ASD

10 Things I Would Say to a Female with Asperger’s Syndrome, if I were her Therapist

| Aspergers Girls

10 Things I Would Say to a Female with Asperger’s Syndrome, if I were her Therapist

1. I would like to offer something to you, if that is okay. I believe, at this moment, I cannot in any way understand what it is like to be you. I do not believe I know what it is like to be anyone, and I understand you carry with you a vast collection of experiences and knowledge. With that said, I want to try to understand as much as I can about your journey and perspective, so that I can be here with you, not as your teacher, or counselor, or therapist, or even friend, but as another human having a human experience. I don’t consider myself to know the answers; in fact, I believe you to have all the answers that we require to move through this process of discovery. I look forward to this journey with you.

2. I am here for you; you are dedicating your time and your attention, and I respect your commitment to be here. I recognize you have a choice of whom you see, and that you may or may not fit with my person as a whole. Please know that if there is anything about my presentation, my office, or my mannerisms, even my personhood that make you uncomfortable, I am open to you telling me this and will try my very best to be receptive to your input. Please know that any type of discomfort you feel, at any time, and at any moment, takes top priority above any discussion. I understand there may be many thoughts on your mind and that I am by no means able to alleviate all your misgivings, and I recognize this is not possible; yet, I still say this in hopes of creating a safe place for the both of us to sit together. I try in my practice to release the need of agenda, plan of action, or a blueprint we need follow. I am by no means perfect, but stating this to you helps me to remind myself that my top priority is you not my thoughts and needs. This allows the two of us to focus on what you believe is at the heart of your thoughts at all times, and keeps me from thinking I know the answers; as truthfully I know I do not.

3. If there is something of peak interest to you at the moment, perhaps an interest or a hobby, I am here to listen. I don’t mind if you need to talk the entire time we have allotted, that is what I am here for. I am here to listen above all else, to be present, and to receive you as a whole and complete person. I don’t see myself in lacking and in return I don’t see you as lacking either. I think we are both where we are meant to be and I am truly honored to be in your presence. I am not going to write notes about you, if that is okay, as I wouldn’t think I’d much like a person writing notes about me, but instead, I would like to offer you this paper to take home to write down your thoughts after our meeting; if you do not, this is perfectly fine with me, and if you do, wonderful. Feel free to ask me questions about my journey and respecting the therapist/client boundaries, I will offer out as much vulnerability as I can. I would take joy in meeting you equally in this journey, and will strive to remind myself when I become preachy or seem to think I know more than I do. I am human, but I know, beyond a doubt, that what is important in these rooms is not within me, but within you.

4. I wonder if you might be comfortable telling me what the driving force behind you feels like? Where do you think your inspiration comes from? Why do you think you have the intelligence you do? The drive? The stamina? How often do you think about who you are and what you are? Is this inquiry something that interests you or makes you uncomfortable, or something perhaps I am totally off base about asking? I ask, because in the females with Aspergers I have encountered, there is a depth of wisdom that honestly leaves me in awe and makes me curious as to how the universe works inside the mind; and I thought through this direction we might open doors to discovery? What do you think?

5. I am comfortable with whatever subject you want to discuss. There isn’t a set topic I have in mind, nor do I feel at this time there is going to be a need for a topic. I would like to know what pops into your head, and to listen to you process your thoughts, if you are comfortable with this. I think the more I can hear you talk, the better I will be able to approach the challenges you might be presented with through the course of us working with one another. Also, this may or may not apply to you, but if you are more comfortable, I have a lovely plant set in the corner there, and I am more than pleased to watch it as you talk, if me watching you makes you uncomfortable. Also, I can respect your body language and the way you choose to communicate, because I know this is what works for you at the moment. So please know I am not evaluating your body language, tone of voice, or anything about the quality of your speech or subject manner. I understand in my working with other females with similar, but of course their own unique way of perceiving the world, that sometimes they might need a full hour just to speak and process. In the past I have scheduled hour-and-a-half blocks of time, suggesting that the client speak for half of the session, to process her thoughts, and then we meet together and have more of a back and forth discussion. What are your thoughts on this? What would work with you?

6. I believe that there is a serious need for more information about females with Aspergers. What type of information have you found? Is there something specific you think I might be able to gain knowledge from, a book or resource? If you are comfortable, I would appreciate any information you have collected that resonated for you in regards to how you feel; this might be about females with Aspergers, poetry, paintings, or any form of expression. I would especially like to hear if there is anything you wrote, perhaps a poem or a short story. I think I can gain much insight in our journey together, if I am able to see the two of us, symbolically, exploring outside of the constraints of this office, and in the realm of something you may of have created, or perhaps will create in the future. If not, would you like to tell me what you see when I show you particular paintings or what you feel when I read a poem? I have collected some items from other females with Aspergers, a variety of expressions through different art media that I store here at my side. Sometimes, with clients, we look in the basket to see if there is something that resonates?

7. In working with other females, those that have traits of Aspergers, whether diagnosed or not, I have come across a checklist of attributes that typically fits the Aspergers experience well. I would appreciate being granted the opportunity to read this to you, to see what you think? Or you are welcome to read the list yourself, either aloud to me, or to yourself. I think there might be some connecting links here we can explore together. If you would like, we can develop a list of priorities, or address perhaps five items that caught your attention. For instance the concept of the anxiety that builds in planning for an upcoming event outside the house. Then we can decide together where to go from there.

8. I am well aware that sometimes certain techniques I have implemented in my psychotherapy practice aren’t universal, in meaning they don’t fit with everyone. I recognize that we are each unique in our experiences and learning modalities. I have done research on various learning styles, dyslexia, dyspraxia, and sensory integration challenges. I would like you to know that I am aware some of my approaches might not be the right “fit” for you. Such as in the past I implemented positive self-talk to a lovely client, and she explained to me that the form of therapy I was using, called “cognitive therapy,” was adding unnecessary stress to the stress she already carried. I am so thankful she told me, because from there we worked together and developed a new approach. With this client we looked at her favorite books and created stories about the characters in the book; this type of approach resonated with here. With another client, she explained that she had been through years of self-help and group therapy and only initially needed a safe place to be. And so we spent many of our sessions with me listening and her sharing. Another client loved Carl Jung and the thought of the collective unconscious, so we took that route together. Please know this is your time and I want to spend the time doing what fits your style, not mine. I think, if we both explore the vast range of possibilities, we can easily find an avenue that suits your comfort-level and learning style. Also, as a reminder, nothing we establish is necessary, or set in stone, or needs to meet completion; we can change midstream; in fact, I like to do that, as it reminds me that I am not the one in control, nor do I need to be. This frees up space for me to be more present and attentive to your needs.

9. Are there any specific spiritual practices you gravitate towards? Or any types of methods of relaxation you incorporate. I found with one client that even the thought of implementing a practice was daunting and actually sparked an avoidance of doing such practices. How do you feel about goals and lists? Have you ever partaken in specific grounding exercises, self-centering, or body awareness visualizations, and is this something you might be open to exploring together? For my own self, I find that when I am in my body and aware, I can better detect where the anxiety is coming from in my environment. I can then talk to this anxiety, and other emotions I have, as if it were a person. Do you understand what I mean? Do you ever personify numbers, or letters, or parts of your body?

10. I know of someone who says she thinks people with Aspergers are: “Keepers of the Light.” I like this definition, as I see such pure traits in women I have met on the spectrum or believe themselves to be on the spectrum; there is a source of pureness, innocence and this honesty that just bears all thorns. I cannot tell you how much I long to experience some of the truths you carry and to understand what this journey of yours has brought to those around you. I see you as such a gift to me and to the world. What would you like to call Aspergers? What name shall we give this journey?

All rights reserved. May be printed for professional use in therapy setting. May not be redistrubuted or used in any other manner. Thank you. Please maintain author information on the paper. Author of the blog Everyday Aspergers. Samantha Craft, M.Ed. Writer and Educator. Female with Aspergers with son with Aspergers.

Photo on 4--13

290: Torn Open

| Aspergers Girls
wiped clean
Torn Open

Torn Open

If I were a painter, I’d paint you as the river flowing through my heart, my arms outstretched in acceptance and need and want, my body limber and bleeding, the blood the very essence of my unquenchable desire.

The water, being you, would be the clearest and the sweetest, and the very richest, pouring through the canvas of me as melted butter across warm sugar-cakes.

I’d take you into me, soak in your yellow-sunshine, and swell into a catapult of expectation fulfilled. The rest of me, the part I’d left behind, outside the door that shelters our space, I’d call forth then, one by one and piece by piece, each part carrying in another puzzle of my completion.

And there, gathered on the floor, I’d rest, my every angle dismembered, broken, and waiting to be reassembled by you. In doing so the echoes of my desperate longing would be answered, and silence would ensue, if not forever, then for a moment, long enough for the splinters of my callings to rest and form shape.

There, in the silence, in the peace, I would wait, no longer afraid or without, no longer in pain.

Though broken and scattered, I would be whole. Though taken and left out, I would be home. Though ripped apart and tangled, the very heart of me missing his place, I would beat with a life so full my dreams would sing.

Like soldiers I would take flight; winged butterflies, a spectacle of starlit ghosts twirling and rising all at once to the trumpeting of our destiny.

You would whisper then, to me, this sugar-spiced dumpling of one form or another, in all my mystery, in all my guise; you would whisper sweetness so pure that my spine would tingle and take his place, amongst the pieces lost.

Here you would draw, your finger thick and calm, your voice trembling through the vibration of your flesh; and I, as ink, would appear, my design clear and precise, my meaning known and wanted.

I would not whisper, for the voice of the room would be yours, and yours alone. Your silhouette dancing in the shadows like a raven whom pecks the ripest seedlings from the foreground, a painter himself merging and forging to create substance for this soul.

Red would drip new, droplets of amulets and silver-tipped gold. My paint yours. A keeper of chance you be, diving into the gentleness and hope of tomorrow with the tip of your brush, a quail’s feather topped in delight.

Scribbled across white, I be.

Designed in the fashion you forbade and forbid, both ruptured and raptured at once.

I would burst for you, and you alone. My hungry voice rising to be heard above the quiet you created. Until, as serpent uncoiled and ram diving thick, I would come forth, rebirthed and complete in the making of you.

For where you dipped and twirled the horsehair and blanketed warmth, the artists stick and brush, I too dipped. For where you danced, I too danced, like a stallion in the moonlight free, my mane flowing beyond and touching the edges of your silhouette.

For in creating me, you both created self and dream, mister and misses. My sacrifice, though felt eternal, well worth the storm.

My endless searching, my endless calling, my escape into nothingness and a gentle calm, all part of the canvas you set forth. For if not for you and me, for my pain and your finding, then still I would pierce myself atop the mountain top, one knife after the other, alive but dead, awake but asleep.

For it was not until you called, until you came, until you saw me and claimed my existence that I truly was. Not until your coming destroyed me and brought me back again that I was truly born.

For in the existence that I know, you are my maker, my shaker, my taker, my master, my everything beyond the sun. In knowing you, or the part of you that held me, I have at last held myself.

And though the tears have etched and molded, created someone I know not, someone beyond my very self, alas I remain in awe of my beauty, inspired by creator you.

So please, as you whisper farewell, as you close the door, my fallen pieces reassembled and transpired, know I weep not so much for the loss of what was you, and what I thought I knew, but for the finding of myself.

~~~ Samantha Craft, December 31, 2012

Happy New Year….may you above all, having found the beauty of you, spread your light upon the waiting world. Blessings ~ Sam

Seasons Greetings

| Aspergers Girls

 

 

Josh Groban 

From the album “Noel”

“Thankful”

Somedays we forget

To look around us

Somedays we can’t see
The joy that surrounds us
So caught up inside ourselves
We take when we should give.

So for tonight we pray for
What we know can be.
And on this day we hope for
What we still can’t see.
It’s up to us to be the change
And even though we all can still do more
There’s so much to be thankful for.

Look beyond ourselves
There’s so much sorrow
It’s way too late to say
I’ll cry tomorrow
Each of us must find our truth
It’s so long overdue

So for tonight we pray for
What we know can be
And every day we hope for
What we still can’t see
It’s up to us to be the change
And even though we all can still do more
There’s so much to be thankful for.

Even with our differences
There is a place we’re all connected
Each of us can find each other’s light

So for tonight we pray for
What we know can be
And on this day we hope for 
What we still can’t see
It’s up to us to be the change
And even though this world needs so much more

There’s so much to be thankful for

~~~~~~~
Merry Christmas from Violet and Sam. See you soon. 🙂
314593_10200151923110904_1373231954_n

Day 207: My Words Put to Music: Traits

| Aspergers Girls

Traits of Females with Aspergers (words by Samantha Craft)

I did not make this video.

My Words Put to Music

Hello you, who longs to be loved and noticed

You know everything is okay? Right?

You know you are just experiencing emotions

Nothing else

You are not flawed

You are not wrong

You are perfect in your feelings

It’s okay

You don’t have to pretend anymore

It’s okay

Show all your colors

You are most beautiful that way

Share what you have found inside of you

This truth

That even in your frailty and fear, you are beauty

There is no shame

In being real

We all get scared

We all get worried

We all believe someone might steal something or someone

But they can’t

They are just borrowing

Just basking in the collective wisdom

Remember nothing in this world is yours

You know happiness is not found in possession

So today give what was never yours

To a world that is you

And let your words be put to music

~ Samantha Craft, August 2012

And I say my favorite daily mantra: How could life get any better than this!

Day 198: Finally Sunday!!!

| Aspergers Girls

Sam’s Ramble

If we went out for coffee and I drank coffee, and you looked like you might be at least half awake, this is likely what I’d tell you:

Four teenage boys are up at my house celebrating my oldest’s birthday. Their record is 6:00 a.m. bedtime. At least that is how late they stayed up the last time they all gathered at someone else’s house.  So looks like I’m in for a long night! Or at least they are. However, I had that quarter cup of coffee at eight in the morning, and that’s enough to keep me still awake at this late hour of 1:40 a.m.

Of course letting my son buy Hostess desserts that have enough sugar and preservatives in them to last until his hundredth birthday was likely not a keen idea on my part. It is the first time I’ve actually bought Hostess products. Twinkies scare me.

I always feel weird filling my grocery cart up with junk food. I want to wear a sign that says: “I normally do not poison my children, but it is a special occasion!”

Today’s shopping excursion with my newly fifteen-year-old was painless. Just a few swipes off the shelves…..first stop Coke, second stop large bag of Doritos, third stop Klondike ice cream bars, fourth stop donuts. Okay, I managed to convince him to buy some orange juice. Of course, I normally don’t buy orange juice because of the lack of nutritional value and high sugar content. But considering what else was in my cart, the OJ came up on top as feasibly the only product that had real food inside of it.

The boys are loud. Very loud. My husband assures me that wrestling at this age is perfectly normal. They are testing out their manhood and showing who is top dog. I’m sure glad I’m a girl. I am not good at wrestling. I did warn them to stay clear of the fireplace hearth as they are throwing each other down on the ground.

The first time I went into the daylight basement game room to see the boys, the first words out of my mouth were: “Wow! It sure stinks in here.” I then opened the sliding door and turned towards the teens to smile. The boys looked at me like I was very odd. One boy shyly asked if I was indeed Michael’s mother. I’m not sure what to think of that comment. Who does he exactly think I might be? A friendly neighbor bringing junk food and candy to random children?

What an odd week. Everything felt like it just missed the mark….kind of like the whole universe was singing off-key and I was tone-deaf. So I didn’t really notice, but knew something was askew.

My ankle went weak on me on my walk a few days ago and I just about ate dust. Hip still healing.

A friend from California called me out of the blue and I totally freaked out because I had to change my plans for the day. But we had a grand time. The second day I saw her we took a walk. My ankle went out on me, again, and this time I slammed my wrists down to stop my fall. Ouch. And we took this walk on this road, and every time a car came by, clouds of dust blew up into our face. Oh. But we did find this vacant house and sat on their deck and admired one of the most awesome views of water and layers of foliage and hills and mountains I’ve ever seen in my life. But I had decided to leave my camera at home. Later my friend informs me that her husband heard swear words coming out of my oldest son’s mouth that even he hadn’t heard before. That was a pleasant surprise. Almost as pleasant as the fall and dust clouds, but not quite. It was fun watching her elderly father fall asleep with his finger still pointing to the line of text he was reading from in his political book, and hearing from him that divorce is just a way to legalize prostitution, and finding out that he thought I was my sister. (I don’t have a sister.)

When I tried to go to my weekly massage appointment…I know, I know…but it’s for pain management…really it is. Well, they had just finished putting in a new floor. Seriously just finished. I mean I watched the carpenter’s van drive away. Well the whole building smelled of toxic floor glue. So I had to reschedule my massage (weep-weep)  and calm my lovely masseuse down, as she wasn’t too pleased with the smell herself. Which turned out to be okay, because my three boys were home alone, and I’d forgotten my cellular phone. And I figured that the fact my massage appointment was canceled was a darn good excuse to treat myself to a gourmet chocolate truffle at the Food-Co-Op. Of course, the CoOp had just finished pouring a new driveway which smelled like tar. But I risked the stench for chocolate.

A couple of days ago, my dog (Spastic Colon–her name, not her condition) took a crap at the lake where we walk everyday; and me being so utterly unprepared, because she only does number two at home, started worry frantically about the poop on the ground. I was so embarrassed that I yanked her before she was done and left a trail of her droppings. I noticed later a sneaker print in one of the droppings. Icky. After her “accident” I had to go retrieve the intolerably-smelling blue doggy bags the city provides and walk back and scoop up the poop. The poop doesn’t bother me so much. Well, it does. But those dang doggy bags that are scented with this awful artificial smell that stays on my hands and whatever else they come in random contact with are the worst! Once I forgot a city bag in my pocket, and the bag served as a laundry freshener. The wash came out smelling like doggy bags: a pungent rancid baby powder smell.

Today, when I tried to walk Spastic Colon she decided it was way too hot and just spread out on the grass. I had to yank her back to the van.

After meeting my neighbor for tea, five minutes into our conversation, a much-needed conversation, and much-needed company, I get a text from my oldest: “Mom. Please stop what you are doing and come home now. I cannot stop myself from punching my brothers.” That was fun. Then what had to be the largest bug in the world flew into our faces at our outside table, where we were having our tea, (well actually I was having sparkling water) and we both stood up and screamed and flapped our hands. Then the bug came back again. Turns out it was two black insects in the heat of romance. I still don’t know what they were, but they looked and sounded scary, with those black wings flapping and their darting about. I wonder what that would be like though….flying and doing what they were doing.

Today it was so very hot, some 95 degrees hot. That’s hot for here. We have no air conditioning. Our upstairs was eighty-eight degrees at 10:00 tonight.

Earlier, I took my two youngest chaps miniature golfing and my “baby” swung the club super hard and smacked a ball right into my ankle. Ouch! Then at dinner, a vegetarian trying to cut spare ribs for her son, (that would be me), with a butter knife, ended up sliding the ribs off the plate and smack onto the floor. Smack again.

I’m just glad it’s finally officially Sunday, the start of a new week in my book, so I can get back to my normal life. Like a few months ago when I came home from a walk to find my youngest two barricaded in the bedroom screaming as my eldest (then an immature fourteen year old) was threatening to kill them with an iron fire poker.

Oh, I forgot to mention. While I was at the restaurant supping with my boys this evening, a half-naked drunkardly-looking guy, carrying a toddler in his arms, rode by on a green fluorescent unicycle. And when we left the restaurant a fire truck was stopped in traffic with the fireman staring at me with wide fearful eyes, while I was staring at the scary man standing in front of the boys and me on the sidewalk, who had on sloppy white clown makeup and a costume red nose and old tattered clothes. He was attempting to do magic tricks by pulling out some type of tattered colorful scarves out of an old black wagon.

My middle son, with ASD, after we are seated in the van, he looks up and, with a deep sigh, says: “Did you see that fireman? Did you see his weird expression? He gave me the creeps!”