Abscissa – Autism and Techno Blog

Time for another blog, it’s pub time. Did plan to go out last night but I fell fast asleep in the evening.

To briefly mention that it’s very rare but I fell asleep about 7 or 8 pm and stayed asleep til about 2 or 3 am. A full nights sleep near enough. Then I only stayed awake for an hour or so before sleeping again. Sleeping up to about 10am this morning.

Lots of sleep but lots of rest to catch up on. How have I felt today? Not bad actually. Had a genuine urge to get out and do something today while feeling considerably fresher than usual.

Well all I have done today is to pop out for a bit of shopping which lasted less than an hour. And gone out to the pub to do the usual. Reflecting and thinking on things, getting stuff written. Talking to myself as per the usual.

Don’t have that much to talk about today. Something that has come into focus is when straddling the lines of black and white.

I’ve spoken before about how rigidly I see the world in black and white extremes. Don’t deal with shades of grey very well.

There is one aspect whose extremes are both terrifying. Drama. Too little and too much. For me the extreme edge of too much stimulation is when I lose control of my emotions and feel too much pain. An intolerable feeling that must be avoided at all costs. The other end? Nothingness, emptiness, ennui.

Both are intolerable but I sit here and scratch my head over which one is actually worse. Since I avoid both in different ways, it’s hard to tell.

My psychological defenses are built on protecting against getting hurt because life is about interacting. The idea of my true self is one who wants live life and feel things. Wants to dance in the fire of life.

I’m calibrated too much towards safety and not enough towards freedom. Because what’s the point in living otherwise? Alas there is no middle ground for me to pursue because my brain is always looking to push on in one direction or another.

When have I ever found the balance and got the best of both worlds? When have I ever been content with where I am? It’s always too much or not enough.

It is with lament that the general trend for a long time has been the shrinking of my comfort zone as more and more of life becomes problematic for one reason or another.

The few things I enjoy doing will always be pursued monomaniacally until I’ve milked all I can out of it. But more pertinently, some things just feel like an illusion ready to be shattered.

I’ve lost track of how many people I’ve liked who eventually demonstrate a politics I can’t stand. No heroes left now, everyone’s tainted in some way. Wouldn’t it be nice to forgive and forget?

It has little to do with them in the end. Just my own growing intolerance speaking up. But it is what it is and I can’t just ignore and rewrite how I feel.

Stimulation of course is needed but then it quickly becomes too much for me to handle. What I’m talking about here is mainly social stimulation of course. And this is what I think truly fills the mind and keeps the emptiness away.

I’ve been isolating in effect for over 2 years now because I no longer trust people enough to empathise with them. Been thinking about this, that the lack of empathising is really a lack of ability to share conscious existence and hence a lack of shared experiences to fill ones mind.

Yes I sit here saying a lack of empathy is in fact the most miserably damned and loneliest of existences. No further demonisation or punishment is required. I’ve suffered for a lifetime and continue to suffer in silence. The only one who ever hears my cries of anguish is me anyway.

Is it any wonder I struggle to switch off when so much of life is starved of social stimulation? The brain kneejerks away to avoid overstimulation when I do socialise but the long and arduous battle to get some form of human interaction was always worth fighting.

For the first time in my life I went through something that made me stop. A pain that finally felt worse than oblivion. Feelings that didn’t want to be felt were repressed and bottled up for years.

To have been so utterly broken that that bottled exploded and the fallout is still felt to this day.

The solutions seem obvious but they don’t seem applicable because that’s just not who I am, it’s just not what I can do. I’m all or nothing baby!

A million miles an hour, forward or reverse. Or just zombified into inertia.

I settle now for chasing whatever mental stimulation I can get from my many projects, doing stuff only I find interesting and is for my own benefit, not really of any objective, material interest for anyone else.

No one would choose to live life this way, only if they were forced to. And yet I can’t help but feel I’ve adapted to live this way. Made the best of it that I could. So much so that I don’t really believe I will ever change. Won’t ever actually feel comfortable living a better life.

It’s kinda not really what I want or ever wanted. Struggle has always been more meaningful than comfort.

The thing about struggle is when it becomes too much to handle, you have to shut down or ask for help. In which case it stops being meaningful and makes one feel useless. Such a feeling does not make social anxiety any easier.

It’s been so long that I had completely forgotten how when I am around people, the empathy/stimulation/shared consciousness is there but it is far too much. I’m overexposed unless it’s only a small handful of people and only if I actually care about them.

As I say it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten how to empathise, shutting everyone out since I stopped feeling safe socially.

Should I aim for the pain of autistic burnout or should I aim for the quiet emptinessb of being alone? Because those are the only choices I ever seem to have. And I hate them both.

My closest of friends I made at the autism hub, were so good for me. It became just three of us for the most part, and I’d never felt as safe and happy as I did with them.

But of course I wanted more. It was the loss of the closeness that I grieved and still grieve to this day. But I couldn’t deal with the hurt so I shut them out and I don’t know if we will ever be friends again.

What advice can give to anyone reading? Fuck knows. Sounds like I’m fucked either way doesn’t it. Either accept it or make a change and adapt.

Thanks for reading as always. Kindest regards xx