246 - Asperger's (2) - checklist

In this second post about my current self-diagnosis of Asperger's, which I assume will be confirmed by my therapist in 3 weeks, I want to discuss Justine's checklist.  It was on her website that I had found the AQ test, mentioned in the first part of this series. 

Let me remind you that Asperger's syndrome isn't an illness, not mental illness. It's a developmental disorder.

Justine mentions and breaks down the 4 areas of life in which aspie's may be impacted - in various degrees, individual to each person. 

245- May exposures

In my 19th CBT session, I agreed with my therapist's renewing and prolonging the exposure tasks that I had in the 18th, because I hadn't managed to do much of them. 

In the past 3 weeks, since that 19th session, I have had avoided just a few social situations, the biggest of them being the march against Monsanto. Thus far, ever since I learned about it, I had managed to go only once  - in 2015. This year, I would've had the support from only one friend (as compared to 2015's situation when I was accompanied by nearly 10 of our friends). 

This year, I also didn't feel physically up to it, so I left this march for another time. 

244- Asperger's syndrome... (1)

The full title of this entry should be something like "self-discovery or redefinition as a person with Asperger's syndrome", but I felt it'd be too long for a blog title, so I left it vaguer.  

My wife had started research to understand some of her friends and relatives, and through her reading and knowing me for over a decade by now, she recognized some aspects of my own personality and started suspecting that some of my personality traits are due to Asperger's syndrome. 

After reading about it, my wife discussed the matters with a mutual friend who agreed with her theory. 

I need to specify that Asperger's isn't an illness, mental or otherwise, but classified as a developmental disorder. 

243- Embracing my uniqueness

Throughout my life, I observed trends of all sorts and refused to be part of them all : I'm a rebel and hate to be boxed into a label or a group, because I embrace my uniqueness. 

Let's be frank, we are all unique! 

Why is society trying to force us into normalcy when such a thing isn't even part of our nature ? We all have specific traits that are unique to us and no one else in world shares all our parts - we know that our DNA coding is unique; siblings and even twins don't end up identical in all things. Our teeth and fingertips are totally one of a kind. 

242- Summer's my favorite season!

I think the person who made this challenge should've swapped weeks 21 & 25, because summer doesn't tend to start in May but in June.  Either case, here I am, talking about summer. 

I'm grateful for summer's warmth, though my heat resistance has lowered the past few years, either out of aging or lack of exposures due to several physical health issues that prevented me or to my avoidance due to my social phobias. 

Either way, I hope that this summer will mark a return to better shape so I can hike again, and some moderate climate would be nice. 

241 - MHAW17 : Surviving or Thriving ?

***Multiple trigger warnings (including the hyper-linked blog entries : religious cult, conditioning, abuse, domestic violence, suicide***

May is mental health awareness month. In 2016, I had participated in #mhwk16 that Kristen had run for the first week and this year, I was too uninspired, tired and running everywhere to do anything for #mhaw17.

British Mental heath foundation chose this year's topic Surviving or thriving. All this week, I struggled and finally found what I can discuss. 

240 - 52 weeks of gratitude - Week 20 - A friend (2)

In post 177, I had discussed my friend Anna, who has been my most regular reader (in the French version of this MH blog). For week 20 of this challenge, I chose 2 other friends who are a Jean-Louis* and his sister Claire* (the names have been changed). 

239 - What would recovery be ?

* mild trigger warning* 

During May 11's #talkmh chat on twitter regarding recovery, I expressed that I wasn't even sure how much real recovery I had experienced. I just looked and found that I had discussed the subject just over a year ago, during MHW2K16 challenge, in this entry, where I managed to imagine what recovery would mean to me. 


I realize that my moods affect my viewpoint about such questions and that I tend to be overly self-critical in most depressive states - about which I understand the logic, by depression's very nature. 

238 - 52weekgratitude - catching up on weeks 16-19

I'v lacked inspiration to continue this challenge, after week 15's post about spring. 

It's time to catch up a bit because we're already on week 19. 

So, let's see each of the late topics in order and then come to this week itself.

237- CBT2017- 19

Based on the previous sessions, I thought I'd report a lot of exposures and progress for my 19th CBT. After all, I had a whole month since the 18th session, so I naturally had high hopes. 

Instead, I have a feeling of stagnation, and having to continue another month with the same exact exposure tasks as my 18th session. 

236- ptsd relief, burnout, and general fatigue

You may have noticed that after following two thirds of B's #30dayblogchallenge in March, my regularity in April dropped rapidly and that I posted only 13 entries in 9 days spread throughout the month. 

Indeed, thanks to the challenge, my overall posts in March broke all records in regularity and I hit my highest number of entries in a month : 34. I felt quite accomplished with this.