(this is my comment on Shutdown: A Specific Type of Meltdown. I'll just post it here because my comment says it's too large and I want to share everything.)
I am diagnosed as borderline-schizoid PD. I agree with BPD but not SPD. I still have questions about myself until found that SPD is like Aspergers. It took me months later to finally assess myself for aspergers after becoming so confused. And alas, all traits of aspergers answers questions about me. I opened this to my Doc but he said aspergers are retarded. At first I thought he meant autism but aspergers it was. Since I last saw my Doc, 3 months ago, I am waiting to be confirmed as aspergers.
I have shutdowns like "meep" (a commenter). When I'm overstimulated, I tend to shutdown most of the times. Before, I meltdown in my room. I'm self-destructive. I punch walls, hit my head and body against walls. After the rage, I shutdown, I get so exhausted too. I get sleepy then I fall asleep. Now, I am not allowed to self-destruct, so I mostly just shutdown though most times I want to repeat the punching, it makes me feel alive and I don't feel pain but only after all the rage. (I'm not taking meds either, I've been off for 2 years now, Doc says I don't need them, I only need to "change".) But I recently have been having more meltdowns out in the open (and I mean where I am not alone) and I kinda like it better. Cos when having my shutdowns or meltdowns alone without people around, no one is there to help me and I fail to tell or let my counselor know/see my misery. Cos if in the open, she can see me. Sadly, she rarely/barely sees or knows when I am having a shutdown. She only sees me with it if she pays attention or look after my every move and she'd make a remark, "You seem to be looking so frail."
When I have a meltdown, I just cover my ears or put my hands to my head and if more triggers come, I scream and if more then more, there's a possibility I could self-destruct. I guess, this is my stress cycle: stressed, (shutdown) reserved & quiet & isolation, (meltdown) hands to my head & shout/suppressed yelling & punch & hurting myself or if driving, reckless, and rarely hurt someone but mostly my brother, he's my #1 trigger, (shutdown) tired/exhausted & quiet & slow in speech and pace & sleepy & falling asleep. I may skip some but it still is a cycle.
I tend to have meltdowns when things are really too much already and I couldn't hang on any longer or suppressing isn't helping anymore and that solitude cannot wait or unavailable. Though after a meltdown, I shutdown even in front of people because I'm exhausted already. I get too quiet and slow mentally and physically like walking or picking up things. When I have my meltdowns, I like it when my counselor is there to the rescue after I calmed down a bit from a meltdown because only in meltdowns can I get a touch/hug/embrace from her. In regular days, I am only up to wishing she would embrace me even in "almost-shutting-down" times. Even feeling depressed times. And now I think I have some relationship distress issues with her because she seemed to now show disinterest on me. I think I have tire her. I think she doesn't like me anymore. I think she has other people needing more of her attention than mine even though my Doc tells me she's giving me special treatment/special sttention but I didn't believe my Doc because I seemed to be treated by her less than special, less than normal. Treated very exceptional and I mean that she doesn't treat me like the others like e.g. a hug. I am, I guess, the most problem person in our church of only 200 members.
Btw, she was my computer teacher 11 yrs ago, a Sunday school teacher, a bible study leader, one of the pastors in our church, and my counselor, a good friend.
I'm sorry about my last parts of my sharing. I'm just exhausted and still is since getting overstimulated and shutting down 5 days now. And it seems I really lost my counselor/best friend now after she told me that we stop meeting until 2 months later because she thinks I'm clingy after giving her bad remarks and frequently getting angry at her. And sometimes I think she may not be liking my emotions/meltdowns out in the open. The "2 months" was up a month ago. But I really think I lost her now. She doesn't understand me though she thinks she does. And I'll always be a loner. I guess I'm just too incompatible with relationships. From my first counselor 7 years ago who just suddenly "disappeared", taking away her commitment to help me because when she found me, she saw the loner in me, it was from her I first learned the word LONER.
This present counselor I have. She found me two years ago and I was depressed. Sick of school. Sick of the course I took, it wasn't my liking nor my decision because I was undecided. Sick of adjusting to a new house during my 3rd year in college, a very toxic year. Sick of inability to keep friends. Etcetera.
And now I can't wait to leave my hometown. So I will no longer see the people here. Still wishing to find people who understand me and can really help me and whom I can hug without me always asking for it and just receive a NO.
And I despise myself.
Or I don't know. Maybe I'm just mostly a shutdown type. I'm not quite sure of the difference of meltdown or shutdown. I don't like to hurt people. I also drive wrecklessly when a meltdown occurs while I'm driving.
I really don't like these shutdowns and meltdowns..
1 comment:
Sami,
I read this when you first posted it but got interrupted before I could comment.
If your doctor used the word "retarded" or if he implied that people with aspergers have below-average intelligence, then you need to find a new doctor. One who is properly qualified to diagnose you.
From the way you're writing, it sounds like you're staging meltdowns in order to receive hugs. If that's the case then they're not meltdowns but tantrums. You generally have little control over a meltdown and certainly can't use them to achieve ends.
You also need to think carefully about what you're doing because if you therapist discovers that you're craving her attention, she will stop hugging you. Obviously she cannot be attached to her "patients". It wouldn't be legal.
You could probably benefit from trying to meet others who could hug you when you asked for it rather than having to have a meltdown for attention.
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