Aspergers and the "Grey Zone"

Individuals with Aspergers are particularly vulnerable to living in what is sometimes called “The Grey Zone.”  Perhaps an illustration will help to explain what I mean by this. 

Behold the boy wizard Harry Potter serving detention in the Forbidden Forest at night.  He comes across a shadowy figure drinking the silvery blood of a dead unicorn.  The figure is none other than Harry’s archnemesis Voldemort, currently a ghost of his former self.   Noticing Harry, Voldemort begins advancing on him. 

Seeing Harry in peril, the centaur Firenze comes to the rescue.  When Harry asks about the figure he saw, and why he was drinking the unicorn’s blood, Firenze explains: 

“The blood of a unicorn will keep you alive, even if you are an inch from death, but at a terrible price. . .you will have but a half-life, a cursed life, from the moment the blood touches your lips."  (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone) 

Living with AS is, in many ways, like living this half-life—not living so much as existing--or rather living in a “grey zone”.  As the name suggests, life in this zone is neither one thing nor another, but somewhere in between:  not exactly sad, but not happy, either; not insane, but not mentally healthy; not asleep, but not quite awake; and so forth.  It is what Lehi referred to as a “compound in one”, a hazy existence with nothing very clearly defined.  It is frequently characterized by shame, grief, withdrawal, and despair.  There is a constant undercurrent of melancholy and “nothingness” which colors every aspect of life (gray, of course). 

In my own experience, life in the Grey Zone is largely dominated by “Not stupid, but not very intelligent”.    It’s a form of sleepwalking through life, being partially aware of what is happening in the outside world, but not entirely.  Because of this, many autistics are perceived as being self-absorbed.  While there may be some truth to this notion—I often get caught up in my own thoughts to the point that I am largely unconscious of my surroundings and other people—it is an oversimplification of a complex mode of existence.  Much of the work to be done by the AS individual involves getting out of the Grey Zone and awakening to life in all of its complexity, uncertainty, and energy. 
 

By Way of Tribute to Rich...

..I'm posting a radio commercial I wrote some time ago. (Yeah, I'm buying time until I can collect my thoughts about the last couple of weeks.)

RIT-A-CHEW RADIO SPOT

Announcer: It’s an old and familiar story . . .

(Johnny is jumping up and down, making noise and being generally hyper)

TEACHER: Johnny, why won’t you pay attention in class?

JOHNNY: Teacher, I’m sorry. I forgot my Ritalin this morning.

TEACHER: Well, here—have this.

JOHNNY: Gum? We can’t chew gum in class.

TEACHER: It’s not gum. It’s RIT-A-CHEW!

ANNOUNCER: Tired of hyper kids bursting your bubble? Give them a rest, and yourself peace of mind. Give them RIT-A-CHEW!

CHORUS (singing): If your kids aren’t cooperating,

Having trouble concentrating,

Then get them masticating—

Give them RIT-A-CHEW!

TWO WEEKS LATER

TEACHER: Johnny, your grades are so much better!

JOHNNY (slowly, almost sluggishly): Yeah, teacher—Thanks to RIT-A-CHEW, my mind is a steel trap!

ANNOUNCER: So teachers, give yourself a lift by bringing them down to earth—Plug ‘em up with RIT-A-CHEW.

Disclaimer: This product will never be approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

Script: Terry Foraker
Music : Konstantin Kuzyayev

Lyrics: Konstantin Kuzyayev and Terry Foraker

What a day!!!?

Okay, it's me - the guy with the ADHD.

I was a bit psyched up for work yesterday, as it had been a while since I had been in, and we had 84 patients (7 of them were new patient exams), and I knew we couldn't let things get behind.

All the preparation went reasonably well. I focused on meditation/visualization of how I wanted the day to go, and listened to a few Podcasts from EnnerSanctum and My Thought Coach to get in the right mindset. I fell asleep at 10pm, which was great, but I woke up at 4am, and could tell very soon that I wasn't going to be sleeping anymore.

I managed to get a little excercise in, and psyched up on the 40 minute drive to the office with some more podcasts. I told everyone at the start of the day what we would need to do to stay on time, and to not mind me if I seemed upset more than usual, that I wasn't I was just letting my true feelings show more now. It worked great. I hardly had to growl at all, and specifically thanked everyone that assisted in the manner I had specifically asked for. We also started most of our exams, so it was a BIG day for us. The problem is that I was pooped when I got home, and didn't feel up to going to a movie with the kids. They mostly got over it pretty quickly, and went with mom happily, but I could tell there was disappointment in Thomas's face when he knew I wasn't going. He kept asking for me to come.

After they left, and my dinner energy kicked in, I was sorry that I didn't go. I could have done it. It would have been a little touch, but sitting around at home didn't SAVE my energy. I have another BIG day tomorrow, as it's only a 2 day week. Hopefully I won't wake up so early this time!!!! (I didn't mention that I was dreaming about trying to get into Orthodontic School, and was relieved to wake up and say "Oh good, I'm already in and through with that!")

ADHD - My Regiment for Success

I know I have YET to finish part 2 of The First Signs of ADHD. It turns out quite well, or I should say, is turning out quite well. It's a process and a mindset that has to be revisited over and over, but there are SO many ways to improve life quickly and effectively. Here is my current list of QUICK helps for the issues I deal with:

1) Anytime I feel my mind spinning, I begin relaxing by breathing correctly. There is so much to say about the mindful breath - focusing on the way the breath feels as I let it expand in my lungs, and breathing out fully.

2) Next to Meditation is Medication - I find my life is much better since I started medication. At first I had to take something to calm me down, as I was in an utter panic. That was critical - so was the sleep that came with it. Next, I started regular Ritalain. I noticed that I was a little shakey at first. My psychiatrist (and this is key as well, don't try to have a general practitioner manage your ADD/ADHD. It's easy to manage it somewhat, but what you want is EXCELLENT management of your mind. This is NOT a priveledge for the rich and famous. For me, it was a big key to realize that I was going to have to invest money in a good psychiatrist, and not cut down on my meds due to cost, if I was going to make it BIG. One therapist told me that she never had an unmedicated ADD patient that didn't float to the lowest rung of responsibility in their life. I happen to know many that have done quite well, but they are people who have everything going for them, and are working primarily from their strengths. I know that medication doesn't work for some, and for others that it takes a long time for the doctor to get it right. Be patient with them.

3) Take vitamin and omega supplements - Omegas do wonders for so many other parts of your body, but for your mind, an Omega-3/Omega-6 pill twice a day carries a huge benefit for thinking and stability of emotion. Take lots of Vitamin C (and any other anti-oxidants you can get without going broke).

4) This goes back to Meditation, but it's so important. If you don't know what meditation is all about, find out. There are so many misconceptions about meditation, but it is basically exercise for the mind that helps you focus, and gives you brain muscle to get out of ruts. When you have recurrent thoughts, it's difficult to get out of the thinking rut because the neurons of your brain create a pretty solid pathway. Meditation for 15 minutes a day (and less as you get good) allows all the following documented benefits: better decision making through mental clarity, increased ability to reach peak performance for any activity, enables you to act rather than just react, enables you to manage change through greater awareness of your own state of flux, enables greater pleasure, opens up your senses, helps you have better relationships (b/c it helps you slow the mind down, and become a better listener, enhances emotional awareness, which is a HUGE key for a successful career (or relationship). There are many books and podcasts on the subject. My favorite podcast is called My Thought Coach, which is full of excellent meditations and affirmations. I recommend some book knowledge of the subject as well if this isn't intuitive for you. Thich Nhat Hahn has written many - a CD (which works great for ADDers) If you do Yoga, you will learn the meditation. I've enjoyed PM Yoga, which is really quite whimpy Yoga in the eyes of a Yoga Master, but this is perfect for relaxing the mind in a way that has all the benefits listed above.

5) Ask yourself at the start of every day "Why is everything that I want to have happen going to work out so much faster and so much more effectively than I ever dreamed?" Let your subconscious do the rest. This is SO powerful, as our mind will always bring back answers to the questions we ask. Have you noticed that when you ask "What else can go wrong?", that inevitably, something always goes wrong that day? How about "Why am I going to overcome the next obstacle so easily?" When you ask the second question, the inevitable negative event is perceived totally differently, and the body/mind reacts totally differently. Hope makes you strong. Practice STRONG thoughts BY asking questions that will elicit strong answers. This is another practice for getting out of the negative mind-chatter, after a good dose of meditation.

6) Accept that it doesn't change in one day, but at the same time, affirm over and over "everyday, in every way I get better and better", then replace better with stronger, smarter, healthier, happier, more resilient, more balanced, more full of love, closer to God, closer to my best self, and so forth. Accept that going through pain is inevitable, and rather than avoiding the pain, meditatively face the pain. Allow yourself to suffer, but in a way that affirms hope. I like to invite my negative, recurrent thoughts to "please come in, my dear old friend", and visualize myself in a peaceful room with another being. Sometimes the eyes are terrible, and the fists of the being are clenched. Sometimes I imagine THE person who I am feeling pain from. I ask them to please come in. Accepting that they WILL come in, and choosing to refrain from fighting the thoughts has a paradoxical affect. They lose their potency almost immediately. Sometimes they sit down, but they don't talk. I continue to smile, breathing in, breathing out. I nod my head to them as an old Chinese sage would to his worst enemy: offering them tea, patiently letting the tension dissolve. They will inevitably come back again. Offer them 'tea' a thousand times, but don't yell at them, or tell them to GO AWAY, or they will grow like the itch of scabies when scratched. This is letting go. This is buddist thought that westerners are learning to use more every year. It is wonderful stuff. It is the awakened mind. The CD by Thich Nhat Hahn, a very well known exhiled Vietnamese monk is called "The Art of Mindful Living". He has so much non the internet - it's the basis for stability and recovery.

7) Learn about Emotional Intelligence, and how to develop it. The basis is in meditation, and writing exercises that I won't go into in this blog, as time is short, but the 4 parts of Emotional Intelligence (E.I.) are 1)Self-Awareness 2)Self-Management 3)Interpersonal Awareness 4)Interpersonal Management. It starts with self, and the key to being aware of what you are thinking and how you are acting is the first step. When you notice your stress needle is starting to point to the yellow or red, you begin step 2 - to manage the stress. To say "Hey, I'm really starting to feel upset" rather than to simply get lost in emotional thought without ever really noticing. when you notice, you can exercise the mental muscle that you have developed through meditation.

8) Exercise. Find a way to get that jogging, or even walking in several times a week. Get your pulse UP. Get the blood to clear out your mind and body. Ideally, 20 minutes of good running, or whatever, with positive affirmations along the way. I like to chant positive things while I jog, such as the "Every day in every way" phrase, or "Strength in the body, strength in the mind, strength in my heart - I feel myself getting stronger in every way". It's amazing how the seeds of these planted thoughts will flourish when the dung of life is thrown at you. It's fertilizer! Hey, what do you know? We have potential for growth! That's why it hurts - because God wants us to grow. Exercise results in a body/mind that is invigorated, and able to relax. As Abraham Lincoln said "If I had 30 minutes to cut a tree down, I'd spend 20 sharpening the saw". We can't afford to let our mind or body go dull. It WILL get dull, despite our efforts, but that is precisely when we kick in some positive scripting that we've practiced.

9) Link emotion to a movement that is easy to do. When I am running full speed, and feeling full of CAN DO emotion, I pull up thoughts of overcoming difficult obstacles that actually happened, in detail, then tap my thumb to my pointer and middle finger with both hands. This is a commonly taught psychological technique that Anthony Robbins promoted. I like it. It works. I touch my thumb to my pinky finger when I need to relax - to start to breath deeply. It takes some time to program yourself, but you will know it and feel the difference when you have created these links.
I am an orthodontist, and often encounter thumb suckers. Out of curiosity, I always ask them to show me where their teeth hit their thumb. Inevitably, if I have them press down on that spot with their fingers (from the other hand), they say it causes their whole body to feel calm and relaxed. This isn't new - it's ritual stuff that anyone understands. Part of the reason smokers calm down (and I don't recommend smoking) is that they are breathing deeply, and performing a ritual. If they put a TWIG in their hand that rests like a cigarette, it helps them a bit. If they can suck through something that resembles a cigarette, and BREATH, and do THEIR ritual, it has a very calming effect. Building rituals that relax and calm you, as well as rituals that help you to conjure up the feelings of motivation INSTANTLY is wonderful - especially when you have ADD, or other mind related issues.

Well, I must go! Hope this helps someone, because it changed my life!

Whimsical Writings--Poetry

As something of a respite from the gloom and doom of the past few posts, I offer up this tidbit that I found while going through some old papers.  It's a forgotten piece that I wrote sometime around October or November 1987:

From Within the Upside-Down Cake on the CD Player

Good yesterday, Mr. Turtle, 

And I don’t mind if I don’t. 

Yet here you are wearing my 

Sixth-best golf sweater, 

Although the holes above the sleeves 

Make your typhobia most apparent. 

Open your book to the 

Seventeenth and three-eighths page 

And read to ourselves 

The meaning of this cake 

In which we find us.   

Stick out your tongue 

And lick the frosting from the floor 

(No—that’s the ultraviolet light) 

So that we may better ascertain 

Who has built this wall around us.   

But what’s that sound? 

Ah, such clarity in a clarinet 

As I have never heard still! 

Are we… 

Yes we is… 

In this cake— 

On top of a gloriously, stupendously hugantic 

CD PLAYER!!!   

Fancy that!

(There's a LOT of stuff like that from around the same time period...)

Interlude #1: Christmas Reflections

So this is Christmas,

And what have you done?

                        --John Lennon

 

Lately I’ve been taking stock of the last year, to see what progress I might have made.  It’s not so much a matter, as Herr Lennon suggested, of thinking what I have done or accomplished over the year (uncomfortably little, as it turns out), but rather of taking note of what I have learned.  The memory of accomplishments tends to dim with the passage of time and the reality of new challenges; learning remains, however, with each new insight building upon (and often reinforcing) previous ones. 

 

Here are a few of the nuggets that I have picked up:

 

• Something as simple as watching my breathing can have a dramatic impact on my mindset.  I have asked myself how this can be, and I have concluded that much of it is what I call “neurophysiobehavioral”.  One of the unfortunate side effects of the pace of life that we are more or less compelled to live these days is that we get into the pattern of reactive behavior.  Being called upon to make split-second (or less) decisions at a nanomoment’s notice, we don’t take the time to think before speaking or acting.  Consequently, we generally find ourselves in crisis mode, regressing to the status of cavepeople who are always on Saber-Tooth alert.  Constantly on edge, waiting for the next emergency, we “act (or react) first, and regret at leisure”.  As Raymond Tallis recently noted, “We do not walk, we sleepwalk; we do not act, we react, scarcely aware of that to which we are reacting.”   The one thing I have found that breaks the cycle is slowing down my breathing.  Slower breathing means slower neurological and physiological response, which gives me time to consider my options and to choose a response.  Just five minutes or so of concentrating on my breathing usually does the trick.  I have found that it also prepares me for prayer, clearing my mind of the babble of concerns so that I can pray in a peaceful, trusting state of mind. 

 

• Agency (or free will) is supreme, but it is not as simple as we seem to make it out to be.  While agency is an eternal principle, our ability to exercise that agency can fluctuate according to circumstance.  Our task is not only to make good use of our agency, but also to optimize conditions so that we can make best use of that agency.  Psychologist Allen Bergin has pointed out that the ability to exercise agency can be enhanced or impaired by our actions or by the actions of others.    In my own case, I have seen that my agency-exercising capacity has been limited by both, as well as by the limitations imposed by my AS.  Much of my activity over the last year and a half has been in the context of increasing my ability to exercise my agency.  It’s been massively difficult and incredibly discouraging, but I see that I have been making some progress. 

 

• Shame is absolutely debilitating.  It causes us to question our worth, distrust our thinking, and dismiss even our noblest impulses and desires.  It makes us intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually dependent upon other people, assuming that they know better than we do and that therefore we need them to dictate to us.  It places us in the role of victim and keeps us there, since we believe that’s all we deserve.  It paralyzes us and renders us incapable of acting for ourselves out of fear of making even the slightest mistake.  In short, it keeps us in the position of frightened children who never grow up unless we “wake up” and summon up the courage to move out of that role.  One of the most enlightening pieces I have ever read is an article called “The Three Faces of Victim”, which has helped me understand how the combination of continued social rejection due to my AS, the various forms of abuse I experienced as a child, and a rather dysfunctional family dynamic all contributed to a deep sense of shame which paralyzed me for most of my 40 years.  It is only this last year that I have become aware of its effects and have made some initial, tentative steps to move out of a “victim” identity.  Ironically, I realize that my incessant self-blame only made me a victim of myself, and that’s the worst form of victimization. 

 

• I believe that the key to understanding and overcoming our problems is to understand our concept of God.  I now see that not only my own hyper-conscientious, perfectionistic tendencies but also my associations with various influential people for whom “good enough” was never good enough have led me to perceive God as judgmental, exacting, impatient, and waiting to lay into me for every trifling mistake I make.  This has further paralyzed me and kept me from being more than I am.  As psychologist Wendy Ulrich has stated, “Excessive self-blame . . .distorts our view of God, who becomes the Great Ruthless Judge in the Sky waiting for the worst possible moment to shame and punish us if we stop our self-reprisals.”¹   I see that I have taken what should be a reverential fear of God and turned it into a terror of God, thereby turning away from the One who can truly help me.  I forget that while perfection is His standard, He is also infinitely patient, loving, and merciful, and that perfection only comes as we surrender ourselves to Christ and latch onto his perfection, rather than trusting in our own feeble achievements.

 

• Finally, I came to realize that all I really have to offer Christ is a broken heart.  However, that is the one thing I have devoted my efforts to avoiding at all costs.  I hide from people to avoid having my heart broken and crushed as it has been so many times before.  I over-intellectualize things to avoid having to feel them—keeping them instead tucked away deep inside my brain, at a safe distance from my heart.  The consequence of this is that my heart is not only hardened, it is well-nigh calcified.  I have guarded it well, all right—so well that nobody, God or man, can penetrate it, and it is therefore useless to anybody—least of all myself. 

Last night as a family, we talked about what we can give Jesus this Christmas.  We each wrote our gift down on index cards and put them in a box under the tree labeled, “To Jesus”.  My gift was a truly broken heart which can be influenced by the Spirit.  It may not be too much of an exaggeration to say that all I have learned throughout the year—and much more—has been leading to this point.  It will be interesting to see what 2009 brings, and what I will have to offer Jesus next Christmas.  

1.  Forgiving Ourselves: Getting Back Up When We Let Ourselves Down, p. 32

The First Clue (Part 2 of 2)

The first part of the report, summarized previously, described school history, family background, and behavioral patterns; the remainder of the report, as highlighted below, details findings related to testing.

 

Test Performance (WISC-R) 

• “Keyed-up and nervous throughout testing”
• “Keenly interested in doing well”
• “Worked hard and was very responsive to cues as to how to improve his performance”
• “Eager, but hasty and impulsive”
• “A very active mind which makes many associations with any task assigned…distractible”
• “Began to work more steadily and carefully”
• “Once he had relaxed…[he] showed a great deal of patience and persistence…began to attack performance tasks in a methodical, orderly way”
• “Scores ranged from average to the ‘gifted’ level”
• “Visual-motor organization is…significantly lower than…general intellectual development”
• “Since his motor skills are weak and he is not interested in sports, he has tended to develop his more verbal interests”
• “Verbal reasoning and general information fall at the ‘gifted’ level”
• “Social judgment and comprehension of society’s expectations are superior—at least, he knows the rules and the reasons for them.”
• “He has not mastered…the ability to behave independently and appropriately in concrete situations [though] he can verbalize about them quite well”

 

Projective Drawings 

• “Evidence of insecurity and dependency”
• “[Drawings suggest] angry, frighteningly aggressive feelings but no tendency to act them out and no confidence in his ability to control his environment”

 

Conclusions

• “Very bright”
• “Abilities governed by the left…lobe of the brain”
• “Socially maladjusted in the sense that he behaves like a much younger child and has no ability to adapt to peer standards or defend himself against scapegoating”
• “Scholastic success is likely to be adversely affected because of the depression that will ensue”
• “Cannot lead a full or happy life without learning the social skills, and the confidences, which he lacks at present”

(The report ends on a pretty gloomy note--I expect that my posts will become a bit more positive once I’ve trudged through the sludge of the past.)  When I first read this at age 17, it helped answer a lot of questions I had had—but not entirely.  I found it fascinating, but its full value would only become apparent 13 years later.