The MooTown Four, new art

12" x 12"

Acrylic on wood

what it feels like these days

Barn Quilts 12" X 12" Patchwork Heart, Garden Path

I am just a nothing

Unwanted

Unwarranted

Unloved

If I fell in the forest

The leaves and roots

Would reclaim me

Before anyone noticed

I am nobody

To come home to

To hug

To smile at

To look forward to

I am awash in

Anonymity 

And disconnect

Few distant 

Relationships

Nothing close

No one close

At my side

Sitting next to me

Across the table

Alongside the

Sidewalk

The Aloneness 

Of months and years,

Knowing my future

Months and years

Will be more of the same.

She stood invisible

In heavy traffic

No one noticed

She had stepped

In the road

Or cared

That she did

She was nobody

A nobody

Insignificant 

Of No importance 

To any one

But her self

And then

She stopped

Caring

About herself.

The nobody

Had no one

And they call it life

Even when it is filled to the brim

With pain

Radiating

Exploding

Unceasing

Bringing her to her knees

Unnamed

From places and

Circumstances unknown

She was consumed

By the pain...

...

...

...

And she

In her extreme Aloneness 

And agonizing pain

Wrote this...

Maybe someone will hear

And know she is there

And can understand 

How deeply she suffers 

In her silence

In her dark

Little corner...

...

No one looks for her

No one misses her

No one hugs her

No one wants to be by her

No one tells her

I miss you

I love you

I'm happy to see you...

She is very sad

Nobody is very very sad

😔 

She's talking about Incest again, omg, like she spent her entire childhood being raped every week, Family Secrets

Watching this documentary, made me realize how easy it was for siblings and family members to picture me as nothing but a liar, out for some hidden, non-existant gain. Seriously, what possible motivation does a child or an adult have that they would blatantly talk about being sexually abused, raped by a family member? The only reason is to free themselves from the pain and shame of being forced to keep secrets for years and decades. Freedom can be found in words, truth spoken. The emotional pain is lessened and can start healing Only with the spoken words.

People see what they want to see, especially in families deeply entrenched with physical and sexual abuses. No one wants to believe a father could molest his daughter week after week, year after year.

If so, why didn't she tell anybody? Like anyone would believe one little girl over a family's rally cry behind the good husbandfather. Threats were constant, violent and frequent. 

It's good to see incest being talked about.

Truth is truth, even if it's ugly and makes your stomach turn and you don't want to believe it.

Incest Happens

Talk about it

Don't ever let the perpetrators win

Start healing

Speak your truth

Stop loving your mother

It was actually really easy to stop caring about my mother once I remembered how she whored me at 5 for groceries every week.

I really do not care about her at all anymore. Oh darn, the mother child bond broken by gross criminal malfeasance. 

Barn Quilts

My latest project is perfect for me. It's cloudy winter. I require bright colors. I love to paint but have no original designs hanging out within my head. Enter the Barn Quilt. A single quilt block, painted on to wood and hung outdoors on a building or indoors.

The first one I completed [all are acrylic paint on 12" X 12" wood] is called many names: Hidden Star, Pigs in a Blanket, or LeMoyne Star, to name a few.

The second one is called Courthouse Steps with the black center representing the judge. 

The third is the most popular quilt block, the Log Cabin. The red center represents the hearth of the home. The pattern is hundreds of years old.

Every day I paint for a few hours. Love it.

Busy getting screwed over and overlooked

This week has been ugly.

Let's start with how I did a favor for a friend with the promise of reimbursement for gas money.

I had to drive 50 miles one way to check out an airport that I'd never been to because my friend asked me to pick her up.

I took the afternoon to drive down there. On my way home, I stopped on the way to take photos, and that's when the battery blew up. If I hadn't agreed to this favor, I would have never been 18 miles out of town. Sure, the battery probably would have blown at some point but more than likely closer to home saving money on the mileage for the tow truck which was over 250$. The only reason I was that far out of town was because of the favor.

Car gets towed and fixed so I go to pick up my friend from the airport after 11pm. Oh, she missed her connection. So, my two hours, 100 mile trip for naught. I go back home.

Next morning, I drive another 50 to the airport, puck her up and then 50 more miles back.

I ask about the gas money. She says she'll catch me later.

Mind you, that's 300 miles worth of gas, a 550-600$ car tow and repair, and over 6 hours of my time and I live on disability where every dollar counts. I'm out bucks that I can't replace.

So, we meet for coffee last week, over a week since the airport trips. Halfway through, I realize I have to ask for the gas money cause she hasn't mentioned it.

I sheepishly ask if I can inquire about the gas money. Oh, she has to get it from the bank. Oh, she was just at the bank. She had forgotten my gas money. She says she'll get it to me.

That was last week. I'm still short. Still low on funds and unreimbursed.

I'm fucking invisible people. My biggest quality is how easily I am forgotten and overlooked. I don't think I have it in me to ask again. But, I have learned my lesson. No more free rides. 

Next, I had arranged to meet someone new at a local place. I arrive on time and text her. Oh, she is somewhere else but she will get there as soon as she can. 25 minutes later. 25 minutes later. No excuse other than time got away from her or she just forgot.

I'm that invisible. I do not make an impression of people. I'm like wallpaper. Always there. Completely unnoticeable. Just a f

ucking nobody.

Yeah. It hasn't gone well this week. 

It's safest, least painful to just stay home and avoid the hurt of being forgotten. Sometimes I really hate this not being noticeable, respected, liked or even loved. It's really difficult. I try and fail.

Stay home.

Stop the hurt.

I refuse to engage and put myself out there to be ignorantly stomped on.

I feel like a failure

Because my car battery blew up and left me stranded 10 miles out of town, in the middle of the road, on a bridge over dying water. The sound of the explosion as I turned the ignition on, was like a gunshot fired from a stray hunter's gun stopping me dead in my tracks. 

The cloud burst of tears. In panic and desperation breath, I called the emergency contact that I had trusted for over 25 years.

Hush, hush.

I feel like a failure because I had to ask for financial help with the 226$ tow bill and the 356$ repair that my monthly 900$ disability payment could not afford. Disability because I am and have been unable to work due to Multiple Personality Disorder and Complex Post Traumatic Disorder from a childhood, teenhood spent surviving weekly incest and monthly bouts of being sold as a child prostitute to groups of men.

Owning a car seems like a luxury reserved for the able bodied, the unabused and those survivors stronger than I.

I feel like a failure because I had to ask people to sacrifice their hard earned incomes for the sorry likes of me.

What did I do to deserve this?

I feel bad that I am getting help. I'm grateful but I feel like a heel.

I'm sorry I'm not better equipped to live my life in a fulfilling manner.

Forgive me.

Sometimes I need help.

You can live without love

You can live completely alone without anyone to love you. No hugs. No one to hold your hand. No one to care that you've been in bed all day. No "I love yous" in words, eyes or smile.

It can be done. 

Love is overrated.

Or, rather, unobtainable. 

You can live without it if that's just the way it is.

And you can grow up without a parent to love you, to care, to hold and make the bad stuff all go away.

Love is probably great, if you can get it.

Exciting, Excitement a new emotion identified and felt

I have found myself saying that I feel excited. When I published my book, talked about giving it to someone, and now, as I watch NFL football for the first time this year.

I feel excited. My facial expressions and accompanying gestures outwardly express it, too.

It's a new emotion for me to identify and exhibit. It's a "whole body emotion" that I had never encountered before. It's funny, I started saying the word out loud and then I noticed how it felt. Next, I could feel my face express dramatically. Like every cell has a little spark, sparkle. The accompanying hand gestures are those crazy fist pumps in the air, or just arms shooting skyward.

I've been a very secluded, reserved person and this large, visible expression of emotion I have never experienced before.

So, I go to look for an image online, to use for this post, and I'm surprised they all have a unique facial expression I tried to describe, And and that crazy fist in the air!!!!

61 and still learning

I wrote a book

Solitude is a gift

The absence of drama and waterfalls of insignificance. I am free to breathe and be exactly who I am without having to worry about how I look or what should I say.

It is immense peace deep within and surrounding. 

A gift of stress-free living and being.

To be totally alone, ones thinking needs to be geared differently, towards independence and self-reliance. Accepting shortfalls and celebrating victories without an audience or fanfare is not for everyone. I dare say those who love solitude and the silence of external voices that accompanies it, are mighty few and far between. I'm grateful for my solitude and deep sense of self and independence.

Extraordinary Attorney Woo Autistic Series

I love this series. Im still speechless and wound up from being amongst the public at the busy movie theater or I would be able to think and point out all I like about this.

I went to the movies

I had been in a movie theater in months, maybe a year or more. Tonight, I went with a friend of mind. So much overwhelmed me.

I knew enough to take my anti-anxiety medication. There were a lot of people there! Maybe four dozen or so, as a guess. Before the show started, getting popcorn was loud and confusing. My friend picked out the seats which helped. Waiting for the movie to start, everyone was talking a lot and it felt quite loudly. I was glad when the movie actually started as the crowd noise died down. The lights died down. And my anxiety lowered.

It was a movie I had seen many times, Jaws. I remembered most if the places were I had to look away from gross stuff. The movie sound was upsetting when it got really loud, which was mostly in the last 40 minutes or so. 

It was much scarier up on the big screen and not my little television. There was no closed captioning, and I kept thinking it would pop-up because I have it at home and I am quite used to it. I only understood about 50% or less of the dialog.

It was really nice having a friend to go there with. Having a friend is really new to me. I hadn't had one in seven years. She's really nice and on the spectrum, too.

My ears are still ringing from the noise. I'll need medication help to calm dow

n and sleep tonight. It was the most intense crowd event that I have experienced in a long time. But I managed to do it!

Biff and Whip, How my grandmother beat the Autism out of me

I was a child born in the 60's. Autism may have existed but it was unheard of. I exhibited strange behaviors that irritated people. I didn't look people in the eye or even look in the direction they were speaking at times. I paced and rocked when everyone else was standing still with arms at their side. My hands moved in jerky, erratic fashion whenever I was nervous or bored, which was the majority of time.

My paternal grandmother, who also raised my undiagnosed Autistic father, had a surefire way to get me, to stop my uncontrollable behavior. She would Biff me in the head, which is defined as a smack on the upperside of the head, within the hairline to make it unnoticeable, whenever I moved wrong. It was a quick, often unexpected smack to the side of the head.

The lack of eye contact was quickly cured by consistently Whipping my chin (I called it "whipchin") from the side, to face forward by her firmly grasping my chin while vigorously twist it face forward. Hence, Biff and Whip. I cannot accurately recount the depth of my pain and humiliation at his grandmother's actions.

I hated myself. Hated how my body moved and acted against my will and wishes. Oh my God, how I hated my body in its constant betrayal and the amount of physical and emotional pain it's tics and twitches caused. Funny, as I write, I'm not blaming the grandmother nearly as much as I am blaming me. Even though I had no idea what was wrong with me, it was never justified to be so disrespectful with an adult. Ouch. I'm hurting myself just with the realization of the damage done.

Grandmother was just one person but I did spend a lot of time with her, weekly mostly, all through my childhood. I wonder how many Biffs and Whips I endured before I learned to hide and become invisible. What methods did I use to suppress and deny my nervous, bored and fearful tics? Especially when the mere thought of that woman beast crushes my soul and makes me cry.

I endured terrible pain and suffering at her hands because I was an undiagnosed and misunderstood Autistic.

Yeah, I remember grandmother's two best friends, Biff and Whip.

An Autistic Child Dealing with Incest and Childhood Sexual Abuse

 It feels important on the verge of imperative to write about the incest memories that are surfacing after they have been withheld and hidden deeply within my self. 

These things, these events, even though they are hideous and immoral and difficult to hear about, they really did happen to me. Some people are allowed to talk about their past but incest survivors usually do not.

Secrets are like monsters we keep chained up inside that are eating us away, eroding our health and esteem. We feed the monsters with our continuing silence, day-by-day. I'm done feeding the monster. I'm no longer using great efforts to keep them chained inside.

Writing about Incest Out Loud means the perpetrators no longer control me. Their idle threats have died along with most of them. 

Today, I remembered how the incest began with my evil paternal grandmother. I was five years old. My family had just moved back to their hometown of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Not only was little me getting used to a new family home and neighborhood, quite dramatically I inherited relatives to interact with every week.

I recall my dad taking me over to the house on Valley Street. Dad was trying to explain the relationship, what grandparents were. I was Autistic, so the concept seemed really difficult to grasp but it turns out my dad had a mom and dad, too. This just seemed way out there. I found myself in this other new house complete with all different furniture, walls and smells. The carpet was thick and dark brown. Dark brown stairs, piano, dining room table; it was quite dark especially if it was night time out and only the lights illuminated the interior.

I stood in awe, or frozen, as the case may be. When I was overwhelmed, I could not physically move. I guess you would say I had that "deer in the headlights" look to me. Frozen in place and highly startled. Too much emotion. Too much all new surrounding me with the actual place and then these "relatives" some of whom I had seen a few times before but briefly, and they were wearing different clothes and hair now.

It was loud, too. People make noises when they greet each other. And if there are many people to greet, the noise just goes on and on; one person making noise after the next person making noise. There were a lot of people at grandmother's house as the aunts and uncles all wanted to see us because we were close now, and not living across the state or states away as we had been.

I guess it would be safe to say that there were always ambivalent feelings about going to grandmother's house, on my part. The food was usually plentiful and good but the people were a mixture. I mean, some were nice and all but some were just plain loud and too touchy.

I don't know how long it was after our move back to the city before dad brought just me and a sibling or two over to grandmother's house during the late afternoon or early evening. The house and the people living in it, still felt new and scary.

Grandmother announced with a smile and a smirk, that "Amy needs a bath" and since I was, once again, frozen in place because I had no clue what she meant, the grandmother grabbed my hand and started directing me up the living room stairs with her.

The stairs were scary and novel, covered in this thick carpet and they twisted a bit on the first few. Well, I guess it was more like, there were two or three steps, then a small landing which held a set of shelves, then the stairs turned like 90 degrees and headed up rather steeply. It felt like I was walking into an unknown cave or second floor dungeon as it was dark up there before grandmother turned on the light. A tunnel, that's what it looked like, a thick, black tunnel I was being led into. I was definitely scared of this big unknown. I was being separated from my dad and my brother and taken to a new place with this still new person called grandmother.

"I needed a bath?" what did that mean? I had already been bathed that day but, somehow I had gotten dirty and needed to be washed. Boy, my mother would have been more than a trifle upset if she knew all her preparations for going over there were for naught. Mom made sure I was clean and in clean clothes and my hair was brushed, just for grandmother, yet she found me "dirty". This was not good. I felt like I was in trouble, in addition to my overall massive confusion.

This is were it got really weird, really bad, uncomfortable and abusive. You don't have to read it if you don't want to. It is disturbing. I have to write it for my own sake and sanity. It hurts just to think about and it will hurt more to write about but then, only then, can the healing begin.

The bathroom door shut behind us. She started the water running in this strange bathtub that was way different from the one at the new family house. She began to disrobe, talking and chuckling and trying to say things in fun ways. I didn't move. There was this funny looking, naked lady in front of me. I couldn't move. I didn't know what to do or what was happening or what was expected of me.

So, she undressed me. Uncomfortable was an understatement. I still stood there, unflinching. Smiling, she reached her hand into the water and made splashing sounds but resolute and confused, I stood. She ended up lifting me into the tall-walled bathtub. My feet felt the warm water rushing around me. Grandmother sat down at the not faucet end of the tub. Talking, she was always talking; her lips didn't stop moving much. She wasn't forcing me to sit. She was trying to coax me into sitting all by myself. After a bit, that worked. I sat. The faucet at my back had been turned off. There is an eerie silence when you are naked in a tub of water. It's like you are in a different world and all the outside sounds are muffled.

I'll summarize what happened next. Grandmother started washing herself with a washcloth. Then she would wash me with the same washcloth. Then, she wanted me to wash her with the cloth but I still couldn't figure out how to make my body move in such a dire, unpredictable situation. Again, she grabbed my hand and prompted it to move on her as she saw fit. I was grossed up but still deep enough in shock not to display any emotion. My mind could not grab the gravity of the situation or what was taking place. At some point, all the washing of bodies stopped. I was again, helped out of the tub and thoroughly, uncomfortably dried by her after she had dried herself with the towel, smiling and making light remarks the whole time.

Still stunned, she dressed me, fixed my hair and led me back down the stairs. The people in the living room cheered, or at least, it felt like they were cheering, smiling at me with big teeth and welcoming me back into the fold "now that I was all nice and clean".

This is me, my story, my family and the things that happened when I was a child, an Autistic child being introduced to yet another family member and more incest.

Aspergers and the Alien free ebook August 6, 2024 - August 8, 2024 on Amazon Kindle

Freshly updated and edited!

Free is Good!!!! 

Edited and Published!

I'm so pleased with myself! The arduous, majorly challenging task of uploading and formatting my book in all three forms, ebook, paperback and hardcover, is now completed!

I had to revise the manuscript, add more information, edit chapters, create an index, write a description then upload all that and revise the cover. It Is Complete.

I am seriously technologically challenged. The newfound helper, I call "the god youtube" allowed me to format in the right way.

The book finally looks as I envisioned it, professionally done!

There were so many tears of frustration. It is a relief to publish!

Writing a book and self-publishing

I swear, the most frustrating thing about writing books is the difficulty figuring out how to get them published online.

I spent many hours today, simply transferring my written updated manuscript onto the amazon kindle site.

I spent yesterday, in futility, trying to create a table of contents via watching youtube tutorials, about a half dozen or so.

My brain just cannot grasp the simple constructs of performing basic computer document tasks. 

Anyway. Its a Great Book! 

Read it. Learn something new. Write a review if you feel so inclined.

Finding those hidden memories of incest and abuse

I've only recently discovered the extent to which both of my biological parents had me working as a child prostitute. Around 5, my mother told me I'd help the family get groceries each week by "doing to the grocery man what you already do with daddy". My parents were pimps.

In a way, I'm grateful ? Not the right. Relieved, might be more apropos, that my childhood sexual abuse was so extraneous and egregious and horrific because it makes the rest of my life make sense.

I spent my years in such great pain and distress and mental instability. And it had a Valid, Logical and Expected reason!! I was never making things up. I was never ever exaggerating! I wasn't a liar or a drama queen. I wasn't the boy crying wolf; I was the child being raped. 

My pain was real.

My life makes sense.

I make sense.

I love a good quiet

I don’t even have the energy to explain myself.

Blurting, saying things loudly and unintentionally

 

Blurting – to utter abruptly and impulsively; to say something suddenly and without thinking, usually because you are excited or nervous. Blurting is an uncontrollable reaction that I get, in which I say things out loud that I normally would prefer to keep to myself.

Case in point, for example, my family doctor was unpleasantly telling me that I had limits as to how long I could be on a certain medication that works wonders for me. Instead of a couple of adults discussing that, I turned into a petulant child and could not refrain myself from saying thins like, “I don’t like you”; “I find this conversation and this topic very unpleasant, unpleasant, unpleasant”; “I want you to stop talking about this…please stop talking about this.” I said many things in an angry tone of voice because I was starting to Meltdown and I was upset about the topic. Basically, I was Melting Down and I was mandatorily required to continue to sit in that unpleasant office and have that upsetting conversation, no matter what mean or disagreeable words this person insisted on speaking about. An Autistic without an Out, like out of the room, or out of doors, or the option to bolt for safety Will Probably Meltdown if overloaded. Yes, I was trapped and my blurting of phrases was the only option I had.

When I was finally released and she had stopped talking and I could run top my car, I proceeded to call her many, many terrible names as I banged my head and swore loudly within the confines and safety of my own vehicle.

Blurting is different than just talking to myself. I, like most people who routinely talk to themselves, often do so to help remind or remember things. Often it is done in small or soft voice as opposed to loud for all to hear.

While I have always talked to myself, blurting is something new that I have noticed only within the past couple of years. It feels more like an uncontrollable tic as opposed to a minor verbal disturbance. Like my other tics, I try and find places to blurt where others cannot hear me whenever possible. Blurting happens and sometimes accompanies a Meltdown.

Blare, a self-soothing technique

 A repost from an earlier time.

I am learning appropriate formatting for my book, thus finding pertinent older posts to edit and add.

Blare is the affectionate term for music turned up really, really loudly so that windows shake and floors vibrate. 

Believe it or not, there is a sound (LOL) reason for this atypical behaviour. I don't remember it exactly, but, at massage school they taught us that one of the reasons massage works when people are in pain is due to the overstimulation of the sympathetic or parasympathetic nervous system. When the right one gets overloaded, the nervous system automatically calms down. They called it the gateway effect or some such thing.

Its like if a million neurons are going in all different directions and someone stands at the top of the peak and blows a whistle really loud...everyone falls in line and simmers down.

Blare leads to calm...and i like calm..a whole lot. Its a self-soothing mechanism that actually works for this Aspie.

Its true...really...trust me...I'm a certified massage therapist...I know this.

Yeah, Blare and me...we got a thing

going on

Magpie Syndrome, the love of pretty shiny things and stealing Updated

 Magpie Syndrome – Back in 2016, someone I knew invited me to a conference for Autism that was taking place over a weekend miles and miles from my home. It would involve me riding in a car filled with mostly strangers, attending events and lectures that I did not understand, as well as spending the night away from home. I had no idea what I was getting myself into as I had little idea of what a conference entailed. I learned many interesting and surprising things about myself and my peculiar brand of Autism by stretching my comfort zone and being present at such an event.

One such anomaly was that I found myself admiring pretty, shiny things mostly other peoples’ bling (bling- expensive, ostentatious, jewelry) and baubles (baubles- small, showy trinkets or decorations) mainly jewelry such as rings, necklaces, fancy key chains and pins or brooches worn upon the chest.

When seated with others from my party, I often found my gaze seriously gravitated to necklaces and rings, to the point where I had to either consciously self-restrain myself from touching or I would ask the wearer if I could examine said pretty, shiny thing. Most people proved to be okay with allowing me to touch their goods with one woman even going so far as to remove her ring and let me play with it for a moment.

Upon my return home, I scoured the internet to see if there was a correlation for Aspergers/Autism and pretty shinys and if the obsession with all that glitters was a psychiatric or named syndrome. It took my search awhile to stumble upon “Magpie Syndrome” and even then, only on one obscure website named “Urban Dictionary” mentioned it. I wasn’t even sure Urban Dictionary was a legitimate site but I double-checked and indeed, it be real.

Here is what that website said:

Magpie Syndrome- an irrational affinity for shiny objects. When a highly shiny object is seen by the sufferer it often may induce a compulsive need to claim it and several minutes of staring at said object. This will later end in the sufferer pocketing the object to add to his/her collection by a sunny windowsill at home. If a shiny object is out of a sufferers grasp it will usually result in a strong, though usually short-lived obsession over it.

Okay, so it is somewhat tongue-in-cheek (an ironic, flippant, exaggerated, insincere or not exactly true thought or saying) and it is a website where individuals submit their own words and definitions, but it really, really fits. I find that it is irrational, an unquenchable thirst, a lust with no name, rhyme or reason,  and definitely obsessive to the point of distraction and nothing else mattes, albeit momentarily or temporarily.

A couple of days after my return home, I was picking up my new repaired cellphone and the technician assisting me had on a bright, oversized, shiny pretty necklace with a semi-familiar symbol on it. After a few minutes determining when it would be appropriate to ask, I did inquire as to the necklace’s meaning and origin. Of course, I do not touch things that are directly upon a person like that, but I was able to do the second-best thing which was to overtly stare and admire it as the wearer described it.

My Eldest Aspie son has Magpie Syndrome to a degree maybe a bit higher than my own, and I consider mine to be of a medium high degree. Back when my son was 4 or 5, my other parent and I noticed that bright, shiny, expensive small things were missing from the house…jewelry, crystals, souvenirs, things like that. My child had been pilfering many sparkly items. As his biological mom, the job fell upon me to give him a good, reprimanding talking to about removing items that were not his. I thought my talks were effective yet the behavior persisted and I continued to find purloined items in his room on cleaning day.

It became quite clear that this was an activity that was obsessive and beyond his rational control. My ways of coping were to simply start checking through his room once in a while or if I detected anything missing from its normal place. I stopped displaying certain pretty shinys and instead, kept them out of sight or hidden.

Magpie Syndrome is indeed a symptom of the Aspergers that runs in my family.

Walking in the rain

Listening and feeling the raindrops falling onto my hat and coat, the nearby variety of leaves and grass, with the absence of any vehicle or motor noises, I imagine this is what a rainforest sounds like. 

It is bea

utiful and gentle. I love it here.

The Depths of Parental Cruelty

A friend once said, everyone has a lousy childhood. I believe my childhood was different, more extreme and deviant, the epitome of how to deeply scar and destroy a child. I was a child prostitute from 2 to 13, at my parent's behest.

It started as seemingly innocuous play between my dad's friends, one-on-one, behind the closed door of my parent's bedroom while mom was away and dad and his small trio of friends played hearts and drank beer. It had been a long week and every man deserves to unwind as he sees fit. My parent's apartment was the place to be. That was between the ages of 2 till 5.

The first time I saw money change hands was at the air force base when my dad's commanding officer handed me back to him after a romp in his private quarters while everyone enjoyed the parade. I was 3 or 4 then.

The real fun, the malfeasance extraordinaire kicked up in earnest when my parents bought their first home along with a mortgage, taxes, utility bills and two, then three, more mouths to feed. 

Beginning around age 5, I started attending parties, private homes where men arrived with money in hand to pay for a piece of me, private time in the dark with a child from 5 to 8 years old. The parties happened three weekends a month, on Friday or Saturday, at one of 4 various residences. The event was rotated to avoid attention and suspicion. I'm sure the sight of young girls in places with grown men may have been alarming to onlookers or nosy neighbors.

At the parties, in addition to making a handful of money, groceries for the week,  my dad would arrange "specials". A special was a separate time, one-on-one with me, in a motel room paid for by the customer. My dad would always be near  waiting in the bathroom until the deed was done and the customer was satisfied. Physically, I was not to be harmed but that didn't stop some customers from being rough. I did not look forward to specials even though it meant more money.

Specials were scheduled on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday night. Usually it was just once or twice a week. I didn't do well when there were two specials in one night, so dad stopped scheduling two back-to-back like that.

I had time periods when I became quite ill, strep throat mostly. A round of antibiotics and a week home from school, and working parties, would often cure me but not always. If I was working too much, and school was demanding, there were times I required two rounds of penicillin and two weeks off of work.

I would be conflicted those times I was sick and wrapped in covers on a feverish day spent home in bed. I was glad I didn't have to work the men but sad that my brothers and sisters would have less to eat. I was selfish and selfless at the same time, but I couldn't control it. Sometimes my scrawny, little body just couldn't take it anymore.

In the late 60's and 70's, a hand job was 10$, a blow job 15$, and well, a special was 25 to 35$.

My dad could not make enough money to feed his family or ensure the roof was over his head. My mother and he decided to sell me to make sure all the bills got paid and food was on the table.

No, my childhood was not like yours. It was unlike anything I have ever read or heard about.

Early on, I learned to separate off, splice away and hide my incest and prostitution memories from my everyday ones. It's like I have two houses inside. One filled with whores, the sexually abused, the incest ones and the other filled with the good, loving, Catholic school girl, loving daughter who loved her parents.

I am different. I am weird and queer and broke into pieces.

We all are the abuses we don't talk about, the family secrets we keep hidden. We are our scars even if we refuse to look under the bandages. We are our traumas and tragedies and their repercussions whether we acknowledge and talk about them, or not.

I write this because I can. It is a story no one wants to read or hear or believe but I was there.

My parents were monsters who sold me for sex to strangers. I'm not going to hold that secret in any longer.

I am in therapy for life but it is my life and now I own my self and every single wretched and cruel thing that was done to me.

I chose to heal.

I am different. This is my story.

Getting Social

Tomorrow is the first day that I don't have planned appointments or social outings. I actually get to sleep in and decide for my self what, if anything I decide to do. It's been two week of busy days, so tomorrow is Friday and the weekend is mine!! I can smell the freedom from here. My expectation stresses are melting away. Maybe I'll turn into a noodle with this lack of temporary rigid structure.

Learning to give my self time, hours and days, that I can call my own. Feels good and cozy and warm just thinking about it.

Looking forward to sleeprest and a languid three day timeset.

I have Aspergers. I went outside. I didn't meltdown. Reward me.

Going out today, errr no

I was going to head out this Saturday morn. I had given myself plenty of options to choose from: laundromat, library, cemetery pictures, drop off clothes to thrift store, shop at thrift store, pick up apples and bananas from store. Then, I sat here near the open window.

It sounds high peopley outside. Lots and lots of distant traffic, like a constant stream in two opposing directions.

Change of plans.

The new idea is to find as many things to enjoy within my home, and choose which I'd like to do.

It makes me nervous just hearing how busy it is out there. Yes, I am in an especially high high sensitivity mode and easily overwhelmed, and I know it.

Staying in for my health.

I Used to Love Going to the Zoo

 When I was a child, I don't remember my parents taking me to the zoo. Mom was too busy pushing out babies and dad was engaged in work or looking for work. There wasn't the time nor the money for a ticket. I do recall being an early teenager and my aunt, who wasn't much older than me, would stop by our house, pile in some kids and we would head to John Ball Park Zoo in our hometown of Grand Rapids.

That place was simply amazing! It was another world full of the bizarre and outlandish. Around each bend, within each building something new and foreign and unexpected and real lurked and breathed. The animals were exotic and exciting to see. 

The first stop past the ticket booth was a large pond filled with waterfowl, ducks, geese and usually flamingos. I had to read the signage to learn the names of all these critters that I had never seen before, except for the flamingos, of course. Not only birds and animals from foreign lands but local fauna that I had only heard about like turkeys, swans and assorted geese.

The Zoo brought the external world that I had only read about and watched on television, into my reality. It broke through my Autistic tightly closed walls of miniscule awareness. It made the outside world real. Flamingos really did exist. Camels, monkeys, ostrich and elephant were all three dimensional, living breathing beings not just pictures on a screen. There indeed existed warthogs and zebras, lions and tigers and bears. Foreign countries like Australia, Nairobi, Kenya and Africa were indeed, actual places not just shapes on the map. I could have spent entire days doing nothing but sitting and observing, except that my aunt had limited time and there were so very many people clustered about. I could have done without the people.

When I became of driver age and had my own car, I would grab my available younger siblings and we did indeed spend many days and hours at the Zoo. I learned that rainy days and week days were the times that were less crowded. As in most things, less crowd equals more enjoyment for this Aspie. I loved the freedom of being able to go places and stay for as long as I wanted like that. The zoo enriched and enlarged my miniscule perspective and grasp of things in my external environment. 

Throughout my adult, being a mother years, I was grateful that my partner and I were able to visit many fascinating zoos scattered around the US from the kangaroo zoo in Kentucky to the huge Cincinnati zoo with polar bears, to the smaller, name forgotten place that had Howler Monkeys that completed enthralled me with their distinct yowlings. I loved them so much, as did my Eldest son, that we both became quite adapt at imitating their raucous howls. The in-person educational value and the pure enjoyment I received is immeasurable. Zoos provided a refuge and a sanctuary, a top-rated schooling and tons of enjoyment. 

As I became an adult, well, actually a later aged adult, zoos were more scattered as I lived in places that required a travel of an hour or more. My want and willingness to drive in big cities caused considerable stress. I haven't been able to drop by to see the animals much. My perspective or maybe it's my empathy and viewpoint changed as well. The last time I stopped at the Portland Zoo, I noticed animals that were nervous, stressed out and very unhappy. The  mountain goat that just stood there looking afraid. The elephants that appeared to be trapped in an environment too small that they could not escape from. I had to stop looking at the animal's faces because I was seeing pain more often than naught. I felt conflicted inside. Whilst I enjoyed my experience of marveling at these magnificents, at the same time my feelings of their grief and sadness loomed large. It was no longer fun for me because they were suffering, and I could readily see it.

My heart turned sad. The happy events of my youth began to fade. I don't know if I can ever feel positive emotions if I were to visit a zoo again.

They do have an aquarium an hour away that I have been to many times. It is different there. The fish and eels, sharks and rays that swim about in the monstrous, walk-through aquarium do not seem distressed in the least. Sure, I have witnessed the occasional sea creature who looked sluggish or appeared to be ailing, but they were rare, few and far between. I am not alarmed or saddened to peer into the tanks there. Maybe the fish adapt easier to their manmade constructs and require less intervention than their on-land counterparts.

Outside of the aquarium, on the grounds there are a number of habitats for otters and seals, waterfowl and mighty winged ones. In those places I am more likely to sense distress. It's as if the habitats all fail to provide the breadth and depth and width that these animals require. I do appreciate the rehabilitative facilities and it's wonderful to see a critter on the mend and being cared for. That is much more common than I previously noted. The pelican with the broken beak is a permanent fixture as is the eagle with the damaged wing. I do see the positives as some facilities have become more of a marriage of exotic animals and rehabilitation specialists. There seems to be more humanity, more awareness and consideration given to the care, housing and feeding of enclosed creatures. That part is heartwarming to see, much needed and appreciated.

Sometimes I miss the ignorance of youth when a pretty zebra was just a pretty zebra and not a sad, constricted, stress-laden foible of man put on for show. 

The lions were more majestic when I didn't see the thick glass, notice their neurotic pacing, or realize that being enclosed within a plaster clay arena devoid of any green or trees or running water or room to roam was detrimental and damaging to their sense of wellbeing.

Yeah, it was easier to see them when I didn't think to care or to look or to see. But know this, I will be forever grateful for the respite and the knowledge and the gentle way that these animals showed me that there was indeed a world outside of my self, and it was broad and diverse and magical in it's variety.

I love zoos. I Loved Zoos. 

A Mournful Waking Sleep

When your circumstances are such that events of the present and past cause irrefutable constant pain and it is daytime and there is nothing to do to change your situation. I call it, a mournful waking sleep. There is nothing I can do. Not really here. Not really there.

When one exists in a state of nonactivity.

The Consummate Hermit

 

My life is severely changing and challenging in new ways. I'm not sure what my life will look like next week. I'm not who I was or thought I was. Once a mother, now grown children considerable distance away.

I make a single friend once in awhile. I realize that the possibility of ever having a significant other grows more remote with each passing day. My family of origin is irrefutably gone. My depth of loneliness is sometimes the oily sheen upon the ocean whilst other days I am plunged within its depths so far not the tiniest trace of daylight can be found.

My ability to communicate effectively seems to be an idle thought with no engine. In-person people rarely understand me yet I think I am making my self clear.

I believe the only routes left are Crazy Little Dog Lady, Eccentric Artist and Consummate Hermit. Those three are me. They are appropriate titles that I fully understand.

My goal is to pare down my lifestyle, go out and interact as little as possible, reduce any lingering need for human contact and connectedness, and stop trying to make sense to anyone other than myself. Maybe the days of banging my head against a wall are over.

I need to stop searching for the impossible, someone who understands me and connects while accepting that this is all that I am, a single person with little value who bests functions in obscurity.

Life 

The Collective Unconscious Stream

Every now and then, I tap into the Universal Vibe, usually when I first wake up and before my daily personal thoughts and objectives wake up.

I first noticed it around the holidays when I would awake and sense specific holiday songs in the air. Or around easter when the old catholic hymns of my youth would be found on the tip of my tongue. Those two occurrences even though I despise all holidays and especially those two family orientated ones.

Then there are the times I feel the dome of natural disasters that have taken place faraway from me. When the violent winds that caused high tornadic death and destruction blew into my area, the winds felt violent and carried fear and sorrow.

Violent tornados, tsunamis, earthquakes, large events that caused extensive, massive destruction on a personal level, often I feel them.

This past weekend, I awoke...and had the sudden abrupt thoughts that mudslides, landslides would be a terrifying way to die. I had this newfound and unwarranted sensation of what it must feel like to struggle drowning in mud. The sense was overwhelming and hit me throughout the remainder of the day.

I am weird as a rule, and I think unusual things that others don't, so I thought noting of these feelings in my mind.

Monday I turned on the news. I don't watch the news with regularity because it can overwhelm me so easily. I do turn it on for the evening news a few times a week to keep current with events.

Monday, they talked of a massive mudslide in Papau New Guinea.  Immediately I knew. A mass casualty event from a natural disaster half a world away. I knew. I had gotten "in touch", perceived the great cries of terror experienced by others I did not know.

The Collective Unconscious is a constant stream that carries the strongest or most prevailing vibrations throughout, the world. It seems like a general pulse or heartbeat, a headline all can read if they look in the right place.

I feel subtle energy easier than most. I guess you could readily say I am a highly sensitive. 

This reminds me of an event last month. I read about a hit and run fatality on a road that I frequent. The culprit, the driver was apprehended after a few days. The victim was not found for at least a couple of days.

I did not know exactly where the victim was found or where the egregious event actual happened but I had a general idea.

I hadn't driven that road in a number of days. Then I needed to get to the next town and drive on that road. As I navigated a turn, I felt like I hit a wall of scream. It felt like an invisible wall of pain that stretched from the concrete up about 20 feet. It felt big, big energy with bug force. There was a sudden surge of strong emotion. It was anger, like someone shouting "why didn't you stop! Why did you leave me there!" The woman, the crash victim, is who I was perceiving and she was so very angry. In a way, from my take, she was most upset that the driver did not stop than by actually being struck. Anger! 

And I kinda saw through the victim's eyes. The woman was struck and then, I'm guessing her spirit then stood on the shoulder of the road where she saw the black car continue driving for a bit. It must have been at least a block down the street before the black car pulled over, it was night and I see her brake lights, she pulled over after quite a delay. I don't know if the driver was intoxicated, distracted or in some altered state but it's as if the driver did not acknowledge or was not concerned or aware she fatally injured someone. When she did finally pull over, she got out of her vehicle to check for damage. It was nighttime. She saw her front end damaged and got back in her car and left. She never looked back. The victim "saw" her pull over and that the driver did not retrace her tracks to see what she had hit. This is where the victim stood screaming after watching her leave. At the exact spot she was injured. She stood.

It almost feels like the victim screamed angry at the driver and maybe to try and tell people she was lying there in the tall grass and wanted to be found.

I felt that anger that had been built over days. I can't help but wonder that if I had driven by the area, would I have been able to sense her angry presence. Would it have been a sensation strong enough to make me pull over and go search? I will never know.

On my return trip home, past the accident spot, I bid my sorrow and regret to the angry one. I told her the driver was caught. The driver has been caught and that I am glad the authorities had finally found her.

There had been no missing persons report filed anywhere. The victim was not missing or being looked for. Like me, if I would disappear for days, it would go unnoticed in the world. Maybe I just related heartily, heart and soul, to her plight. Maybe that's why I so readily felt her great pain.

I'm weird. I sense things others don't. And things that cannot be measured or verified or may sound illogical are difficult for me to share. But maybe I should learn to share.

Why bother talking

Or writing or trying to communicate...

Maybe it was because I spent a few hours with another Aspie, listened to her talk and wondered if I sounded the same: like a small child in a huge body, or ridiculous and using familiar words in strange ways.

I am in agony and have sent many messages to the counselor but it was only after many that I was able to convey my great pain and need for assistance. 

I can't even scream for help in a dialect others understand, even those trained to recognize and aid 

I fear writing will make me sound ridiculous. I fear talking will make me sound ridiculous to a much greater extent.

I think people can hear me. They just can't decipher what it is I require and need and am pleading for.

The fear of speaking grows great which is greatly interfering with my attempts to get aid.

I am lost and awash in anguish and grief. And I'm not holding out my hand properly or using the right words.

One of those days wherein the self critical, self awareness is so high I hate being Aspie.

My words are not being understood. Is it my bad or others. Doesn't matter. It's just bad.

I like staying home

Lack of Eye Contact

I noticed it again today. On a rare occasion when i am out about in the external landscape and I engage in a conversation lasting more than a few seconds. The look of confusion on another's face, hurts me. Makes me realuze I am inadequate and operating on a different frequency. 

The Mother Ship, my Aspie hopes and dreams, in exhaustion's breath and bed

A Girl and Her Blog

I'm old and I still call myself a girl. Some boys just need a dog. I knew girls that just wanted a man. I know people who want nothing more than a successful career or a loving relationship. Me, I'm good with having a place to write all the things I don't say because there's no one to say it to or I fear judgement or I'm just too shy to say aloud or admit to thinking.

Yes, my mind is a wild, beautiful junkyards with various piles of used and unused, discarded and missing, words, musings and thoughts.

Like, sometimes I imagine the blinking light of the smoke detector is the mother ship finally arriving to take me home having taken forever to realize I've been dropped on the wrong planet.

A little Turkey Vulture humor

I guess this specific photo is the one that spoke to me most. Yes, i know i am weird.

I try humor. I usually fail.

Woodland Walks, Hiking and Trail Exploring

This post will be challenging to write for two reasons; one, it shows the degree of extreme isolation and "in my own wordism", two, I have to figure out how to put into words something I have never talked about, something obscure. Bear with me.

I grew up in the city. Grand Rapids, Michigan is a pretty large metropolis teeming with small city parks but lacking in grand open areas of forest or nature. One could not go on a 5 mile hike within the city, of course. It's a city with all the pavement, sidewalks and buildings.

When I was in my 40's and 50's, I had moved to northern Michigan which provided wide open spaces and bigger parks. I remember thinking the sidewalk along Grand Traverse Bay was quite the marvel as it stretched for miles. I hadn't discovered state and local parks that supplied trails, of any kind, really, short, long, wooded, pasture, etc.

While living in Manistee County, I had an acquaintance, a neighbor, who had children the same age as mine. One day she invited my son and I to accompany her to a local state park trail. Honestly, I had no idea what she was talking about. I was apprehensive but willing to try new things to enrich my kids life and to maybe make a friend. So, we went with her and her family.

The parking lot, if you can call it that says city girl, was a specified piece of cleared grass that had large rocks marking the area to be parked within. There was also a sign stating the parks name and a few rules.

I remember looking at the trail entrance. It was basically, a sheet, a wall of trees with a small, 4 or 5 foot pathway composed of dirt. It was scary because I could not see in, could not see what I was getting myself into. Out of visible range means the great and spooky and unpredictable unknown and I was quite dismayed that I was to be trekking in a place I could not mentally map for more than ten or twenty or thirty feet ahead.

It is important to, when at all possible, to have a guide on new experiences and adventures. I asked my neighbor how often she had been there to elicit whether or not she was familiar with the terrain and the trail. Her answer gave me an indication that I would most likely, though not certainly, be safe with her. She was pretty worldly and like, worked for the forest service or something so she appeared to be able to navigate the area quite well. I emitted a silent sigh of relief and closely followed her into the dark, shrouded woods of unfamiliarity.

It was terrifying, looking back. My pulse races as I write and I remember how incredibly close I walked next to her as we strode into this new experience. Trees on both sides and above me. Enclosed. Small and medium shrubbery, familiar but mostly unfamiliar. The ground was in continual...chaos. It was uneven. The surface texture and materials, branches, leaves, roots, pine cones, constantly was in flux. There was great uncertainty upon the forest floor. My vision was riveted to the floor the majority of time lest I stumble and fall. I was not used to this need to monitor and adjust to each step due to conditions. It was a lot of work to walk there. I had to remain focused on the ground, low hanging branches, changes in elevation. I rarely caught sight of the scenery during this first trail walk. I did admire greatly how the trails were well marked with numbers at specific intervals. I felt less lost whenever I encountered a trail marker like that.

I think the trail was about a mile or two. There was a multitude of trails and one had to pick how far and in which direction they chose to travel. My neighbor did pick a shorter route for which I was grateful. I was relieved to find that the trail ended back at the small grassy knoll. I was exhausted. This was all new to me.

A few days later, I asked my neighbor to allow me to accompany her a second time were she to go there again. The second time was easier, less stressful than the first. The third time was even less anxiety ridden and bordered on feeling pleasant. After many walks with an other, I was able to go for a woodland walk, on this specific trail by myself. It was such a huge accomplishment for me. I know, it seems an ordinary event but for Aspie, agoraphobic, PTSD ridden me, I did awesome.

I thought of this today, as I climbed up Vineyard Mountain, by myself, in the Willamette Valley on one of the many mountain, woodland trails that I walk. Today, I decided on a 3 mile hike. The views were spectacular. I am alone but it is okay. There is such such tremendous beauty upon the trails, especially here near where I live. I am so grateful that I was brave enough to conquer walking woodland trails, one step and one small hike at a time. I remembered how far, how courageous I really am.

Of Bus Pants and Dumpster Shoes

 I remember the first time that I watched The Big Bang episode in which Sheldon talks about having Bus Pants, trousers that he specifically wears on the city bus. I didn't understand why he required different trousers for the bus. For what reason and to what end and why???

It seems Sheldon found the city bus seats to be teeming with, well, filth, in the form of discarded gum and food stuffs and all manner of human oozes, I guess. I failed to understand why he needed an extra layer of protection against the remnants of humanity that gets left in public seating...then, I rode a city bus. My city is small to mediumish and the bus fleet is well-maintained, but I caught a glimpse of the people that were boarding and riding the bus. They brought food and drinks. Some riders emitted specific odors. I try and tell this joke about "I have not been smoking pot. I sat behind someone on the bus and well. I inhaled." Something like that.

People have odors, most of which are unpleasant and offensive. Okay, I'll admit, a couple of riders did smell freshly showered and had applied fragrances that were delightful, fruity and masculine alike. People smell.

Anyway, I digress from the meaning and spirit of this post. If you can understand Bus Pants, then you might understand Dumpster Shoes. They are the specific shoes that I wear to dump my trash in the communal dumpster so that my good, everyday shoes do not encounter filth, usually in the form of leaked batches of kitty litter, broken glass and discarded foodstuffs that almost made it to their large green metal destination.

More often than naught, there is a debris field of some type in that parking area right before one encounters the dumpster. 9 times out of 10, kitty litter is there, hence the need for alternate footwear.

I was going to call the Dumpster Shoes, Trash or Garbage shoes, but both of those monikers were rather harsh and unpleasant for two footie devices that save my 120$ Brooks running shoe. (No, I do not run but these are the shoes I love that fit and cushion and endure.)

It's kindof odd because my Dumpster Shoes are indeed a pair of Brooks runners yet of an on-sale, poorly fitting, bought the wrong ones online, type. 

It's the little things that make my life easier that I am grateful for. I'm glad I figured out Bus Pants and enlisted Dumpster Shoes.

I am happy

I deserve food that tastes good and doesn't hurt me

It wasn't until my 60th year that I realized the ingestion of food need not hurt.

The first time I baked homemade buttermilk biscuits, I cried.

The first time I was able to accomplish the complex task of creating a homemade chicken pot pie, I cried.

The food did not hurt to it. It tasted good, wonderful, warm and synergistically insync with my inner body.

It taste like the feeling of finishing a marathon or how one feels atop a tall mountain after an arduous climb. It tasted pure, unaltered, soft. After and as I ate, my digestive system wasn't fighting or working overtime or trying to neutralize or work around hazardous conditions, as it does with the majority of food.

This was different. Eating the biscuits. Eating the pie. There was no dissension. Eating was actually a highly pleasant experience, for the first time in my life.

My body has oft reacted negatively to food. I have a low tolerance for histamine which are found in leftovers, anything fermented like cheese or yogurt or yeast, many fruits and vegetables, as well as processed meats. If I eat too many foods high in histamine my entire outer body, my skin, contracts itchy hives.

I discovered I had a low tolerance for histamine when I tried eating an avocado. Then another time, it was when I ate zucchini. Foods that are supposed to be good and healthy make me feel bad and sick.

After my chicken pot pie rapture eating wherein I ate nothing but it for days on end for most meals, I reverted back to baking up an individual sized homemade pizza with nothing but a little sauce and cheese. It did not sit well with me. It made my digestive system, as well as all other systems it associates with, I'm sure, unpleasant, ill at ease, as if I had been sailing pleasantly on a calm sea and now I felt the hidden rumblings of storms beneath the waves. It's an unpleasantness that is subtle yet definite. I felt off kilter, like something was wrong but I didn't know exactly what. Reminds of the fairy tale, the Princess and the Pea, wherein something so small that most would never notice, was huge and obvious to me.

Eating, relishing the pure homemade foods that agreed with my body provided a barometer allowing me to recognize these sublime unhealthy and troublesome foods I had been ingesting.

I'm paying much greater attention to how I feel and the clues my physical body is giving me every time I eat. 

I am actively working to provide my body with food it doesn't have to fight.