Sorry Zhekai... (that i never responded to this)

zhekai said...
Cool:) I've enjoyed reading your blog. I also get the word interpretation thing...someone says 'I have misgivings' and my brain will tell me all the double-entendres and possible interpretations. So i'll think:1)Miss Givings, what about Mr and Mrs Givings? I hear they're a very giving family, etc.2) Mis-givings sounds like you tried to give something to someone, but you messed up, etc. I find that hilarious....but nobody else does, so i've learned to not say such things.Can I ask if you relate to something else?:I seem to have two modes of expression. My natural thoughts and ways of talking are very chaotic for others, so i try to make everything very ordered and logical. It means i'm always explaining myself...So i have to choose between speaking naturally and being misunderstood, or being understood but turning everything into a really boring explanation that nobody wants to hear!!!It's very frustrating. And the irony is that ordinary people, even if they dimly understand what i'm saying, don't appreciate it in the same way.Thanks for responding!

(except. it's not really never since i'm responding. but. it's still been a while.)

yes. my brain will insist on telling me every possible meaning of something before i can move onto another thought. Ms. Givings indeed. i find #2 hilarious too. people are always looking at me like i am a hopeless dork.
Me: But don't you GET IT???!!!
Them: Yep. It's NOT FUNNY.
Me: I think you are not getting it. (this part muttered secretly in my head.)

I noticed I do something and am not sure if all humans universally do this too- when people speak to me, I have to repeat the sentence internally before i HEAR it. Sometimes this results in long, long pauses before i respond because I have to get through the Givings family Tree, then listen to a detour about the book The Giving Tree. Green cover. I like green. And then I have to "read" back the last thing said to me.

And yes, I have what I think of as my natural voice and then the "correct" way to talk. I always feel like I don't really speak English, I am just constantly translating. People miss the one version and are bored by the dissection process of the other. Like today, people were talking and I asked an either/or question-- "oh, are you collecting this or that?" and the answer was a both. so then i said they collected stone birds. but that did not make sense. they were like, what the hell is a stone bird? (the expression "kill two birds with one stone" combined itself into one stone, and then paralleled to the "both" in question.)

To me, that's not a joke, not trying to get a laugh exactly, just feel like it conveys lots of idea tangled into a short thing. But it doesn't really. I have "met" a couple Aspies online who get my twisted shorthand and love to talk in a combination of amanda-speak and them-too-speak, but most people do not appreciate it. Which, i can understand, because the explanation of things bores me too, the fun is in the breadcrumbs... play with me... follow me...

the curious incident of the dog in the night-time

i read it last night. i thought it was supposed to be about a kid with Asperger's, because that's what it said on the back of the audiobook. (i got the audiobook first, for Garret.) the hardcopy was checked out at the library then. but the book-book doesn't say Asperger's on the jacket description, just autism.

either way, it was a pretty good book.

i decided i don't like the audiobook version though. i listened to the first bit of that, because Garret said, "You have to listen to this."

So I did.

the guy who reads the audiobook goes too slow and thoughtful. the book-book was MUCH better. and it had excellent diagrams and footnotes. the syntax was flesh and not choke, and it raced into my head very nice, so that was the part i liked best.

but i feel a little unresolved about Wellington-the-Dog getting stabbed with a garden fork. i guess that's why the author made him a poodle, so i wouldn't have to be too distressed about it. because no one likes poodles.

Fear. Anger. Quitting.

My heart is racing, I'm shaking & dizzy. It's like a weird, in-between panic attack. I'm not gasping for air or having chest pains like a full-blown panic attack-- just shaking, shaking.

I'm afraid 100% of the time, and since I hate that, I end up angry 100% of the time, since anger is slightly better.

Online people ought to be safer. They aren't as real. They're nicely two-dimensional. I get just as angry and afraid from online confrontation though.

Garret always asks me just what exactly it is that I think people are going to do... I don't know.

I just hate this sick, awful feeling. And I can't stand very much of it. So I quit most things. Because most things deal with people. And people cause it.

I am often afraid that I'm going to be a serial killer. When I think about people dying and screaming, I feel calmer. Soothed. It makes me laugh. Makes the anger and the panic stop.

Stupid people who think I'm beneath them...

First off, stupid people can be delightful. I will forever and absolutely love Joey from high school for believing that M&Ms expand in your stomach and if you eat too many you can die, and also for lacking the math skills necessary to buy drugs.

But I really get annoyed by idiots that think they are the shiny penny.

The people who keep explaining things to me that I already grasp, when they are SO missing the point.

Just like slutty-girl in the 7th grade lunch line, who gasped and said, "Like, you are in THAT class? I thought you, were like, in the OTHER special ed, with like, retards."

Slutty-girl was very helpful. She made me realize that many of my perfectly intelligent sentences were actually mistaken for nonsense by those in the genetic kiddie-pool.

But I still have this problem with adults, all these years later.

I am not sure what to do with it sometimes because I find the motivations of people to be strange. What is the point of someone talking to me if all they want to do is act like everything is going over my head and I should tremble in awe of their superior mediocrity??? Seriously? WHY? They have self-esteem issues and need to pretend they are smart?

I don't get it. It really bothers me when I don't know why people are messing with me. I just can't see the point and it stresses me out. I want to solve the puzzle of it.

I also get into trouble because I assume OTHER people are secretly smart, since I get misjudged so often. Sadly, this is not usually the case, but I get tangled up in a lot of paranoia before I figure that out...

Me vs. All There Is To Say

This could possibly also be thought of as Aspie vs NT, but I don't know that for sure, so For Sure is is just the blog title for today.

ME: fish fish dead fish. gaping eyed. dead breath fish. image slam: hook lip jerk, head crash fill impotent sensless repeat repeat reap eat repeat. struggling shocked fish. fading glassy eye slap. sloe death. flap. flap. gasping trap. sir, i believe he's been struck in the eye with a mackrel. blink open reality, things are ALWAYS REPEAT. reap what you eat. beefit's what's for dinner? fish.

All there is to Say/Explain out loud: I feel hurt.

My head is filled with nonsense. You cannot come in. I am so tired. English is not enough.

Executive dysfunction

Really Amanda, i thought you possessed better powers of observation than this.

i KNOW!!! i'm retarded.

grrr. we have been aware of AS for 5 months now. have read the term executive dysfunction. have even googled it before and skimmed some deffinitions... but it wasn't until just now, when i read the term in conjunction with MOTIVATION that i really paid attention.

sigh.

of course, it might also be that i have walked into the kitchen over 20 times today: thought about how my stomach is growling. that i feel hungry. seen that there are no clean pans. thought about pizza. thought about washing a pan. stomach growls again. i walk out of the kitchen. repeat. repeat. repeat.

i swear i would starve to death without intervention.

i don't know. i don't want to take medication. and i hate psychologists. i don't know if anything could really help me anyway... :( but i wish there was a good neuropsychologist nearby that had actually heard of AS so that i could at least ask.