quirks

Day 222: The Belly of A Star

| Aspergers Girls

Things That Made Me Smile Today:

1. I Am the Belly of A Star

I found the original person’s name who wrote the following quote that has been circulating around social media pages; and then found the person’s promotional Facebook page. And I liked what I found. By the way, by the author’s account, NASA plagiarized his words below; that makes me feel like a kindred spirit. Not that NASA has stolen any of my work, yet. But they do do research on alien life, right? (hehe: I wrote do-do.)

“Consider that you can see less than 1% of the electromagnetic spectrum and hear less than 1% of the acoustic spectrum. As you read this, you are traveling at 220 km/sec across the galaxy. 90% of the cells in your body carry their own microbial DNA and are not “you.” The atoms in your body are 99.9999999999999999% empty space and none of them are the ones you were born with, but they all originated in the belly of a star. Human beings have 46 chromosomes, 2 less than the common potato. The existence of the rainbow depends on the conical photoreceptors in your eyes; to animals without cones, the rainbow does not exist. So you don’t just look at a rainbow, you create it. This is pretty amazing, especially considering that all the beautiful colors you see represent less than 1% of the electromagnetic spectrum.” –Sergio Toporek

File:Starsinthesky.jpg
image from Wikipedia

2. Superb Self-Awareness

I admitted to myself that my fixation to blog has turned into a fixation to prepare my son’s homeschool curriculum; and laughing at the fact, that beyond eating and sleeping, all I did today was research. I can plan a month’s worth of curriculum and lesson plans in two days. Yes, I am that good…or quirky…or driven…or crazed. You pick. I don’t care.

Excellent Source: www.learner.org

3. Happy Babies

In the little time I stopped obsessing over homeschool, I found this twin baby video someone had shared on Facebook…..oh….this is joy.  I could feasibly be one of the first 20,000 people to see what is soon to have a million plus views! I’m always the last to know! Not this time.

4. Appreciating What Happens In Between

I took two long hot showers today: one before my massage and one after. Yes!

5. Accepting my Circumstances with Grace and Gratitude

I ate out and had a not so fun reaction body-wise (yes, body is wise to not want chemicals in food). And was on the couch (researching) most of the day. But I didn’t put myself down about my lack of vigor, my fatigue and lingering pain. Instead, I rolled with the flow, and reminded myself of the source: food. And reminded myself how lucky I am to have a husband who never complains when I am on the couch, and who even cleaned the whole of the kitchen. And no, I don’t fake my fatigue to get the kitchen cleaned, but the thought has crossed my mind.

6. Knowing I AM…the ant that moves the  rubber tree plant!

I read (and cried over) a comment a reader left for me under this link on Female Traits which reminded me of why I continue to post. Why despite my fatigue, mood swings, sometimes lack of confidence, and various distractions (euphemism for fixations), I will continue to share with authenticity and high-hopes.

7. No Longer Driven to Take Photos of ME

After several months, I do not have the need to post a photo of myself! I finally figured out what I look like. Yes, I still see myself in parts, but I’ve put the parts together into a makeshift puzzle, glued the pieces together onto cardboard, and hanged a copy in my mind. I’m fairly certain I’m a bendy doll with over-sized alien eyes, elven ears, hair with its own intelligence and stubbornness, and a smile that is still searching for a home, but will always keep knocking.  Yep, that sounds about right.

8. I Have Lost the Angst

Since May I’ve had an ache in my…oh, I better delete this number, as to not depress my husband. Those of you who need to know, see  My Aching Loins.

9. Texting my Son

I pretended to be my teenage son’s girlfriend (obviously he knew I wasn’t) and sent him a text reminding him that his mom (that’s me) wanted him to get off the Xbox game system he was playing downstairs. I am upstairs, and like I mentioned, couch-bound. He texted back “??????What???????” I texted: “Poor Guy.” Then he texted, or at least I thought he texted: “Um, I’m not even close to ten.” And I thought, wow, he really is a Leo, with that witty bite. He thinks I am immature. That I act like a ten-year-old. I felt a tinge of guilt for being so quirky and odd, and was thinking of how to apologize, when I reread his text. It read: “Um, its not even close to ten.” So I’d misread the clock and his text. But my son didn’t make fun of me! At least not like when I told him I purposely got this temporary second brain tattoo just to embarrass him on our son and mother outing.

10. Rediscovering Galileo

There is some language in this one. I think my thirteen year old would like to be homeschooled at this speed and with this language. This is my competition. Oh, boy!

Remembering Galileo. Remembering my favorite song Galileo by my favorite band (in the 90’s) The Indigo Girls. Remembering I dragged my boyfriend to an Indigo Girls’ concert on a hot August day. Remembering that we squeezed our way through a sweaty thick crowd to get a better view of the band. Remembering I started to look around. Remembering there were only women. Remembering all the women were kissing super close. Remembering that my boyfriend looked at me and said, “You do know that the band members are lesbian? Right?” And me, with my eyes growing wide, asking, “Really?”

Did I mention, I’m usually the last to know?

I now bring you awesomeness….

Oh, look; it’s post 222….

Okay…so I just posted this post: Day 222: The Belly of a Star. We call it “publishing” in blog world. Right after I posted WordPress (who gives me this blog) sends me a notice, like they always do, if someone has commented on my blog or linked my post to their blog. A little orange light goes off in the upper right hand corner of my blog to notify me.

Well, I’m looking at this light and reading, and I see it’s someone named The Belly of a Star, and I’m thinking: Wow, that’s a really cool name. I wonder what their blog is like?

The truth is, I do this each and everytime that I link back to an older post of mine. Everytime I think someone else has linked to my blog. I forget it’s me!

This time, I even thought: Wow, what a coincidence that she was looking at the exact same post I was at the exact same time; and she linked to her blog, just like I did.

And then L.V. (The little voice in my head); she says that person is you CRAZY LADY. You wrote The Belly of a Star. Remember it was like two fricken seconds ago, brainless!

And I think: Wow, that’s a cool name, Belly of a Star.

I know…I know…you don’t have to tell me. I know I say Wow way too much. 🙂

Day 220: I Gotta Be Me

| Aspergers Girls

My ten-year-old son made his way towards the aisle lined with big, bulky twenty-dollar televisions. “Those are ancient,” he commented. “Yes, they are,” I answered.

We were at Goodwill, a national chain that sells used items. After twenty minutes of strolling together, looking at various treasures and collecting a few homeschool materials, I had explained to my son, amongst other things, the complexity of college statistic textbooks and why he might not be interested in purchasing one today, the perplexity of eight-track tapes and how they don’t sell new players any longer, the oddness of bowl-shaped old hair dryers that went atop the head, and the sad reality that this store didn’t have used goldfish.

As we wrapped up our mini-excursion, and the mini-lessons, we stood in line to make our purchase. Seeing us there, a fellow lady customer, standing in front of us in the checkout line, motioned to our mostly empty cart, and said, “Please, go first. You don’t have much.”

I smiled and replied, ” Thank you. I do that, too, let people go in front of me. That was kind.”

As she backed up her cart and we swapped places, I noted there was a Starbuck’s coffee cup in her cart. I don’t normally drink coffee. It turns me into a very dynamic thinker who believes she can solve all the world problems, if given an hour. In fact, during my walk today, around the lake, I think I completed three blog articles in my head. As today, I had coffee.

At the store, I turned to the young lady, motioned to her coffee cup in the front of her cart, and said, “I left my Starbucks in the car. I can’t wait to get back to it.”

As soon as the words left my mouth, I felt like a goof. I always feel like a goof when thoughts quickly brew and percolate in my mind, and spit themselves out before I have time to stop them.

After I blushed, this kind customer, a woman about half my age (say twelve), began a full-blown monologue that sounded something to the tune of:

“I thought about leaving my coffee in the car. But I didn’t. I brought it in. It’s the same coffee I always get. I don’t know why I always get the same flavor, white mocha, but I do. It’s silly, but I always get the same. Maybe I should try more variety. I was going to leave the coffee in the car. I was. I wasn’t sure I should bring it into the store, but then I thought, what if I die. I mean, what if I drop dead, and the last thing I think is: I should have brought my coffee. I mean if you’re going to die, you might as well have had coffee first. Who knows. This could be my last day. My last hour. And here I’d be dying without my coffee. And with the way my life’s been going lately—lots of personal crisis and stuff, that just makes me upset. Well, this coffee is a real treat. If you know what I mean. I need to treat myself, now, more than ever. Plus, I’m anemic, and I get so cold. That’s why I’m wearing this. (Motions to two or three layers she’s wearing, and the high neckline of her cotton sweater.) I must look pretty silly wearing this in the summer. But my anemia, it makes me very cold. I shiver sometimes. I have to dress this way. That’s why I’m shopping. This cart had my whole fall wardrobe. Can you believe it? The whole season, right here.”

When she was finished, she grinned wider. At first I was speechless, as I watched my son’s eyes grow from super large and then shrink back to normal size. But I was certain to politely validated the lady, before I set out to pay for my few items.

Hours later, I keep smiling knowingly to myself as I visualize the woman with the mulit-layers and white-mocha coffee. I keep hearing her words in my head, seeing her cart full of clothes, and watching her weave her story.

I can’t help but think that my big guy in the sky (multiple gods, or woman or tree or void, depending on your beliefs) is smiling down with a wink and saying, “See how grand it is to be quirky! See how grand to be you!”

I can’t help but here the phrase I gotta be me resonating in my mind.

I can’t help but chuckle in delight.

I can’t help but like myself a little better.

And as a bizarre-o side note, I do have this rare superpower. I can tell when white paper cups with lids are empty.  Amazing, I know.  When I’m watching a movie or sitcom, when the actors are drinking from paper coffee cups, I can tell they don’t often have a full cup. And I can tell when people in real life have hardly anything left in their cup. It’s true! I haven’t figured out how to use this rare, and now probably sought after, superpower. But stay tuned. I’m sure to find out soon! I just hope no one tries to steal my superpower from my amazing mega brain!

Day 190: In the Mirror

| Aspergers Girls

For those of you that are not into rambling, here is a pretty photo I took today. You can look and stare, and come back tomorrow.

Oh, and this one too.

And one more, since I like the number three, and because this is my all time favorite.

Now for the rest of you…here you go:

me

People often say I look familiar to them, or they know someone who looks like me, or that they have met me before. Years ago someone thought I was that teacher that got caught shagging her student. Don’t remember her name, but it didn’t help when the suspecting stranger asked if I was a teacher, and I said, “Yes.”  I’ve been told I look like certain celebrities—usually bad politicians or people who play dope dealers on television. Thusly, the still very small ego. That strikes me as odd, that people recognize me or relate me to others, as I haven’t a fricken clue regarding what I look like.

I do not recognize myself in any photo. My dear friend who is a photographer says my bone structure affects my photos. She reassured me I don’t need plastic surgery. I actually texted her from some hotel in northern California in tears after a recent photograph, convinced I needed a nose job that very day.

This week, my dear masseuse reassured me that in person I do indeed  look like my photos on my blog. Yes, I have the most awesome masseuse; she actually gives the best massages while discussing me and my blog. I call her my number one fan! That and sue-happy!  She said I don’t look like me when I give that look though…with some questioning, sweet Sue agreed that look meant a blank stare. That blank stare look is my typical smile, or what feels like a smile.

Everyday my husband patiently answers questions for me about my looks. During a movie I might ask (during a crucial moment of the film): Do those look like my wrinkles? Am I that old looking? Do I look like her when I smile? Is that my nose? Oh, is her hair like my hair?

That same photographer friend I texted, she has always said I am blessed with a gypsy-skin complexion and doe eyes. I like her. To make me feel better, she also has told me, more than once, that “pretty” people never like photos of themselves because they appear different depending on lighting. I really like her a lot. She also says I am a good catch. I love her.

mememe

To me, my appearance changes from moment to moment. Forget about the photos. Each time I look in the mirror I do not recognize myself. I particularly do not like my reflection in the car’s rearview mirror or in the glass screen of my laptop computer. Some reflections accentuate all my lines, and I appear to be a prune. I cry at prune faces.

I do not recognize my eyes as the lids droop. And as I age, I wonder where the me before went. Not that I ever saw myself fully to begin with. But now it seems the person I never figured out is vanishing all together into the folds and creases of flesh.

Not being able to judge how I look affects me in many ways. I can’t apply makeup well. I don’t know how. Lessons won’t help. I can’t tell if the shade is right or if I have put on too much or too little. Usually I hardly wear any makeup. I do like watching my eyes change once I put mascara on my lashes, though. I’m like a little girl. I apply and then stare in amazement. It’s like someone enlarged my eyes. When it comes to eyeliner, I can’t tell if it makes me look older, wiser, sexier, or slutty. I do however notice that lately I have developed these distinct come-hither bedroom eyes. Don’t know what’s that about, but have some theories.

me and steff

Fixing my hair is hard. I can’t tell what it looks like. Hair pins at different angles, hair back, hair forward, hair wet, hair straight, hair curly. My looks alter depending. I don’t know who the heck I am. I guess if I was bald that would be one less constantly changing thing. But then I’d probably have that whole light-reflection-changing-the-angle-of-my-scalp thing going on.

I cannot grasp facial features in general, of anyone. For instance, if I was asked to describe a person’s face for a police sketch artist, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even describe my sons’ faces. I was always fascinated in movies when the witness would tell the sketch artist about the nose shape, the eyes’ distance, the lips, the hairline. It feels like they have super powers to me. I’ve been staring at my fourteen year old’s face for fourteen years, and I still couldn’t tell you what he looked like beyond the fact that he has big eyes like me, long lashes, thin dark hair, and a chin like his dad. The rest, all the inside parts, inside the hairline, the face shape, the nose, the lips, the brows, they all go blurry when I try to visualize my son.

I see things in pictures. I see things as a large whole or a specific. For example I see the wrinkles between the eyes, the bump on a nose, the ear that sticks out, the red dot on a check. I am naturally drawn to the details, and distracted by the details, as if I am a camera focusing in. Then, after a little bit of time, I focus out and see the overall face. It is as if I do not have a middle focus, only very narrow or very vast.

I am amazed at how I can look so very different from what I imagine myself to look like. Inside my head I do not look like any representation outside of me.

november walk

I’ve always studied faces, since I can remember. Last year my fixation was ears, particularly ear lobes. I was trying to figure out what my ears looked like in comparison to others’. I know my ears are unique…elf-like…they stick out a bit, and larger on the top part, and generally fleshy. Makes for good nibbling, I suppose. It’s been a whole year of ear studying, and I still am clueless. I couldn’t draw you a picture of my ear unless I was staring at a photo, and likely tracing.

I just started on my nose in May. I’ve been comparing my nose to other noses, and trying to find a companion nose, so I know what the heck my nose looks like. My nose is a funny creature, constantly changing shapes based on the camera angle or how I look at myself in the mirror. When I take a photo of myself, like above, when I extended my arm out, my nose is very European. Sometimes it’s rather cute and pudgy. Other times I know for a fact someone has put their nose on my face, and it’s just not mine! I’ve been studying movies lately, pausing a film and looking at the actresses’ faces, and noticing that their noses change too. It’s not just mine. I’ve noticed how still frames of a movie star’s face are so different from when an actress is in motion. I like to go to the dentist and eye doctor, because I spend time studying faces in magazines.

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I’m still trying to get used to seeing me. Sometimes I think I look like me one day, but then the next day I look back at a photo and think that is not me.

I honestly don’t think I am supposed to be in a human body. I frequently feel as if I have put on the wrong body suit.

I have been insecure my whole life about my looks; mainly because I am a walking shift-shaper and have no looks. From one mirror to the next, I am not me. I capture glimpses of me, but then I fade. Sometimes I think I look very Maltese/Sicilian and other times I see my Irish side. Sometimes I look like I’m from another planet. Other times I am certain I am a little elf: a princess elf with handsome male knights that adore me. And one in particular I want to marry in the forest glen…I digress.

Sometimes I think I look very angular and other times very round. Sometimes I go through thirty moods about my looks in one single day. One mirror in the morning might reveal a tolerable image; I might even like my appearance; but another mirror in the afternoon makes me afraid to leave the house because I’m so frightful to behold. I’ve felt this way my whole life.

Recently, beyond the ears and nose, I’m starting to study eyelids and how they droop. If I am staring at you, I am likely studying your lids. Take no notice; the phase will pass. Just keep your fingers crossed that I don’t leave the face area!

I may sound vain, but I don’t think I am. I think this face obsession has something to do with how my brain views the world in pictures, even words and numbers in pictures, and how my brain is trying to piece together the whole of a very complex shifting face.

I don’t know if I’ll ever truly see me. I recognize me, of course. But I don’t know if I’ll ever understand what I consistently look like.

I AM trying to change something. I’m superb at picking out all my flaws and thinking I am a walking big-nosed, wrinkly-faced bozo. So I am practicing looking at myself without cringing. That’s a big deal for me. Since I recently lost a lot of weight, and have grown more confident inside, men are noticing me more. This is very weird for me. I keep thinking, what the heck do they see in me. Are they blind?

I’ve been posting a lot of photos of me on this blog because I am trying to come to terms with what I look like and to accept myself.  I actually am very confident on the inside. Interior-wise, I love me, probably a little too much a times. I’ve falling in love with my person and spirit entirely, and at the same time fallen in love with other people, too. Thing is I don’t care what they look like. Heck, their faces shift and change more than mine. So I focus on their energy, their beauty, their eyes. So that’s what I am trying to do with me: focus on the inner beauty and my eyes.

Please don’t tell me I’m pretty or lovely; that’s not going to help. If you want to comment, comment about the subject matter. I’m not fishing for compliments. Even when I called my husband in to look at the photos tonight, I just needed reassurance that the photos looked like me. And I needed him to say he didn’t notice the huge, gigantic mountain-eating wrinkles. I needed him to explain to me why I look so different in every photo. I must have asked him fifty times, “Is that really me? Do I really look like that?” This isn’t about beauty to me or self-acceptance; it’s about figuring out a puzzle. It’s about figuring out who that woman is staring back at me in the mirror.

space me

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Day 163: Super Freak

| Aspergers Girls

I’m a SUPER FREAK this morning. I am pretty sure my youngest has restless leg syndrome. And he definitely talks, moans, and moves a whole lot in his sleep. Oh, yes…..traveling once again, and so very much reminded of my human condition. This time an eleven hour drive to California with my three boys, ages ten, thirteen, and fourteen…..oh boy! Literally!

Just pulled this writing up from early May 2012. Today, again, having slept in a hotel (sigh) I am dealing with much overload, lack of sleep, exhaustion, and grumpiness. Hope to have a happier disposition tomorrow after a decent night’s sleep. If you see a woman having a meltdown on the side of Highway 5 in California…that would be super freak me!

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On the first day of our trip to the Island of Maui, I was reminded of my over sensitive system. I hadn’t imagined the plane fight would be such an unpleasant experience. I’d forgotten, or more likely, I’d hoped for change.

Many people with Aspergers, if not all, are extremely sensitive. They feel emotions and feelings in great depth. Likewise, their senses of sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell are very acute. Often, a person experiences sensory overload when he or she is outside his everyday environment. In some cases, home or perhaps nature, are the only places that are tolerable to the senses. Outside of the comfort zone, a person with Aspergers can likely feel an overwhelming degree of agitation, pain, and misery. This is one of the reasons I prefer to spend more time at home than in public places. Sensory overload can lead to meltdowns—which are akin to adult tantrums—a screaming out for help, when one does not know how to help one’s self.

In considering sound, where many people can block out background noise and focus without distraction, people with sensory sensitivities hear everything at once. There is no mute button. And there is no making the noise stop, beyond earplugs and escape.

The other senses work the same. Textures irritate. Smells overwhelm and overtake. Sights hurt. And even the taste of air is unpleasant.

It appears there is something about the Asperger’s sensory and processing system that cause people to sense things in the environment in segmented over-exaggerated parts, instead of whole. Instead of looking upon a crowd and seeing a crowd, one looks upon a multitude of bombarding shapes and sizes, each movement as uncomfortable to view as the next.

People with sensory sensitivities are acutely aware of everything happening in their environment and everything seems to be occurring all at once. There isn’t release. What would be a soft unnoticeable hum to one becomes a piercing roar to the other. It is as if someone has turned up the volume of every single sensory organ.

There is no relaxation, only the constant stream of shards—parts of chatter, parts of the ticking clock, parts of the rattling and  hum. There are parts of smells, all sorted out and classified, not mingled, not forgotten. There are parts of tastes—the breath, the air, the fragrances, the poisons chemicals. Sights are in parts. Fragmented pieces that attempt to make a whole, but fail. A face not remembered except as shape of wrinkled wide nose and color of dark narrow eyes. Even the mind is in parts, continually breaking down wholes to subsections. Whole to parts is easy. Parts to whole is hard. Nothing is as it appears. Everything is in parts. It is the parts that bring agony, the endless parts that bring with them the impossibility of finding retreat in the whole.

With my sensory sensitivities, the six-hour ride in the airplane to Maui was torturous. No mind control, mantras, visualization, or distractions could stop the parts. And lacking the ability to help myself, sank me into self-blame. I sat in misery wishing to time travel into sweet oblivion. I became depleted, agitated, and depressed. Meltdown was avoided, but angry eyes prevailed.

The worst was the piercing babies’ cries. There were at least ten babies on the plane. There wasn’t a time when one wasn’t screaming.

I did find refuge. I had my words. I could write. I could escape through the process of creating images, feelings, and thoughts into story. Words were my parachute and freedom, a passport away from the screaming shards.

Cry from the Sky

Imploded

Without retreat

Saturated misery

Roots into ear

Vine out

Crumpling, tearing, crackling paper

The rhythmic off beat dance murdering peace

Stop!

Bring silence

Opening cans, clanging carts, annoying repetitive footsteps

Bumping in front, bumping in back

An uninvited rollercoaster

No escape

The babies scream and scream again

Piercing thorns

Constant chatter, whispers, sighs

Conversations bleed into a monster of noise

Roaring engine rattles fury

Even the yawns scream

Squishing and swishing misshapen bodies

Stench

Stale garbage

One hundred meals at once

Beyond window, the fresh and silence beckons

A tease of the unattainable

Aches, irritations, stiffness, icy cold

Suffocating soreness

More bumping, more banging

Nothing is calm

Nothing is motionless

Everything moving

Everything in parts

One broken into a thousand

Question after question

Comment after comment

Trapped in stinging air

Recycled germs everywhere

Breathing in danger

Stop. Shut up. Cease

Release me

Put a cork in the child’s mouth

Put a muzzle on the man

Put a mute light on

STOP MOVING!

Energy spikes, energy flows, energy feeds

Energy spirals, burrows, pangs

Into self

Close eyes

Close noise

Close people

Close the outside

Focus on inside

Focus on calm

And still the babe screams

“Help me!”

Day 117: A Body of True Confessions

| Aspergers Girls

(This post used to have photos of me. They have been removed by me. Hope you find the post useful.)

This is me HAPPY. This is my real smile caught by camera. I just found out the frozen banana bread ice-cream sandwich was going to be dipped in chocolate! That’s me in a nutshell. Give me chocolate and I forget everything else.

We have returned from Maui. And I am sorting through photos. I HATE  don’t care for photos of me.  I never ever feel like a photo looks like me. I see myself in parts, not in whole. So I see my nose, or the wrinkles around my brow, or the sun spot on my forehead, or the many other “flaws” that jump out at me. I tell myself I should look better. That I need to change. That I’ve aged. And so on….

No picture I have ever taken looks like how I see myself. And in every photo, I look so different (to me).

I get super depressed when I go through vacation photos, because I think I look absolutely terrible. I don’t think it’s a vanity thing. It really is not having a clue what I look like or understanding the image I am looking at. I try to tell myself positive messages, but somehow the messages get all twisted.

And then I get a host of negative messages, such as: “You need to lose fifteen more pounds. Imagine what you looked like before you lost those ten pounds. You are so HEAVY.” I tell myself horrible things, like: “Oh, your husband probably hated to take this photo of you, knowing you are starting to look soooo old.”

I’ve partaken in this negative self-talk, since puberty. Before then, I could care less. I had a huge overbite and a chipped front tooth, and would smile like I was a movie star. Something changed with puberty. Something changed when I realized people judge on appearances.

Thing is, I don’t notice the physical “flaws” in other people. When I look at their photos I see pure beauty. I see their essence. I think all people are beautiful. But I still get so terribly down on myself.

Posting photos of me on this blog is HUGE for me. Of course, I went through and cursed a dozen or so shots, before choosing the ones I felt safe to post.

Often, after a few years pass, I can look back on a photo, and see more of me. I can appreciate the happiness I had during the photo and see less of the flaws. I tell myself: “Why were you so hard on yourself. You’re sweet and kind. And you look absolutely fine!”

I’m hoping, this time, it won’t take a few years. I don’t know why the passing of time helps to view myself, but it does somehow.

I tell myself, I ought to be happy I can take a decent photo with little to no makeup on and my hair barely brushed, if brushed at all. I tell myself that everyone ages, that no one is perfect, that my distinct characteristics make me ME! But the talking doesn’t help. The negative thoughts come back full force. It really is a curse.

I don’t like worrying about how I look to other people. And I certainly don’t like worrying about how I look to me!

I’m putting this out there to help myself. To share my deepest thoughts, and in so doing release some of the associated doubts and deep-seeded fear. Heck! I just returned from one of the BEST VACATIONS in my life. Probably THE BEST, and I’m fretting over how ugly I am, telling myself I ought not go out in the world and be seen in public! It’s very, very ridiculous.

Maybe part of it is not having had a father who ever hugged me, called me pretty, or said he loved me. Could be that my father is so heavily into fitness, always firm and muscular, always concerned about his looks, that when I see me, I feel rather inadequate.

Could be, too, that it’s how my brain works. I know other people with Aspergers that see things in parts and have a hard time seeing the whole. Maybe seeing myself in parts, scrambles my beauty in my head. Sort of like seeing a lovely Black Beauty Horse cut and dissected into pieces on a platter. I think that’s what I do: Dissect and pull apart so that nothing remains but broken slabs of me.

Here is a list of what I feel uncomfortable about me:

1) Since my mid-twenties my arms have been thicker than I’d like, heavy and wide compared to other people my size. I have to be a size 2, seriously, for my arms to appear skinny. My husband says its proportional to my chest and that I have a swimmer’s body; another friend calls me ‘healthy.’ I don’t like either one of those observations, and would much prefer to have skinny arms! Skinny arms fits my personality. I see myself as petite, like a fairy. No fairies have a swimmer’s back.

2) I have incorrect posture. So does my son with Aspergers. It is hard for me to stand fully erect. I look funny, to me, when I stand up tall. I don’t know how to stand without feeling unnatural and in an awkward position. To protect myself from others, I have always hunched. I feel safer hunched. My posture makes me appear odd looking in photos. Same with my hands and arms. I don’t know where to put them in photos. And my smile….I never know what a real smile looks like.

3) My skin used to be perfect. I was very lucky. I looked like those kids in the suntan advertisements. Lots of California sun changed that. Now I’m spotted like a spotted lizard. This spots jump out at me in photos, as does every freckle, marking, mole, and “imperfection.” As I age, day by day, more markings appear. I don’t like to watch my skin change. It bothers me to no end.

4) My Italian nose will forever haunt me. I have tried to love it, truly. And it didn’t seem to get in the way of attracting previous mates; however, my nose is all I see in photos when I first look. That’s why I like far away shots. My nose looks cute if I’m standing back about five blocks!

5) My eyes. I’ve always loved my eyes. But now they appear sunken and old. Like I’m twenty years older than I am. Maybe that’s because I still feel like a teenager inside. But outside someone has redecorated, and I’m not too impressed.

6) My chin. At some angles, I look like I have three, and can’t tell where my neck ends and my face begins. I have a very prominent chin. My son’s orthodontist complimented my bone structure. Maybe if the whole world were orthodontists, I’d be set. I see a witches chin. The witch that has the house fall on her. I want to be the good witch. Luckily I have no warts or hair growing out of moles.

7) Sadness. Sometimes in photos I look very sad or even angry. It’s not how I’m feeling. I don’t feel irritated or melancholy, but I look like someone either just said something to piss me off or just told me my cat died. I try to look like me, and have no clue how to. It’s very frustrating. Sometimes I over smile so people will know I’m happy. Then my husband says: Don’t smile so intensely. Often my eyes bug out, if I’m trying too hard to smile.

8) My hair. It has a life of its own. I never know what to expect. My hair looks the best in the bathroom mirror, and as soon as I step outside the bathroom, my hair changes. I swear it does! Perhaps it is the lighting and the shadows, as my hair appears entirely different in every photo.

9) Shadows and lighting. The lighting of a photo changes how I appear to me. Sometimes I appear swollen or shrunken; other times expanded, elongated, and downright horrific to look at. I want to carry around a perfect lighting bulb above me, like a photographer. I have not posted the photos of me that make me look like I’m a marshmallow, that make my face appear shrunken into itself, and that show I’ve been tattooed with wrinkles. But they exist.

10) Ghastly spider veins. I’ve inherited those creepy little bluish-red lines that decorate my knees and thighs. I think I have as many as most people approaching their eighties. They are truly icky. I press on them and they magically disappear for ten seconds. My husband says that’s not what men are looking at. I don’t really care what men are looking at! I care what I’m looking at. And spider veins are not beautiful. I once read that a lady had lost a lot of function in her legs (mobility) and that she would do anything to have legs that moved well. She said who cared about spider veins. She’d be thankful to have any functioning legs. Reading information like that only makes me feel extremely guilty for not appreciating what I have. Then I just beat myself up more.

To be fair, I do like my eyebrows, my hair color, my teeth, my neck, the bottom half of my legs, and my toes. So that’s a good start, I suppose.

My Biggest Fear……That I will be too ugly to be loved. That’s it! I said it. It haunts me day and night. I feel so beautiful and light-filled inside, but I am afraid the outside will scare people away. It’s silly, I suppose, but it is how I feel. I don’t want to grow old. I don’t want to watch myself change. I don’t like change!!! I want to live a long life, but I want to freeze my appearance. I don’t know how to handle my body shifting. I don’t want to be one of those plastic surgery ladies or Botox queens, but I want to be able to look at a photo and see me.

Wine tasting, and what am I thinking. Oh, I look terrible in this photo. Notice how I chopped my arm out of the photo. Huge stress line on forehead, spotted arm, pointy chin….Gag me. I’m so super self-conscious and critical. If only this were a redeeming quality.

Almost didn’t post this because of my nose wrinkles. I secretly want you to think I’m 20. I had my kids at the age of 6! I’m such a goof-head. Someone change my brain, please!!!

I see big nose, forehead wrinkles, and fat face. This is what I see. I want to see friendship, love, and happiness. But I think: I wonder why my friend likes me when I am ugly. Yes, this is sad, but this is truth.

I love this picture. This is truly me HAPPY. Right before I surfed. My arms are covered so I feel safer. And this is one cool dude!

I like this photo because I’m far enough away that my nose looks cute and you can’t see my wrinkles! Maybe I’ll just stay a distance away from people. Of course, I see my flabby arms and my double chin and my pointy little ear. But my teeth look white!

I’m crying streams of tears. This is beneficial. This is healing. I’ve told my secrets. They shall no longer haunt me!