To be or to have, that is the question…

The debate in neurodiversity circles is often how to identify oneself. Do I align myself with disability and disorder?  Do I say “I have Aspergers Disorder”– which feels very strange, identifying myself as disordered, when I tend to have a rather blissful superiority complex—Or do I take a kind of giddy pride in being different, exclusive of neurotypical behavior? This seems more natural, but also uncomfortable, to say “I’m an Aspie” when this means different things to different people, and I really do not want to have to defend myself to someone. Yes, I am highly-verbal. Yes, I have a sense of humor. No, it is not your sense of humor. When I came to that non-mandatory meeting and left abruptly, it was because I couldn’t sit still and you guys were driving me nuts with your stupid jokes that weren’t funny and your self-important incredibly generic “graduate student lifestyle” anecdotes that seem to come off a “top ten list”. If I am only going to sit in the corner juggling Hershey’s kisses and being bored, I would rather leave. Tell me to lighten up? How can I when I know my name’s been on the gossip menu and you seem to be making fun of me? I am very sensitive to sounds. I am very sensitive to touch and light. I cannot wear high heels or synthetic materials. I am sensitive to fragrance and chemicals. I have had to drive across town to the grocery store for over a month now due to construction odors in the one down the street that make me want to pass out. “I am an Aspie –” I have a heightened sense of justice and purpose and a lower tolerance for superficiality, generic knowledge-gathering, and logical fallacy, and I will tell you exactly what I feel. I won’t go to your parties because you are all just trying to prove your intellectual credentials. I’d rather be at home IMPROVING mine.

As someone in the high-functioning realm of Asperger’s (who nevertheless has experienced a lot of cruelty and discrimination due to misunderstanding) I am still afraid of taking advantage of the diagnostic label to create a public identity. I’ve never really liked the idea of a public identity anyway– I don’t much see the point. It can so easily be ,or in place just to make noise and draw attention to oneself.  Nevertheless, from what I’ve been told, I am one of the most eccentrically memorable–either positively or negatively, depending on how much of an asshole you are 🙂 — people that many have met. So if I’ve already established some sort of “public identity” why not give it a name and take advantage of having a community?

In a way, however, I feel like a word oversimplifies and pathologizes my personality and temperament. I also feel like it makes it seem as if I can’t or don’t want to grow and change — just because “I have Aspergers” or “I am an Aspie”, doesn’t mean I WANT to stare at the wall while you talk to me, or become aggressively argumentative, or cry way too easily at inappropriate times.  I know that there are things I could do better, and I am working to change them. I have a really sweet story about eye contact coming up soon, actually.

Also, I don’t want to reduce my complex self and mannerisms to a vague term people associate with an even vaguer term, autism, that people associate with disease. I am generally very proud of who I am, an iconoclastic, socially rather immature, intellectually highly focused and obsessive, queer woman with a mental illness that has allowed me to deeply understand what it means to depend on others and be grateful for their strength. If I didn’t have such experiences of intense struggle and disabling illness, I don’t know if I truly would have learned to love and to love the right people, those who have proven their sincerity by “coming to my rescue” and accepting me, no matter what.

Gayatri Spivak’s concept of strategic essentialism works well here. Identity politics often require us to essentialize ourselves whether ethnically/culturally/religiously or as gendered/sexual/disabled beings, in order to speak for and gain recognition and acceptance for a marginalized population. Nevertheless, essentialism only ever applies to us up until a point. I have a professor who wrote a book about being bipolar, and I hate to admit it, but I think of her in terms of her capacity to identify with me on this level. When I think of Temple Grandin, I think of autism. When people think of me, what will they associate me with? A label, a stereotype? If I give myself a label, will they distrust it and ask me to “prove” my Aspergers? And in that case, will I find myself directing them to traits of mine that appear negative or like shortcomings, rather than strengths? Why would I want to initiate THAT conversation? (How are you messed up? Exactly? Tell us so that we can think even more poorly of you and ask you to just “get over” it.)

Because of the complexity of my mixed-diagnostic experiences and my rather fragile emotional state at this time, it is possible, at this point anyway, that it may be best to simply speak for the neurodiverse community without being unnecessarily specific. And make a point to talk about Monk whenever possible.

Rage, meltdowns, temper tantrums, and the urge to inform.

Aspergers, mental illness and religion: strange bedfellows

I’m no enemy of religion but I’m not an uncritical friend of it either. I do not shut down conversations of God and meaning. Their variety intrigues me. There are far too many questions than there are answers. I generally love life and humanity but struggle with the problem of evil, which scares me, and sometimes get so lost in the incomprehensibility and sensory clarity of consciousness that I have panic attacks and obsess over things to calm down. The Aspergers/autism spectrum individuals have this tendency to obsess over things and people… and that’s where religion gets tricky.

Reality is out of our control, beyond language. Religion grants order and stability, and its rituals are a tempting distraction to the mind and senses.Here’s another thing that makes it trickier: I have bipolar disorder, and therefore extreme emotional and psychological states. If I am obsessive and manic, or obsessive and depressed, that obsession takes on all the darkness or overwhelming passion of these states. Therefore religions can give me a kind of mystical ecstasy, an incomprehensible passion, adrenaline. They can also lead down the path of terrifying delusions when my mind and body go into self-destruct mode, because  religious and radically empirical, rather than rationally deductive, explanations have become immediate and appealing. If religion brought me peace and ecstasy, then I will grant it the power and authority to determine the nature and cause of my illness. Am I a sinner? What have I done to deserve this? Are God and the Devil truly fighting for my soul?

So, fixations are one of the most productive and positive aspects of autism spectrum disorders, in that they provide a way to concentrate and calm oneself, but if I obsess over the wrong things, it just makes everything go from bad to worse. That is what happened with me and religion a while ago. I had a mental breakdown and decided to convert to a faith I had been studying for a long time. I was terrified of everything, from trees to broccoli to reading the news. A crisis of absurdity had struck along with a biochemical malfunction. To put things in order I adapted a very strict faith system. I thought it might solve everything. As my bipolar episode grew progressively worse, however, the literal way I was interpreting religion started to make me delusional. My religious friends believe in the end times. They believe my suicidal ideation is the work of Satan. Well, one night when I was in the ER for the fourth time in two months, ranting that there was something inside me trying to kill me and that it was God and the devil fighting for my soul, I had a realization.

It was simply this: I am being irrational. This isn’t me. Fuck this shit, I’m getting off this train. And I did. I threw off religion with fear and revulsion and committed to rational autonomy with an equal belief in its redeeming powers.

I am fascinated by the complex, deconstructive philosophical questions, the rituals, the ecstasy, and the mytho-poetics of faith systems.

On the other hand, I don’t like arbitrary social coding that isn’t clearly in place to prevent greed, murder, incest, etc. Gender is a constructed and imaginary thing that can be bent, stretched, enlarged, circumcised, penetrated and collapsed. When I have made the big step to an intimate relationship, which is not a priority or need, but when I do, I love women as well as men. In *that* way. I really love the gays, homosexuals and homosexuality, bisexuals and bisexuality, and all other forms of sexual conduct involving adult, co-species consent. I am pro-masturbation. I like it a lot. Do I ever! Wow. I can really get off at my own hand. I think I will stay single forever. Who needs kids and a family? Not me. I like co-ed sunbathing and swimming. Coed everything. My body needs to feel the wind and sun, and there is nothing sinful about exposed skin and attractive fashions.  I like John Waters, erotic novels, photography, and painting. I find daily life potentially quite erotic, in Europe especially. Bridget Bardot. Albert Camus. Tango, ballet, Sex at noon in a hotel in Paris. I like atheisms, nihilisms, existentialisms, and all their deep pathos because I too fear oblivion, and their irreverent humor, because I like making fun of everything. That is, everything. Even things you think I shouldn’t. I argue with authority and I kind of like causing trouble. This list could go on forever. I hate lying or making believe. I hate small talk.