MORE OR LESS

We’re more and more aware that our sensory sensitivities are intricately interwoven with our mental, emotional, physical, and neurological proclivities. This holds equally true – in very different ways – for my son and me.

Just as I often suspect I feel “too much” as compared to others, I think too much as well. Here’s an example: I was in a local coffee shop, reading a sign on a muffin: “Uni        Corn Muffin,” it read, with the “Corn Muffin” part all typed and official and the “Uni” handwritten.

I began to consider this puzzling marker...Did it herald some sort of prestigious, single-source, locally-farmed corn? Just one particular type of corn, a Silver Queen or Butter n Sugar perhaps? Or were they referring, trendily, to “uni” as in sea urchin?

I definitely didn’t want that!

“Um...what does that mean?” I asked the incredulous cashier, pointing to the sign.

“Unicorn?” she said, with pity.

Oh.

Pardner asked me not long ago, “When do you decide to put on lipgloss?”

I think he expected an answer along the lines of, “When I don’t have any on.”

I, however, gave him a very long, involved answer, touching upon the vicissitudes of being a ghostly-looking white person, what sorts of textures there are in lip things, the many, many sensory and chemical qualities that can be wrong with various lip-related products, what makes for a good lip gloss, and, most importantly, how incredibly painful it feels for me when my lipgloss wears off in even a tiny part of my lip...

                                              Figure I – Amount of Dry Lip That May Lead to Crisis

There’s a potential world of pain in a dry lip, and I say this as someone who bears the chronic pain of rheumatoid arthritis with nary a whimper (rheumatoid also brings me raynaud’s syndrome, which adds to dry lip – help!). I say this as someone who has lived quite a life and is amply endowed with “perspective.” I am pretty butch...but don’t leave me stranded without my chapstick. Burt’s Bees original, to be precise, with the Lip Shimmer on top.

Some of you will be reading this aghast. Indeed, I might be called an over-thinker, and/or an over-feeler by many, be it regarding muffins, lipgloss, or just about anything else. Others will be nodding along, having experienced life with sensory processing differences.

I am not saying people with high physical sensitivities necessarily have high emotional ones, just that our physical, emotional, neurological, intellectual, and all other “parts” are so intricately related. Sometimes our “parts” complement each other – and sometimes they exacerbate each other. We notice and feel and think and so on, more or less, more and less, more and more, less and less....It’s part of who we are.

Take my G, he’s a smart, caring, and thoughtful giant little dude, but, as I have mentioned before, he wouldn’t notice if there was a pound of schmutz on his mouth. In sensory processing lingo, he’s an “under-responder.”

                                    Figure II – Putative G Mouth: Yes to Schmutz, No to Crisis/Cleanup

Perhaps partly because of this less-sensitive-to-irritants way of being, G is so relaxed and natural about life. He’d read “unicorn,” no problem. He has a carefree heart. He feels a lot, but his feelings, so far, are remarkably positive. In contrast, I have to work pretty hard to stay upbeat, because of all that’s literally weighing on me. Being more sensitive overall – an “over-responder” - has a lot to do with this need to make quite an effort just to function at times.

G’s executive functioning is almost non-existent, and I know this, along with some social differences typical of neurodiverse persons, as well as non-noticing of schmutz (and other hygiene issues), will bring him many, many challenges in the years to come. But how about his EQ (emotional intelligence)? Off the charts. What balance and wholeness this seems to bring him!

Just yesterday, G pulled his socks on over soaking wet feet without screaming. In fact he was smiling and chattering while he did so. How liberating would that be? I wouldn’t change either of us  – and I am not crazy about the judgy aspect of terms like “over-“ and under-responsive” – but I do find our differences fascinating. I watched him doing this little thing I could never do, and I marveled at the range of ways of being whole, at how our mores and lesses -- RATHER THAN MAKING US MORE OR LESS -- make us, us.

Love,

Full Spectrum Mama

Welcome to the Sensory Blog Hop -- a monthly gathering of posts from sensory bloggers hosted by The Sensory Spectrum and The Jenny Evolution. Click on the links below to read stories from other bloggers about what it's like to have Sensory Processing Disorder and to raise a sensory kiddo! Want to join in on next month's Sensory Blog Hop? Click here!

An InLinkz Link-up

TEACHABLE MOMENT

WE ARE NOT YOUR TEACHABLE MOMENT

We are a Colorful Family. When we are out in public, we are usually the ones people are looking at. Because we are unusually attractive. OR, perhaps, because one of the kids is usually doing something "interesting" and one of the parents (usually me - Pardner is a chef, and chefs quite a lot) is usually doing something "creative" to try to channel the "interestingness."

I’ve realized over the years, because I find myself staring when I see families with differences or public challenges, that some people—like me -- look on with identification and empathy.

Some look with scorn and judgment (those guys don’t even deserve this sentence).

But the other group consists of the ones who want to use my family to teach “tolerance” – which feels a little condescending -- or those who (much better) are aiming for respect and acceptance, whether of neurodiversity or ethnic diversity or any other inclusive impulse…

Um, may I just say that being anyone’s “Teachable Moment” can be a wee smidge annoying? But okay, I get it, people.

So here’s my Lesson Plan for this Teachable Moment:

                                           Figure I – The Full Spectrum Family Lesson Plan

Guess what. It's a spectrum. Is yellow "better than" violet? No. Red vs. green: who wins?

Nobody.

Neurotypical's not better than neurodiverse -- and vice versa.

White? Brown? Peachy keen? Melungeon? Different?...Equal.

Orange? Blue? Indigo? Sensitive? Impervious? Female? Male? Trans? “Normal?” Weird?” Can’t tell?

Equal.

Please think carefully before you approach us just because one of us is brown and might not be “mine,” or because one or two of us seems quirky…unless you do so under an equal and inclusive flag.

Whatever we are representing to you, it’s probably not our "fault." It’s not even necessarily that interesting.

There's nothing wrong with us, or at least no more than there is with any other given family. And we all need to learn to get along. Best we do so with the basic assumptions that no one is a specimen and that we are all equally valid members of this funky human rainbow.

Thanks – I needed to get that off our Spectrum.

Love,

Full Spectrum Mama

An InLinkz Link-up

PAIN – SQUARED

Parents who have children who were adopted from orphanages often have to ‘teach’ their children to acknowledge pain to themselves and to express pain to others. Although Z came into our family at only nine months of age, she had already learned not to react to her body being hurt, or to express hunger or thirst through a baby’s only language (tears).

Instead, she expressed herself primarily through screaming if being put down at any time. Once she found someone to hold her at length, a single person devoted only to her and her brother (to whom she was immediately attached as well), she was not about to be abandoned. This was particularly acute during her first weeks with her family, during which not only did she demand to be held at all times but also to be walked around while being held, resulting in SEVERE sleep deprivation for all concerned.

Arriving home, we embarked upon a plan. I had heard that children whose most basic needs for comfort have not been met may present a range of developmental and emotional challenges and I had bright ideas to “fix” some of these potential issues. Reacting to pain came first: a strategy of exaggerated response to any possible injury quickly taught Z that if something happened to her that potentially did not feel good, and there was someone nearby to help, she could get a response to her feelings and be the beneficiary of comfort measures, such as an ice pack or the proverbial band-aid.

To this day, though, Z doesn’t even blink an eye at pain when she thinks no one is looking! I have watched from the kitchen window as she has fallen – hard, or been accidently but vigorously wacked with something from afar by her clueless brother. She never makes a sound…or even a face. I wonder: did she somehow never develop some important aspect of the neurology to feel pain because of those early months of neglect? Is she just brave as heck? Does she feel the pain, but less?

G and I, being highly sensitive personages, have to work really hard not to scream when we, like, step on a stray drop of water (no - really), so this is definitely a germane question in the Full Spectrum family.

Whereas a casual hidden observer could probably catch G or I writhing privately in agony several times a day, I’d wager that observer would never see the same in Z. Z has learned that public expression of discomfort leads to results, but when there is nothing to “gain” by reacting, she seems to have decided not to waste her energy.

Similarly, she doesn’t seem to notice hunger or thirst unless in the environs of potential indulgers, in which case she will avail herself of various and sundry treats. G and I, within an hour or two of not eating, invariably find ourselves starving, even trembling, with hunger. Much longer and we become vague, lightheaded, nauseous. I happen to be hypoglycemic, and G may be too; perhaps equally significant is the fact that we both had our needs met as infants. Our physiology (sensitive) and our early environments (sensitive to our needs) matched. 

Z, in contrast, seems to be able to function indefinitely without eating, unless food is offered to her. That is, her energy stays high, her focus sharp, her spirits strong -- whether she eats regularly or not…[Obviously, I haven’t performed experiments on her, I am going on seven+ years of observation.] It’s hard to imagine she could be experiencing hunger in the profound and extreme way that G and I do and still function so well, but, as must be asked vis-à-vis her pain, doesn’t she feel some hunger? She knows her situation now is one in which her needs can be met, and yet she still self-limits on those needs…unless – and this is a real possibility -- her physiology just really is that different.

That her response varies so widely according to context potentially indicates a reduced sensitivity to her own body’s cues and/or a self-imposed (conscious or un-) denial of self-nurturing and/or a really advanced mastery of social capital. Would Z be more sensitive overall, and therefore more vulnerable, had she been nurtured differently in her first months?

People sometimes ask me to blurb their books or products or blogs on this blog and I recently agreed to read a novel about reactive attachment disorder (RAD) by a reader named Michelle Weidenbenner. Her book is called Scattered Links (http://www.amazon.com/Scattered-Links-Michelle-Weidenbenner-ebook/dp/B00HP3X6R4) and it is about a Russian orphan’s journey. I haven’t finished it (and it seems to have some Christian undertones, which may be a plus or a minus or neutral for different readers), so I haven’t yet got a blurb. I was struck powerfully, though, by this sentence from the preface, which is written in the orphan’s voice:

“We never learn how to ask for what we need because when we do, no one listens.”

I’d never connected Z’s inability to acknowledge pain or hunger with her inability to ask for what she needs or wants. Z’s refusal to ask for things comes across as regal, but it’s at base a survival strategy, a sad concession to a disappointing start.

The other day we saw a “Wild Women Don’t Get the Blues” bumper sticker and Z asked what it meant. I explained that women have often been taught to do as they are told and that doing so, just for the sake of obedience, makes women unhappy. Women should follow their own dreams and beliefs, I told her, and then they won’t get “the blues.” But sometimes the other people who make the rules -- and the other people who follow the rules -- don’t like when you make your own rules, and they might call you “wild” or “different” or “crazy,” even. And that’s okay, because you will be happier -- and stronger -- for following your own heart.

Of course, she’s still too young to make up her own rules. And I assured her I still get to boss her around for a Long Time. But I want her to know, and I will continue to say to her:  if something (or someone!) hurts you, or if you are hungry for something, speak up, my daughter!!!! How we feel – in our hearts, our bellies, our bodies, our beliefs – matters. YOU MATTER.

Now, let’s eat!

Love,

Full Spectrum Mama