Pride and internalized prejudice
Mar. 10th, 2022 04:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
flamingswordMy senses have been acting up today, increasing the intensity of every taste and sensation, which is hiss and also boo. Plus I'm sad about some stuff, so I'm going to day-drink and blog about my feelings. Like you do.
My therapy assignment for the week is to consider in what situations my differences and disabilities are a good thing.
The physical disability stuff helped me to realize where I had internalized ableism, and see where that was intersecting with me holding myself and other people to unfair or ableist standards. It helped me to let go of stuff that other people taught me that was wack, and get it replaced with better stuff. This is still not something I am perfect at, but I'm way better now than in my 30's and before.
The autistic traits I have to take one by one, mostly, because some stuff like time blindness has no upsides that I can see. But the ability to jump into a project or new special interest with enthusiasm and soak up a bunch of information about it all at once? That has plenty of academic and social uses. And the hyperfocus is hella useful when I am under a deadline, even if it does stress me out. That combined with the sleep disturbances meant that while I was used to running on little sleep I basically had 18 usable hours out of 24, for about a week at a time. So when time crunches would come, I could get a hell of a lot done before I started shaking and having meltdowns.
The sensory processing stuff means that I used the scent sensitivity to teach myself to make perfumes. Which is not nothing for someone who scent stims. (I want to buy myself more base ingredients but ... no. Not right now.) The high distractability means that I don't get tunnel vision and I'm good at noticing things like peripheral threats, and my anxiety means I have lots of run-from-tigers juice if I need it for one of those threats.
The proprioception/interoception stuff made me able to push past pain signals in lots of situations pre-fibromyalgia, and I might not have been great at fighting when I had the poor coordination, but it was rare that someone walked away from a fight with me still looking pretty, and they always walked away looking like they'd been in a fight, which you could argue is not a "good" thing but it was a thing I intended and got me left alone by asshats once I built up a reputation for being crazy in a fight.
In a comment the other day I said "passing along healing and skill-building to my friends? That's so validating and chest-burstingly great I don't have words for it. Whatever it is, it's a big feeling that is so deeply good that I have trouble letting myself feel it all at once. And maybe that bears thinking on, too." And I think that chest-swelling feeling is pride, maybe? I've looked at the feelings wheel and that's the closest thing I can put a name on it, with maybe some joy? So this is another case of foreboding joy and me not letting myself feel proud of myself in an effort to keep myself from getting more arrogant than confident. But maybe it is time to stop doing that, now that I am no longer more arrogant than a common neurotypical person. And the foreboding joy doesn't really fix anything, I just don't trust myself around joy.
My therapy assignment for the week is to consider in what situations my differences and disabilities are a good thing.
The physical disability stuff helped me to realize where I had internalized ableism, and see where that was intersecting with me holding myself and other people to unfair or ableist standards. It helped me to let go of stuff that other people taught me that was wack, and get it replaced with better stuff. This is still not something I am perfect at, but I'm way better now than in my 30's and before.
The autistic traits I have to take one by one, mostly, because some stuff like time blindness has no upsides that I can see. But the ability to jump into a project or new special interest with enthusiasm and soak up a bunch of information about it all at once? That has plenty of academic and social uses. And the hyperfocus is hella useful when I am under a deadline, even if it does stress me out. That combined with the sleep disturbances meant that while I was used to running on little sleep I basically had 18 usable hours out of 24, for about a week at a time. So when time crunches would come, I could get a hell of a lot done before I started shaking and having meltdowns.
The sensory processing stuff means that I used the scent sensitivity to teach myself to make perfumes. Which is not nothing for someone who scent stims. (I want to buy myself more base ingredients but ... no. Not right now.) The high distractability means that I don't get tunnel vision and I'm good at noticing things like peripheral threats, and my anxiety means I have lots of run-from-tigers juice if I need it for one of those threats.
The proprioception/interoception stuff made me able to push past pain signals in lots of situations pre-fibromyalgia, and I might not have been great at fighting when I had the poor coordination, but it was rare that someone walked away from a fight with me still looking pretty, and they always walked away looking like they'd been in a fight, which you could argue is not a "good" thing but it was a thing I intended and got me left alone by asshats once I built up a reputation for being crazy in a fight.
In a comment the other day I said "passing along healing and skill-building to my friends? That's so validating and chest-burstingly great I don't have words for it. Whatever it is, it's a big feeling that is so deeply good that I have trouble letting myself feel it all at once. And maybe that bears thinking on, too." And I think that chest-swelling feeling is pride, maybe? I've looked at the feelings wheel and that's the closest thing I can put a name on it, with maybe some joy? So this is another case of foreboding joy and me not letting myself feel proud of myself in an effort to keep myself from getting more arrogant than confident. But maybe it is time to stop doing that, now that I am no longer more arrogant than a common neurotypical person. And the foreboding joy doesn't really fix anything, I just don't trust myself around joy.
no subject
Date: 2022-03-11 04:19 pm (UTC)Thank you for that gift.
no subject
Date: 2022-03-12 12:34 am (UTC)I should try to remember what all feelings I put lids on to stop myself from being ways that were socially disadvantageous and bring them all back slowly, I think. But that will have to go on the to-do list. Right now i have other stuff that takes precedence.
no subject
Date: 2022-03-23 06:39 am (UTC)The sensory processing stuff means that I used the scent sensitivity to teach myself to make perfumes. Which is not nothing for someone who scent stims. (I want to buy myself more base ingredients but ... no. Not right now.)
Hmm, interesting... (my housemate's very likely autistic, has an ADHD diagnosis, and is super into making perfumes rn haha.)
no subject
Date: 2022-03-23 04:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-03-23 06:15 pm (UTC)there are several of us on a few different journals
Date: 2022-03-23 08:01 pm (UTC)