#but this whole situation is really quite stressful + i've been without my meds for over a week already which has sucked!

[kayleerowena]

adhd meds are costing me $150 this month because of the vyvanse shortage so: if you like my work and have spare change, i'm sliding this link to my tip jar in your direction very subtly

[clatterbane]

Adulting win, though, which did eat up way more mental energy than it likely would for someone without the medical trauma background: I finally filled in and submitted an eConsult thing at the GP's, asking for more asthma meds!

I put this off over the winter, since the situation was enough better that I reasonably could put it off.

But, living in a setting with fewer allergens after the big house cleaning/decarpeting plus my finally stopping smoking 🙄 doesn't do jack shit to affect tree pollen season starting up! 🙃 Never mind the rest of the pollen season afterwards.

Not compounding the allergy load with as much indoor bullshit is certainly helping overall. But, it's not about to fix the whole problem. Unfortunately.

The past week or so, I've been noticing my breathing acting up some again. Nothing too bad so far. But, I know that I am going to be in real trouble if I do not get some asthma treatment before the annual maple bukkake fest really gets rolling. 😬

In the meantime, I should probably get Mr. C to bring the HEPA unit I'd been keeping in the bedroom in here, so I can at least run it while I'm trying to sleep.

Not quite to the point of being willing to wear a mask with PM2.5 filter inside my house, though we've sure got plenty of those these days! 🙄 And they have had the beneficial side effect of helping with allergens whenever I go out.

But yeah, hopefully they won't insist that I come in for an asthma review before they will prescribe any routine asthma treatment. 😑 (The practice nurses handle those besides diabetes appointments, and at last check they were still having to see patients in person! Unlike the doctors.)

I did make sure to politely stress that, while I am having relatively mild symptoms now? I am responsibly trying to prevent a much more serious situation from developing with the pollen season--as part of a longterm pattern already known to the practice. And that I am, indeed, already experiencing some breathing problems right now.

We'll just have to see what they decide to do. At least I did go ahead and get a request for treatment in.

[mad-queen-thorn]

Massive vent under the cut, its been a week and a half and I can’t seem to dwell on this any longer. Venting again only because I have very little followers and 90% of them are good friends I hang with regularly, so I feel safe spilling out my feelings here, don’t want to burden anyone with my thoughts and feelings, reading is optional.

I didn’t mention this here, because I didn’t feel the need to. 

When it comes to my Diabetes I’m almost in remission, its a good thing, and by June I might be off the meds and officially into remission. Which is looking promising, but knowing my luck, I beat one thing and two more take their place. Its like taking 3 steps forward and 2 steps back. 

And well, its 3 things this time, I’m now on blood pressure meds for hypertension, only weak ones, so its not that bad. Docs think it might be the pressure I’m putting on my body with the lifestyle changes, but when I lose more weight it should go back to normal. Other than that they want to check out my kidneys as they said there’s a lot of protein in there. They’ve pushed back one of my tests which is causing me worry. But it was merely because the equipment they wanted to give me hasn’t arrived yet. So maybe I’m worrying over nothing. 

Anyway, this isn’t the major thing I keep bottling up. 

Along with my Type 2 Meds and my Blood pressure meds, I take Fluoxetine, which I’ve been on since late 2015. For anxiety and depression. So with all the appointments I’ve been having the past few months they’ve also been keeping track of my mental health, and now the docs think it might be more than just my Anxiety and Depression. 

They think I’m Autistic. In fact, I’ve been told that its highly likely I am after them talking to me, a family member and a friend who has autistic children herself, talked together in the docs room about my past, my behaviours and such and how our friend sees a lot of traits in me, and the doc said “You’re most likely right.”.

We sent off a referral form with a tonne of information about myself, my hyper fixations, behaviours, stimming, social interaction and more.

I’m officially under investigation for Autism.

I’ve been trying to process the information for almost 2 weeks now, barely telling a soul about it. But with the information I’ve been given, the more I think about it, the more of my life is making sense: 

When I was younger, I had a hard time making friends and I still do. I thought it was because I was ugly, weird and because of my overbite that it drove people away. That it was my fault entirely for not being good enough, like bullies made be believe. 

Turns out, that making friends can be hard of Autistic people because of their differences in communication. 

Which at the end of day... explains a lot. 

I’ve noticed that in large groups, I’m very quiet, both in person and online. I don’t speak unless I feel its needed to, and I try to not speak over people and often find myself doing so. I really don’t mean to. I just find it really hard to understand when there’s a good window for me to chirp in without seeming rude. Other times I’ll wait and wait and then when its time for a moment for me to voice the conversation has most likely moved on, which isn’t a bad thing. It just seems like I don’t have a good grasp of social cues. 

My black and white thinking also seems to impact my social interaction. As in the past I’ve just assumed and read situations wrong. Sometimes accidentally upset friends on multiple occasions without meaning. As sometimes my mind is just: 

“It has to be 1 or 2″ And nothing like a 3rd option comes to mind until its pointed out or I’ve made my mistake and beat myself up for it. Thinking I was being selfish and horrible. But now I guess that this explains those moments. They happen a lot, but not in bad ways. Like I said, sometimes its either one or the other, and I fail to see alternative options unless stated. 

Like, the other day I was with my friend who has autistic children, we play Pokemon Go together. And we had a debate about the design of Attack and Normal Deoxys: 

(The top Two) 

She said that they are a different colour, yet I said they are the same colour. Yet she said they’re different. Now, my brain didn’t connect the dots and that she meant that parts of their body are different colour but they both have the same colour scheme. It took me a few moments to actually get what she meant... so??? I guess??

I tend to have little moments in communication like that. 

Also, when some of my family make a joke, most of the time I don’t laugh. My sense of humour tends to be niche and connected to my hyper fixations and spur of the moment puns. Or I’ll make a joke to my family or a friend and they don’t get it, and I have to explain and they still don’t find it funny. I seem to have stronger connections to people who are into the same things I am. Something for me to build a conversation off of or I’ll fail to maintain a conversation. 

I thought this was just normal?? But at the same time it might not be...

Idk I have so many questions. There has been many things I’ve questioned about myself.

Like the need for a second opinion on situations others would see as common sense. Sometimes I go to someone I trust, explain a situation only to be told my feelings are valid and why I’m even questioning them. 

I dunno, it feels good that there might be a possibility behind how I communicate. 

While explaining to me, the doc said: “Your brain seems wired different, and you see the world differently from everyone else. People need to understand that.”

And I... like I said, I don’t know. 

I mean, the following seems to also be signs: 

In person I find it hard to make eye contact. 

I like to be left alone sometimes. 

I can’t be alone for long periods of time as I get stressed and it pulls down my whole mood. 

I find it hard to take part in group conversations over voice. Text is fine. 

My body language and tone can be completely different to what I actually mean. I’ve gotten in trouble with this, but the person who was mad at me didn’t understand. 

I don’t pick up on body language. 

But I’ll be observant on everything else. I tend to spot most things others don’t notice. I’ve had this in person many times and people tend to compliment me with “Wow you’re so observant!”, “You have good eyes!”. 

Lack of excitement, this happened today. We got new carpets in and my mother was overjoyed, but I never felt a thing. I felt like I should be happy too but I couldn’t. I am capable of being happy for other people, but yet again, it has to be connected to a hyper fixation or someone I trust/care about. 

Relationship with my parents isn’t great, probably due to my communication issues.

I only express myself to people I deem I’m close to, other than that I seem very disconnected. I’ve heard people say that I seem to be in my “own little world” on more than one occasion.

Selective Mute or nonverbal. Sometimes I just can’t speak or come up with what to say and remain silent. 

Picky with food. For example, if someone puts beans on my plate, I simply can’t eat around them. I’ll dismiss the entire plate and feel bad about it. Cuz my mind tends to think the whole thing is “contaminated” by the beans and I can’t eat it. 

In person I can tend to point instead of using words sometimes. 

I’m not a touchy person, especially with my family. But if you’re someone I trust, I’ll probably cuddle you to death. Really selective of who I let close to me.

Nobody can touch my hair but me. Nobody can brush it but me. If I let you brush it, its a blessing. 

Always listening to music while doing things like drawing/walking ect. 

Questioning my place in social situations and how others think. I have a habit of putting myself below everyone else. The idea of other people thinking of me or thinking positively of me next to never crosses my mind, the whole thing seems foreign to me. 

Another major pointer to it is my stimming. 

Now, I’ve stimmed for many years now and felt BAD about it. Because I felt like I didn’t deserve the stim toys I have. But now everything is starting to make sense. Even though my stimming does piss some family members off, I try to not do it around them and simply can’t. Sometimes I start stimming without even noticing. The most common being my legs, I will bounce them. All the time. If my hands are busy its my legs, if my legs aren’t moving, I need something in my hands and I have quite a few stim toys. From fidget cubes to squishy pokeballs. I have a habit of making them click or rolling the ball in my hands between rounds on videogames or when watching youtube videos. I also tend to lean towards glitter shakers. Love those things. I tend to mute my mic a lot during voice calls as I get paranoid people can hear me stimming. Because I feel like the bump bump of my foot on the floor or the clicking of my fidget cube will annoy people. 

Not adjusting well to change and being in social situations with a lot of people are another two signs. For example, yesterday I was in the kitchen with all the furniture while the carpets had been getting put down, there was limited space to move, I had nothing to stim with and didn’t like it. I felt bad for being annoyed. I wanted to go to my room but couldn’t. I wanted to move around. 

When it comes to social situations, I can go to heavy populated situations like conventions but not for long. I start getting overwhelmed and feeling sick. I enjoy it as much as I can but I can only take so much. 

Same with social interaction. I can only take so much. 

Once I get overstimulated I can get moody and my temper shortens, but I usually isolate myself by the time it comes to that point.     

I blamed all my social woes on my Anxiety but at this point it might not be my anxiety. It might be Autism.

But one final thing that also points to it:

Hyperfixations

I currently have two massive fixations.

Pokémon which is one I've had all my life

And Guild Wars 2 which has been a fixation since 2017

But within them I have specific things I fixate on. Which I guess are sub fixations?

For example, in Pokémon. I love the lore, certain legendaries and I absolutely adore cat Pokémon. Every time there is a new Pokémon game out I almost cry in excitement. My bedroom is covered in Pokémon stuff with a few other fandoms scattered in there but it's 90% Pokémon.

Pokémon shirts, Pokémon bedding. Pokémon posters, Pokémon bags, Pokémon plushies, keyrings.

Whenever I get something my family tend to go "Ugh. Not more Pokémon"

And Guild Wars 2 is pretty self explanatory.

I love Aurene, Tybalt and most of the main characters and lore.

I have the Rytlock figure and art and the OST discs ext. Books of lore and stories.

But 90% of my fixation is on the Thorns.

Thorn Pyjamas, Thorn bags, Thorn plush. Anything I can get my grubby little hands on...

Go figure!

I also try to not express myself too much as in the past I've had people try to force me out of hyperfixations because I was too "annoying".

I feel like I talk about my two major fixes too much. So I try to curb down on it to not drive people away...?

I wish I knew the results as I have so many questions.

They said they think it's very likely I'm autistic.

I don't want to write myself off and say "Yeah, I'm Autistic."

Because there's that chance I'm not. But so many people who know me in person think I am. And I've been asked many times over the years and never had a second thought about it.

And like I said, the docs said I most likely am.

I'm just waiting for an assessment and the result which I got told could take months to years.

I just want answers so I know how to make life is easier for me.

I want answers so I can just be myself without fear because I keep holding myself back thinking I'm weird or a bad person or bad at communication.

I always notice my social flaws and say they're "habits I need to kick"

But maybe they're not. Maybe it's just how I am.

I want to know.

I need to know...

I just want answers...