Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello
I am 36 years old and I was diagnosed last month. I am waiting for the paperwork to reach my GP from psychiatry uk with recommendations of any support for me.
But in the mean time I am struggling with how to cope with different challenges I have. For example I had a big change recently in my life. Which this week has meant I have had quite a few ‘meltdowns’. This manifests itself in me becoming very overwhelmed, sometimes it comes out in being irritated and even angry and I may shout/scream. Other times it comes out in me just crying my eyes out.
If anyone else experiences this when they are struggling to cope with a change for example, how do you cope with ‘meltdowns’ ? I just don’t know how to deal with them the right way.
I’ve always had them off and on, when I was little it was labelled as a mental health problem. And I was told to do deep breathing and count slowly to 10. But this does not really work much.
I appreciate any experiences or tips you could share!
All transitions are not only hard, but our responses to them MATTER. While sure, humans can adapt, adaptation is not something that is a Smash Cut Edit. It takes generations.
You should feel the impact of a transition at some point & it would be odd if it didn't feel painful, you're experiencing a loss. Think of every transition as a long swing in the jungle. If there is no ivy to reach for in order to swing swiftly from one trapeze like vine to the next and you are forced to let go, it will be physically impaling. But even letting go of one and grabbing the next should be something of personal agency and will. Transitions like moving house or a break in a relationship or a death of a loved one, we might never heal completely from but find resolution as how to live with the break/memory/move. This is not a mental health issue. It's productive to the self to cry or sit with the pain of a transition. This only becomes a mental health issue if we cannot mourn a loss properly.
Now, the Autistic difference is that we feel with a greater intensity due to sensory experience having a greater impact. We don't create defence mechanisms, which in turn dull the senses, but can feel thrown into survival mode and here, our response can be crucial. Sometimes, it's just a matter of being aware of what's happening, creating a good set of boundaries to allow our selves all the time we need to heal. Don't be rushed or forced to 'getting past a thing' emotionally or psychologically even if we must move on physically. Sometimes life is just grim.
Eventually, if you can begin to have blocked time for yourself to heal and find the terms of the world, the social contracts, the pace and systems and all the confusing things within society, then you may have a better command of how you want to navigate it, grow within or beyond it and as an individual.
Ignore the nonsense of 'Resilience', it's not correct. Resilience is a type of callous the human body builds after a thing breaks. It's a reclamation of nature after she's been destroyed. It's not a word fit for matters of the heart :) x