ASD and ADHD solidarity

Random Infodump: Counting

2023-06-19T04:26:09Z

Posted by: cora

Content: I will be talking about methods to handle anxiety, not the descriptors of anxiety. This is more of an ADHD thing.

Once upon a time, when I was a small child (like five or six), adults would give me the advice to count to ten before I got mad to allow myself "time" to calm down (and probably for practice with counting from 1-10).

Fast forward to adulthood:
It's 2018. I am dealing with really debilitating anxiety (but convincing myself it's a "normal" level of anxiety most of the time - it wasn't). I realized counting forwards from 1-10 would not be helpful because I have the words memorized to the point I don't even have to think about the order they are in. Ditto with counting backwards. So I came up with (or borrowed the idea from the Internet - unclear) this idea that I would count backwards from 100.

I know what you're thinking, "Cora - 100 is just 10 patterns of 10!" Yes! BUT! I don't often think in that number pattern, so I found myself tripping around 97, or "wait, what comes before "70?"

Eventually, I got used to that counting pattern, so I switched it up and went backwards by '5's (I already have forwards by '5's memorized - 5 was my favorite multiplication as a kid. The halfway and 'right on' points feel soothing as you count them).

I do not do any breathing exercises, as the point for me hasn't been to mediate, the point has been to force my mind to do a 180 of topics and distract myself until my emotions have calmed down some. I found this helpful for the nights when ADHD brain is wide awake (and gives zero fucks about 'we have to wake up in ~6-8 hours, it is time for sleep, my friend!). It worked when my brain wasn't over stimulated or overwhelmed, it was just struggling to "settle down" for sleep (similar to a cat that keeps giving you elevator butt when you are petting it, despite them sitting on your lap & giving other indicators of 'time to settle on my hooman's lap for a while').

The advice in this column also helped me. Breathe in for 4 breaths, hold for 7, exhale for 8. Alternatively, name 3 things you can see, 3 things you can hear, and 3 wiggle 3 body parts (toes, fingers, arms, legs).

I will leave other people with ADHD out there one final note: I forget if I learned it from a podcast, HowtoADHD, or someone else's experience on reddit, but I did hear a rumor about how when ADHD brains get bored, some of them will ramp up anxiety just for that sweet adrenaline/dopamine rush. Knowing that was empowering the last time I had that sinking "oh, no" feeling, and helped me give myself permission to avoid the anxiety train all together (It was a completely fixable situation that didn't even take ~15 seconds to come up with a solution for once I was in the right headspace again :) Definitely not worth an anxiety spiral).

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Autism & Eye Contact

2023-06-15T21:25:11Z

Posted by: cora

I fell into a bit of a TikTok rabbit hole last night (maybe the night before last? Time - what is it?) about how autistic people see faces vs. how allistic people see faces. I thought I would info dump here about it and see if I can help revive this community a bit (the last post was from 2018).

KC Davis has a great series on this on her TikTok (link). A few of the take aways:

Autistic people think "eye contact" is literal - it's not. Staring directly into someone's eyeballs like you are trying to stare into their soul is just as overwhelming for allistics as it is for us.
Allistic people are able to take in the entire face of someone; autistic people tend to take in bits & pieces
Autistics tend to look away from someone's face because looking at someone's face is distracting. ADHDers will look away from someone's face because everything outside of that person's face is distracting.

A friend sent me an article about this phenomenon today which validates everything KC Davis has been talking about on her TikTok:

The findings indicate “that the basis of eye contact avoidance in autism is the result of an abnormal sensitivity of the threat processing system,” Hadjikhani said. “From early on after birth, the subcortical face processing system is too sensitive to basic face configuration and gets over-connected. Since this system over time gets involved in gaze perception, this is experienced as a stressful thing. -- MSN PsyPost

As an AuHD, I have noticed I tend to look *everywhere* else in the room when I am talking with someone in meet space. As a kid, I used to do drawing/doodling/knitting that I would look at instead, but as an adult such stimming while someone talks isn't socially acceptable, so I'm literally drawn to looking at *everything* else around the room to avoid face contact.

On video meetings, I tend to get myself to look at the computer screen (always a different window than the conference, though). I have Cookie Clicker in a tab to get me through the meeting. I don't really like looking at people while they're on camera. It feels far more intimate than making face contact in meet space - not only do I see the person, but I also see their background. I can easily tell who priorities house aesthetics vs. who does not (which inherently comes with an implicit bias about socio-economic backgrounds with those realizations which can then lead to a bias for or against someone).

I'm not sure how to end this, so I'll just end with a random, *completely unrelated* fact: Neurodivergents tend to bond through infodumping. This is why we're not so great at small talk, and the small talk we *are* good at is random facts. Because it's just micro infodumping.

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Hello from Aiden

2018-12-18T02:32:42Z

Posted by: welcometoheck

Hey guys! Those of you from Tumblr may know me as Kat. I have both autism and adhd. I’m bisexual and genderfluid, and my family, like Alex’s, sucks about that. You can let me know if there’s anything I can do to improve this place.

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Hello from Alex!

2018-12-18T02:22:54Z

Posted by: alexthewarrior

Hey all, Alex here!

Those of you who are here from Tumblr would know me as Kit.

For those of you who don’t already know, I have Autism and ADHD, I am Genderfluid, Asexual, and Aromantic!

I live with my (unfortunately) Transphobic and mildly Abelist parents, but I’ve got great support In the form of my best friend, and platonic life partner, welcometoheck (aka Aiden)

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Tags and Moderation

2018-12-18T01:01:11Z

Posted by: welcometoheck

Just going to leave this here to let y’all know that you can actively help us moderate this community. If you see a post or comment that goes against the community guidelines, let us know so we can deal with it. Community guidelines can be found in a link on the sidebar.

Also, you can ask us to add new tags to the community. If you can think of a tag that would be useful but we haven’t added it yet, let us know! We want this place to be easy to use and navigate.

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Community Guidlines

2018-12-18T00:48:03Z

Posted by: welcometoheck

Welcome to our community! This is meant to be a pretty open place to talk about neurodiversity, so there aren’t going to be a whole bunch of rules about what you can and can’t post. However, to maintain a safe place to have these discussions, there are some rules:

Don’t make posts that have nothing to do with neurodiversity. Posts can also be about other topics (neurodiversity and gender, ableism and racism, etc.) These posts will be removed, and if you repeatedly do this you will be banned.
Don't try to start arguments about other subjects. If this community grows at all, it’s inevitable that members will have disagreements, but if it has nothing to do with neurodiversity, this is simply the wrong place to have that discussion. This will result in a ban, especially if it appears you are deliberately attempting to upset people.
It’s okay to try to spark discussion on a topic, but if you aren’t debating in good faith (trying to come to a better understanding of the subject, willing to listen to other people’s thoughts) your post or comment will be removed. You will be removed and banned if you repeatedly attempt to argue in bad faith.
No bigotry (you will be banned).
No bullying or harassment (you will be banned).
Don't misuse tags. They’re there to make it easy to find certain types of content.
Neurodiversity impacts all areas of life, so no part of life is automatically banned from discussion. However, if you make a post about an adult subject, please use the age restriction feature. That keeps our community a safe place for people of all ages. If you accidentally forget to do this, you will be reminded of this rule and won’t be banned immediately, but you will be removed if it becomes a problem.

These rules are mostly things that make sense for any community, so they shouldn’t be too restrictive or hard to follow. Just be mindful of what you’re posting and respectful to others, and there should be no problems.

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