Reflections on past incidents

This week I've been reminded of some of the distance I've travelled following the start of this blog and a number of events in my life that were very traumatic for me following my second best friends feeling overwhelmed by people demand their services for free just cos she's popular.

Much of that reminding came through recall of the incidents in trying to explain something however imperfectly about what I learned from them that helped me move past that may be of some use or comfort that even thinking about upset me.

Some of my thoughts and my problems around those events were that I never really processed them emotionally so much as attempted to stick them in the (emotional) trash can so they were hanging around and finding myself by accident processing them this week helped in drawing a line under what had happened.

I saw a site that had go in for some really heavyweight verbal abuse and liable at that time have people post on it this week that actually they never had an issue with me and some saying they didn't understand why it had all started in the first place when at the time it had left me feeling very frightened, vulnerable and even wanting to take my life.

I remembered all too well the nervous breakdown from 2006/7 when I had a very important community role with financial and other responsibilities where it was I was being left with essential tasks others with greater abilities  and non of my 'adult' functioning problems while willing left me alone to deal with them and a public who expected way too much.

Autism is very much like that when it comes to just how people treat some of us, damned if we do, damned if we don't, they tell us they aren't mind readers but they also don't want to be told cos they feel that's patronizing.

With regret I came to the conclusion problem was non-austic peoples presumption in favour of their own ideas not wishing to be open others and recognizing they themselves often mix-message which makes it hard to know just what they are thinking.

That was the moment I had to ungrow up and acknowledge a painful truth, that the era of pretend and masking needed to stop because functionally I was at the level and abilities of a child and simply could not cope with the sort of adult responsibilities such roles expected of me.

As  one employed person of said organization whose name I won't mention on the internet said "I really had to shield and protect him (me) from what he was expected to do and cope  with".

I left them with a excellent testimonial thanks to that person for what I had managed to do and started to work on rebuilding the links to my Inner Child and in time letting her out, feeling more at ease of being the chronological adult who is child in all other respects with same needs and interests.

I moved forward in my life by embracing and moving back to the past - my past and being the child I am.

Uniforms

Source: albert prendergast ltd.

Sometimes it seems as much as the modernists argue against the whole concept of uniform, the fundamentals of how a school uniform can look good on your do show though such as short trousers and the V neck sweater revealing your tie.

While it is a pity turn over socks with coloured bands can be hard to find when  they match it is just amazing so are something I like to be put in to although many still hold to lace up shoes.

It is more possible to get a exact fit through lace tying than velcro having had both but for me the ability to fasten velcro myself is more of aid enabling greater indepedence of the sort where you can just "go out and play" without having to find someone to fasten your laces.

These days you can get footy boots that don't need tying too which would of helped no end back in the day.

 
Face it: You look smart in it, one reason I preferred the schools I attended that had them as somehow casual is seldom worn with any real sense of style.

Thoughts on recovery

I wasn't too great on Friday so it is a bit of a catch up session as I type this and the other blogs out this weekend.

At one level that is easier than it use to be for being out of the workforce with it's routine of phoning in sick, arranging a return day and the meeting with a supervisor to start your return gradually only to find that work has built up over that period.

It tended to be 50/50 if your colleagues worked with you to get through it or if they felt having come back you could jolly well sort it yourself. 

These days you'll most probably seen me at home more like this sprawled across a chair or sofa, on tablets and pretty much out of it looking every inch a traditional school boy with his seventiestastic short short trousers minus much of the adult say and responsibilities, being cared for in exchange for doing what he's told.

The come down has been overall better for me because I can manage situations better for being treated as a boy feeling less of a hindrance going through meeting cycles every three weeks apart from having less on my mind so I am less likely to develop sessions where I may be ill for a week or so.

Not being seen as fully adult also means both I don't get "dumped" on emotionally nor expected to do things which are problematic for me but receive more the guidance and support of a boy in the community.  I know they are there for me.

I'm comfortable with this exchange.

Of Tumblr and stuff

 There are a couple of topics I feel like addressing this week.

The first being the olderboygreyshorts3 tumblr was started a fair while back but it has a number of inherent issues that make blogging on it difficult, nearly all going back to this sites actions with the account.

In short order they are:

Inability to post on the main Tumblr with statement invalid tumblrlog showing even though there are three posts on it and I can alter the avatar.

Inability to delete the main and with it the account to restart.

Limited functions on the usable secondary Tumblrs that doesn’t include being able to like from it, like I’d rather of had this as my main which would of made more sense.

Because of  the first, it is difficult to block posts on the secondaries using the normal techniques  so you have to manually copy and paste details to the blocklist. That is tedious.

Because of this and the content is duplicated on pasttimesforever10 with more followers on a separate account I plan to discontinue this Tumblr by next weekend.

Thus this weeks posts will be the winding down ones before it is paused.

The second is post two of what I call reference photographs by which I mean pictures that do encapsulate how mentally I see me which is more problematic on Tumblr (and why we have blogs!).

I saw this which was "conversion" from long trousers on a blog but was not to happy with how they had got the colours so redid it so in a way it's my edit of an edit.

This is the closest yet to how I see the schoolboy side of me with a boy looking more around the eleven mark but as we all know some boys always looked older and others younger for being around the same age.

It's the look I emulate.

The other is the Cub me, around 10 so heading towards being moved up to Scouts but enjoying his remaining time, exercising responsibility in looking after the younger members, helping Akela out feeling confident, loving an adventure.

This how the LB side of is more at.

School dress from past decades

Children's clothes especially school wear from the past have  always fascinated me.

This is very much 1971, familiar to anyone who read the school based stories popular from that era whose illustrations would be like this such as pre 1970's Enid Blyton. and around six terms after joining the Infants myself

The simplicity of it is what strikes me with a jumper or cardigan over a top with tie even if it might of been elasticated for us with short short trousers for us and either a grey skirt or pinafore dress for girls.

I find it interesting two are wearing red  rather than grey.

What I normally wear is very much the modern version and targeted more toward Infant and Juniors reflecting the changed attitude that saw as we entered the seventies high school boys going straight to long trousers which I did and still loath with a passion

Triggered and trying to pick up the pieces.

The week was due to end on something on high and anyone that read the post on Friday  on the other blog may well of been forgiven for thinking that  as I looked at how over the years I had actually developed and as a result of that the blog had reflected those changes in me.

Some of those things included people who were going to have a more parental input in my life to help me better manage it because I was struggling with it providing guidance.

 It's perfectly true to say emotionally and psychologically, many of us carry some baggage around with although for most it's something they have control over but for some of us it goes much deeper than that.

You might think you have it safely contained where it doesn't cause you any problems however this sort of traumatic events can jolt you back back very much in that moment reliving those raw terrifying emotions, freezing you, leaving you shaking badly.

For me personally I do go 'mute' in stressful situations, I stare out oblivious to what is going on around, I just shut down and curl up. It's a vulnerability I have to live with when I'm so overwhelmed I can't act to look after myself.

That's what makes a triggering episode like the one I had on Thursday really bad bring back painful memories of witnessing verbal abuse and physical violence at home and of inappropriate physical contact outside of it. It goes that much deeper than just something you'd rather never happened.

I supposed in a way it had to happen at a site very much for adults because with my mixture of learning/developmental disabilities I don't really slot into sites well because I do need generally a higher degree of moderation and 'hand holding' than most sites expressly for adults offer but either that sites that do are strictly under 18 or more general ones where some topics would (understandably)  be off limits.

What I need more - an more older kid style of site -  but for over 18's doesn't exist.

It just happened that in innocuously questioning a part of the main site entrance,  it opened up discussion things that directly triggered emotions from those experiences that left me shaking in my tummy  just even typing it.

I just feel at the moment typing this I need  to try to get this under some control and a part of that is to take a break from the site in question until I feel ready to log back in seeing posts without all these memories flooding back.

I think the whole topic that lead to this needs to resolved, "put to bed" so the thread and everything in it can just float away or be closed off.

For me at some point when I feeling better than I am presently, I would like to work toward some permanent closure  with the individuals concerned and  not just from a personal point of view  that's obviously a very important for me but also for them to try to work through their feelings on what happened and how it's left things.

To me it is that within my limitations, I do need when I'm better to resolve all of this in a mature way rather than just avoiding people who I did really like and mostly likely never saw where things would end up.

Something for the road

It is hard to believe we are in Spring not least with the recent very windy and cool temperatures most recently.

Getting out always was the thing when I was younger be that to the informal what today they'd call unstructured rustic play areas with grass and a few trees dotted about where in the absence of play equipment we created our "play" in our heads, running around, kicking a ball in the street or going to park which in those pre subsidence works tended to be muddy and sinking in the middle.

The other kind of out tended to involve short car journeys where we'd pull up play for a bit before having a packed lunch and a rest to let your dinner go down.

It wasn't uncommon for us to bring comics, magazines and books with us from the ever popular I Spy series to the "Observer book of..." series that you might read in the car but more often just resting by a tree on your picnic throw and whicker basket with the food and drink in feeling carefree.

That was how this thing was with us.