Earlier today I attended the sort of (moderately) crowded (I had more than 1 - 2 m distance to most people, and just under 1 m to people I talked with), noisy events that I have disliked intensely for most of my life. This was such event since I identified my neurodivergence, and it was interesting to have the extra insight from that into how I was reacting.
Before that identification, I would just complain (mentally) about how unpleasant being at the event was, but now I could say:
- OK, that reaction is to the increased noise;
- that reaction is due to the bright lights (this event was the first time I consciously noticed that I was squinting, but I have very strong suspicion I have done so before);
- I have always been aware of people getting too close and impinging on my aura, and that continued at this event. However, I was aware (this time) that my psychic protection wasn’t as flawed as I sometimes suspected: problems were also occurring because of sensory overload, which explained the occassional disconnect between protection seeming to be OK but some reactions I experienced;
- in the past when this occurred I would just lump everything together as me becoming irritated, but now I could watch myself going through overload to shutdown.
But, best of all, I had let the organiser know that I might have to leave early for personal reasons, so I had a nice , pre-prepared reason to leave early if, as happened, I became overloaded.
One other thing was that I felt safe enough with the person I was talking with to explain I had autism - which came about when we discussed a mutual acquaintance who was involved in disability activism.
So ... an interesting evening.
PS - today, a few days later, while shopping I found myself having to cope with a relatively crowded environment for a few minutes while waiting for an order: combining my awareness with basic psychic techniques - especially flaming - worked. Much as many neurodivergent people often have higher than normal empathy, I am beginning to wonder if neurodivergence can often come with increased psychic sensitivity. Psychic techniques may help with that latter aspect - but, equally, the psychic sensitivity is clearly only part of the issue.
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Remember: we generally need to be more human being rather than human doing, to mind our Mӕgan, and to acknowledge that all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering”.
