Diagnosis

What is wrong with me??

So, it’s a bit of a running joke between Paul and me that I occasionally have “a case of the dropsies” wherein I just seem to fumble and drop EVERYTHING.  Thankfully I’ve not dropped any dishes or glasses, but I’ll drop my keys when trying to hang them on the hook, or when I’m getting my tablets out in the evening, I’ll end up knocking too many out of the bottle and send one or two pills flying to the floor (or the bottle itself after screwing the top back on)… and I’ll do that with more than one bottle of tablets.  On Friday, I had a mini-meltdown after I dropped a container of Chinese food leftovers as I was trying to put them on a shelf in the fridge… rather than pushing another container out of the way with my other hand, I tried pushing it aside with the container of leftovers I was hoping to refrigerate for the next day… it fell in slow motion, and as the top came off, it all had to be binned.  I was so upset… like, not just at the waste of food, but that yet again I’ve fucking dropped something and it’s so stupid.

Now, in my research into Autism and seeing a correlation with Dyspraxia, I couldn’t help but wonder if I may have a certain degree of Dyspraxia too.  I was NEVER good in gym class in school – like, any game which used a ball, you could guarantee that it’d hit me in the face at least once.  Tennis?  Sheer hilarity as I flailed around with the racket trying to hit the ball… and if I did manage to make contact, it’d go flying over the fence and I’d get a disappointed tut from my partner and gym teacher.  And when it came to art class, I couldn’t draw or paint or do anything particularly well – despite having fabulous ideas in my mind, I just could not translate them to paper (or any other medium) because I just didn’t have the right level of manual dexterity, which always frustrated me.  The only reason I didn’t graduate nearer the top of my class than I did was because my gym and art grades were lower than my academic subjects (before final grades were issued, I was estimated ranked 9th, but years later when I requested my transcripts for UK equivalence verification, it turns out that I was actually 8th out of 150-odd in the class #HumbleBrag).

I thought that because I am just not athletic by any definition, I just thought it was down to everyone being different.  It never occurred to me that there might be a name for it other than just “clumsy”.

I have been feeling quite stressed lately, especially in regard to work because I’ve had a few quite complex cases blowing up and parents persistently ringing (“stalking”) me which has been enough to make me want to retreat into my bubble of solitude and protection, which is not exactly easy to do when you have a job to do.

Is it possible that my stress is manifesting itself into me just being a bit more clumsy than usual, or is it indicative of something more sinister??  Holding my hands out in front of me, they’re not shaky or anything, so I don’t think I’m having any sort of nerve issues, but it’s really making me cross when I keep dropping things.  I don’t know what to do, other than maybe keep track of how often and under what circumstances I’m dropping things.

If anyone has had any sort of similar experience, I would appreciate you leaving a comment below.  Thanks, folks x

I’m so proud of him.

So, Paul was on a team building-type conference today for the banking corporation that he works for… mandatory attendance jobby, despite the fact that he’s IT and not banking.  Anyway, they were focusing on all these soft-skills things and interviewing techniques (which candidate would YOU hire?) and he explained a scenario where you were shown a video in two parts – initial impression (“hello, I’m here for an interview”) and then the interview itself (about a minute long).  The video was stopped after the initial impression and people had to say “to hire” or “not hire”.  In one of the videos, a middle-aged woman walked into the room, was quite nervous, shy, didn’t make eye contact, and tripped over her words when saying she was there for the interview.  At this point, about 60% of the room showed “not hire” cards.  The video was then resumed and she continued to not make eye contact, couldn’t get her words out, and asked to look at some of the questions again.  Now, just on reading that, I’m sure many of you may think that she may be on the Spectrum, perhaps at the Asperger’s end of it.  Please bear in mind that while the example was not illustrating neurodiverse interviewing techniques (as she later showed lack of interest and other non-ASD related behaviours).  By the end of the video, 99% of the room said “not hire” and Paul was the only one to hold up the “hire” card, but unfortunately was not called upon to explain his position.  He explained to me that, after watching Employable Me on the BBC, he understands more that those who are high-functioning intellectually but perhaps lower-functioning socially do not often get a fair first impression when it comes to interview situations, and probably explains why so many people on the Spectrum end up going years without being able to successfully land a job; just because one is ‘bad’ at interviewing does not automatically mean that they would be bad at the job they’re interviewing for.  I know I personally have failed at interviews because of my short-term auditory processing difficulties have let me down (before I knew that’s what they were), and I wonder if I had asked for the written questions if that would have also worked against me anyway.  Paul recognises that he himself is most likely on the high-functioning end of the Asperger’s part of the Spectrum, but he is not interested in pursuing a diagnosis for himself because he reckons that he’s developed his own set of coping mechanisms to get through day-to-day interactions.  He acknowledges and supports my desire to pursue a diagnosis for myself and as such “waves the flag” for those with Autism and embracing neurodiversity.  While we both say that neither men nor women on the Spectrum “have it easy”, he accepts where I’m coming from in my perception that it’s almost easier for men to get through life without the context of a diagnosis, whereas it benefits women to put them into that context so when seemingly uncharacteristic behaviours present themselves, they can be explained within a framework.

Even though he didn’t get to explain his position in the training session, I’m still so proud of him for recognising that the way that interviewing scenario was managed was not inclusive nor showed recognition of neurodiversity.

That took effort.

So, just over a week ago, I emailed my client questionnaire to the Autism Spectrum Condition Diagnostic Assessment Team… Well, actually three versions of the same questionnaire: the first being a quick overview of things, the second being a much more in-depth explanation of my needs and experiences with quotes from Aspergirls (which, if you have been following this blog, has greatly helped me in the process of requesting an assessment), and the third being a slightly abridged version of the second one with the quotes from the book taken out.  I felt it necessary to embellish on things after completing the first one because it did not really give much by way of explaining what I find difficult in particular but realised the extended version may be quite long.  This way, the clinician can look at whichever one they wish – I know that all information has been shared from my end.

I also asked in my email for an update in terms of timescales for an appointment, because I feel that my mental health is becoming progressively more fragile the longer I am waiting for this and the uncertainty is heightening my anxiety greatly.  Even if I could be given an estimate as to which month I am likely to be given an appointment, I would have been most grateful.  The lady I had been emailing had said a few months ago that the service was looking to recruit more assessors and I was (understandably) wondering if this has affected timescales for appointments.

It was, needless to say, disheartening to have the one line reply to my email: “Thank you for the attached documents, I will be in touch as soon as I have an appointment for you.”

In every email exchange, I have made mention of my anxiety, stress, and fragile mental health… but it appears to mean very little. I feel like, if you’re going to be working in a service for people who suspect they are on the spectrum, then it would be beneficial if you have a shred of empathy for the clients you’re encountering.

So, just over a week has passed since this email exchange and it’s been playing on my mind… not helped by the increasing stress at work. I finally mustered up the courage to ring the service to ask again about timescales.  The crazy thing is that whenever I need to talk to someone on the phone for virtually anything else in life, while I don’t like it, I can manage okay enough… but today, I was stammering and finding it difficult to keep myself together to ask… I can’t quite explain it, but I almost felt like my articulate self ran for the hills and left my vulnerable self behind without any support. I was told that they’re seeing clients referred in June/July (2015) currently, so we’re looking more at July/August for me, as (through no fault of my own!!) they only added me to the waiting list in September. I feel a bit better knowing that it shouldn’t be too much longer, but at the same time, I’m frustrated that it was such a palaver in the first place. Had I not chased up my referral because I hadn’t heard anything back in the estimated six weeks, I would still be waiting!! The fax from my GP surgery was never received (honestly, who uses fax anymore???) and it took me nearly having a meltdown over the phone to my surgery to get it sorted out… It still gives me a flutter of anxiety when I think about it now… quite similar to the anxiety I felt when things were pending with the mortgage and taking AGES to finish. I suppose it’s the whole “managing expectations” and not being told one thing and it being something completely different or just flat-out wrong or late.

Anyway, I’m hoping that before the end of August, I will at least have had my assessment and, hopefully before my 32nd birthday, I’ll know for sure and have the validation I’ve been after since last summer. It’s crazy how much time has passed, yet at the same time, it feels like it’s dragging.

I’ll quit blithering now… I’ll be back soon with hopefully something more interesting for you all to read. 🙂

Just a quick one for now.

I know it’s been a while again, but work has really been using any extra CPU (computer analogy of how my mind works) and by the time I’ve gotten home, I’m too cognitively exhausted to write anything.

I’ve just this morning discovered a Facebook page called the Autism Women’s Network and read an article shared a few days ago which perfectly explains how I feel while I have this diagnostic assessment pending.

This was what I commented on the post and (hopefully) it’ll make sense when you read the article (link here: As a Woman on the Autistic Spectrum, My Diagnosis was Delayed because of Gender Stereotypes):

“I’m a bit nervous posting publicly, but I’m going to give it a shot. I am awaiting assessment for AS (more specifically Aspergers) because after attending a convention/conference last summer, hearing various women speaking about their experiences of late diagnosis felt like they were telling me my own life right back to me. I started having conflicting feelings, thinking “how could I possibly be?” which shifted to “how could I not see this before?” I’ve always been a bit quirky, but because I did well in school despite being subtly bullied, and managed to go through university and get a job, and landed in a relationship where I could more clearly see Aspergers traits in my (now) husband, I was too busy looking outwards and not seeing how any of the traits might have applied to me… But this may also be down to the male-centric understanding of Autism up until recent years. I needed to decant the things swirling in my head and started writing a document outlining how I thought I might fit the criteria, and that came out to be 29 pages long – single spaced, size 11 font. It took me a few weeks to build up the courage to print this and request an assessment from my GP, which she immediately agreed with. I’m now still waiting for an appointment to be made. The more time goes on and the more I ruminate on things, the harder I’m finding it to cope with things that I was somehow able to before because I had to because I couldn’t articulate why it was taking me more effort to cope than those around me. I’ve not mentioned to many people that I think I’m Autistic/Aspergerian because of the exact same reason this author highlighted – #SheCantBeAutistic. I just hope that I can make it through the assessment process and have a certain sense of closure on the one hand, but a new way to explain myself in the context of society on the other hand. Thank you for reading this.”

I have also had a harebrained idea about a charity/social enterprise that I would love to start… But I may have to keep you waiting a bit longer before I show my hand on that one just yet.

Addition (25/03/2016): found another two links today which share other women’s stories about the problems presented with gender stereotypes and being failed by the system – How Gender Stereotypes Prevent Women With Autism From Unmasking Their True Selves and Is the NHS failing women with autism?

I’m sick of being sick.

Hello to my handful of followers.  Sorry it’s been a while… took a chance with attending a party for our friends’ daughter’s first birthday, aaaaand as to be expected, there were sniffly babies (January, ya know) and I came down with a viral infection which knocked me out of work for a week.  I’ve still got the cough lingering, but it’s nowhere near as bad as it was a few weeks ago.  Needless to say, I’ve been trying to get myself feeling better and back into my routine, which has been thrown off by being poorly.

I’ve been feeling a bit lost as well.  I sang with Rock Choir locally for about three years and made the decision to leave at the end of 2014, and had the break from singing from January to August 2015.  I miss the friends I had in Rock Choir, even if they were only “I see them once a week to have a laugh and a sing” friends.

I think I’m experiencing a bit of after-effect trauma (without trying to sound dramatic, but I cannot think of another word for it) from having to leave the a capella group that I had started attending in late August [see 2015… over already?].  While they were lovely to listen to, I was getting bored with sitting doing nothing and not being up there singing.  The expectation for perfection was quite high, which I didn’t think was realistic for me to achieve consistently in the long term and began to intimidate me and make me doubt my singing abilities.  The final straw for me was being told off for sitting and reading my Kindle one evening because some people on the risers said it was “distracting”… I don’t know how sitting still reading could be distracting, but like I said, it was a long way to go to sit and do nothing, so I thought I’d just read because they weren’t singing anything I could participate with.  I haven’t felt that sinking horrible feeling since I was in school being told off for some slight like chatting when we should have been quiet or something.

I had befriended several of the women on Facebook in my time being there, and I found that several had unfriended me after I decided to leave. The level that this actually upset me surprised me, because I figured, on the one hand, I was quite unlikely to see any of them ever again, but on the other, I was not adverse to continuing to support them by attending future shows, etc. and I was hurt that rather than messaging me to see what was up (because I was too distraught to message them all individually), they just unfriended (or in one case blocked!) me. I don’t know if I’ve just sabotaged it all by being truthful about my feelings about what happened, but I guess I’ll never know.

Following that, I was trying to find a middle ground between Rock Choir and that a capella group.  I stumbled across an a cappella community choir, but one that’s not about perfection, but just singing with other people.  I attended one session in mid-January and have not been back since as I became poorly, which has had me coughing a fair amount, thus hindering my ability to sing.  Because it’s a community choir, a lot of the people who attend are local residents, so I feel a bit of an outsider because I’m not part of that immediate community; I never felt that with Rock Choir, because I know my back row buddies both traveled from even further than me.  The leader of the community choir was so lovely and was very welcoming; I guess because I lost my momentum after the first session because of being poorly and I’m questioning my return because I’m still not sure if it’s a proper fit for me.

Why I came to the very difficult decision about leaving Rock Choir in the first place was because I was just not enjoying the song selection anymore, and it was a lot of money to pay to not be 100% enjoying it anymore.  I stuck with it for so long because I enjoyed the social aspect most, but also I suppose because it became routine.  Now, I find myself in a position of, “Do I keep trying this community choir, or do I go back to Rock Choir?”

I don’t like this feeling that I feel.  I just feel icky inside, that I don’t like myself, that I feel like I’ve somehow done something horribly wrong.  I was really surprised at some of the people who unfriended me from the a capella group… ones that I thought I had struck a bit of a friendship with.  But I guess it’s a bit like an exclusive club; you’re either in or out, and I worked my way out.  Part of me wishes I hadn’t even tried because I’d have been spared the emotional turmoil.  But on the other hand, that’s a very slippery slope into becoming a total recluse.

I just wish I knew the answer.

“Just chalk it up to good experience.”

I’m tired of interviewing.  I hate it.  It’s a performance for which you can have no rehearsal because you never know what the questions are going to be.  I had an interview last week for a team that I had worked with before over 2 years ago and I felt more relaxed because I knew the people on the interview panel.  I walked out of there thinking I did a spectacular job and floated through the weekend… until Sunday night when the catastrophising feeling sunk in and I started feeling severe anxiety… “what if they don’t offer me the job?”  I didn’t sleep overtly well that night and was really tired and down on Monday morning.  Thankfully they put me out of my misery quite early (just after 10am)… and to hear the words, “I’m really sorry but we will not be offering you the job,” you just want the world to open up below your feet and swallow you whole.  What the feedback boiled down to was that I didn’t fully answer the questions with robust-enough responses.

Now, this is where I feel that my suspected Asperger’s/Autism comes into play; when I’m asked really long questions, I usually need it repeated or (ideally) written down in front of me to be able to read and process.  The one particular question where I gloriously fell flat on my face was a two-parter (explain a situation where you had to say No to a parent and how were you able to positively maintain the relationship afterwards).  I’m sure most of you reading that would start thinking of several situations, but then you have to completely recategorise whatever you retrieve from long-term memory to make it fit both conditions set out by the question.  Because I had completely forgotten the second part of the question (or possibly not even fully processed it) my example used was just completely wrong and they couldn’t score me any points on it.  “Gutted” doesn’t even come close to explaining the feeling.  I’m so annoyed with myself, because if I could have just processed the questions the way “everyone else” can, then I might not have cocked up my opportunity and would have maybe even offered the job.  I know I’m a damn good caseworker; if they observed me in my current post, they’d see that in the short time I’ve been out of social work and in SEN, I’ve adapted to the different world quite well.  However, they’re not interested in that; all that matters is the impression you make in that 30-40 minute interview, which (in my opinion) is bullshit.  You can have someone who interviews beautifully, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be any good at the job!!

Thankfully, I’m working in a good team where I am and have very supportive colleagues who were genuinely disappointed for me, but were selfishly glad that I’m not leaving.  I have been rationalising it like this: I’m secure in my job (for now, pending potential commissioning out, but that’s a whole other issue), I’m happy with my team, I’m happy with my manager, and things could be a lot worse.  I just was looking forward to not having to commute over an hour (both ways together) every day, as well as the step up professionally and the higher salary.

*sigh*

Until the next job comes up… perhaps I’ll have my diagnosis by then and can have some extra help.  I’m not expecting to be given the job just because of having a diagnosis; I’m just becoming increasingly frustrated that I feel like I’m being judged when I say I have difficulties because I don’t appear to have difficulties.  I have managed to hide my difficulties for so long, but I think it was easier as a kid, to a certain degree; being an adult is hard, though I still have times where I feel like I’m not quite an adult yet… it’s hard to articulate.

My next blog post will be about my disdain for Christmas.  Stay tuned!

Catastrophising

The tendency to leap to the worst possible conclusion—the “everything will be ruined” option—is known as catastrophizing. Like perfectionism, it’s a common trait of ASD and closely tied to black and white thinking… Autistic individuals are supposed to be bad at generalizing but when it comes to catastrophizing, we’re experts… Thinking, thinking, thinking. That’s what catastrophizing is, right? A bunch of thoughts, one worse than the next, feeding off each other… I don’t understand why, but catastrophizing has a self-soothing effect, even as it makes me feel terrible… I can look at all the logical reasons that I’ve listed to justify how detrimental and unproductive catastrophizing is, but then I get to the last point and I’m right back where I started.   (Cynthia Kim – Nerdy, Shy and Socially Inappropriate: A User Guide to an Asperger Life [UK Kindle Edition])

I could have written all of the above myself… I honestly thought that something was wrong with me because I am so fucking guilty of doing this on an almost daily basis; it’s how I function (or not actually function at all?).  This was quite possibly the most difficult chapter to read so far in this book because it was like being faced with hard truths, but at the same time, I was being validated that the way that I think is actually more associated with Asperger’s than just on its own.  If anything, I feel like the more I read, the more I’m just writing my own diagnosis.  I would feel so much better if I could get this actual assessment started sooner rather than later, but I just cannot afford to pay to go privately to get this done, so I have to wait for the NHS to be able to see me.

Having lost my temper a few times recently with all the mortgage nonsense and having to put up with the daily annoyances of living with a chronically-untidy individual who takes no notice of the impact on their seemingly harmless foibles on someone with suspected AS, when I read the following excerpt from the book, I felt like Cynthia had written my own User Guide to a Meltdown.  If only I’d had this when I was a child, as a stroppy teenager, and as an adult having to deal with more than she expected to… it would have made the resultant flipouts/tantrums/meltdowns less traumatic for all involved.  I suppose knowing now is better than not knowing at all, but my god, this is in the simplest language possible and is just a perfect explanation of what it feels like and what I want from those around me trying to provide comfort and calmness.

What I don’t want to hear:

  • “It’s okay.” [It’s not.]
  • “You need to pull yourself together.” [I will, when I’m ready.]
  • “Everything will be fine.” [I know.]

What I need:

  • space
  • time
  • absence of judgment.

Please don’t ask me if I want to talk about it, because:

  • there’s nothing to talk about
  • I don’t have the resources necessary for talking.

“Will comforting me help?” [No.]
“Do I want the meltdown to be over?” [Yes, but not prematurely.]
“Would I like a hug?” [No.]
“Am I in danger?” [No. I’m conscious of the boundary between stimming and serious self-harm.]
“Do I want company?” [If you’re okay with sitting silently beside me.]
“Can you do anything to make me feel better?” [Probably not. But you can avoid doing the things that will make it worse.]

Meltdowns are embarrassing. They are a total loss of control. They are humiliating. They make me feel like a child. They are raw, unfiltered exposure.

What I need when I’m winding down:

  • deep pressure
  • quiet
  • understanding
  • to pretend it never happened.

(Cynthia Kim – Nerdy, Shy and Socially Inappropriate: A User Guide to an Asperger Life [UK Kindle Edition])

Fate vs. Destiny?

or, How Much Are You In Control Of Your Own Path in Life?

I always felt like the path my life was on was very linear and pre-determined… after high school, I went to university.  After undergrad, I went to grad school.  [Those steps were accepted without question because that was just how it was meant to be.] After grad school, I moved to England.  After I moved to England though, it suddenly became unregimented, undetermined, unclear and confusing.  Somehow I managed to float through – got somewhere to live so I wasn’t staying with my Dad & Rita for longer than I had to (but even that was quite serendipitous and didn’t require a whole hell of a lot of effort on my part); landed my first job and subsequently my first permanent job (which then evolved on a yearly basis thanks to council restructuring, so it almost felt like every year was a new ‘school year’ for me again)… it wasn’t until I ended up going to that first fostering agency which threw my life into a tailspin.  In the interview, I only remember the words “recruiting foster carers” being thrown in casually, not identifying it as the core purpose of my job; if I had, I would not have been keen to take on the role, because I felt that my skills did not match that.  I persevered, though it was a nightmare for me, sitting vulnerable in shopping centres and supermarkets, hoping that someone would come and talk to me.  I could not have been more miserable.  I also felt like my manager wasn’t that happy with me and I feel she engineered my exit because, despite my difficulties, I was not getting any support as to what to do (they just assumed I’d “get on with it”, but how can you if you don’t even know where to begin??).  I counted how many days I’d actually worked there, and how they could possibly expect me to recruit a whole caseload of new foster carers in 36 DAYS absolutely baffles me.  GOOD RIDDANCE to the lot of them.  All the short term jobs which followed led to more changes to my routine… teaching assistant roles, Outreach work with teenagers, then the second fostering agency which went down the same avenue as the first eventually… after that, I had consoled myself by saying that I wasn’t actually a failure at being a social worker – I was only failing to find the right role for me and my abilities and skills.  Landing into SEN face first ended up being a blessing in disguise, though I still have little struggles here and there, but I am much more able to handle the demands of this role because it’s far more structured in relation to social care, which was chaotic and reactive rather than planned and regulated.

To a degree, that’s how Paul’s and my relationship progressed too, as I learnt from the examples set by my parents and grandparents: first you date, then you get engaged, then you get married, then you have kids.  I never felt comfortable with the idea of having kids before getting married, obviously not because of religious reasons (see first full paragraph on page 2), but because that wasn’t the right order in which to do things… what makes it “right”, I cannot define… but I feel quite rigid in that respect and can’t explain why.  Obviously, I don’t have to worry about that, because we clearly dated, got engaged and then got married, but I think I would have panicked a bit if I became pregnant “out of sequence”… but again we were both taking the appropriate steps to ensure that didn’t happen.

It’s been a while…

…and a ridiculously busy and hellish month.  My life is not that interesting to divulge all here but I felt I needed to “check in” as it’s been a few weeks since I last posted.

The month started in a pretty standard way, and the first weekend saw me attend my first “proper” hen weekend [n.b. my own hen do was VERY low-key because I knew that the usual shenanigans weren’t for me and I am a bit of a control freak and did not want to relinquish responsibility to someone else].  I was borderline petrified because I went into it really only knowing the bride-to-be and her soon-to-be sister in law, and was pleasantly surprised when I found that I got along really well with most of the other attendees (there was one girl who had a serious grump on the whole two days and I gravitated away from her), especially one of the bridesmaids, the bride’s sister, and the honorary “rooster” – a good friend from Sixth Form who happens to be a guy.  He got fully into the whole thing, wearing custom t-shirts, a hot pink tutu, fishnet gloves and a hen party headband with springy boppers on them.  It ended up being a lot of fun… we started off all meeting up in Bath and having a spot of lunch, then a ridiculous uphill walk to the hostel where most of the party were staying (the rooster and I were both going home and coming back the next day), getting into our tutus and other gear, then going back into Bath town centre for a crafty session making fascinators (for those who don’t know, they’re delicate hair decorations which women in the UK wear to weddings).  After beautiful fascinators were made, we went for a drink then dinner at a Thai restaurant and finished the night off at a pub with an open mic night.  The next day we had a spa day with half hour treatments and time spent in the pool and sauna, followed by a late lunch at Prezzo before parting ways to end the weekend.  I was looking forward to the wedding even more following this weekend because I would know more people there and knew that we’d have a great time.

The wedding was yesterday, and even the officiant said it: “I’ve never seen a couple more excited about getting married.”  The bride and groom were both bouncing with excitement and absolutely radiant.  The ceremony was beautiful, the meal was delicious, and the evening entertainment was fantastic.  The groom’s dad’s band played a few cover songs to warm the crowd up, followed by Paul’s band (the groom is the drummer) playing a few songs with the groom himself on the drums, later filled in by the drummer from the first band so the groom was able to enjoy the evening entertainment with his new wife.  It was just a super fun evening from start to finish and I’m glad I’ve got a quiet Sunday to myself today – Paul’s gone off to watch the F1 with some mates.

We’re still not done with the remortgage either… though finally the solicitors seem to have gotten their act together and are speaking with each other.  Annoyingly, we’ve been sent through loads more paperwork for the Land Registry, a lot of which required our signatures to be witnessed… again.  We had loads of paperwork initially to do for the solicitors which required witnesses, and it just boggles my mind, that if all this was going to need to be done anyway, why were we not asked to do all this at the BEGINNING of the process!?!  It’s just so frustrating.  I’m so over all of this and I need it to be done sooner than later.  It looks like at this rate I’ll be lucky if we get this sorted (including the work done to MIL’s flat before she moves in) by my birthday in November!!  It’s been a very long process and I’m just exhausted and sick of it.

OH.  And I nearly forgot.  So, back on the 17th of July, I finally mustered up the courage to take my ‘manifesto’ to the GP to request a referral for an assessment for Asperger Syndrome.  The same day, I was called back by a lovely receptionist to say that my GP agreed to refer me and that she had a form for me to collect, fill in and return.  I went back the same day, filled it in, and returned it on Monday the 20th.  Amongst the paperwork given to me, it said that first contact would be made within four weeks.  Back in my post on the 8th of August (Am I or am I not?), I mentioned about the anxiety I was feeling about chasing up the referral… even though it was only three weeks into the four since I had returned my referral form.  Finally, after six full weeks (4th Sept) I emailed the NHS email address indicated on my paperwork, asking if I could have an update on my referral, only to be told that it had not been received.  My heart sank.  I tried to keep myself calm when ringing my GP surgery to find out what happened, but my voice cracked and I ended up starting to sob.  The receptionist asked who I contacted and I gave her the details, and she said that she or a colleague would ring me back before the end of the day to let me know what’s happened.  Fair play to her, it was sorted within the hour.  The surgery still had my referral form on record, and it appears that the assessment team never received the fax (because we’re *still* faxing in 2015?!), so they verified the number and sent it through again, and verified also that it was received at the other end and phoned me to inform me of this.  So, talking about “recalibrating” my mind on things like I did in my last post, I’ve now got another minimum four-week wait… of which I’m already two full weeks into.

There has been so much going on, as you can see, and my poor little brain has found it all difficult to cope with and I’m desperately trying to stay on top of everything (I’m not even going to get into all the malarkey going on at work), but when I’m feeling particularly overwhelmed, I just shut down and go into “power-saving mode” (I find I use computer analogies a lot to explain how I work).

I just hope that contact is made for my referral soon, because I think the sooner I get this sorted out, the more relief I’ll feel.

I live to fall asleep

When I was a teenager, I’d end up staying awake quite late into the night and sleeping in very late, especially during summer holidays because the lack of structure and regular activities made me feel very disengaged and I thought I might as well sleep.  At university, my erratic sleep pattern continued because there were always far more interesting things going on with my hall mates, so again I’d survive on only a few hours of sleep.  By the time I made it to grad school, I needed to have more discipline with my sleep routine, as my classes were more regularly timed and my work and internship patterns were more consistent.  In the US, Melatonin is available to buy without a prescription, and I started to take this and found it helped my sleeping pattern significantly.  I brought a bottle over with me when I moved here, but when I realised that it was only available on prescription, I panicked.  I have since found that a supplement that Holland & Barrett sells (5-Hydroxytryptophan) mimics the effects of melatonin, so I’ve been taking that for years – almost as long as I’ve been in the UK.

I feel that I would benefit from a melatonin prescription, but felt like up till now that I wouldn’t have been taking seriously and would have been prescribed sleeping pills, which I do not want to take; melatonin and 5HTP help me to fall asleep without feeling groggy or drugged in the morning.

Also, since about 2010, I’ve been using a white noise app to help me get to sleep and stay asleep.  I cannot sleep in a quiet room, as I end up hearing every creak and groan in the house, which keeps me awake and alert, and my brain is constantly running, thinking about what I have to do over the next few days, and I need the white noise to drown out the running commentary in my mind about what’s to come.  I put the timer on the app to turn off when I want to wake up, and I’ve naturally been able to wake up like this for the last three years with no supplementary alarm.  I also have to sleep with the window on the latch and a fan going to move the air around in the room because otherwise, I wake up with a headache due to the stuffy and stale air.  Also, I have to sleep with the sheet tucked up under my chin, because I don’t like the ‘draft’ created by my breathing on my skin.