Family Groups: Fear, Friends, and...Love

[Aspergirl4hire]

"We're like family." Conventionally this is said of friends who are closer than usual, whatever that is.

Everyone has a "family of origin." At its smallest, that's a single parent. An "extended family" includes in-laws and cousinly degrees so faint that lineage depends upon social convention. "Street family" are homeless individuals who sleep together and watch out for each other.

What's an "aspie family?" How does being aspie as parent, or aspie as child, change the way family works? What is a family, to you? What do you want it to be? And what do you bring to a group that seeks some closeness, when our minds have problems with the social glue that makes closeness possible?

What does it mean when friends are family? What roles get blurred? What truths are affirmed?

I love friends deeply, which seems to mean that I will admit to things not admirable, and the shame of them and the forgiveness of the friends enables me to do better in future. My own family are the people around me who accept who I am and that I have a place with them, and them with me. My family of origin is totally estranged; I've been an orphan for years, and will soon be a survivor.

There was a thread once about the nine kinds of love. I captured them and put them on my refrigerator:

Agape: Selfless, altruistic love; spiritual love; universal love of mankind.
Eros: Passionate physical and emotional love; stereotype of romantic love.
Ludus: Love that is played as a game or sport; conquest; playful love.
Mania: Highly volatile love; obsession.
Philautia: Self-love based on self-respect.
Philia: Comradely love of friendship; loyalty, as between brothers (and sisters!) in arms.
Phrenic: Intellectual love of any kind; intellectually-based love of a person.
Pragma: Practical love that is driven as much by the head as the heart; mature, enduring love.
Storge: Affectionate love of kinship; familial love; love based on similarity.

1. What kinds of love connect you to others?
   
2. How have they blended and worked when they've worked most successfully?
   
3. Does love cast out fear?

 

[watersprite]

1. Eros, Philautia, Philia, Pragma, Phrenic, Storge
2. Briefly, as otherwise I'd write too much here, the Philautia works (for lack if a better word at the moment) hand in hand with Pragma. The Phrenic with Eros. Pragma stands alone for my kids, because I am or was responsible for them; but as they grow older has combined with Phrenic.
3. Love doesn't cast out fear. Action casts out fear by the self continuing on through the situation.

These are subjective and subject to revision.

 

[DC1346]

"I love friends deeply, which seems to mean that I will admit to things not admirable, and the shame of them and the forgiveness of the friends enables me to do better in future. My own family are the people around me who accept who I am and that I have a place with them, and them with me. My family of origin is totally estranged; I've been an orphan for years, and will soon be a survivor.

My thoughts exactly! Although I email my father once a week, I haven't seen him in 15 years. I have had NO CONTACT with my mother for over 36 years or my sister for about 34 years. I haven't seen my Uncle or any of my cousins in over 20 years.

My NT friends tell me that this should bother me and they use the word "family" as though that should actually mean something.

It doesn't.

1. What kinds of love connect you to others?

Although I am a reclusive introvert, I do care about others. I have problems expressing my feelings because I find emotions to be terribly messy ... so I express my feelings in other ways.

I work as a chef instructor in a rural high school's Culinary Arts program.

I could teach to minimum standards but prefer to push my students to the limit of their abilities. Teaching for me is form of caring ... and so we don't just bake cookies ... we make gingerbread houses. I don't just make complete meals with my level II classes. We work on plate presentations. We don't just make salads. We exercise our knife skills to create a composed cucumber salad.

I like to speak through my food. For me, food is art ... food is the end result of various culinary techniques ... food is love.

Last week I went to work early and made a dozen cheese omelets with home fried potatoes and either crispy bacon or sausage patties. I loaded this food onto a utility cart and wheeled it out of my Culinary Arts kitchen and into the main hallway. As teachers arrived for work, I offered them breakfast. I didn't have enough for everyone, so when I ran out, I simply wheeled the cart back into the kitchen. No muss, no fuss.

Pictured below is a plated luncheon that I volunteered to produce over the summer for 35 faculty and staff at my school. I went Italian and produced lemon chicken, Florentine pasta roulade, and fresh seasonal vegetables. For dessert I offered a buffet of 2 different types of cream cheese pies (chocolate or strawberry), carrot cake with orange butter cream frosting, pizzelles (Italian waffle cookies) stuffed with lemon cream and pistachios, glazed open faced tarts, and a fresh fruit salad. I am told that this meal was "over the top" and that my predecessor had served a casserole.

I am a great believer in volunteer service. While working at an American school in Saudi Arabia as an elementary teacher, I was a volunteer with the USO and served at our military base (Khobar Towers) as a volunteer baker. I'd buy $100 worth of baking supplies every weekend (which for us was Thursday and Friday) and I'd bake cookies for our troops. During this time I was also a volunteer host and would bring as many as 6 soldiers back to my home for traditional holiday meals.

I have been a Red Cross Disaster relief volunteer (shelter management). I have picked up trash for Texas Parks and Wildlife. I have worked in a foodbank, served as a Bible study leader and church videographer, and have been a volunteer firefighter ... so I also express my love of community through my actions.

While working as a volunteer at a foodbank, a colleague at work told me about cafeteria kitchen assistant at another school who was having financial problems. Her son had just gotten out of prison and was unemployed. The son had moved into this woman's home with his wife and two kids and the poor woman's meager income couldn't extend to providing her family with a Thanksgiving dinner. Since I volunteered at the local food bank, I was asked if I could provide a holiday box. Our holiday boxes consisted of a whole turkey and all of the food items needed to make a Thanksgiving meal ... but all of these boxes were already spoken for.

Unwilling to tell my colleague that the foodbank was out of stock, I bought all of the food products that were needed and boxed them as though they had come from the foodbank. With the foodbank manager's permission, I later delivered a boxed holiday meal to this woman as though it had come from the foodbank. The woman broke into tears and was grateful ... but her gratitude was towards the foodbank and not to me because I didn't want her to feel indebted.

2. How have they blended and worked when they've worked most successfully?

My love of food and teaching has made me a good teacher. Most students seem to like my class. They also seems to like me as an individual ... a fact that continues to mystify me because in teaching, I am simply trying to do my job to the best of my abilities. I am not trying to make personal connections ... but it would seem that teaching IS a type of personal connection ... so I'm not sure how this happy accident came about.

One freshman in particular seems to have adopted me as a surrogate parent. I do not understand why.

A couple of weeks ago she approached me after school. Her drama club sponsor had not showed up and the drama club had been waiting in the hall outside the theater for 15 minutes. I called the office to report the problem and invited the students into my room where we played several rounds of "Chef says" (basically Simon says). Each time a student won, I'd offer a granola bar or candy bar. I keep a stash of snack items hidden in a kitchen cabinet. At the end of the game, I passed out snacks to the two students who hadn't gotten anything and sat with them while they chatted until the club sponsor showed up.

Last week this same student showed me an incomplete script for a murder mystery play. I read it and because she expected some feedback, I offered some constructive criticism.

Since she seemed to expect something more from me, I tentatively offered the fact that I enjoy murder mysteries and particularly like Law and Order. She smiled and began telling me all about her favorite TV mystery dramas. I was relieved because I'm not very good at small talk. In social situations it's always much easier for me to find a topic that an NT enjoys and to allow that person to talk while I nod and interject the occasional comment to show that I'm actually listening.

Does love cast out fear?

Love of what I do for a living has enabled me to largely suppress or at least delay (until I'm home or alone at work) panic attacks, anxiety, and melt downs.

Don't get me wrong ... I find being out and about in the world to be extremely stressful.

At work I don the persona of a chef instructor. It doesn't matter that I'm actually a trained chef, have industry work experience, and am actually certified as a culinary arts teacher because the real me is a timid reclusive introvert. Chef me knows no fear. I wear my culinary uniform like a suit of armor and I can do my job as needed provided I have time to decompress and have time to recover my emotional equilibrium at home.

This is me at work pictured below.