I often do a ‘music video of the week’ or a ‘film/series of the week’ recommendation in my posts, but I think I might need to add a ‘Word of the Week’ section because I am getting so many comments by people who identify with my latest explorations into various aspects of Neurodiversity.
This week’s first ND Word is “Monotropism” which is defined as ‘an individual’s tendency to focus their attention on a small or singular number of interests at any time, with them neglecting or not perceiving lesser interests. This cognitive strategy has been posited as the central underlying feature of autism.’
I see there are various opinions (isn’t there always about everything?) about Monotropism and whether it is a negative personality defect or just a neurodiverse characteristic, with no judgement or shame associated to it. This little graphic was created by ‘Autistic Realms‘ but I found it in a blog by The PDA Space.
The blog above discusses why monotropism can be to your advantage or how it can serve as a way to calm you down when you need regulation. For example, colouring is one of my focusses. If I am really feeling stressed and cannot get outside, I can colour and listen to music and it will help me to regulate. I use it like a meditation. My mind may solve problems, or my mind can wander aimlessly. I download information or I contemplate situations. But my mind can do any of these things gently, floating around with no direction while I focus on staying within the lines of my art project.
I enjoy painting but am certainly not obsessed with it (probably because I am not very good at it). I love gardening but not enough to look up a plant and know its genealogy and metadata. I just like messing about. The same with birds, I can spend hours looking at them and sometimes manage to identify them, but if not, I still enjoy them.
I have some less than healthy obsessions such as crime and murder, not that I want to commit either of these acts myself, but I find reading about killers interesting from a psychological point of view.
I am completely obsessed with Drag Queens. I have watched every episode of the US, UK, Australian, Canada, Untucked, All Stars, Canada vs the World, UK vs the World, plus others. Basically if it is in English and if I can find it online I watch it. But I do not think that is an unhealthy obsession. If I were hiding backstage with a net to take Jujubee home with me forever that might be different. (If I could kidnap a Queen it would be either Jujubee cos she loves cats and is so funny or Jinkx Monsoon for entertainment value, but I suspect she might be a bit moody. I adore them both.)
There is a questionnaire about monotropism if you would like to take it. I took it and unsurprisingly, I scored high.
My Monotropism Score: 203 / 235
My Average: 4.32
Whatever that means.
Here is a graphical representation of my results that I do not understand at all. What I understand is that I am ‘more monotropic’ than 69% of other autistic people and 98% of all people. That can’t be healthy. I am actually laughing because I do not have any problems with any of my obsessions, but then again, why would I?
For me it is probably an advantage as I can ‘lock in’ to a set of data and focus on the granular detail but also be aware of the overall project timelines, so I have no issues there.
There are some potential disadvantages to monotropism such as an inability to shift your focus easily. I really struggled with this when I had my time allocated to multiple clients, especially as I work in such a deep level of information as a data analyst. I found it very hard to switch my focus from one to the other and now I understand why. As a consultant, that is not ideal but I have not had to be split allocated in a while so let’s just count that blessing and move on.
The other risk is that monotropism is used as Demand Avoidance which is simply ‘resistance to doing something that is requested or expected of you. Persistent and marked resistance to demands is a characteristic experienced by and observed in some autistic people. It can impact essential needs like eating and sleeping, and expectations such as going to school or work, and has implications for diagnosis and support for some people. I often have trouble beginning something, but once I get my routines sorted out and I know what I am doing then I am off!
One of the challenges is that most of the ‘standards’ and analysis were done on white males, so being ‘typical’ is not easy as we all differ. I am a mix of a million personalities, sometimes extroverted, sometimes introverted. I can usually force it or ‘turn it on’. I know I have one of those serial killer type charismas and if I want to really zero in on you, you will feel like the sun is shining on you and you are the most special person on earth. My youngest has that too, we can usually charm our way into (or out of) anything. Just another mask I can slip on for convenience when required.
The problem is, I just do not have the energy to mask any longer. Instead of charm you get the Labrador puppy if you plug into one of my special interests, or the blank stare of disassociation if I am not at all piqued by our conversation. It is not intentional rudeness even though it may be perceived as such, it is just how my brain works, it wanders off somewhere, out the window, watching a bird.
Speaking of birds, my sunbird was back again on Monday when I sat outside in the sun to have my tea. He danced across the garden, up into the trees, down into the vines, landed on the light in the bushes in front of me and skipping around the lawn.
This week I realised that he was reassuring me. He saw my fear. I then used the technique learned from Tamlyn in one of her workshops and I asked myself, ‘why are you afraid’? I heard ‘because this almost broke us when it happened, will we survive facing it?’
I feel that in my stomach, my belly feels acidic, clenched and I feel nauseous. That is it.
I realised as well it is not only the sexual abuse from my childhood that has stored its poisons in my body, it is my abusive first marriage and traumatic divorce. It is the grief around the loss of my ability to properly parent my children. I keep telling myself I have healed because I have such a great relationship with them, but I still cry when I think of all of the things I missed out on and for what they missed out on! I still have a lot of pain and guilt around the whole situation.
On Monday I had my appointment with my therapist from the Neurodiversity Clinic. It had been 4 months since our last appointment and we met up and discussed how I have been. I told her that the knowledge I have gained around Neurodiversity has given me so much understanding of my own behaviour.
I have often blamed Norm for his bashing of dishes when he is unloading the dish washer. I thought he did it deliberately, trying to make a point that he is doing the dishes while I am doing whatever I am doing (definitely not dishes). Meanwhile I just learned that it is something common among the neurodivergent. I cannot remember if I have posted the ND Ick list? Here it is. This is item 24.
Another item that flipped is that I had also always wondered how Norm could walk past the dog’s water bowl and not notice it is empty. I now realise it is not that he did not notice it, it is that I noticed the million tiny details in the room no one else sees and that was one of them.
I have underestimated my own abilities and assumed other people were deliberately slacking or avoiding things, which somewhat points back to my Rejection Sensitivity Dysphoria.
I likened it to putting all of my ‘quirks’ onto a plate and then shining the lens of each of the neurodiverse terms or tendencies I discover and analyse whether it affects the items in the basket or not. I am able to do so in quite a detached manner I think. Or I am lying to myself.
The other term is ‘Psychogenic Amnesia’. Situation-specific psychogenic amnesia refers to a loss of memory for a discrete, usually traumatic, autobiographical event or sequence of events (labeled ‘dissociative amnesia’ in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition).
Again, I did not know the words for it but I experienced it after my childhood abuse. I disassociated and only remembered it suddenly at the age of 24 when I had another trauma occur. From age 5 to 24 those memories were ‘forgotten’ but once remembered, they all came hurtling back. Obviously my subconscious decided I was in a state to cope with this information? It was wrong, but here we are.
I keep discovering other items on the ‘Ick List’ that I had thought I was not affected by. I thought this one was not relevant and then I watched myself take the fruit out of the fridge to get to room temperature so I could eat it. I was starving but I would rather wait than eat it cold. Bingo number 21.
The other is my intense olfactory system. I once told my HR manager that she smelled like she marinated in her perfume and it made me sick. I told a woman something similar in the UK and she reported me. But strong scent makes me feel ill. I cannot eat food with rosemary, basil, ginger, or anything that smells strong. I do love coriander though!
My therapist says that she likes how I can filter the ND info I am learning and understand how it affects my own life. I also told her I have created a neurodiverse community with my Kitten In the City Facebook page and this is where I am being educated. She also likes how I am reframing the terms and my own quirks as not being negative, just different. She also stressed that when autistic people say that something is ‘uncomfortable’ for them, such as bright lights, or loud noises, most people do not understand the intensity of the discomfort for us. I likened it to someone pushing a needle into my brain. It is not just discomfort and I should not minimise it, it is intensely painful!! But I must be able to make people understand that I am not just being overly sensitive, I am expressing my boundaries.
I noticed last night that when watching a video of a dog chasing a little boy, I was feeling very anxious and I noticed that I was stimming really strongly with my hand. I then wondered have I always done that and only now noticed it, or has it felt free to ‘come out’ now that I have accepted myself completely? When I mentioned it to Norm he said he has never noticed it. He said if he does he will smack my hand and tell me to stop. I know he was joking but it almost made me cry as it tapped into whomever rejected that behaviour as a child? Or did it just tap into that shame? Either way I told him he upset me and we hugged it out.
When I finished work on Monday the sun was out so we sat outside for a bit.
Norm used his mini-chainsaw to cut down a few limbs which were unbalanced. I look at the trees a lot, they need to be uniform or it makes me dilly. So two trees lost a bit of limb. Finn seemed to lose his sanity for a moment and had a severe case of the zoomies.
Tuesday and Wednesday were both cold and drizzling with rain with a little peek of occasional sunshine. It was still bitterly cold.
I had another Notable Bird Encounter on Wednesday. It actually started on Tuesday morning when he came to stare at me while I prayed. Then on Wednesday he kept hopping all around me when I was outside. Then he popped onto the same chair as the Sunbird. He is a Cape Robin Chat.
Today is gorgeous outside.
I had my coffee break in the sunshine.
Lily and Amelia are driving down right now and should be arriving soon. I will post a separate post for the weekend as it is Caitlin’s baby shower. It is being held at her sister in law’s house.
I hope you all have a lovely weekend and until then, Kisses from the Kitten x0x0x0x0x0
Kitten in the City 