@actuallyautistic
The holidays are over and I can finally get back to normal. This includes having my usual three days off together and as I start the first of those I have to report, that I am fucked, completely drained, knackered and down to my finally ounce of energy and ability to give a ... But, then I knew I would be, as soon as I was finally able to relax.
This is, perhaps, one of the most important things I have learnt, since realising I was autistic and beginning to learn about it. The knowledge of how many things drain me, that in the past I wouldn't have believed could. Sure, working over Christmas, isn't ideal. But, there's all the rest. Spending time with the family I love. The presents, the food, all the wonders of this, the happiest time of the year.
But, as much as I, mostly, still love Christmas. I can see now that all this comes with a cost. The complete shattering of the routines that normally support me. The added pressure of having to get around them and dealing with all the added events of family and parties and the sheer busyness and intensity of this time of year. The way so much of it, just isn't geared towards my needs, or even an ability to satisfy them. Shopping becomes a lottery of will it be quiet or not, even, will they have what I want, or not. The roads become something more akin to Deathrace 2000 and the peopling is just so much worse. Not withstanding that everyone needs me to be (shudders) happy and God help me if I'm not. Because I'm stressed, or tired, or just simply trying to cope and that's currently taking everything I've got. But also, because it never seems to end.
All this is what I wouldn't have been able to see in the past. I would have gone into this time of the year, fighting the tiredness, refusing to admit that there was any genuine reason for it and therefore believing it couldn't be real and bulling headlong into my life as if nothing was wrong. I certainly wouldn't have made any plans for how to recharge. I wouldn't have known that the crash was coming and that I had to accept and in fact welcome it. That the body can only take so much and then you have to give it respect, or it will make you somehow. That this is as much a part of being autistic, as any of the good things. I would, instead, have just been normal and cracked on with my life, like a train wreck waiting to happen.
Which probably explains why January and February were always my darkest and lowest months. When depression, and perhaps more likely burnout, I can see now, would dog me, like an unwanted guest. It was always a period I couldn't explain before. It was always, hello post Christmas depression, my old friend and then the knowledge of the long slow trudge to spring and the hopeful lifting of it.
So, if like me, you find these the hardest months. Perhaps think about why and also how much grace and understanding you can actually give yourself, now that you can see and prepare for those reasons.
[#]Autism
[#]ActuallyAutistic
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