Back once again.....

It's been a year and two months since I updated. I guess life gets in the way and we forget. So, while New Years resolutions are complete bunk, I may have decided that Sunday is my new update day. This, I will stress, has nothing to do with the fact it's Sunday morning and I've decided to start blogging again shut up, I can't hear you la la la la.

Plan of action is an update every Sunday. This gives me a week of wacky japes to get up to so I don't feel like I have nothing to say and am obligated to say it. There might be random check ins as things happen, and things might change if life gets interesting but with a demanding work life and another new girlfriend (yeah yeah, rubbish at relationships) I hint once weekly updates is a good start. What form these updates take will be determined by what happens.

In the mean time, I've started a Facebook page The Aspy Journey Reloaded, so that I can link Facebook resources and other links without needing my iPad/craptop. Please check it out too. 

I'll be doing something similar with Twitter as soon as I download the app/ create a page and oh god I'm going back to bed zzzzzzzz

For now, as Chris Hadfield would say, soft landings.

there are times.

I'm sure I've mentioned that I was doing a second degree, but if I hadn't, I'm doing a second degree.

Why am i doing a second degree? Because, unsupported I managed to get a 3 Honours degree, and a 3 isn't enough to do a masters, so I'm doing some degree modules to try and gain enough points to do a Masters.

Or you know, i could just realise I'm dumb and jack it all in.

The benefit to being disabled, for once, is that the university support is great. I can (and have) extend my time for submission, and I have availed of support in uni (I even have a named member of staff).

I'm sure many readers know that all these things are available, but having had no academic support for my first degree, its still novel.

I suppose that, while disabilities are not an excuse, they can be included and alleviated to gain support. With the right adjustments and support, life gets a little easier.

So I had a bit of a surprise when i renewed my energy supplier (a yearly ritual that I feel I have to do to try and get the best deals etc, because i might be missing out. I might also be owed PPI or have been in a serious accident, who knows). My energy supplier asked if I was disabled. There's no point in saying no, so explained all the intricacies of my life, having to spell some of the more obscure disabilities (like cerebral palsy and aspergers) and just sum the rest up as "learning difficulties".

I thought, like everything else i've ever filled in, was just for statistics or something. However, I'm now entitled to priority energy supply should there be a power cut. This is to power my hospital bed, my electric wheelchair, tube feed pump device and iron lung, none of which I currently own (hospital beds are uncomfortable, and at present I am able to walk mostly unaided). It was  a nice and generous thought, and I am glad that my provider has the thoughtfulness to priorities those who rely on electricity to live, and it strikes me that possibly it's a law. Ofgem, the regulator of energy providers has a document about the care of vulnerable customers.

Always good to know, even if I don't need anything of the sort.

quick shout out.

So while I struggle to write a coherent and sensible (and sourced post) about the benefits and flexibility of society to adapt to disability, I thought I'd do a quick product placement, um I mean comment on something I found helpful when I first got my orthtoics.

Way back in February (which in terms of how little I update this blog, is about ten lifetimes) I posted about the Rub, basically the pressure damage that my not yet broken in orthtoics where doing to my delicate girl feet. In it i discussed silicon stripes that I had found that acted as a pressure relieving layer to prevent rubbing and damage. The downside was, of course, that they had fallen off and slide under my foot and become painful to walk on (as things do when you walk on them).

I met the rep from the company today and even showcased my blog, so smiles all round.

Anyway shameless plug to fill the gap while I wrestle with a topic of both interest and I suspect division.

Night all.

(Please note that I am not being sponsored to post this, it was just a helpful tip at the time and I had reason to show a rep today).

Poor sleep

I haven't had sleep deprivation for a while, so I might as well enjoy some now.

I slept for no less than 13 hours yesterday so I guess it's pay back tonight. That said, I also may have made a minor cock up in work and it's keeping me awake, but lets not get into semantics.

It is odd things that worry me. A late file won't bother me if I've got a reasonable excuse, but a forgotten attachment will keep me pacing (and having a meltdown) for hours if I don't feel like I'm on solid ground.

I'm sure everyone suffers from this, but I occasionally feel trapped, unable to settle until i have an answer one way or the other. I have no off button, no system to simply decide i can wait and sleep. I have been told to create a 'bin bag' in my mind that I just trash can my day into and leave it behind.

Sleep loss doesn't help either. It means I'm awake for hours and hours, dozing in work, losing my ability to control my meltdowns, or even having meltdowns altogether.

It'll negatively effect me, and I'll blog later (or tomorrow) to tell you how it went.....

spelling errors and updates

So, it's been three months again. I swear I get time off, I just don't have anything to blog about. That said, I met an old friend on Sunday and she told me I should blog about my life.

Prepare to be bored.

First off, I've decided to go back to using my laptop to blog. Using mobile devices seems to get me auto corrected to hell, thanks greatly to my inability to proofread.

I suppose a general update is in order for my first post in a while.

1) Orthotics are working well, due to delightful redness and rubbing I had them widened recently. this has reduced the pressure on my feet but now lefty has a habit of trapping air on the way up stairs and making......noises.

2) I finished physio, and have now got to continue it through my own devices. I've joined a gym. If you've read my blog, you'll guess that it too has fallen by the way side.  I need to go back, it was making a difference, although I still have a beer gut and one moob.

3) I'm watching TV shows, marathons are the best. They make great background for blogging?

4) I'm working like nobodies business. Some body promoted me.

I'll start trying to update more often, drawing development from posts in the past that needed more review. Also, being able to schedule post should let me blog in one day and have a weeks worth of posts.

Good to be back (until I forget again)

side note: My blogging platforms spell check doesn't recognise the word "blog"

Blogging ain't easy

So' it's been a little while, and I think that will be the rhythm of this blog. Things won't shift and I'll have nothing interesting happen for a while, and then something will happen, or a thought will enter my gormless head and I'll blog.

We all ok with that? Good.

Any, this came from TED talks and it's too good not to share.

Enjoy.

http://youtu.be/_MBiP3G2Pzc

New Cracked.com article

So, I've been reading Cracked articles since about five minutes after I discovered the internet. My friend Charlie sent me a link I'm sure he intended to freak me out with and I simply got engrossed. I love list articles (which I'm sure I've mentioned before, like Listverse).

Their newest list article is about living with Autism. I find it really relatable, except for the sarcasm bit because I use sarcasm regularly to prevent me actually saying nasty things in a nasty fashion. A friend I used to work with said her son hated sarcasm because he really didn't understand it, and I can see why. I often find real praise hard to understand because I can never tell if someone is being genuine or not. 

I suppose I do fall into the charming but not tactful type Hollywood loves, and looking at some of the stats posted about non verbal and low IQ people with autism it is obvious why Hollywood skips the reality and goes for the sugar coated 1%, the ones who seem adorable or sweet in their obsessions and hobbies and can control their screaming melt downs. No one wants to have a comedy or drama ruined by a faeces eating screaming human that many would associate with a horror flick. I guess its hard to portray a rounded character who, without good insight, many " regular people" would find distasteful. Many people with Autism disorder are more difficult to engage with and to build meaningful relationships. They take a more nuanced approach, more unorthodox approach and can have little positive results in return. Often their hobbies and interests aren't the inner workings of speakers, or something that others would consider at least a contribution to humanity, like astrophysics, but more like sheep or colours. 

Even those of us who are higher on the spectrum can have impenetrable hobbies, interests and social lives. With the creation of the internet, nerdom has become cool, mainstream and accepted, at least in the portrayal of Anime, Games conventions and even LARP. On the surface, people now readily accept that Dungeons and Dragons is a game to be enjoyed by all, but when complex math gets involved and we're rolling twenty sided dice and making jokes about 'TEH' (a common internet misspelling of the) it quickly alienates people. If you start waxing lyrical about your level 20 Mage with +69 staff of penetration at a dinner table, you're more likely to get condescending comments. No one needs to know the entire back story to Mrs Marvel, thank you......

The article touches nicely on emotion. I suppose I don't feel much emotion, possibly because I do bottle up what I feel or because, as my partner is currently stipulating, I'm a sociopath (more on that in another post). I do however, get angry. Screaming melt down angry. If the late, rediculously great Sir Terry Pratchett taught me anything (and who didn't learn that Luguage with legs is hilariously funny), it is that anger can be turned into greatness fuel. Stoke your fire with anger and anything is achievable, be it Sir Terry's anger at being told by teachers he'd never write well enough to get published or my own anger engine when I'm told I will never amount to anything. A screaming anger fit can be turned nicely into an hour of rapid productivity. I know that is only me, but still.

As for an autism charity, I've never fulled engaged with the UK one. I guess I don't need their support that much and they have their hands and rescources full trying to help and support those who do need it, so I can't comment on whether or not they view it as a disease to be cured. I know from my own interactions with healthcare there is certainly a focus on helping aspies control more outlandish parts of themselves, as least in public, so that we can fit in. While it might sound a bit eom goth, I think fitting in may not always be what's needed, but it certainly helps streamline the everyday activities of living.

The one thing on the list I haven't touched on is work, because this entire blog seems to stray back to that topic regularly and we don't need to hear more about it now.....

Be safe.