looks angry.

Anxiety on the other hand is the dread you experience but can’t explain. You might be having fearful feelings but not be able to say why. This is very challenging because not knowing where the fear comes from, means you have no way to face down the fear.

But relax. There is help. And I know we’ve talked about this before, but with more than fifty percent of 100,000 college students* rating anxiety as their biggest issue when visiting a campus clinic, and the Canadian Anxiety Disorder Association stating that anxiety is now the number one mental health problem in Canada, this information bears repeating.

So here is help: Five ways to fight anxiety and come out a winner.

At the end of each day, think of three things that went right. Focus your thoughts on those incidents. Did you hand a report in, and get a good mark? Did someone compliment you? Did you finally make that phone call you’ve been dreading to make? Did you balance your budget? Smile at someone who smiled back at you? How did you make that happen?

For more on the power of positive thinking from Michigan University see: https://www.uofmhealth.org/node/651843
Be grateful. Think about something you have–your health, your living space, your cat,–and be thankful for it. It can be something as simple as a beautiful day, or rain for your garden or the sun on your face. Feeling and expressing gratitude leads to reduced anxiety. For more information about this topic see: https://www.bphope.com/bipolar-buzz/10-ways-to-use-the-power-of-gratitude-to-help-depression-anxiety/
Be kind. Doing a good deed doesn’t just lift the spirits of the recipient of your kindness; it somehow magically transforms something inside of us to a good emotion+. And here’s the great thing–it doesn’t matter if you save someone from getting hit by a train (very anxiety producing in itself!) or if you just say hello to the lonely senior living down the street–it’s all powerful anti-anxiety medicine.

To learn more see: https://www.springer.com/gp/about-springer/media/research-news/all-english-research-news/doing-good-deeds-helps-socially-anxious-people-relax/679444
Volunteer: think of some charity you’d like to lend a helping hand to, then go and sign up as a volunteer. You’ll meet people with similar interests, see that you are better off than some people, and possibly make new friends. At the very least you’ll have social contact and feel productive.
Be compassionate to yourself. Forgive yourself your blunders. Tell yourself you’ve learned something from that embarrassing situation and will do better next time. try to see the humour in it, and understand that you are loveable, you are unique and you are worthy of happiness.

*From a Penn State University study. Read more at: http://news.psu.edu/story/343727/2015/02/05/research/annual-report-offers-snapshot-us-college-students%E2%80%99-mental-health
+

Tagged anxiety

Margaret Jean

Asperger Me!

Tag Archives: anxiety

Aspies: Challenge or Opportunity? Your Choice!

We all know about challenges like climbing Mount Everest or crossing the Pacific Ocean on a raft. If you’re up for that kind of challenge, you may read no further. Congratulations!

For some Aspies, the word ‘challenging’ may seem to be synonymous with ‘anxiety-producing’, creating stress.

Experts tell us that whether stress becomes a positive or a negative factor in any particular situation depends upon how we respond to that stress.

Worrying creates unhealthy stress, whereas allowing stress to spur us on into action in a challenging situation ensures that it leads us forward into a positive learning experience.

For some Aspies, ‘challenging’ may even refer to those activities which for many people are common, almost daily occurrences.

For instance, what if you would like to go to a certain shop but it’s in an unfamiliar area of town; one into which you have never ventured. You don’t know how to get there, let alone how to get back!

Maybe you’re hesitant to take a bus because the numbers, the routes and the schedules can be quite confusing.

Breaking down a challenge like this into its relatively simple components will allow you to realize that you can resolve each of them, separately, quite successfully.

You could download a schedule for the number of the bus you need to take to get to your desired location. When you are ready, go to the nearest bus stop. When that particular bus comes, take it.

Carefully observe what roads the bus is taking, what shops and restaurants you are passing, or which other points of interest are along the way. You could make a mental, or even a paper or e-note of them.

When you get to your destination you may not wish to initially venture too far from the bus stop.

Familiarize yourself with the three or four blocks around the bus depot, note the street names and any other unique or ‘landmark’ buildings, parks or memorable natural landscape features.

Once you have experienced the bus route and the nature of the surroundings at your desired destination, you can take the bus back home again.

You might find it helpful to do this two or three times until you feel comfortable in your knowledge of the route, how long the trip takes and the nature of the area surrounding your destination.

What will you have accomplished? Just this: you will no longer need to wait for someone else to have the time to drive you where you want to go. You will be able to move about based on your own agenda, not that of your parents, your siblings or your friends.

You will be in control of your day, and just a little bit more in control of your own life.

And you will feel a sense of success, maybe even of triumph!

Becoming more knowledgeable about your community and its surrounding areas can increase your confidence, giving you a greater sense of independence.

You will find that knowing where you are going and that you can get there on your own can be exhilarating and liberating.

The result is that your sense of self-respect will receive a tremendous boost, encouraging you to undertake similar challenges, in a similar manner, with far less anxiety in the future.

It is important to realize that falling into the trap of simply avoiding the initial anxiety which may accompany a novel task will not get you where you want to go. But meeting the challenge will enrich your life.

When we decide to take control of a situation in our lives, we ask something of ourselves.

When we respond positively and successfully we present ourselves with an opportunity for growth, which involves meeting, accepting and overcoming challenge after challenge.

Ultimately, we become our own heroes, infusing ourselves with the courage, even the desire to face whatever challenges present themselves. In this way we can view new challenges as opportunities for enhancing our experiences.

Our reward is a life fully and joyfully lived, with gratitude for challenges which come our way.

Share this:

Like this:

My Asperger Personality Unmasked.

Research published online on May 19, 2017 examines the notion that Aspies and others on the spectrum camouflage their autistic personalities in order to manage social situations.

The study entitled, “Putting on My Best Normal”: Social Camouflaging in Adults with Autism Spectrum Conditions* looks at a number of issues ranging from:

why females in particular are often diagnosed later in life,

if the fact that so few females are diagnosed is due to the feminine personality being more successful at camouflaging, and

that perhaps camouflaging can be detrimental to our mental health.

Before I read the study, I wrote this blog in an explosive mood after experiencing severe anxieties about taking a bath. I didn’t post it because I was afraid of what my partner would think if he read it.

After what I read in the study, I realized that by not showing him the blog I was camouflaging, masking my anxiety–though honestly, not very well.

Why did I take a bath? Because it’s such a normal thing to do, and I felt that I must be weird to be so resistant to sitting in a tub.

What follows in the resulting blog are my true feelings about the situation. Looking at it now that a little time has passed, I realize that while some of the blog sounds reasonable, logical and fairly intelligent, other aspects simply seem to be the rantings of an angry child.

Here it is then, one Asperger personality, my own, unmasked and unleashed!

The Bath: A Source of Anxiety for Asperger Me.

As an Aspie, maintaining a relationship can be a challenge.

My partner thinks of baths as sensual, delightful, peaceful and meditative experiences. Candles, essential oils, music, time for reflection.

There is no music in my bathroom, I told him.

To break the ensuing period of uncomfortable silence, I spoke up. I said Baths are boring. Which, granted, was probably rather inconsiderate. That’s when he brought up the essential oils, candlelight, reflection etc.

You have to sit there. I said. Doing nothing.

People who take baths seem to think that to truly enjoy bathing you have to sit in the water … like forever. I am not tall, but my chest is always out of the water. It gets cold. I soak a cloth in the warm bath water, but it quickly gets cold too.

I could catch a chest cold. Not to mention the other alternative: die of boredom.

You haven’t learned how to let go, he says. How to be one with the water, breathe in the aroma of the oil, enjoy the sensual texture of the water against your skin.

It’s tap water, okay? Tap water.

But a four-foot tub filled with tap water? Come on!

You have to learn to relax, he says. He means be STILL. Unfortunately to actually be still is a physical impossibility for me.

I have a familial tremor, which means my body is in constant motion whether I am consciously moving it or not. It also means my adrenalin is always, to some extent in fight or flight mode, under which circumstances, unless I’m sleeping or comatose, it is pretty much anxiety-producing to be still.

But okay. I had a bath. I believe I stayed in that tub for ten whole minutes. Maybe eleven.

Next time? If he brings in a portable CD player and puts on some Celtic music, I’m going for twelve minutes.

*More about this study can be found at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5509825/

Share this:

Like this:

Aspies: Ten Ways Volunteering Can Help Us Learn to Adapt.

When someone else changes plans which also affect us, as Aspies we may become temporarily stuck in a “this is unacceptable!” zone. How can we become more adaptable?

What activities or new experiences may best help us handle change so that we might adapt to other’s needs and acquire a healthier focus; one which does not lead us to a feeling of dread when we must deal with a changed agenda?

Save The Children’s Marc and Craig Kielburger give a possible solution in a recent newspaper article*:

“Youth who volunteer through our service programs…are more comfortable adapting to change…”

Renowned for creating the Save The Children Foundation as a young teen in high school, Craig Kielburger still operates the organization that was originally entirely run by and for children.

In their article, the Kielburger brothers note the following ten ways in whiuch volunteering helps teenagers adjust to school and other stresses, including aversion to change:

When you do something for others, your stress levels are reduced. This is proven by research**.

Volunteering may give you an alternative social scene, in which you can find a sense of community and belonging.

Volunteering for a cause you’re passionate about will connect you with mentors who have similar interests.

Helping others puts your focus outside of yourself, encouaging you to see your own situation in a different and possibly more positive light.

Volunteering broadens your outlook. Your own problems may seem far less significant when you come face to face with the plight of others.

Seeing other’s problems, Kielburger says, can help you build both perspective and empathy. Kielburger also notes that doctors state that empathy is a powerful antidote to stress.

As a Volunteer you enjoy increased self-esteen. According to research done within the Foundation, volunteers for Save The Children are 1.3 times more likely to “have a strong sense of self”.

The kind of stress found in volunteering — that is, helping others with their problems — can be an opportunity to overcome challenges, to build resiliency and to develop self-esteem.

Volunteering can build leadership skills.

Volunteering helps develop a life – long habit of giving back.

Find a cause you are passionate about, Aspies and get involved!

Maybe sorting clothes at the local hospice society thrift shop won’t do it for you, but perhaps volunteering in a Wildlife Preservation Society or starting up a chapter of Save the Children will.

Whatever you choose, if you give it your all you will find yourself thinking about situations, people and places beyond your own inner world. Go for it. And, most importantly, enjoy!

**After what I read in the study, I realized that by not showing him the blog I was camouflaging, masking my anxiety–though honestly, not very well.**