Here we can all be heard for a little while. Part 3

Waves_and_Smiles

Morning all!

I am sorry that you were hurt so badly Sue but a huge well done for learning to be happy with yourself, that isn't easy to do.

Talking about cuddles with autistic people you reminded me of a lovely man with severe autism that I used to work with. He couldn't live independently, had no verbal skills and had some very challenging behaviors so staff were wary of interacting with him. I really liked him because I admired his determination so did a lot of one to one work with him and after months he grew to trust me a little. He never cuddled anyone and would hit out if anyone tried, you couldn't physically touch him at all. Even when walking down the street with him we would hold the back of his coat so he didn't run off because he wouldn't even allow anyone to hold his arm.

One day I was sitting on the sofa at work and he walked into the room, sat next to me and pushed me off on to the floor very determinedly. He then laid down and took my hand and held it to his cheek and rocked. That was his cuddle for me and from then on he would frequently push me on the floor and put my hand on his face. I found it incredibly sweet and it really meant a lot to me. I have never forgotten it, it was a lovely cuddle.

Waves_and_Smiles

You know on the subject of illness making people act differently Pyxis, I had a friend who was sociopathic. She had a diagnosis of a socopathic personality disorder and displayed all the symptoms for her whole life. She developed a benign brain tumour and during the months until it was discovered she suddenly began to feel. She was totally distressed because she didn't know what to do with the emotions, she had only ever had limited experience of them. It really confused her and we spent a lot of time trying to figure out how she could cope with suddenly feeling things so strongly. She was basically like a child trying to learn how to control their emotions.

I remember once she asked me how I was and then stopped herself and said "I actually care about the answer!" She had always gone through the motions of what was polite to say but never really cared, suddenly she had feelings for people. As she never had you can imagine this was very scary.

The tumour was removed and she went back to having hardly any emotions again just as if it had never happened. We both found it fascinating that it made such a difference.

Just to add while I am on a roll people with sociopathic personality disorders get a really raw deal. People group them with psychopathic disorders and it isn't that at all. My friend wasn't violent in the slightest as most believe sociopaths to be, no danger to anyone. She just wanted to be left alone because people with their unpredictable emotions were unfathomable to her. She did have a degree of emotion, but it took a lot to make her feel anything. I think the biggest thing was she lacked any empathy, she couldn't imagine what it felt like to be in someone else's shoes at all and social behaviour floored her. I just had to point out the differences there because people with sociopathy are often very unfairly judged and the condition is stigmatised even more than psychosis. It is possible to have a very rewarding friendship with someone with sociopathic tendencies.

Torry_Quine

I hope everyone hass been having a good day and that's why things have been quiet.

Penguin about dealing with loss I am going to speak with someone I trust about my issues on Thursday afternoon. Now I am doing something I feel silly for worrying so much about being my mum's age when she died. However it is rare that a day goes by without something reminding me which is no way to live and I'm sure it's not what she would have wanted. It's not easy for to open up, I've been burnt too often before.

I am also finding myself thinking a lot about who will sort things out when we are both gone with not having children which is hard enough without adding extra thoughts in relation to it. End penguin

SingleSue

Pyxis wrote: »

I watched Tuesday's episode of The A word yesterday. I was very interested to hear about the Fever Effect, where autistic children who develop a fever often display a lessening of autistic behaviour.

This effect is currently being studied.

Youngest went to a party a short while ago and they introduced him to alcohol (it's ok, he is 18 now). Weirdly they discovered that when he is tipsy/drunk, he becomes 'normal' apart from the fact that even the smallest amount of alcohol ends up with his legs not working at all. His brain works at an awesome level anyway but he becomes even smarter, talks easily, makes eye contact, will withstand cuddles and close contact 'gets' jokes and becomes a real people person (he doesn't like people normally).

Not sure I have ever experienced the fever effect, youngest would just get even more grumpy and middle son would just complain about being cold.

SingleSue

Waves_and_Smiles wrote: »

Morning all!

I am sorry that you were hurt so badly Sue but a huge well done for learning to be happy with yourself, that isn't easy to do.

Talking about cuddles with autistic people you reminded me of a lovely man with severe autism that I used to work with. He couldn't live independently, had no verbal skills and had some very challenging behaviors so staff were wary of interacting with him. I really liked him because I admired his determination so did a lot of one to one work with him and after months he grew to trust me a little. He never cuddled anyone and would hit out if anyone tried, you couldn't physically touch him at all. Even when walking down the street with him we would hold the back of his coat so he didn't run off because he wouldn't even allow anyone to hold his arm.

One day I was sitting on the sofa at work and he walked into the room, sat next to me and pushed me off on to the floor very determinedly. He then laid down and took my hand and held it to his cheek and rocked. That was his cuddle for me and from then on he would frequently push me on the floor and put my hand on his face. I found it incredibly sweet and it really meant a lot to me. I have never forgotten it, it was a lovely cuddle.

I still remember the first time youngest initiated a cuddle with me. He was about 10 or 11 and he came up and put his arms around me. Unfortunately, I burst into tears (of happiness) which frightened him and made him back off and it took another 5 years before he attempted it again.

onomatopoeia99

Flybaby wrote: »

Ono - are you going to see endurance? Wey jealous!

Yes, it was the world endurance championship round, I go most years. Went to Le Mans once (fabulous) and will do so again one day, but not sleeping in a tent!

It was jolly cold this morning and I was glad I put my thermals on before getting dressed and leaving home, race circuits tend to have their own unique climates. Sun came out in the afternoon and it warmed up a bit, to 10C or so which was quite pleasant.

Solarjunkie

I know what you mean Ono, I used to go to a race circuit regularly which was known as the place "where the equator crosses the Arctic Circle".

faerielight

Tory, well done for making that step to see someone about your grief .It's really brave of you. . keep us posted x
Flybaby, thanks! It was fun to make
"RANT WARNING"
I'm getting really stressed tonight with the impending week ahead: knowing I'm going to have to do my daily fights again, ring the agency and beg for the lock on my door to be fixed, ring my dr surgery and try and get a dr appt, but they keep closing the surgery die to lack of drs, beg the surgery to email shelter with the housing letter so I can get those forms off to housing to get up to band a, beg them to do some blood tests that they keep arguing with me it costs too much to do the bloods I'm supposed to have every 6 weeks. due to nhs cuts,once I've had that damn letter sent I am getting the hell away from the surgery and changing dr practices.

I've got an endocrinology appt on this that I'm worried about, as my gp is taking me off the rare thyroid drug that's kept my thyroid stable for the last 7 years, due to the cost of the drug, so gearing up for a battle there,
Chasing up appnt to the spinal clinic as I still haven't had an mri for the dislocated vertebrae and the pain is getting worse,chase up pain management appnt that I've waited a year for, as my pain levels are driving me to despair with widespread arthritis/belly scar tissue pain, lipped disc, etc. and the dr refuses to up my morphine.
And finally, pray and hope that I hear from the bpd/trauma service asap as the wait is driving me mad.. Another fun week ahead, woopie! I didn't see my bestie ;last night so I've been on my own for a week now and it's getting really lonely(.RANT OVER!) I am truly fed up with my crappy life. Thank goodness for my animals.

Torry_Quine

Faerie I will be thinking of you and all the things happening with you this week. Remember you are strong and can do it.:A

Gingernutty

I've been putting off a job.

My parents are both dead and I've volunteered to scan the photo albums.

My plan is, to scan the photos onto three hard drives so that I and my siblings can have one each and to distribute the photos between the three of us.

At some point in January, I took a HUGE suitcase to London and filled it with all the albums, photo packets, framed pictures and individual presentation packs and it's been sitting in my back/dining room ever since.

It's been lurking in the back of my mind, getting bigger and ever more loom-y as the suitcase just sits there.

Matters haven't been helped by me getting a 'state of the art' scanner with stitching, negative scanning and colour correction software packages. The 'manual' is so mahoosive that it's a link on my desktop to a website.

On some occasions, I have built various 'jobs' up in my mind to gigantic proportions and on attempting to do them, there was less to them than I thought.

So, I thought, first step to breaking down the job would be to ......I dunno.......open the suitcase.

So this morning, I opened the suitcase to 'face the task'.

It's still mahoosive.

Matters aren't helped by the fact that many of the old photos have nothing written on them to state who the photos are of, where or when they were taken or anything.

Blurry, black and white photos in packets which stated the photographers' prices in pounds, shillings and pence and huge, two inch square negatives. :eek:

I really need to start at least practising on my all singing, all dancing, all the bells and whistles scanner but I simply won't have the time until the weekend.

I've had three months but I'm still managing to stay so busy that I have to put it off further......