The Greater Good

Spent a long day speaking and sing at Heritage Baptist Church in Manistee, MI. We talked all about our proposed career as missionaries to the Czech. Got home at midnight. The kids are in bed, and Marge and I are winding down with e-mail and facebook.

I'm sitting in her office with her wondering what's making the high pitched wining sound. It could be the lights or maybe it's a bearing going bad on the fan in my laptop or a light in the room.

It's just so cool that I've learned to cope with the rapid change and the many new environments as we are in pre-field ministry before going to the Czech. It's because I have someone greater than my limitations for whom I am working and striving. My relationship with Christ drives me to look for ways to grow and change in my ability to cope so that I can do this stuff that I am called upon to do.

Having something of greater importance than just my needs or my condition is so very key. I think it's important for anyone. Think about it, if my whole life is summed up in my progress toward some unknown level of normalcy or ....what is it we are all trying to get to? Then, My sense of self worth of purpose in life rests on the shaky ground of my own ability to do....what is it Aspies are trying to do?

Seriously. Are we trying to be normal or trying to be better Aspies or trying to simply live a good life. Those are all good things, but they are so self focused that they can easily lead to a "crash and burn." When we are living to serve a great good, or in my case Jesus Christ, then my good days and bad days don't define me. Those are just difficulties on my effort toward a mission that exceeds the sum of my own struggles.

Adam

It's very cool.

Now I Really Believe in Weighted Blankets

When I was planning my trip out here to Oklahoma City, I decided carry on my baggage, so that I wouldn't have to go through the baggage check and pay the extra fees that Northwestern Airlines charges. That also meant that anything I carried on would go through the stringent security check.

So, I left my leg weights behind, as they could look quite suspicious to a secruity person (especially in the post shoe bomber world). I also didn't think that I could fit my clothing AND a twenty pound weighted blanket in my carry on bag.

Consequently, I have spent the week without any sensory integration types of weights. Over the course of this week, I have found that symptoms of chronic pain (tingling in the limbs for one), have begun to return, and I'm less rested. I also feel a sense of controlable agitation that I haven't felt for some time.

I'm looking forword to getting home and getting under my weighted blanket. It really does solve a world of problems. I also have the pet theory that, while at one time I was diagnosed with Fibromialgia, I question if I ever did have it. I think that the Asperger/Autism need for sensory integration along with an intollerance to wheat and dairy contributed to a group of symptoms that seems like firbro.

I still have hip pain, but it's quite managable although fairly constant. The hip pain responds well to physical therapy. Controlling my deitary intake of Glutten and Casein (dairy) protein, and attending to my sensory integration deficit by using a wheighted blanket has revolutionized my health.

If I go back about 10 years, I was a mess. I think it was 10 years. I don't know if it is typical for all Aspies, but my sense of time is not linear. Anyway, the first major change I made was in more intently pursuing a relationship with Jesus Christ. That was the first big change that made all the others possible, and meaningful.

So, I've enjoyed the classes I took here in OKC. I learned about running sound systems. I'm also so looking forward to returning to my family and my weighted blanket.

Adam

Aspies Inc Coffee meeting

Aspies, Inc. Coffee Meeting Thursday 26-Feb-09 at 7pm - Panera Bread 7199 SE 29th St # 113, Oklahoma City - (405) 869-0550

Meet for discussion, support, questions. No admission, just by something to eat or drink from Panera. That way they won't be angry that we are sitting there.

I know, Glutten problems. I won't be buying any bread eiter. Bring a neurotypical so that they can get all exited about Panera bread.

Filter It Out

I'm at this sound system training. As the trainer is talking I'm thinking of all these things I want to say, and I am purposely toss out almost all of it. It's part of the Asperger to have this urge to disgorge every bit of information in your brain about a certain topic.

I'm not sure why that is, but it just is. Problem with that is that it starts to upset other people, who have come to hear what the teacher has to say. So I do two things before I ask a question or make a comment:

1. I ask myself, what is the big idea or the main point that he is moving toward in his teaching. Will my comment add or distract from his main point. If it won't add something, then I really shouldn't say what comes to my mind. It's unfair to be a distraction. Besides, I'm not their to chat, I'm there to learn what is in the teacher's brain. Better to letter the teacher talk and guide the direction of the class. Example: The teacher is describing in general terms how to set a compressor limiter. I want to ask, "Do you like the Behringer compressor? I had one and it only cost $120. That is a distraction from the whole point of the discussion, and the other students don't care what I own. They will just think I'm bragging and trying to look cool. Although, Behringer isn't cool, it's affordable.
2. Is it possible that what I have to ask about is outside the boundaries of this class or will be covered in later material. An overview course, such as "Core Principals of Audio" does not go into detail in any one area. It is a two day introductory course. To ask questions that require great detail in any one area is unfair to other students. Also, if I manage to get the teacher to go into too great a detail, some material will have to be skipped later, because the class has a limited amount of time. If I think the material might be covered later, then I should not ask my question. I might be answered later without me interupting the teacher. If, when the class is over, I have a question that wasn't answered, I can ask the teacher individually.

Another big urge is to tell the teacher things about myself so that I can talk to him. That's unexpected in the neurotypical world. People that talk alot about themselves are viewed as braggers or if they just keep talking and talking then you start seeming creepy.

Just because you feel the urge to talk doesn't mean that you have something meaningful to say. Observer silence as much as possible. Then also watch how cheap other people seem when they try and "talk up" their skills or stuff they own. It's not cool. It just makes you seem childish or like an amature. The real professionals and cool people don't talk as much about themselves, because they don't feel the need to prove that they are valuable people. Assume that you have value and worth, and don't attempt to prove it to anyone by talking. It never works.

Adam

New Place - Can't Hear You

I'm in Oklahoma for audio system training. I'm by myself, staying with a relative of a brother's wife, I've never been in Oklahoma, and I'm doing something not related to missions or tech writing.

Consequently, my mind is racing searching for a rule set to govern my behavior. How should i stand, act, greet, small talk . . . who am I in this place? I have no rule set for this location. Am I supposed to be here?

I stopped for breakfast this morning. My waitress was talking to me, but i just sort of hear this muffled sound. It hurt to talk to her and look at her. Right now, I'm sitting, just to myself, not talking to anyone. I've had a fair amount of coffee, and I feel like hiding in a dark quiet place.

So, when people talk to me I can hear the words, but much of the meaning gets lost as the words wander through my grid searching for a culture in which to place them. This is when I just have to live with getting only part of what I hear, and being happy with ending up, some how, in the right place. By tomorow, I will have better integrated my environment, and won't feel so out of sync.

Aspie Traveler - Am I Actually Doing This?

Today I made it through flight delays and airports, cramped in little airplanes in order to go to sound system training in Oklahoma City. This seams absolutely crazy. It’s an Aspies nightmare. I’ve never been to this city, I’m staying with relatives of my sister-in-law that I haven’t seen in 20 plus years, and it’s all a bunch of unknowns.

I have my sensory defense items:
*Ear plugs to limit the overwhelming sound of plain engines
*Sunglasses for when things are visually overwhelming. It’s not just for when things are too bright either. If I’m in a room full of people and I don’t feel comfortable with what I should do with my eyes, then I put those on and my eyes aren’t a concern any more. Also, when I’m on a plain, the sun glasses make it easier to deal with the way plains can sway and move sometimes.
*Vicks Vapor Rub in the half ounce tin. It easily fits in my pocket. I put it in clear plastic bag with other toiletries for the security check and then put it in a pocket for the flight. My second flight, I was sitting waiting for the plain to take off, when I smelled . . . well it was either body odor or some kind of jet exhaust, but it some body odorish to me. So, I put Vicks in my nose and it masked the smell. The first time you use it, just use a little. It it’s not enough you can always add more.

I didn’t bring my leg weights as they might get taken away during the security check. That’s also why I would never try to carry on a weighted vest. To help calm myself, I have red and deaply pondered the Bible, read a book I enjoy, and now I am writing this text which I will later copy into my blog. These things give me my “constant”. Something is familiar and unchanging in which I can find comfort.

You see, I am bound and determined not to let Asperger shape the course of my life any more than it already does. I will ease it if possible, work around it if necessary, and when useful utilize the gifts that it offers.

So, why Oklahoma City? Well, I have always had an interest in music. I was in the band Sojourn for 15 years, and while in it learned how to run live sound. I’ve had opportunity to instruct church people how to do a good job running sound for worship services, but I’m completely self taught.

I have an opportunity to attend a four day class that covers the basics as well as technical aspects. I want to know this stuff. Through some unexpected funds the opportunity has arisen. It seems crazy to me, and it really has me nervous, but I can’t let that hold me back.
My core belief is that God is the creator of all people, fashioning each one. My Asperger, while not ideal from my viewpoint, is not a mistake from God’s viewpoint. That means that I have a responsibility to use the life God has given me and always work to make the most of it. It’s such a priceless gift, and God is such a kind giver, how can I let my Asperger hold me back?

Adam

Accomidations at Work?

A reader recently asked me about asking for accomidations at work:

As an adult Aspie who worked for a major pharmaceutical corporation, I never initially asked for acomidations. That said, I had an excellent reputation and once I was diagnosed my employer made some accomidations informally.

1. Some one with whom to check my perceptions. I was able to go to my boss and a coworker and ask questions about social rules or what certain e-mails meant. Such as the e-mail from the CEO asking everyone to help the new VP of sales feel welcome. I took it to my boss and asked if the CEO really expected us to do anything or if the CEO was making "happy noise". I would also swing by my coworkers cubicle to check how I should respond to certain things (i.e. e-mail, phone call, ignore the comment).

2. Headphones. If you have a desk job in an office environment get headphones so that when you are trying to concentrate you can have something that masks out other sound.

3. My coworkers new that I brought a book or something to fiddle with to every meeting. If meetings were to slow or boring I would get agitated. Thank God for laptops and wireless internet. If a meeting leader would challenge me, my coworkers would step in. I really was in an ideal situation. People were curious about my condition, supportive (Pfizer is big on inclusion), and I was doing good work accept for the occasional Aspie goof. If you have one of those smart phones that allow you to access facebook or to blog or something, you couls set it on your lap so others couldn't quite see it, and then you could fiddle with that.

4. I live by sunglasses. They really help cut glair if you have the right kind. They can also help the discomfort of making eye contact. They need to be light enough so that people can see your eyes. Yes, I used to where them inside if I felt I needed to. Not alot though. Interestingly, most people would assume they were transition lesnses that weren't clearing up for some reason.

5. I also had coworkers that would proof my documents for spelling and gramar.The thing is this, If you are good at what you do and people value your work, they will put up with all sorts of things. They will consider you skilled, but eccentric. Especially if you are an easy person with whom to work. That said, I built the reputation first over several years. What does the Aspie need that would keep him/her from successfully completing the work? That is a better question. The other question is, what is the marketable talent this Aspie has? If an employer wants what you have, they will make accomodations so that can have it.

Adam

Aspies, Inc Meeting Thursday 26-Feb-09 7pm

For anyone in Oklahoma City, I'll be at the Panera Bread on 7199 SE 29th St # 113 at 7pm on Thursday 26-February-2009. The phone number for the Panera is (405) 869-0550.

I'm going to be in OK City for some classes, so this is a chance to meet some parents and be an encouragement. Usually, I get the question, "Do you remember when you were [name an age]? How did you...." Happy to answer any question.

I'm not a credentialed expert, but I've lived it to a degree.

No charge, just buy something to eat and drink so Panera will be happy. I'll be wearing a dark green sweater and a black baseball cap. I might even have the sunglasses on. It depends how nervous I am.

Adam

Speaking at a Conference Near You?

You know about two years ago, I got opportunities to speak on Asperger Syndrome at some conferences and meetings. About four different times. The smallest group was about ten adults, the largest group was closer to 150.

Leading up to each event, I would get all worked up, wondering why I had agreed to this. I would try to document every word I was going to say, but toss each script. In the end I had either some well documented notes or a few scraps of paper.

As I was sitting and waiting to go on, I could feel something in me switch on: like an engine warming up. Then I would step behind the podium, and that something would click, and as if out of nowhere I would have all this stuff to say.

In the last year or so, I've been speaking quite a bit at churches. Different topic. I started to document my presentation less. I've noticed that I work best with a broad outline on paper and then some good ideas in my head. The presentation, sermon, or speech begins to do itself in my head over and over in the days leading up to the event.

When I get up to speak, the sermon, presentation or speech sort of makes itself, and I sit and watch. It's always very visual. I can see and hear what I'm talking about.

I don't know if I'm that good of a public speaker, but it's a remarkable experience. I have noticed that audience reaction to my Asperger presentations is one of enlightenment and hope. That's really cool. Honestly, there's a lot of hope in this world, we just can't see it for what it is.

I'm not scheduled at any more Asperger conferences, but I'd be happy to speak at some more.

But, the point of this blog entry is that I'm wondering if there are other Aspies that have an intuitive ability. It could be music, speaking, drawing . . . something which just sort of gushes out from an unseen place. Maybe as parents of Aspies we can benefit our children, but gently encouraging and feeding that gift, even if the gift doesn't seem to fit our expectation of something with good career prospects.

When I was five, who would have thought that my talking too much could turn into a career, at best, or at least a side job. But as a 43 year old unemployed Technical Writer, I'm sitting here thinking that writing is not my strongest skill. Speaking to and motivating groups is. I don't know how to turn that into any kind of temporary income, but I'm wiser to keep it in mind.

Adam

Aspie / Fibro Connection - Encore Posting

A May 2007 posting has gotten three comments (most of any posting so far). I am reposting it here with the comments, and some more of my ideas. If you have ideas, questions, thoughts about it, please post them at the comments link. Once in the comments section you are also free to respond to others comments.

I review all comments prior to them being included.
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MAY 2007


Aryeh Abeles, MD and other contributing doctors have authored research recently published in the Annals of Internal Medicine. The study put forth the notion that Fibromyalgia sufferers have a lower pain threshold. Maybe it's better to say that they have a greater sensativity to everything. Maybe Fibromyalgia sufferers sensory defensive.



Having recenly been reading the book "Too Loud, Too Bright, Too Fast, Too Tight: What to Do If You Are Sensory Defensive in an Overstimulating World", I started wondering if there is a connection between the overstimulated state of our Aspie brains and the existance of chronic pain. I wonder if Aspies have more occurance of Fibromyalgia and other similar conditions? This is a very short post. Just posing the question, curious of what anyone else is thinking?

-----------------------------------

Here are the comments:

Chosenlast said...
I'm an Aspie with fibromylagia. I think the link between the two disorders is chronic stress. Over half of those with Asperger's Syndrome also suffer from stress, anxiety and depression. It's strongly suspected that the hormone imbalance caused by stress, causes neural changes that lead to fibromylagia.Since neither the cause of Asperger's, nor the cause of fibromylagia are known, its unlikely the biochemistry of the link will be worked out in my lifetime.

Susanf said...
Don't know if anyone is still following this thread. Geneticists have found problems in Asbergers with a specific molecule (SERT) whose job it is to vacuum up extra serotonin. In the variation, the SERT molecule gets turned up extra loud and doesn't respond to the bodies signals to shut back down - and vacuums away too much serotonin. This mechanism is a target for both drugs for Asberger's and Fibromyalgia - and a lot of other diseases that happen when the body gets too little serotonin in the right places. HTH.-Susan

KiKi said...
Don't know if anyone is following this, but it's interesting. I have Fibromyalgia and have been reading about autism for my work...and I have a low tolerance for noise, lights, smells, and small irritations. Very interesting.

The Silent Core

Here is a poem (or is it lyrics) that I wrote in 2003. It's about Asperger. Not everything, but the rich inner visual landscape of the Aspie mind that is both a gift and burden.

THE SILENT CORE
© 2003 Adam Parmenter

Locked inside the silent core
Little escapes
The relentless embrace of
The inner mind
So alive
On the inside
Worlds, unseen, bloom and wane
Beyond the reach of
Hands & smiles
If they only knew
The miles & miles
I’ve journeyed alone
Song unknown
Stories untold
Yearning to break free
To be known & seen
From the silent core

Adam

People With Autism Make Rational Decisions

According to Medical News Today, "People with autism-related disorders are less likely to make irrational decisions, and are less influenced by gut instincts, according to research funded by the Wellcome Trust. "

Find the full article at this link.

Lately, I have been "grieving", as it were, over my lack of emotion. Emotional situations become very disturbing, grief leaks out slowly over time, and I wish I could experience emotions as the neurotypicals do. I'm not even sure what that means.

I have discovered that, for me personally, my emotions will come out in a song. For me, everything is a song. Music is a gateway into my emotions that I can't get to through the typical route. I wrote an instrumental song just after my father died. It's called "Kiss Upon The Brow". The last time I saw my father alive, I gave him a kiss on the forehead. That mix of emotions came out in a melody. It is with me forever.

The same happens with lyrics or when I paint. I guess I understand now what people mean when they say they must "express themselves". Do they mean what I mean? I suppose it is wise for me to set aside expressive time in my week so that I'm able to create and capture those emotions.

Now that I'm unemployed and working from my basement, I have music playing at a suitable volume. It makes me feel calm and focused. I used to think that it helped just because it kept me distracted from the noise in my brain. Maybe it is the emotional subtext that I need. Perhaps music for me is the emotional equivalent of crutches for a guy with a broken leg?

I'm no neurologist, so I only have guesses and intuition.

Speaking of intuition. The article noted above makes it sound like people in the Autism Spectrum don't have intuition. That may be true, but I experience intuition for many or most of my decisions. I start with intuition and work back to logic. My version of intuition is devoid of emotion though. My intuition space is filled with timeless principals for living. When confronted with a decisions there is a part of my brain that queries through these principals (i.e. procedures), and reacts first based on a principal. Perhaps that's not really intuition.

Principal led living seems better to me than intuition, but my wife makes decisions based on emotion and intuition and does just as good of a job as I do. In fact she and I share the most important principals for our lives. Hers seem to encoded into both an emotional part of her brain as well as a logical part.

O.K., this post is rambling. I apologize if you were hoping for wise advise. Just some musing today.

Adam

In The Corner Of A Round Room

As an Aspie I rely so very much on certain things in the world being predictable. I often don’t even realize it. So think for a moment about a hospital. They are terribly comforting places and it’s often easy to get lost. However, one can expect a series of hallways, waiting rooms, and nurses stations. Usually this is oriented in squares or rectangles. Sometimes there is a rotunda that joins two wings, the designers hoping to bring in something other than a clinical feel, but typically it goes back to lots of 90 degree edges and straight lines.

The Native American museum in Washington D.C. is a something different entirely. The designers of that building were seeking to achieve a very organic aesthetic. The building is a series of sweeping curves. Successive floors of the building don’t necessarily line up neatly with one another, but instead the whole building has an undulation like the gently rolling hills of the great plains. Some walls are stucco and some are made of flag stone or brick. The curves and variety of forms all combine to say, “this is not an institution.”

This all brings me to Goshen hospital. I visited my dad there as he was recovering from surgery. It appears that some attempt was made to achieve an aesthetic similar to the Native American Museum with Goshen Hospital, or at least parts of it. So the main entry area is a swoops and curves, the walls are of rock in one place and different materials in others. That threw me a little. I think it was a remodeled entry, because once I got back toward the elevators it was back to straight halls.

What really threw me was the patient rooms. Typically there is a square area with a nurses station. Instead the nurses station was in the center of a . . . well I think the idea was that it would be a circle, but all the walls were straight. It was sort of like the Pentagon, but with more like ten sides. A decagon? As you can imagine, the center of a circle or decagon is smaller than the outside (my apologies to all you geometry experts for the way I worded that). With the patient rooms on the perimeter of this decagon, each patient room was roughly wedge shaped. Like a slice of pie.

Pie sounds really good right now, but walking into that room I felt like a had just entered Picasso. So not only am I emotionally charged from visiting my father who is recovering from surgery, but my conceptual brain is working in over drive trying to get the wall of the room to straighten into a rectangle shape. It was all I could do to not start rocking back and forth. I really wanted to stand in a quiet corner, but there weren’t any.

Corners are comforting because they are distinct and strong and fixed. Corners don’t breath in and out, or shift and shimmer. This building had no quiet corners that I could stand in. Instead the walls in the patient rooms drifted out, the hall outside drunkenly careened in dizzy circles, and the entry of the hospital was trying desperately to be the American prairie.

That really freaked me out.

Bite Marks Are Bad (in food that is)

I had two pieces of gluten free banana bread this morning for breakfast. My wife makes it now and then. This morning I noticed, again, that I don't like the round bite marks left in the previously rectangular bread and feel compelled to bite the tips off so that the bread is returned to its roughly rectangular shape.



I'm the same way with a sandwich (don't get many of them these days) or any square food item. The bite mark seems chaotic and disorderly.


I can only guess that there is a part of the brain that identifies the general shape and properties of a piece of bread as being rectangular or square and another part of the brain that assigns meaning to the bite mark. There are probably still other sections that develop texture, color, etc. All these elements a some how combined by another part of the brain and then forwarded to the frontal lobe so that it can decide what I think "about" it.


In a neurotypical brain, a bite mark in food would usually mean nothing unless you hadn't started eating your food yet. Then it would be a problem, especially if the waiter just set it down in front of you supposedly fresh from the kitchen. Then the executive function of your brain would raise an alarm that some one else had taken a bite out of your food, and would set off a cascade of other reactions.


So, I think it goes back to the whole sensory integration. I'm guessing that because those of us in the Autism spectrum have a deficit when it comes to integration, that the something isn't getting combined and forwarded correctly to the decision making part of the brain. So, while that bite mark isn't alarming, it is vaguely disquieting. I even out the edges and it feels right again (of course then I feel just a little neurotic).


Perhaps the message that the bite mark belongs to me is lost in processing. I have a memory of biting the bread and eating it, yet the perhaps the visual image of the bite mark has not been integrated with the other sensory and cognitive memories of biting and eating. So, I know it's my bite mark, but there is a missing "green flag" and it makes me feel a bit uneasy.

Just some guessing based on what little I've read about brain function.


Adam

Why Isn't THAT Funny?

I was sitting in a staff meeting at work and one of my colleagues announced the new corporate IT policy that your laptop computer would follow you where ever you go. It used to be that if you changed departments you had to leave you computer with the other department and got a new computer in the next department. Now the computer transfers with you.

But when he said, "Your computer follows you wherever you go, I pictured this little computer floating along just behined my shoulder. At first it's convenint, but then it gets on my nerves because it's always there. So, I laughed and said, "It sounds like some kind of corporate drug trip." No one laughed.

But later when another guy was talking about something mundaine having to do with the family cat, everyone burst out laughing. What is it with humor and neurotypicals. They get a bigger charge out of laughing at each others mundain stuff, but can't laugh at the odd or nonsequeter.

I still don't understand neurotypicals. They don't get edgy funny stuff.

Adam

Syncronisation Disconnect

A new study published in the Journal of Social Neuroscience explores the mechanism for understanding social cues and the "disconnect" within the autistic brain. According to the study, inefficient pathways for transmitting information between certain brain regions are to blame.

"The communication between the frontal and posterior areas of the social brain network is impaired in autism, making it difficult to understand the intentions of others" said the study's senior author, Marcel Just, the D.O. Hebb Professor of Psychology at Carnegie Mellon.

The study is the first to measure the synchronization between the brain areas that make up the Theory of Mind (ToM) network, which is responsible for processing the intentions and thoughts of others. It is the first to provide such concrete evidence of faulty social network connections.

Some interesting new research:

New evidence shows that the brains of adults with autism are "wired" differently from people without the disorder, and this abnormal pattern of connectivity may be responsible for the social impairments that are characteristic of autism.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, a team of researchers affiliated with the University of Washington's Autism Center also found that the most severely socially impaired subjects in the study exhibited the most abnormal pattern of connectivity among a network of brain regions involved in face processing.

"This study shows that these brain regions are failing to work together efficiently," said Natalia Kleinhans, a research assistant professor of radiology and lead author of the paper published in the journal Brain. "Our work seems to indicate that the brain pathways of people with autism are not completely disconnected, but they are not as strong as in people without autism."

Source: Joel Schwarz
University of Washington

The Plant People

There is a thought structure that I've noticed in myself and in my daughter. It's a tendency to anthropomorphise objects. That is to ascribe human feelings to some objects.



When I was a teen living at home, I had a dresser with a large mirror on it. on the mirror I had taped pictures of all of my good highschool and church camp friends. When I got dressed in the morning I felt compelled to stand in my closet to get dressed or to cover the pictures. I knew that they were people, but the photos did have eyes, and it didn't quite seem right to get dressed in front of them.



I also remember as a child, when I had to erase a word on a school assignment, that I felt bad for the letters that were being erased. You know, letters want to be put to work on a page. It's why they exist. I eventually decided that the eraser was sucking the letters back into the pencil, and placing those letters in un-employment until such time that there was a word that required their services. That's a little better, but unpleasant if that particular letter has a wife and kids. That can be rough. I blame my kindergarten teacher a little for that one, because when we were learning our letters each one had a personality. There were even stories about the letters doing things together, getting into arguments, or being friends. That was supposed to help us learn our letters, but it just imprinted on my mind that letters have feelings too.

Once when my daughter was young some came to me with a moral dilemma. The end had broken off of her pencil. I said, "Just through it in the trash can." She said, "I can't. I named it." Big problem. If you have a name, then you certainly have feelings. I said, "You know, that bit of pencil wants to go in the trash. The little trash can is like a bus. Eventually the bus will take it to this wonderful resort village where all of his friends are. It's the junk yard resort. They love it there." Problem solved for a little Aspie girl.

So that brings me to this past weekend. A good friend of our family has an over abundance of decorative grasses and ferns in our back yard. So I spent two days chopping some of these plants out of her yard and transplanting them into our back yard.

Often when you move a plant it looks quite wilted. Also, it's important that when you transplant it you give it plenty of support by mounding up the soil around its base. Without thinking I referred the plants as being upset at being moved. I told my son to plant them deep enough and mound the soil up around enough so that the plants were happy. Of course some of the stems got snapped in the process, and for some I chopped the plant in half to spread it out or fit in in a spot. They all looked quite unhappy on Saturday. Sunday I fared a little better, but still I chopped and moved plants essentially against their wills, and they didn't look entirely comfortable with the idea.

So last night I had a horrific dream that I was making these people go stand in my back yard, and that I also was giving some of them a chop with a machete. There was no blood shed in the dream, but I awoke wondering what kind of monster I had become that I would dream such things.

Thankfully, I quickly realised that all those unhappy people are the ferns and grasses in the back yard. At that point at 2am in the night was one of those times when I hated being Aspie.

Adam

Music Used To Explore The Autistic Brain's Emotion Processing

14 May 2008 Music has a universal ability to tap into our deepest emotions. Unfortunately, for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), understanding emotions is a very difficult task. Can music help them? Thanks to funding from the GRAMMY Foundation Grant Program, researchers at UCLA are about to find out. Individuals with ASD have trouble recognizing emotions, particularly social emotions conveyed through facial expressions - a frown, a smirk or a smile. This inability can rob a child of the chance to communicate and socialize and often leads to social isolation. In an innovative study led by Istvan Molnar-Szakacs, a researcher at the UCLA Tennenbaum Center for the Biology of Creativity, music will be used as a tool to explore the ability of children with ASD to identify emotions in musical excerpts and facial expressions. "Music has long been known to touch autistic children," Molnar-Szakacs said. "

Studies from the early days of autism research have already shown us that music provokes engagement and interest in kids with ASD. More recently, such things as musical memory and pitch abilities in children with ASD have been found to be as good as or better than in typically developing children." In addition, he said, researchers have shown that because many children with ASD are naturally interested in music, they respond well to music-based therapy. But no one has ever done a study to see if children with ASD process musical emotions and social emotions in the same way that typically developing children do. In this study, Molnar-Szakacs will use "emotional music" to examine the brain regions involved in emotion processing. "Our hypothesis is that if we are able to engage the brain region involved in emotion processing using emotional music, this will open the doorway for teaching children with ASD to better recognize emotions in social stimuli, such as facial expressions."

The overarching goal of the study, of course, is to gain insights about the causes of autism. Molnar-Szakacs will use neuroimaging - functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI - to look at and compare brain activity in ASD children with brain activity in typically developing kids while both groups are engaged in identifying emotions from faces and musical excerpts.

"The study should help us to better understand how the brain processes emotion in children with autism; that, in turn, will help us develop more optimal interventions," Molnar-Szakacs said. "Importantly, this study will also help us promote the use of music as a powerful tool for studying brain functions, from cognition to creativity." Approximately 15 children with ASD, ranging in age from 10 to 13, will participate in the study, which is being conducted under the auspices of the Help Group-UCLA Autism Research Alliance. The alliance, directed by UCLA's Elizabeth Laugeson, is an innovative partnership between the nonprofit Help Group, which serves children with special needs related to autism, and the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, and is dedicated to enhancing and expanding ASD research. The project is also being conducted in collaboration with Katie Overy, co-director of the Institute for Music in Human and Social Development at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. "The hope, of course, is that this work will not only be of scientific value and interest, but most of all, that it will translate into real-life improvements in the quality of the children's lives," Molnar-Szakacs said.

Source: Mark Wheeler University of California - Los Angeles

Hit and Miss

We've eased my children off of some meds. I've also cut back on mine (read this post). I had cut my SSNRI completly to nothing, but with a number of added stressors, I've gone back to taking two thirds of the prescribed dose. Fortunatley, I have a doctor who is willing to listen and discuss. I told him to give me the presecription in pills that equal one third the dose so that I can vary timing and amount.

Well, once again, my employer is restructuring and cutting, my wife had outpatient surgery and the demands of missionary pre-field can also be stressing. So, my pain levels had gone way up (happens in the spring anyway), and going back the SSNRI seemed to help.

I originally was prescribed the SSNRI for chronic pain associated with mild fibromyalgia. As always I put in my disclaimer: I'm not a doctor nor healthcare professinal. Don't use this blog to diagnose nor treat illness. This is just my story. Maybe it will give you something to think about.

There are two SSNRIs that I know of that are on the market:
Lyrica
Cymbalta

Lyrica is a follow-on drug to Neurontin. A follow-on drug is when a company takes one of their own successful medications and attempts to re-engineer it to reduce side effect or improve efficacy. Neurontin was never approved for fibromyalgia (nor until recently were any drugs), but it was found to help. Doctors have the freedom to prescribe meds "off label".

Neurontin was effective but was found to make people sleapy and dizzy. I have found that Lyrica did not have that effect on me. I took part in a trial to gain FDA approval to use Lyrica for treating fibro, but I didn't like the way it made me feel.

I find the other SSNRI is easier for me to tolerate. Don't take my word as law though. There are whole message boards with people screaming about the nasty side effects of Cymbalta.

Keep in mind that both these drugs have wide application and broad dosing. I know a man who is on 20 mg of Cymbalta a day. My prescibed dose is for 60, but I typically only take 20.

How did these drugs help me? In both cases, I had less pain, but still had some pain. However, on both of them I noticed that I was better able to focus and tune things out. I had less repetative thinking, and my mood was more stable. Both drugs have something of a stimulating effect to varying degrees. I have taken Ritalin off and on throughout my adult life to help deal with major transitions or when I suffered from Chronic fatigue. Yikes, when I changed dosages or stopped, look out mood swings. My son took Stratera for several years. Now that he is home schooling, he is completely off of that. He had some side effects both going on and off of that med. So, for me, the Cymbalta has been just enough of the Ritalin benefit along with changes in diet and life style.

The title of this blog is "Hit and Miss". What I'm pointing to hear is that keep your eyes open for different treatments and new drugs, and be willing to carefully try new things. Always research first, but you may find that you can reduce or eliminate some medications when using other treatments such as diet, excercise, and nutrition. If your doctor won't talk about reducing meds and doesn't want to help with that. Find a doctor who will. You need to be able to safely try new things.

Aspie is with you for life. The drugs you take now might be with you for the rest of your life, but they might not have to be permanent.

Adam