Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Life out of a Box

Today I want to talk about one of the reasons I started this blog. I didn't talk about it in the introduction, because I wasn't sure I even wanted to go this route with it, but I think its an important part of my story. This post might wander a little, but try to stay with me. This is key to understand where I'm coming from with various things I talk about later on.

I have Asperger's syndrome. I also have anxiety along with that, and some OCD tendencies. Its something I've lived with my whole life, but I've just recently been officially diagnosed. 

When I first started realizing it was a likely possibility, I tried to find female, teenage YouTubers and bloggers out there who also had Asperger's or autism. There weren't that many that I could find, so I decide that-after I had an official diagnosis-I'd start my own blog, and maybe eventually a YouTube channel, to help offer support to others going through the same thing. The thing is, life doesn't just fall nicely into little boxes the way I had anticipated. 

After have testing done, it turns out I do have all the characteristics of Asperger's, as well as anxiety that likely stemmed from that. It's hard to tell if the anxiety came first and cause behaviors that mimic Asperger's, or if Asperger's has caused me to be anxious because I feel out of control in certain situations.  I also have OCD tendencies seem to stem from both, but that ones not an official diagnosis. 

I decided then not to pursue the blog idea. I felt intimidated at the thought of explaining all of this. I had wanted one label to explain to people, not several. And then I decided to start a blog anyway.

Originally I wasn't going to talk about this at all. I was going to post old pieces of writing, and the only new writing was going to be my weekly reviews. And I was going to carefully leave out anything mental health related in those.

But I wasn't happy. I still felt like I needed to share my story, even though it doesn't fit into a box the way I'd like. So, here it is. Here I am. And even when its hard, I wouldn't want any other story. 

If you have any questions about any of this, feel free to comment them, and I'll try and answer them as accurately as I can. At some point I'll have a post up that talks more specifically about my experiences with Asperger's and anxiety, but I didn't want this post to be to long. Thank you for reading. Xoxo

1 comment: