Hello!
Yes, I am still with you, I’ve just been quite busy up here (really). As you may know, I started university in September, the University of Aberdeen to be specific! And I seem to be surviving, which is rather surprising. Granted, I am having about one meltdown a week, but I’m not dying in a hole somewhere so I think I’m doing quite well.
I have done a lot of things that I never thought I would, get drunk (yes I drink now), make a doctors appointment and go to a club (this really surprised me too). I have also met some very lovely people, two of whom are my flatmates. I managed to get such bad freshers flu’ that my flatmates had to call a doctor and take me to A&E (which I’d just like to say thanks again for, you’re awesome). I was okay, by the way, it was just a stomach bug.
Spinning Plates
What came to me earlier this week (which may or may not have been in a drunken haze) is that life is rather like spinning plates. Every responsibility or stress inducing thing is like a plate you have to keep spinning, so one or two plates are fine, but once you get, say, ten you start having problems. Twenty and you’re practically screwed. So, when everything gets too much and you break a plate, you have a meltdown. Currently that means I’m dropping one plate a week. Which got me thinking, what was happening at home? It turns out that I couldn’t even spin the plates at home, and I was just lying in a pile of broken plates. So, breaking one a week is a kind of improvement, right? I may have just got lost in a metaphor… However one meltdown a week is still too many, as it takes about a week to recover. In response I’ve tried to improve my ‘stressed out detector’. I think it’s actually called interoception (maybe?) and there’s a great post by Musings of an Aspie. Though it doesn’t seem to be working, but I’ll keep trying. I hope to be blogging more regularly but I have exams coming up so…
Anyway, I hope you’ve all been well and as always feel free to leave any questions or comments.
Have a good Sunday!
aspiegoggles 
This post was somewhat educational for me since you reference your “meltdowns”, and my AS husband has meltdowns as well. What do you do during a meltdown? You said it takes you a week to recover from a meltdown; what do you do while you are recovering from a meltdown? What do you think causes you the most stress in life?
Hi, thanks for the question. During a meltdown I usually end up on the floor hitting things and making strange noises. After a meltdown I usually have low moods and feel quite tired for a few days, so I try not do too much stuff. At the moment what’s causing the most stress is some of my other flatmates who are being very inconsiderate to everyone else by playing very loud music and messing up the kitchen. But a lot of the time I can’t tell when I’m stressed until it gets very intense so I don’t always know what’s causing it. Hope this is useful.
Hi, thanks for the question. During a meltdown I usually end up on the floor hitting things and making strange noises. After a meltdown I usually have low moods and feel quite tired for a few days, so I try not do too much stuff. At the moment what’s causing the most stress is some of my other flatmates who are being very inconsiderate to everyone else by playing very loud music and messing up the kitchen. But a lot of the time I can’t tell when I’m stressed until it gets very intense so I don’t always know what’s causing it. Hope this is useful.
Thank you for the information. It is useful! When your flatmates play loud music, does it disrupt your sleep and/or your studying? Have you asked them to stop playing loud music?
Sometimes it disrupts my sleep or studying. I and others are always asking them to turn it down but they don’t seem to get the message. We are going to report them this week so hopefully it will get sorted out.