• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

Analyzing my first Corona meltdown

Yesterday, it's been approximately five and a half months since my last meltdown. Today, it's been zero days since my last meltdown. Several factors have piled up that eventually caused it - and I am a tad bit ashamed to admit that all of them stem from the current global situation.

Since I started intensively researching autism, I have come to understand myself significantly better, to the point where I learned to identify, and in consequence, avoid situations or circumstances that could potentially cause meltdowns. I have done so well that even family members who are not convinced I am on the spectrum had to admit that I have been doing way better.

Right now, I am trying to figure out what went wrong this time and whether I could have avoided this major meltdown today, during which I got so worked up and screamed so loud for so long, that my throat hurts now.

These are the factors that came together:
  1. Due to staying indoors all day - it's week 2 for me - my usual routine has been disrupted completely. I promptly reacted by building a new routine for myself the weekend before I would stop leaving the house on weekdays. The first week, it worked amazingly. I was as productive as ever, all the while having more free time for fun activities (at home, of course). This week, I got lazy and did not follow my new routine. From day one, I could watch my productivity and my mood plummet to earth. That was entirely my fault.
  2. Immediately before I had the meltdown, I read a very well researched and critical article on government measures regarding the current global situation, which confirmed what I had suspected for some time: My government is not doing all that great. It really upset me that I have absolutely no control over the situation but have to rely on people of whom I have no idea what they're doing, planning, or thinking right now. Could I have avoided reading the article and getting myself all upset? Yes definitely, but I did not see that one coming. On the contrary, I do believe it would not have resulted in the meltdown if no. 3 did not apply:
  3. Ain't nobody talking to me. I have reached out to several people I have contact regularly in the outside world. Some of them are people who are very close and important to me; however, I hardly get any replies. This is not logical to me, because I figured people had more time to communicate now, and maybe more need for it since people aren't supposed to meet up right now. Building upon this premise, I started thinking these people do not care about me all too much, considering I have not received any "how are you"s so far. Granted, it's not been long since social distancing started to be implemented, but my friends' lack of communication/replies has been longer than usual.
This last point is the most difficult for me to resolve; am I expecting too much? Is there a plausible reason people communicate way less than usual in a situation like this? Experts across every media outlet there is recommend staying in touch with others to make the isolation easier to handle. So now I'm hella confused as to why people aren't doing it.

Have you had similar experiences so far? How are you handling communication with friends and acquaintances at the moment? Let me know your thoughts!

Comments

You're just like me. I recently discovered I am autistic. All after years dealing with depression and anxiety and some 'panic attacks' that now I identify as meltdowns for various reasons. Anyways, since I know I am autistic (self diagnosed for the moment) I've been making my best to understand myself in a completely different way.

I've learnt about all my difficulties as an autistic person and I have been dealing with them so well. Actually, it's the same for me: My family (who did not think I might be autistic and thought I was overreacting) now see I'm doing much better.

But since we've been all quarantined my routines and my way of dealing with this has just been falling apart. Since day one I lost my routine and entered in a loop of: crying, obsessive thinking and doing nothing, which I don't blame myself of 'cause I was sick (yeah, I've got the virus, I'm okay now).

The thing is... I have to work on dealing with my treats now that I can't go outside and run or go to work or see my friends. I had a meltdown yesterday. Catastrophic thoughts, superficial breathing, I was uncomfortable and nothing made me feel better, jut crying like a baby and complaining about everything and getting angry and draining all my energy holding my fists very tight until it hurts. But today, I feel uncomfortable again, and it's just a matter of time for having another meltdown.

I don't know what should I do. I've never known how to deal with being inside a house for weeks, without working, just trying to follow a routine as long as I can, exercising and eating healthy.

Could you please tell me how you deal with being locked inside your house?
 
I think most people are concerned with immediate family. I think about my friends more than they think about me, because I have so few friends.
 

Blog entry information

Author
simetra
Read time
3 min read
Views
1,474
Comments
3
Last update

More entries in Aspergers & Autism

More entries from simetra

Share this entry

Top Bottom