🧡 Thank you to everyone who has watched, liked, subscribed or joined the autisti-cats community over the last year. It's been an incredible journey. I put together a highlight reel of the best moments of 2023-24; I hope you enjoy it! ✨ th-cam.com/video/_qyfhFxVoIU/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=AutisticAF
I realised that when I thought about how I am able to deal with my spontaneous side (diagnosed ADHD, in the process of getting an autism diagnosis). After I realised how much it set me back to have people cancel on me, even when I was able to see why they did it, I started to plan that together with the plan on meeting someone. I planed what I would do if they had to cancel or reschedule. Depending on the day and how far into already getting ready I am it still sets me back but it's so much less because of the fact that I factor it in as a possibility. With friends who are bipolar, have bpd or some other circumatances that lead to them struggling sometimes with sticking with the plan I saw that it is a relief for them too and it even helps some of them to keep calm and be able to attend more often ☺️.
@@Hopischwopi I realised (BAP here) that I cannot handle things being different then expected... thus leading me sometimes to know the less about something because it's less stressfull (I'm on hypervigilant stress mode then) when going out, then actually knowing were I go and it not being as I pictured in my head. That's just extremely afwull if what I expected actually doesn't happen. Can be little things, like food tasting different that I would expect, then going to the movies and people suddenly changing the movie, or hearing that I can park in front of a house, and then I cannot and have to find suddenly another place.... that kind of things. Suddenly a thing that's always the same being different etc etc...
@histoiresdundragonnier861 I understand that! The problem with not planning is that people want my input and then I am stressrd by that because well I didn't plan anything. So for me preplanned options are very helpful and generally I can deal with a good degree of change compared to other people but only when everything around is stable. Plus I often tend to dissociate or kinda switch into customer mode and then I need a huge recovery time. I hope the people around you understand that not planning/knowing things can be beneficial for you.
I used to think I couldn't be autistic because I don't follow rigid itineraries, but I later realized that my routines are so rigid that my life looks like an introvert's Groundhog Day. Same breakfast, same lunch, same wardrobe, same clock-in and clock-out time at work (7 minutes late and 7 minutes early 😅), etc. I track what day of the week it is by how many bagels I have left in the bag because I optimize every aspect of my day to day life so that I can expand my mental capacity to handle unavoidable variations and changes.
The most autistic thing a lot of you can do is thinking you are not autistic enough because you don't fit the description perfectly and/or literally, happened to me aswell lol
"These routines are not signs of rigidity, but tools of empowerment." You said this right at the end. I think it is a very significant observation. I need to go away and process it. It fits with things I've been doing recently with my therapist - allowing my brain to do what it wants to do.
I love, "not signs of rigidity but tools of empowerment." Thank you. This must be impressed on those who write so-called diagnostic criteria for "disorders."
I'm AutDHD and I say HECK YES! to some routines/rituals. My morning routine/ritual is especially necessary for my brain to start functioning in manageable steps - it eases the transition from asleep to awake considerably. And it is important for me that nobody else is awake yet, I really need my alone hour in the morning, even when it means waking up at 06:00. The most ritualistic part for me is the first kitchen task: cleaning the stovetop. There is something deeply satisfying with transforming it from greasy to squeaky clean. After that comes opening the dishwasher and taking out what is needed for making and serving breakfast. After those two "subroutines" are done I have become capable of actually thinking and the remaining tasks can vary a bit without that feeling stressful. Thanks for yet another excellent video and congratulations on your first Tubeversity! 🎉
That is the last thing I want to do first thing in the morning omg! Or have to do at any time. I don’t even use my cooker every week , but my son uses it most days and we always have a military stand off about who is going to clean it. It’s usually me even though I hardly ever use it. So I detest doing it.
That sounds like such an anazing morning! And I feel the need for a morning ritual/routine. So important, it's the basis of the day and I also get up way earlier that I would need technically speaking but mentally I need that time and the propper transition. I even have differences in the rituals/routines that I do on a workday and an off day which also helps to distinquish those and the mindset I start with.
Thank you for getting the word "ritual" correct. You have no idea how many times I've been called "stupid" for reciting the actual meaning of Ritual when everyone else only wants to associate it with religious centers. Just like "Religion" is a specific set of rituals for a specific purpose.
How ironic they're calling you stupid for it, sounds like you just met people who aren't open to new information... hmm i wonder if theres a word for that... hehe...
This video feels quite like me, I am horrendous at decisions. I get severe analysis paralysis, and have been told I overthink so much. Feel like if i have to make the 'perfect' decisions and its so painful and then I don't often end up making the decision because it stresses me out.
My cat cries and cries oh so pitifully at my bedroom door until I get out of bed to let him in. Most days anyway - today he decided to wail at our neighbour's elderly cat instead.
I cuddle with my little dog every day after we wake up and before we fall asleep. He never wakes me up, we both like to sleep as long as we need to. He is the love of my life and the best thing ever happened to me. 🐕❤🙏
Apologies in advanced for this long ass comment 😅😂 The current code I'm trying to crack on my (formally undiagnosed) AuDHD journey is parsing and identifying all my pre-existing routines and rituals and trying to impose some kind of schedule for myself/make adjustments in my routine while I'm unemployed and at home with my parents. So far, an important finding for me has been: a lot of important rituals for me can only really be triggered by certain pre-existing conditions. For example, most of my hygiene rituals can only be easily carried out if I'm going out that day. If I'm walking out my front door, anywhere for longer than 5-10 minutes, brushing my teeth, combing my hair, and a quick wash if needed before getting dressed is non-negotiable. If I don't have that pre-requisite, suddenly, brushing my teeth is a decision I have to manually make. Despite it being such a simple and necessary thing, having to force myself to do it is so much harder than it has any right to be, and when you spend a lot of time at home, that can be really problematic. It also extends into my eating habits. My household tends to focus more on having ingredients to make meals with instead of having snacks to readily grab, but if the kitchen is a big mess and the components I need to make something to eat aren't available to me (i.e. clean pan, cooking utensil, clean plate, clean cutlery, counter space), a lot of the time, I just won't eat because in order to clean the kitchen up enough to be able to use, I have to use up energy that I don't really have yet because I'm hungry. Then, it'll end up being pushed to the point where the only way I can muster up the will to tackle the dishes and cook is to be so hungry that the only way to quell it is to use the discomfort as momentum to get the task done. It's definitely an unhealthy habit, but despite all my efforts, it's the most effective way to get it done: Needs must. Something I feel that's worth keeping in mind for any peeps who are in the same boat as me for the time being, even if you aren't doing an awful lot with your days because you're not relying on a schedule that's decided for you, you will almost certainly still follow some kind of routine. Mine, generally speaking, looks like this at the moment: - Wake up - Check the time - Either go back to sleep or check up on phone notifications - Spend an additional 1-3+ hours in bed - Go to the bathroom - Go back to bedroom - Spend another 1-3+ hours on my own - Emerge from room to fulfil obligatory daily greeting and check in with the parental - Maybe eat something - Go back to room - Amuse oneself for another 2-4+ hours - Check in with parents - Return to isolation chamber - Check in on parents/make dinner for the fam - Retire back to my room for the evening - Fall asleep after the sandman has persisted-hunted you for several hours Something I'm eager to figure out is how to adjust my standard routine without forcing myself, and I think I've figured it out while I was pacing around my room earlier. Getting dressed. Just going from pj's to a different set of indoor clothes a few days ago caused me to have the most productive day I've had in months. It was so obvious, but I just completely missed it after wondering why, for the last three days, why I couldn't get myself to sit at my desk despite having such a good time and the answer was draped over the back of my chair 🤡 Now that I've had the realisation, I'm really hoping it'll help keep some things clicked into place. Beyond that, I also have this schedule planning method that Hey, Spark shared on her TH-cam channel a bit ago, where you plan your day/week around how you want to feel on a given day. She explained it and demonstrated it really well, it's her start "to-feel" instead video, if you haven't spoken about i"ntuitive planning" before. Either way, despite the struggles, I'm still able to acknowledge that I am getting better at certain things despite not having a schedule to keep me regimented: - This is perhaps the longest stretch of time I've kept my room consistently clean/tidy - I'm brushing my teeth more regularly, even if I still have to force myself a bunch (the goal is to hopefully start overriding the "going outside" pre-requisite and link the ritual with the first bathroom visit of the day) - I'm making the effort to actually try to "start" my day with a meal, thanks to help from my mum :) Sure, sometimes I feel kind of crappy for not just being able to do the basic stuff easily, but I also know that in a lot of ways, I've essentially had to do a hard reboot on myself for the sake of accommodating myself better in the future, and I'm doing it at 25. I will get there, and it will all be worth it. Anyway. Essay over. Congratulations and well done on your one year anniversary! I can't believe it's only been a year, I feel like you've already been around so much longer (in a good way). You're channel is such a massive help and a consistent comfort watch of mine, so thank you for all that you've put out here and shared with us
@@K.Voyence I don't think I struggle as much but if I don't go outside and don't change clothes I also tend to have difficulties with doing anything any given day. That's probably why, even with bullying, I didn't hate school as a child.
Interesting, I'm auADHD as well and as much as I crave for routines... my adhd side makes me get out of the way constantly. The part you mention about getting dressed like going out is true for me as well. The thing for me in the morning is that I need 10 to 12h sleep, which is basically impossible to achieve if you have a job and a house to care. I'm always sleeping less than I need, which makes me take advantage of every minute I can sleep longer. But my waking up time is soooooooo slow, my brain is just not there when it comes to waking up, to the point that I can barely control my movements if I wake up too fast or rushed out because I need to work. Because of it, I can't do usual morning routines too often, and if I force myself doing so, it just ruins my day, my mood instantly go to full anger mode the entire day. Sometimes I just gave up, and go through my day in whatever way I can. This inconsistency from adhd is so bad for my autist self, my entire life feels like internal battle against myself. I try not to think too munch on this, because it really makes me sad. It's always a struggle to just exist.
Oh my gosh you literally explained my entire adult life. I never really thought about the pre-requisites before, but they absolutely determine whether or not I actually do anything that normal people consider productive. And it's soooooo easy to let the house get overwhelming to clean because of that.
Thought before watching: I’m AuDHD, I’ve struggle for years with routine and ritual. Before getting diagnosed common advice and rigide planning caused me so much pain. It destroyed my already established ritual and replaced it with anxiety and burnout. Now i’m trying to establish rituals again but it’s so link to past suffering i've practically given up, leaving me dysfunctional and constantly trying to catch up. Maybe i’ll eventually get out of this draining cycle.
AuDHD twice-exceptional here; this is the only part of autism that doesn’t apply to me, because ADHD makes routine impossible to maintain. We can have rituals for things like bathing, or eating/taking meds, or dressing, but struggle to fit all that into one morning. Bottom line is, we cannot do as much as fast as NT’s can. Hence “disabled”. It’s not that we are lazy or not trying; our brains work less efficiently! 🤷♀️
I've been in the same spot as you going on two decades after a string of burnouts and still trying to crawl out of it. I have to rewire so much stuff I had already trained myself to do, like showering. The basic rituals that neurotypicals take for granted. But I'm not giving up. And I hope you don't either! Eventually, the shit-show has to end.
@@misspat7555 I definitely relate to somehow not being able to do as much as NTs in a given timespan, and how alienating it can feel. Everyone is confused how I spend so much time in the shower. The way I understand it, the source of the difference might be that our routines are established from careful and deliberate decision making, and they might follow a slower process, in a way that's not obvious and difficult to optimise. What I personally find ADHD to prevent from happening tho, is habits - starting sequences of uninteresting tasks unprompted and without additional driving factors. I can generally form routines no problem, but establishing habits is utterly Sisyphean.
I get up at 6am, same breakfast daily, 8am head to my garden studio to paint, ride my exercise bike at 11.30am for 30 mins, lunch, paint all afternoon, garage gym for an hour, dinner, paint all evening, 9.30pm I head indoors for half an hour of tv in the lounge and then bed. I do that 7 days a week, done that for years now and it rarely changes. 🙂
I love the way you've explained this. I actually wrote out all my morning subroutines based on different personal care steps. Things like showering vs not showering, etc. I didn't need them written to follow them, but as someone with time agnosia, it was a huge revelation to me to see the variation in the number of steps and therefore time required. I timed them all out, and now I can set my Time Timer and feel more in control of my mornings without a ton of thought and stress.
Ooh I learned a new word today, agnosia! Thank you for this! When you say time agnosia, is that like the inability to tell how much time something takes? I like the idea of using a timer for routines, that actually sounds really helpful.
The only requirement for an autism diagnosis is differences in verbal (“You use the wrong words, wrong tone, and wrong timing!”) and nonverbal (“Stop staring/ look at me/ what’s so funny/ why do you look mad?!?!”) communication leading to difficulties in socializing. Only two out of four of STIMs, SPINs, sensory differences, and rigid routines are required! 👍 I do agree about doing things the same way every time being a way we save energy in a desperate attempt to cope with a chronically overwhelming world! 😬
Less safe mode, more blue screen of death 😉 I had the type 2 thinking described to me as a brain tree with the branches representing the options and parameters for a decision. A neurotypical person will go down two or three branches and make a decision. An autistic person will need to go down every branch. I started looking at replacing my car in 2018, still haven’t decided on one yet.
This was the biggest thing holding me back from considering myself autistic (now diagnosed!). I thought because I struggle with schedules a lot there was no way I could be autistic, but I have many rituals I follow that fit the criteria instead as well as my special interests. But this way of explaining it as being stuck in type 2 thinking really.. really makes it so clear why not being able to follow a schedule brings me so much distress
Funny I was thinking this exact thing the other day.... I can't stick to a schedule, but I do have routines for some things I do.... Routine at the moment seems to be thinking too much about everything and forgetting to do anything .... This needs to change, but then it's hard to get up when there is a purring, floofy kitten or 2 sat on me as well 😂. Very relatable video as always Mike.😊
When supporting adults with autism (usually with limited verbal communication skills) and also a learning disability my colleagues and I try to avoid what we call 'brittle' schedules. i.e. schedules that are easily broken. For example, if we always drove a person the same way to visit their parents if we go down that same road there'd possibly be an assumption that they'd be going to visit their parents when outcome doesn't match expectation people with autism can become emotionally dysregulated. This also works in everybody's favour if say the 'road to Mam and Dad's' is closed then alternative routes are more readily accepted. In short: just because somebody has autism does not mean that they can't be supported with flexibility if people supporting those with support needs think through how they provide support. Think about the immediate and deferred effects of what your doing as a support worker.
Ordering food in a restaurant is a nightmare for me, and everyone else involved. I usually narrow it down to two or three options, then, about the third time the server asks if we're ready to order, I tell everyone else to order first, and I'll have decided by the time it's my turn. When my turn comes, I have never decided, so I panic order whatever I am looking at on the menu at the time, which usually ends up being something I wasn't considering, and didn't want.
I used to have the same issue - now I read the menu on the restaurant's website the day before and take as much time as I need to decide what I'm going to order - and also have a plan B, in case they don't have the thing I've chosen at that moment.
@@carolinelist-b4p I do that, too. Sometimes it helps, but sometimes I worry when we get to the restaurant that I might not still want what I already picked out, and end up in the same boat as usual.
Have you tried asking for someone else order it for you? When I'm too stressed out I'll just ask other people to do it, either asking for my husband or just asking the server their suggestion. It's just food, we know it, but the problem is the decision making.
Thoughtful and helpful video. Thank you! Retirement is so much more friendly to my need for routines and predictability…I still start each day asking my husband what his own priorities are for the day and what he needs from my energy reserve. I am startled by any change after that. I really have compassion for those still working 😢 and stuck with artificial time tables, and changing workplace expectations (not to mention family responsibilities). I don’t know how I made it through - undiagnosed (unsuspected on a ‘good day’) and exhausted.
This was so helpful, thank you! As someone who’s AuDHD, with a fair dose of Demand Avoidance, schedules and appointments stress me out! However, I love rituals and find certain routines soothing and energy-saving-just as you explained. I loved the explanation of Type 1 and Type 2 thinking. I often feel overwhelmed-or even assaulted-by Type 1 thinking; I sense and feel things immediately and deeply. Yet, I’m uncomfortable making decisions from that place. It’s challenging to advocate for the time and space needed to reach the Type 2 zone, where I know my best decisions are made. The world isn’t patient with that process, and I’ve recently realized I’ve adopted that same impatience with myself. It’s difficult to unravel and reframe this zone as something acceptable rather than viewing it as an annoyance or weakness… I find your videos soothing to follow! Thank you for all your work in researching and making them flow so well!
Believe it or not: I'm just lying in bed with my cat on my lap and finished watching the video and your comment was the first shown to me. I couldn't believe it by myself how accurate you described my situation 😅👍
Best way to enjoy videos! My cat is always there when I watch videos, especially in bed, when I have my tablet because ahe loves to lay right in front of that to block half the screen 😂. I love cats. May you and your fluffy friend have many lovely years together!
I think the ADHD in us AuDHDers makes us have micro routines rather than full on schedules. I suppose non ADHD auti people might be more prone to having the later.
@@linam.9675 I will make a to do list and schedule time for the list lol Or allow myself options within boundaries, like "I don't know where I want to eat, but I will go to this specific street with 5 restaurants and see which one looks most inviting in person". That may sound chaotic, but I'd still get upset if a parameter to my not-quite-a-specific-plan got changed, such as the street or the time I plan to be there, or the order of things done on the way :P
The way I differentiate this is routines vs habits. Routines are algorithms for tasks I perform a lot, and are executed in response to something else. I just used the toilet? Time to wash my hands, and think about something else cause the autopilot brain is doing the handwashing. Habits, on the other hand, are task sequences that are supposed to run unprompted, like doing exercises at a specific time of day without feeling the need for it. I can generally form routines no problem, but establishing habits is basically impossible due to my ADHD. It's why having a dog is helping me go outside more - now it's not an arbitrary idea, but rather my companion's need, and I can skip the habit part and go straight into routines.
@@OutfrostI think you’re mixing up what habits are scientifically with what toxic productivity bros say habits should be. What you describe as a routine is what a habit is supposed to be. An action that follows a certain prompt automatically. It’s incredibly difficult to build „should be“ habits with ADHD, but our brains do form habits
@catagecat Do you have any sources I could study? I'll be honest I've just been following how the words are used in informal language, and trying to find a useful distinction. And if habits are what I describe as routines, then how would you describe routines and rituals, and how do they differ?
@Outfrost You got routine and habit mixed. Routine: (can be negative too like overtraining/ overworking) -delibrate and conscious decision. - clear shedule and pre planned and followed - external influcen or guide by time tables and appointments - can be changed Habit: (can be negative drinking to much alcohol/nail biting - less cognitive effort - repetive - automatic response (Close to reflex)
Routines and sometimes rituals can also be a was to know that every step is made, because if you don't follow the protocol you will miss something... like checking all your gear. Before starting a project... I'm generally caring everything with me because otherwise I will forget something I need like an warm jacket in winter, because I'm too warm for it in this moment... or putting the lunch in the fridge at work before I go to my desk so it doesn't sit in the bag and I can't find it, and it will be even harder to actually manage to eat lunch during the work day...
Ah, I also found this confusing, I have been diagnosed with it, but I always wondered why this didn't apply to me because I HATE lack of change. I like creating schedules and structure, but I HATE following then for too long. I do have several rituals outside and inside of work but thats a lot more to do with helping me to not forget a step because so often Im zoned out if Im not engaged that my conscious brain cannot recall a missed step, but my unconscious brain will feel the ritual feels off and itll cause my conscious brain to turn back online and assist unconscious brain out and so it leads to less missed steps.
Falling off a cliff. That is a really good way of describing the feeling of interruptions in my autopilot activities. It feels like I’m going to forget everything if I can’t complete the task at hand. A similar but stronger feeling happens if I have to travel to a new place or a far away destination and don’t have time to research the area, plan activities, set up rentals, find good restaurants…
Oh, I hear you around rituals and decisions. When I'm in the zone I do things like count eights when I'm washing my hands or cleaning my water bottles. I will shake the bottle for eight times eight because that's the rhythm that feels as if the world is right side up. My sister sometimes gets annoyed with me when I don't make an immediate decision on a little thing like 'Do you want a cup of coffee?' It is not enhanced by her way of asking 'Do you want a cup of coffee or no?' Then I'm caught in the web of indecision because I don't know how I'm supposed to answer. Even worse is when the word 'no' is omitted, as in, 'Do you want a cup of coffeee or ...' Does she actually want to make me coffee or is she hoping I'll answer in the negative? Will I feel guilty if I answer yes, or deprived if I answer no? Aaaarrrgh. Yet, enforced schedules like regular work hours have always been difficult; partly due to my lack of circadian rhythm due to no vision, partly due to 14 years of enforced residential care growing up and partly due to possible autism? That'll be a challenge for the assessor. This video is very helpful in thinking around how we respond to supposed rigidity.
This woke me up to not feeling disappointed in myself. For 20 years now at least, I make very detailed plans for parts of my day. I believed if zi would follow my commitments and adhere to the schedule and plan then I would be "good", what that meant morphed over time but always had a good/bad judgement to it. I would dissolve or veer from the plan in someway in some detail and beat myself up for it. Probably, I just felt safe and more comfortable with my next step and a tiny creative license in that moment. In a way I got mad with demand avoidance from myself and wanted autonomy from my plan. This was a great one.
I am so happy I found your channel! I am late diagnosed autistic/ audhd, going through the formal diagnosis routine. I think you are awesome and I enjoyed watching you. This was the first video of yours I came across and I'm looking forward to watching all the other ones. Thank you so much for making such great videos! Have a great day. XX
The one thing that decides whether my day is manageable is having my morning coffee and 2 hours to myself. When i dont get that, the day becomes a total loss because this routine is grounding af for me. My twins have learned (mostly) not to talk too much or bother me during this time, from experience. Lol
I used to have a really hard time with the social experience of doing job interviews for dev jobs. Especially being asked to write code on a white board. I would get so terrified in my mind that I would not be able to remember the appropriate syntax that it was almost paralyzing to me. I was used to always being able to look things up as I go. Checking and re-checking in programming are ways I can feel good about my work, like doing my own personal code reviews. It took me until only just recently to realize hey, I've never had bug I've fixed come back to me. My code generally works and doesn't go out with bugs in it for other people to find. I don't usually have a coding problem that ACTUALLY goes unsolved, even though I've spent lots of time in my career worrying that I couldn't solve a certain problem (right up until I could). I've sortof embraced that I need comfort objects around me and tools like active noise cancellation or working from home to be able to work to my full potential, and since doing that, I just feel a lot better about myself and more sure of my process.
It might be the dyspraxia but I don't ever feel that my movement is automatic, I always have to think about it. Less so for walking, but I still have to think about it, the way my feet land, the pace, trying not to bump into things which inevitably I fail at. Driving lessons never got easier, not one bit. Every time I drove felt like the first time. And I had over 70 lessons, each lasting 90 minutes or 2 hours if I remember right. I gave up after failing my practical test with 3 majors in the first 5 minutes. Every time I drove I also went into fight/flight, and on my final lesson/test I had such intense anxiety that I tunnel visioned and after it I couldn't remember what happened, when I was told why I made my majors I didn't even remember it. Then when the pandemic happened I decided I didn't want to go through it anymore.
I have dyspraxia, too, and I definitely relate to this. I don't have automatic (controllable) movement a lot of the time. Some days are better than others. The worst days are when I can't "remember" how to make my morning coffee. I just do kettle, instant coffee, sugar, and milk. I know WHAT to do, but just can't seem to remember how to perform the function of turning the kettle on, getting the sugar from the jar to a cup, etc... Those are the worst days. Diagnosis really helped, though, because I just accept it as normal for me, rather than keep trying to "get better." Still annoying, though! 😂
I'm a special education teacher, I see the differences you describe here. Schedules are so helpful in reducing my student's anxieties but they do not prevent my student's upsets. I love when they surprise me and indicate or tell me a change in schedule is needed. Those are the best times because it tells me the schedule is doing its job. Reducing anxiety and making our classroom a collaborative environment.
Well done. Wonderful topic. Routines are incredibly important, because they keep me from fouling up, forgetting things, and frankly…thinking. I’m always thinking, and it’s exhausting. (Expensive example: I have a specific routine for packing up a piece of equipment. I unscrewed it, and prepared to move, when the soft case, which I rarely use, lid closed. I took three steps, opened it, and totally forgot that the equipment was still on tripod. It fell 5’ to the forest floor. $30,000+ mistake, because I did a single thing differently, and didn’t turn off my autopilot. I take over twice as long as my peers, to complete any job, but my attention to detail helps me create perfect jobs(digital maps), while my peers routinely turn in garbage. I have the almost perfect job, for a person with AuDHD, but it can be overwhelming. My company accommodates me, in many different ways. They don’t hold me to a rigid schedule, and I pretty much do whatever I want, as long as I produce something. Bonus: I’m outdoors, my coworker is a robot, and my human coworker’s task is to bring me water, because I work without breaks.
Your discussion on schedules / routines matches my experience. I've never thought of myself as having schedules, but I'm often fulfilling a routine, or doing a ritual. The tea ritual has always helped me. I've tried most of the teas at the local Woolworths supermarket. Japanese green tea. Chinese burdock tea. I go to the Chinese supermarkets and randomly pick tea and repeat if I enjoy it. Same tea ritual but different teas.
I’m AuDHD and medicated for the ADHD and being in college has resulted in EVERYTHING being scheduled in a Google calendar. And I mean EVERYTHING. Waking up, meal times, walking between classes, etc. There are simply too many tasks I’m expected to complete that if I do not schedule them out, they will simply not get done. To me, everything I need to do is just floating around in my brain like clouds, and that lack of tangibility means that without some kind of organization and management of my time, I will not remember and/or will get overwhelmed by my tasks. Part of me is hoping that after college, when I’m working from consistent hours and have more free time not dedicated to homework, research, clubs, etc, I will be able to let go of the schedule. It’s interfered a bit with my ability to do proper self care as it feels like I must schedule in time for myself, which feels like a task and is therefore counterintuitive to self care.
All my routines/ rituals have to have flexibility built-in to satisfy the ADHD side....like writing a job list at the start of the day and then spending the whole morning doing something completely different 😂
Clothing/fashion routine didn't work out for me because of neurotypicals around me. I don't even had the same clothes like Steve Jobs, just every piece in my wardrobe was either black or white. And I never had to think about what to wear & if the pieces will fit together or look good at me & I loved it. But people started to complain and/or make fun about my clothes. That I always look like a chess board or like I'm in mourning, or something. So, I started buying other colours. And tbh, I like colours. But it never got easy again what to wear. And I have to waste way more time to think about it, than I'd like to do :/
Something I have done is consolidate to a certain pallette of colors and combinations that I like and look good on me. I don't have a ton of different greens, it's specific greens that go well with the specific neutrals I collect. It's like combining a little variety with a lot of consistency. Hopefully this makes sense!
"about conserving energy" - Wow! Yes! That's kind of all I am about in my life. While I do seem to have more autistic traits than usual for neurotypicals (according to tests), I might not have autism (I have another neurodivergent diagnosis, though - so there will be overlaps anyway). But seeing videos about autism has helped me so much accept and understand myself more - and find coping mechanism and for a nervous system often stuck in freeze mode.
I relate a lot to your experience with coffee, I started visiting the same coffee shops regularly, ordering the same coffee and now all the baristas know me. I enjoy not just the drink, but also the latte art and the experience of going to the coffee shop.
I've been thinking I might be autistic lately, and the segment on social interactions really speaks to me. The analogy I use to describe how it feels to talk to someone is it's like DI-ing to try and escape a combo in a platform fighter, which is using the joystick to change your launch trajectory when you get hit. Proper DI entails giving the correct response to the other person's actions on command and adapting to all sorts of different situations and matchups on the fly, and it requires constant focus because responding with the wrong DI at the wrong time can be catastrophic, much like how it takes me a ton of effort to figure out what to say in a conversation based on what I was told, who I'm talking to and the social situation I'm in, and I feel like I have to make absolutely sure I'm saying the right thing before anything comes out of my mouth. I learned from the video though that apparently neurotypical people seem to come with the training mode auto-DI so they don't need to worry about it at all, but more importantly that just like DI, social interaction is a skill I can learn through experience, figuring out what the correct responses are to specific situations and being able to use them on command, and while I'll definitely still mess it up from time to time and do the equivalent of dying to a random back air at 70% it's something I can work on and improve at. I used to think that being autistic just meant you had no filter in social situations and would sometimes say really rude stuff without realizing it, but viewing it more as your brain not coming pre-packaged with the social interaction features everyone else has and having to put them together manually is a much nicer way to look at it as well as one I identify with much more
Although I'm not totally strict with a schedule, I do find reminders definitely help me to get stuff done. Because I can hyper focus on something, or ruminate, and totally forget to do certain things. Like eat food. Like it's 6:30 pm and I haven't ate all day. That's pretty normal for me. I should probably go make food.
So, my perspective on this based on myself. Autism loves freedom just as much as routine. My autism loves to follow my minds eye to be free to do whatever my thoughts choose. My perspective also includes our thoughts, which have some autonomy and needs to be free to choose. I find a balance between the 2 makes a huge difference in mental well-being. The most important thing I also have to do is stim regularly physical and vocal stims. Adding music to my focal points of routines allows better focus, such as while cooking allows more focus on that task and better results. Self-acceptance was my biggest hurdle, but I have prevailed. Perspective of our "abilities" is key, our abilities can be honed to our benefit and well-being. I am researching a different perspective of our traits and traits of adhd. What I'm achieving for myself is huge. I would also like to add that many of us who are also empath can hone those traits to our benefit as well. Wr have great abilities and we only need to relearn these traits that are being hidden and blocked. Humanity is becoming a lost art.👻🤪🌶🤘😎♾️
As I have AuDHD I don't tend to develop completely automatic routines/habits (except bad habits) very easily; the only one I do almost completely without thinking about it is brushing my teeth (the process itself; not initiating it; I have to think about it every time; and I regularly lie in bed feeling my teeth with my tongue to figure out if I have brushed them already or not), locking the door when I leave, and bringing my backpack when I leave anywhere, and driving a car. But that only happens with really simple physical actions like brushing teeth and how to steer a car etc. and things that I can decide is completely mandatory every single time, no exceptions. I learned to bring my backpack to school and very rarely went to school without it; and once I decided backpacks (or at least one piece of luggage) are mandatory every time I leave anywhere even if I'm not going to school (since after all it's almost always useful to have a backpack anyway) I stopped forgetting my backpack, because this rule made walking outside without a backpack feel very weird. But because we only had gym class once or twice a week; I never developed a habit for bringing two pieces of luggage, so whenever we had gym class I either brought my backpack and forgot the gymbag or brought the gymbag and forgot the backpack; but around age 14 I realised I could fixe the problem by attaching the gymbag to the straps of the backpack that way I still only had "one piece" of luggage to remember. A lot of my "routines" are just arbitrary but absolute rules I've made up to follow without spending minutes worrying about a decision every time; like after having my electric car for maybe 6 years, and every time I parked I spent so much energy trying to figure out if I need to charge it or not; I finally came up with a completely arbitrary rule that I should always charge whenever the battery had less than an estimated 70 km left. That way I don't need to think about it every time. It does have some logic to it though, my wife's job is about 14 km away; and I often drive her to work whenever she's running late for the bus in the morning; so the round trip is under 30 km; so by always charging before the battery has less than 60 km I still can always make 2 round trips before it complains. So even if the charger occasionally fails to charge (usually because I've pulled out one the other end of the cable without noticing) or if I forget to even consider my charging rule; I will still be fine.
Last year when I didn't give a bigger thought of ASC yet I was thinking to myself "oh dear, my brain loves routines", especially morning one (evening one too, but shhh). And everytime I hear "why you're getting up so early, can't you just..." no, no, no, if I could I probably would. I need time in the morning to prepare, even thinking of just getting up, put some clothes on and in 30 minutes being ready to leave the house - insert hissing sounds here. And speaking about learning new skills like driving a car... when for the first time I was driving a car (during first lesson in a school) I hadn't any idea that people can get sweaty in so many places on a body 😅 I didn't want to hit anything and anybody on the road so badly and at the same time do everything properly that I bearly remember anything except being totally worn out later that day. Well, still long road for me to solve my own jigsaw puzzle, but I'm really happy that there are channels like this.
I agree completely with your advice to carers. It is a dangerous path to walk, if one becomes so rigidly bound to own routines, and schedules. I came with and idea, if I introduce a predictable in outcome, and positive change, while not too often, and not too rarely, I might not be as anxious as I was, when unexpected something happens. So, when it comes to eating habits, where routines are a necessity, in order to be able to manage planning, procuring ingredients, and making meals, I added such introduction, and I called it “Try something new Wednesday” for a dinner, since for me it is less disruptive to everything else, than if it was breakfast.
There, this video goes into my playlist I intend for infodumping. At least on my birthday it should be me who chooses the activity. So no escape from talking about autism tomorrow 😅 Well worded about rituals being important to feel grounded. My current favourite is to watch my shrimps in the evening with my cat in the lap. He never did that before and I'm taking in every moment of it.
@@Autistic_AF Yes. I'll put it into my coffee mug, so it's the first thing I'll find, when I get up tomorrow 😁 BTW, it always astounds me when you talk about struggles. You seem so well put together. Your wording and communication skills are on top. And then there are quirks like struggling with sticky fingers. For some strange reasons all of this makes me happy, and maybe feel less broken, if that makes sense?
A lot of it has more to do with being meticulous with details and being really bothered by “fly in the ointment” types of situations. If I plan on doing X, Y, and Z, but a problem arises preventing me from doing X, I might get so upset that I procrastinate instead of doing Y and Z. I don’t like schedules because I’m not good at schedules. I can’t predict how long something will take and absolutely HATE being interrupted before I can finish something. I’m too perfectionistic to enjoy things I’m not good at, so schedules kind of go out the window. Basically, if something feels contrived and interferes with my preferred pace I’m going to hate it.
This a topic I often talk about with my partner because it can be very confusing, especially when it comes to drawing the line between the neurotypical and autistic approach. Thank you for explaining this in simple words!
Thank you this was very helpful. I struggle to follow my schedules because I see them as burdens, and not mechanisms to reduce decision making. Time to change that :)
I appreciate the fuzzy cat cam, maybe a higher definition one would be a good addition going forward lol. Im working on obtaining a diagnosis for Autism and ADHD, if thats what I actually am, and found myself not being able to understand or relate to the "rigid adherence to routine" because I absolutely hate schedules and being forced to do things I hate and switch from things I want to keep working on or finish and feeling rushed or late all the time... but this video showed me thats waaay too narrow of a definition. I find that when looked at as actual routines/rituals instead of schedules and dividing up every minute of the day into a plan, I fit the description much more accurately. I do have a lot of weird routines, some I would go as far as calling rituals to be honest, that I HAVE to do or I dont feel right. What I do when I first wake up, what I do when I get ready to leave OR what I do going somewhere specific, the way I have to wash my hands, the way I have to wash my hands after doing very certain things, the way I have to go about starting and setting up certain tasks/relaxation periods... Once I started looking at myself through the lens of the video, and being more analytical and less "I dont feel like I am/like I do this" I started seeing how rigid I can be in the way I do things AND how irrationally frustrated I can get when those little things are disrupted or unable to be done MY way. Thanks for these videos, I've self diagnosed, now Im trying to talk to some professionals to get an official opinion and maybe some help finally.
Yeah, I've come to realize that routine isn't really like a strict schedule to me, but more of a "I know what to expect and how to do it" kinda thing. If I have a plan, I can't just switch to a different one in 2 seconds and be fine. Also in conversation I've come to realize I actually have like these very specific ways I talk, which kinda feels like a "fill in the blank words" sheet. Like I have the blueprints for most conversation situations and then I just need to fill them in with the appropriate words. So because of this, my sentences actually follow honestly quite predetermined tracks, which allows me to succeed quite well in most conversations. The problem just comes when someone badly interrupts me or asks me to skip ahead or something since that takes me off the track and I end up having literally no idea on how to continue or what to say so my entire way of talking just completely breaks down and I become almost unable to talk until I figure out what the heck to do.
Man I never new about these kinds of rituals... just the annoying way I have to do things to feel like I do them right. I could really use a few dozen support demons. For emotional and militaristic support. I think I could really make some change with enough. In my life I mean.
What I can do in a day depends entirely on how the day is going, how the day before was, and how much distress I'm experiencing - I don't plan out my days, but I really really (Really) like routine. - If I reel ok enough, I might be willing to do something that stretches me. - Give me indecision or give me something else! - I have done a lot of practicing how to say things and it helps a lot... and it can also be masking, and I think originally was for me, so I could produce an expectable response. - Ah, you got to that point...
yes! this is such a good way to explain it. for me (audhd) it's like doing the subroutine is starting up my brain so i can do other things. morning coffee = it's morning now, so it's time to be productive and work. showering at night = it's night time and i need to sleep now. it allows me to automate tasks that otherwise take SO MUCH energy and effort and the associations my brain forms from doing those things at similar times or places then makes it easier to flow into the next task.
It's really cool to learn that the way I've come to understand my own information processing and decision making - "foreground thread" carefully and deliberately considering one thing, and "background thread" running routines - has been studied and described scientifically :) It's doubly important with ADHD, as I have to manage focus and distractions in varying ways throughout the day, for example making sure the background thread has nice music to listen to, and stops poking the foreground one, which is trying to focus on programming.
Congrats Mike for your first youtube anniversary. You are my favourite youtuber. I brew coffee every morning using an aeropress and freshly ground beans and occasionally pour over. Pour over certainly has a stronger flavour, but you can avoid the bitterness by using a larger grind size, which increases the flow rate of water, and by also reducing the total steep time.
i can't stick to t schedule very well. At least the kind that's the same everyday. I worked for 20+ years in a various biochem research labs and had to work on very different experiments from day to day and each type of experiment was done in a very specific routine way. Any deviation screwed up the data and had to be repeated. Another type of routine/ritual I had was that at each place I worked I went out to eat at the very same place and ordered the very same thing. At UNLV it was a combo burrito no onions . At University of South Carolina it as chicken nuggets, hushpuppies and dirty rice.Went through the drive through and ate in the parking lot. That way I had a quiet break from the people in the lab and didn't have to deal with restaurant staff.
I have never done well with schedules. I do have my own routines, but schedules are really hard for me because I'll start doing something I like but when my schedule alarm rings, it throws me off and I don't want to change what I'm doing. I don't know if that's more PDA, but routines are much more flexible and as long as I brush my teeth before bed then that's perfect.
After I found out I am autistic I started embracing my rituals and rutines even more and realized how mutch komfort and happiness they actually give me :).
Thank you for this video. Just realised my subroutines are outdated. Changed countries and the old one's don't work here. Struggling to build new ones. I am also stuck in read only mode most days. For me everything is a database with facts and dimensions and needs to be stored and catalogued in the best most efficient way. Writing is my preferred form of communication. And so many channels available to communicate - breaking focus - its exhausting.
I’m going thru autistic shutdown and all my routines are out of whack. It’s like my brain is just buffering. It really is incredible how different the mind can be when it’s doing “ok” vs when it’s not.
Ugh, routines. This is actually a huge problem for me because I have so few of them, even though I'm in my mid 40s. I have gotten masking routines and some driving routines, but self care routines? Home care routines? Everything else? NOPE. All the decisions all the time, and my significant other wonders why I hate choosing what to have for dinner. I am choosing everything I do all the time and analyzing all the consequences and... I'm tired. I'm so tired.
Not related to the video. But I finally got my chance to speak to my GP earlier this week. I was refused an assessment but not for a normal reason like my age being "42 so they would have caught it by now". Turns out that in the Oxford area at least, the waiting list got so long (7 years) that instead of doing something to fix the problem they just decided to completely remove the assessment service altogether. There's no chance I'll be able to afford to go private as there are far more important things for me to worry about financially speaking. I was wondering how common this is in the UK. Having my mental wellbeing get pushed aside because people like me are considered not important enough to do anything about. 7 year+ waiting list, this must be 1000s of people left in limbo in my one area alone.
From what I have read from social media, TH-cam, and forums is that it's a thing in the U.K. But that just from my experience of what I've seen. But like Autistic AF said, finding a doctor who knows what they are doing is an issue. A lot don't seem to care enough to look into autism without an issue. I'd say it's the biggest obstacle. I'm in Canada and I got a psych doc that took 8 years to finally realize I was autistic after decades of misdiagnoses from other ones. I'm late diagnosed as well. The quality of care that late dx'd autistics get from the mental health profession is pretty non-existent even when you get the diagnosis.
I'm so sorry, that's terrible :( Unfortunately, from what I've heard and seen, this sort of thing is becoming more common across the UK as the services continue to strain under the high demand, if not the scrapping of whole-ass services, the insane wait lists for sure. I'm not sure how it would go if it's down to area, but if you haven't, perhaps ask your GP to specifically refer you to Psychiatry UK. You'll probably still run into a lengthy wait list by the time you fill out all the questionnaires and hand over all the information, but hopefully it won't be as long as 7+ years! Last I heard, the wait list for an assessment through them was about 2-3 iirc. Good luck! Hopefully you get the support you need, even without a formal diagnosis 🤞
@@bluecheesehasmoldinit The doctor I spoke to was sympathetic to my cause and said I do fit the criteria to go for an assessment. But she was in a position of not being able to refer me due to the fact there is nothing to refer me to.
@@Vandassar Oh wow! I actually brought my known traits to the psychiatrist after I learned about autism. I asked my gp to refer me to one cuz I needed a new one again. I got one but even she isn't up to date fully and I have been overmedicatd for a long time. It's a hit and miss, it seems, when you aren't a kid being diagnosed. I don't understand why your doc said there was no one to refer you to. I guess your doctor forgot that this is the area psychiatrists work in. I didn't need to do a full assessment thingy.
I definitely relate to this. My routines provide structure to my day so I don't constantly have to think about what I'm doing. But I can break from them if I need to. I actually do like to write schedules when I go on holiday. But its more a list of places to go and activities I want to do each day so I fit everything in. I usually allow a few options if I need to make changes. I think I read that Barack Obama when he was President followed a similar clothes rule to Steve Jobs. He also wore the same design of suit so he had one less decision to make. So it's not just Autistic people who do this, though we probably do it more than most.
I make a weekly menu on Sunday. My breakfast has been the same for about 5 years coffee, instant oatmeal and toast. It is ritualistic and if I don't have a component, my morning is often ruined. Since doing the menu consistently, my stress level is much lower. My life was in constant chaos because any time I made accommodations for myself it would be destroyed. I could go on and tangent about that but that's a long drawn out story.
I heard a podcast a while ago that suggested using random chance to make decisions. It was really helpful for me. Plenty of times I have the urge to try to maximize the outcome of the decision. While carefully weighing options can be nice, sometimes just randomly choosing can be freeing. Too much type 2 thinking makes the entire situation less optimal because I wasted too much time and mental effort.
Insight! ❤❤❤ Routines have saved my life. I have a 40 min routine to get up. 1) drink the glass of water with the morning meds (Ritalin et al.) waiting by your bed. Open your eyes. 2) Find bathroom without touching your phone. Have a leak and take a 30 second cold shower. 3) dress up using the sport clothes, socks and shoes you have ready. 4) get out and walk/run to a lamp post or a tree 200-800 meters/yrds away. Return and take a proper warm shower. 5) Check your phone, dress up and get breakfast. I have automated my medication and breakfast so well that might have a butler but notice no difference!
Omg that's exactly how/why my routines work. It's like I make the optimal routine, upgraded every once in a while, and then I do that so I don't have to think. Once I have my routine I can even run it quickly if I need to. And I just do that. It doesn't feel rigid per se, minus my washing and eating routines. This is the area that always has me questioning, but since you've explained it this way it's allowed for more understanding and insight.
I have diabetes, so when I get an English muffin on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday I have peanut butter and sugar-free strawberry preserves. But I'm not restricted about that. Sometimes, for a change, I'll use sugar-free raspberry preserves. So variety is as important as predictability. Your description of driving explains why I used to hate driving when I started. It was too overwhelming and I never realized. I thought it was how everyone experienced driving, but others enjoyed the challenge more than I did. It never occurred to me that others didn't have the same experience.
First time seeing your videos pop up and I am positive god got lazy with me and just hit spawn new instance. Reframing standard neurotypical behavior into tech speak made my night and might help me out in the future. A like & Subscribed well earned!
You really made a good video about this topic. It helps me a lot in understanding several aspects of me, others, my problems and in the process of the question "Am I actually autistic or just traumatized into the same patterns and symptoms?" Even though I'm not really sure why this distinction is so important, especially for society, because in the end I have the same, or at least, very similar problems and experiences. Additionally as I also have ADHD (that is diagnosed and VERY obvious) my need for routines, maximize overthinking and decision paralysis is NOT helping with this question! 😅 Sometimes it's just easier to follow Impulses, even though their unconscious, often problematic and seldom to my liking. But the other option is what you so perfectly described in this video. ADHD and schedules are like two poles of a magnet! 😂 But with medication, therapy and new way of viewing and interacting with the world, the more 'autistic' traits become more and more obvious. Because finally I have (barley) "enough" energy to do that at all. But it just shifted the focus to another aspect in my life I struggle with. Which often ends in me burning out, freeze and isolate to an extreme matter, so I don't have to deal with so much input and keeping up a living that stresses me out. Well I do work on that and accumulated a ton of help (Doctor, psychiatrist, therapy, social worker, therapy groups) that will hopefully work in my favor. I will do trauma therapy next, also to better distinguish which traits are rooted in that or could be, as mentioned, indeed in the autism spectrum. And I did a degree as office management assistant to hopefully find a flexible home office job (if I ever get around to do the decision what and where exactly I wanna work). 😂 Anyway just wanted to thank you, because I find it very easy to follow your explanation and way of thinking. Great work! 💖
Hit me like a brick wall, especially the part about indecision. Sometimes it's bad enough that I've endearingly been dubbed a "deer in the headlights".
As a student, I remember keeping my class schedule folded up in my pocket for the first month or so of the new term because I simply couldn't remember my schedule without it. As an adult, my wife helps me by writing out the weekly family schedule. Otherwise, I easily forget all the errands I have to run for my kids.
(4:50) Hahhahahaha, BRILLIANT!! I love the analogy for "profoundly autistic" that we don't use terms like "profoundly male" hahaha Great analogy!! (I am diagnosed autistic, and although the diagnostician didn't explicitly write it in the report, I would probably be something like ASD-2 / Substantial Support needs )
Sure can relate to that coffee ritual. I’ve also never agreed with strict schedules, I change my mind and mood too often to want to be restricted to sticking to a schedule. I wake up feeling quite different day to day, drink coffee and think about a plan for the day, if this is messed with, I go into chaos.
I really hate schedules and plans. When I have one I need to go with it. All deviations from plans cause anxiety and it can get overwhelming fast. That's why I am a happy go lucky type of guy with no plans. I am extremely fast at making plans. It is both a curse and a blessing.
7:30 I say instantly yes to everything because I don't want to disappoint anyone. Afterwards, however... the pondering is gonna never end: if I really wanted the thing I agreed to, would I've been better off without, if/how I can politely decline afterwards after already agreeing etc. (tbh, I think I automatically agree to everything because I've realized I'm too slow to make decisions so I'll just choose the option that's most likely the least catastrophic on autopilot lol. 8:10 oh this was the very thing that was being explained right after I wrote the comment 🤦) 😂
As someone who has been diagnosed since childhood the whole "routine" idea is mixed; for some things I like a schedule and for some things I prefer not to have one. I don't like having formal schedules but often end up doing the same things at roughly the same time; and even if I schedule free time at a certain time I hate it when I have to change things due to someone else wanting my time. And if I ever do have a formal schedule either of my own making or that someone else has created but I agree with I don't like changing it.
I have rituals when I wake up and when I go to bed. I have to do it the same way every day. If I don't, I can't do it properly. As a freelancer I have flexible work plans. I have a lot of health problems so it depends on how I am feeling that day. AuDHD here.
I pair all of my work clothes when I hang them so I don't have to think about what to wear in the morning when I'm already thinking about the day ahead. It was like the clouds parted and the light shown down from heaven when I realized I could just do that and not have to think anymore.
Omg love it. Search index, call subroutine, relax..... That is my day!. Worker crying at the door? Call subroutine, run subroutine, end programme. Shallow water cooler encounter? Call subroutine, run subroutine, end
I find any list that involves timestamps just makes me anxious. If even one thing happens too late the rest is doomed. What does seem to help is a list of things you could do in certain situations. If you find yourself pondering what to do next (before getting distracted) you can look at it and pick something up from there that seems to fit the moment. It is slightly different from a todo list in that it's not a list of things that need to be done, but things you could do and in what context. Note that you can still have routines for things on that list, an unwritten step-by-step chain of actions you usually go through. By having an overview of several things you can do and then picking one, it feels like a more conscious data driven motivated choice to do that, instead of doing the first thing that comes to mind and then forever wonder if you should be doing something else.
🧡 Thank you to everyone who has watched, liked, subscribed or joined the autisti-cats community over the last year. It's been an incredible journey. I put together a highlight reel of the best moments of 2023-24; I hope you enjoy it! ✨
th-cam.com/video/_qyfhFxVoIU/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=AutisticAF
I suspect that the routine/ schedule thing has solely to do with one's level of monotropism. The higher the monotropism, the greater the need.
To me, a schedule is a demand, a routine is a standard operating procedure for daily tasks, and a ritual is a recreational activity.
mastery in conciseness :D I love it, to manage to encompass all in one sentence, while making sense, and avoiding missing crucial parts.
@mariuszwisla3230 thank you for the kind words. :)
A schedule is a demand, yes. I even find lists (task lists, etc) difficult and overwhelming.
@@jamesrempel8522 agreed. A list is a demand. I hate lists. I usually take several days to complete everything on them.
Yes, routines are fine. Schedules are not.
Yes! I do not need a schedule, I need a plan, so I know what to prepare for.
I realised that when I thought about how I am able to deal with my spontaneous side (diagnosed ADHD, in the process of getting an autism diagnosis). After I realised how much it set me back to have people cancel on me, even when I was able to see why they did it, I started to plan that together with the plan on meeting someone. I planed what I would do if they had to cancel or reschedule. Depending on the day and how far into already getting ready I am it still sets me back but it's so much less because of the fact that I factor it in as a possibility. With friends who are bipolar, have bpd or some other circumatances that lead to them struggling sometimes with sticking with the plan I saw that it is a relief for them too and it even helps some of them to keep calm and be able to attend more often ☺️.
Yes. That's me too.
@@Hopischwopi I realised (BAP here) that I cannot handle things being different then expected... thus leading me sometimes to know the less about something because it's less stressfull (I'm on hypervigilant stress mode then) when going out, then actually knowing were I go and it not being as I pictured in my head. That's just extremely afwull if what I expected actually doesn't happen. Can be little things, like food tasting different that I would expect, then going to the movies and people suddenly changing the movie, or hearing that I can park in front of a house, and then I cannot and have to find suddenly another place.... that kind of things. Suddenly a thing that's always the same being different etc etc...
@histoiresdundragonnier861 I understand that! The problem with not planning is that people want my input and then I am stressrd by that because well I didn't plan anything. So for me preplanned options are very helpful and generally I can deal with a good degree of change compared to other people but only when everything around is stable. Plus I often tend to dissociate or kinda switch into customer mode and then I need a huge recovery time.
I hope the people around you understand that not planning/knowing things can be beneficial for you.
Yes yes yes!! Planning is the answer
I used to think I couldn't be autistic because I don't follow rigid itineraries, but I later realized that my routines are so rigid that my life looks like an introvert's Groundhog Day. Same breakfast, same lunch, same wardrobe, same clock-in and clock-out time at work (7 minutes late and 7 minutes early 😅), etc. I track what day of the week it is by how many bagels I have left in the bag because I optimize every aspect of my day to day life so that I can expand my mental capacity to handle unavoidable variations and changes.
The most autistic thing a lot of you can do is thinking you are not autistic enough because you don't fit the description perfectly and/or literally, happened to me aswell lol
@@4ns00I've never thought of it like that but it's so true haha
This!!!
love this comment ^^
"These routines are not signs of rigidity, but tools of empowerment." You said this right at the end. I think it is a very significant observation. I need to go away and process it. It fits with things I've been doing recently with my therapist - allowing my brain to do what it wants to do.
I love, "not signs of rigidity but tools of empowerment." Thank you. This must be impressed on those who write so-called diagnostic criteria for "disorders."
I'm AutDHD and I say HECK YES! to some routines/rituals. My morning routine/ritual is especially necessary for my brain to start functioning in manageable steps - it eases the transition from asleep to awake considerably. And it is important for me that nobody else is awake yet, I really need my alone hour in the morning, even when it means waking up at 06:00.
The most ritualistic part for me is the first kitchen task: cleaning the stovetop. There is something deeply satisfying with transforming it from greasy to squeaky clean. After that comes opening the dishwasher and taking out what is needed for making and serving breakfast. After those two "subroutines" are done I have become capable of actually thinking and the remaining tasks can vary a bit without that feeling stressful.
Thanks for yet another excellent video and congratulations on your first Tubeversity! 🎉
100%!
That is the last thing I want to do first thing in the morning omg! Or have to do at any time. I don’t even use my cooker every week , but my son uses it most days and we always have a military stand off about who is going to clean it. It’s usually me even though I hardly ever use it. So I detest doing it.
@@tracik1277 Was posting your reaction informative, kind, or otherwise necessary? [wondering & slightly sad]
That sounds like such an anazing morning! And I feel the need for a morning ritual/routine. So important, it's the basis of the day and I also get up way earlier that I would need technically speaking but mentally I need that time and the propper transition. I even have differences in the rituals/routines that I do on a workday and an off day which also helps to distinquish those and the mindset I start with.
@@ronjaj.addams-ramstedt1023 I was just sharing my own experience. It wasn’t meant as any kind of criticism.
Thank you for getting the word "ritual" correct. You have no idea how many times I've been called "stupid" for reciting the actual meaning of Ritual when everyone else only wants to associate it with religious centers. Just like "Religion" is a specific set of rituals for a specific purpose.
How ironic they're calling you stupid for it, sounds like you just met people who aren't open to new information... hmm i wonder if theres a word for that... hehe...
Religion in general has a habitat of stealing concepts and claiming dominion over it... It's part of the true nature of that beast.
Sounds like they were talking about themselves because words have definitions and apparently they can't fathom that
@@jays5002 which is weird in itself because it's not at all new information.
This video feels quite like me, I am horrendous at decisions. I get severe analysis paralysis, and have been told I overthink so much. Feel like if i have to make the 'perfect' decisions and its so painful and then I don't often end up making the decision because it stresses me out.
My black cat waits till human first light then head-butts me. Best start to the day.
I wake up to my black cat smacking me in the face and then kneading my blanket…a bit different but still adorable.
@@GhostKestrel
My cat cries and cries oh so pitifully at my bedroom door until I get out of bed to let him in. Most days anyway - today he decided to wail at our neighbour's elderly cat instead.
@@sapiescent My cat only asked me for food 2959373883838 times today. I think she might be sick.
I cuddle with my little dog every day after we wake up and before we fall asleep. He never wakes me up, we both like to sleep as long as we need to. He is the love of my life and the best thing ever happened to me. 🐕❤🙏
Apologies in advanced for this long ass comment 😅😂
The current code I'm trying to crack on my (formally undiagnosed) AuDHD journey is parsing and identifying all my pre-existing routines and rituals and trying to impose some kind of schedule for myself/make adjustments in my routine while I'm unemployed and at home with my parents.
So far, an important finding for me has been: a lot of important rituals for me can only really be triggered by certain pre-existing conditions. For example, most of my hygiene rituals can only be easily carried out if I'm going out that day. If I'm walking out my front door, anywhere for longer than 5-10 minutes, brushing my teeth, combing my hair, and a quick wash if needed before getting dressed is non-negotiable.
If I don't have that pre-requisite, suddenly, brushing my teeth is a decision I have to manually make. Despite it being such a simple and necessary thing, having to force myself to do it is so much harder than it has any right to be, and when you spend a lot of time at home, that can be really problematic.
It also extends into my eating habits. My household tends to focus more on having ingredients to make meals with instead of having snacks to readily grab, but if the kitchen is a big mess and the components I need to make something to eat aren't available to me (i.e. clean pan, cooking utensil, clean plate, clean cutlery, counter space), a lot of the time, I just won't eat because in order to clean the kitchen up enough to be able to use, I have to use up energy that I don't really have yet because I'm hungry. Then, it'll end up being pushed to the point where the only way I can muster up the will to tackle the dishes and cook is to be so hungry that the only way to quell it is to use the discomfort as momentum to get the task done. It's definitely an unhealthy habit, but despite all my efforts, it's the most effective way to get it done: Needs must.
Something I feel that's worth keeping in mind for any peeps who are in the same boat as me for the time being, even if you aren't doing an awful lot with your days because you're not relying on a schedule that's decided for you, you will almost certainly still follow some kind of routine. Mine, generally speaking, looks like this at the moment:
- Wake up
- Check the time
- Either go back to sleep or check up on phone notifications
- Spend an additional 1-3+ hours in bed
- Go to the bathroom
- Go back to bedroom
- Spend another 1-3+ hours on my own
- Emerge from room to fulfil obligatory daily greeting and check in with the parental
- Maybe eat something
- Go back to room
- Amuse oneself for another 2-4+ hours
- Check in with parents
- Return to isolation chamber
- Check in on parents/make dinner for the fam
- Retire back to my room for the evening
- Fall asleep after the sandman has persisted-hunted you for several hours
Something I'm eager to figure out is how to adjust my standard routine without forcing myself, and I think I've figured it out while I was pacing around my room earlier. Getting dressed. Just going from pj's to a different set of indoor clothes a few days ago caused me to have the most productive day I've had in months. It was so obvious, but I just completely missed it after wondering why, for the last three days, why I couldn't get myself to sit at my desk despite having such a good time and the answer was draped over the back of my chair 🤡
Now that I've had the realisation, I'm really hoping it'll help keep some things clicked into place. Beyond that, I also have this schedule planning method that Hey, Spark shared on her TH-cam channel a bit ago, where you plan your day/week around how you want to feel on a given day. She explained it and demonstrated it really well, it's her start "to-feel" instead video, if you haven't spoken about i"ntuitive planning" before.
Either way, despite the struggles, I'm still able to acknowledge that I am getting better at certain things despite not having a schedule to keep me regimented:
- This is perhaps the longest stretch of time I've kept my room consistently clean/tidy
- I'm brushing my teeth more regularly, even if I still have to force myself a bunch (the goal is to hopefully start overriding the "going outside" pre-requisite and link the ritual with the first bathroom visit of the day)
- I'm making the effort to actually try to "start" my day with a meal, thanks to help from my mum :)
Sure, sometimes I feel kind of crappy for not just being able to do the basic stuff easily, but I also know that in a lot of ways, I've essentially had to do a hard reboot on myself for the sake of accommodating myself better in the future, and I'm doing it at 25. I will get there, and it will all be worth it.
Anyway. Essay over. Congratulations and well done on your one year anniversary! I can't believe it's only been a year, I feel like you've already been around so much longer (in a good way). You're channel is such a massive help and a consistent comfort watch of mine, so thank you for all that you've put out here and shared with us
@@K.Voyence Why is this comment especially relatable for me
my audhd "routine" is pretty much the same at the minute lmao!
@@K.Voyence I don't think I struggle as much but if I don't go outside and don't change clothes I also tend to have difficulties with doing anything any given day. That's probably why, even with bullying, I didn't hate school as a child.
Interesting, I'm auADHD as well and as much as I crave for routines... my adhd side makes me get out of the way constantly. The part you mention about getting dressed like going out is true for me as well. The thing for me in the morning is that I need 10 to 12h sleep, which is basically impossible to achieve if you have a job and a house to care. I'm always sleeping less than I need, which makes me take advantage of every minute I can sleep longer.
But my waking up time is soooooooo slow, my brain is just not there when it comes to waking up, to the point that I can barely control my movements if I wake up too fast or rushed out because I need to work. Because of it, I can't do usual morning routines too often, and if I force myself doing so, it just ruins my day, my mood instantly go to full anger mode the entire day.
Sometimes I just gave up, and go through my day in whatever way I can. This inconsistency from adhd is so bad for my autist self, my entire life feels like internal battle against myself. I try not to think too munch on this, because it really makes me sad. It's always a struggle to just exist.
Oh my gosh you literally explained my entire adult life. I never really thought about the pre-requisites before, but they absolutely determine whether or not I actually do anything that normal people consider productive. And it's soooooo easy to let the house get overwhelming to clean because of that.
Thought before watching: I’m AuDHD, I’ve struggle for years with routine and ritual. Before getting diagnosed common advice and rigide planning caused me so much pain. It destroyed my already established ritual and replaced it with anxiety and burnout.
Now i’m trying to establish rituals again but it’s so link to past suffering i've practically given up, leaving me dysfunctional and constantly trying to catch up. Maybe i’ll eventually get out of this draining cycle.
🧡
AuDHD twice-exceptional here; this is the only part of autism that doesn’t apply to me, because ADHD makes routine impossible to maintain. We can have rituals for things like bathing, or eating/taking meds, or dressing, but struggle to fit all that into one morning. Bottom line is, we cannot do as much as fast as NT’s can. Hence “disabled”. It’s not that we are lazy or not trying; our brains work less efficiently! 🤷♀️
I've been in the same spot as you going on two decades after a string of burnouts and still trying to crawl out of it. I have to rewire so much stuff I had already trained myself to do, like showering. The basic rituals that neurotypicals take for granted. But I'm not giving up. And I hope you don't either! Eventually, the shit-show has to end.
@@jonathana.1802 what do you mean by "but it's so link to past suffering?"
@@misspat7555 I definitely relate to somehow not being able to do as much as NTs in a given timespan, and how alienating it can feel. Everyone is confused how I spend so much time in the shower. The way I understand it, the source of the difference might be that our routines are established from careful and deliberate decision making, and they might follow a slower process, in a way that's not obvious and difficult to optimise. What I personally find ADHD to prevent from happening tho, is habits - starting sequences of uninteresting tasks unprompted and without additional driving factors. I can generally form routines no problem, but establishing habits is utterly Sisyphean.
I get up at 6am, same breakfast daily, 8am head to my garden studio to paint, ride my exercise bike at 11.30am for 30 mins, lunch, paint all afternoon, garage gym for an hour, dinner, paint all evening, 9.30pm I head indoors for half an hour of tv in the lounge and then bed. I do that 7 days a week, done that for years now and it rarely changes. 🙂
I love the way you've explained this. I actually wrote out all my morning subroutines based on different personal care steps. Things like showering vs not showering, etc. I didn't need them written to follow them, but as someone with time agnosia, it was a huge revelation to me to see the variation in the number of steps and therefore time required. I timed them all out, and now I can set my Time Timer and feel more in control of my mornings without a ton of thought and stress.
Ooh I learned a new word today, agnosia! Thank you for this! When you say time agnosia, is that like the inability to tell how much time something takes? I like the idea of using a timer for routines, that actually sounds really helpful.
The only requirement for an autism diagnosis is differences in verbal (“You use the wrong words, wrong tone, and wrong timing!”) and nonverbal (“Stop staring/ look at me/ what’s so funny/ why do you look mad?!?!”) communication leading to difficulties in socializing. Only two out of four of STIMs, SPINs, sensory differences, and rigid routines are required! 👍 I do agree about doing things the same way every time being a way we save energy in a desperate attempt to cope with a chronically overwhelming world! 😬
For high-masking people, I really think this is the barrier that stops them getting diagnosed. Especially when masking becomes a habit.
Less safe mode, more blue screen of death 😉
I had the type 2 thinking described to me as a brain tree with the branches representing the options and parameters for a decision. A neurotypical person will go down two or three branches and make a decision. An autistic person will need to go down every branch. I started looking at replacing my car in 2018, still haven’t decided on one yet.
This was the biggest thing holding me back from considering myself autistic (now diagnosed!). I thought because I struggle with schedules a lot there was no way I could be autistic, but I have many rituals I follow that fit the criteria instead as well as my special interests. But this way of explaining it as being stuck in type 2 thinking really.. really makes it so clear why not being able to follow a schedule brings me so much distress
Funny I was thinking this exact thing the other day.... I can't stick to a schedule, but I do have routines for some things I do.... Routine at the moment seems to be thinking too much about everything and forgetting to do anything .... This needs to change, but then it's hard to get up when there is a purring, floofy kitten or 2 sat on me as well 😂. Very relatable video as always Mike.😊
When supporting adults with autism (usually with limited verbal communication skills) and also a learning disability my colleagues and I try to avoid what we call 'brittle' schedules. i.e. schedules that are easily broken. For example, if we always drove a person the same way to visit their parents if we go down that same road there'd possibly be an assumption that they'd be going to visit their parents when outcome doesn't match expectation people with autism can become emotionally dysregulated. This also works in everybody's favour if say the 'road to Mam and Dad's' is closed then alternative routes are more readily accepted.
In short: just because somebody has autism does not mean that they can't be supported with flexibility if people supporting those with support needs think through how they provide support. Think about the immediate and deferred effects of what your doing as a support worker.
Ordering food in a restaurant is a nightmare for me, and everyone else involved. I usually narrow it down to two or three options, then, about the third time the server asks if we're ready to order, I tell everyone else to order first, and I'll have decided by the time it's my turn. When my turn comes, I have never decided, so I panic order whatever I am looking at on the menu at the time, which usually ends up being something I wasn't considering, and didn't want.
I used to have the same issue - now I read the menu on the restaurant's website the day before and take as much time as I need to decide what I'm going to order - and also have a plan B, in case they don't have the thing I've chosen at that moment.
@@carolinelist-b4p I do that, too. Sometimes it helps, but sometimes I worry when we get to the restaurant that I might not still want what I already picked out, and end up in the same boat as usual.
@@PaulaRoederer flip a coin.
I just order the same thing every time and place. If they don't have my, "go to" meal, then I have no idea what to do.
Have you tried asking for someone else order it for you? When I'm too stressed out I'll just ask other people to do it, either asking for my husband or just asking the server their suggestion. It's just food, we know it, but the problem is the decision making.
Thoughtful and helpful video. Thank you! Retirement is so much more friendly to my need for routines and predictability…I still start each day asking my husband what his own priorities are for the day and what he needs from my energy reserve. I am startled by any change after that. I really have compassion for those still working 😢 and stuck with artificial time tables, and changing workplace expectations (not to mention family responsibilities). I don’t know how I made it through - undiagnosed (unsuspected on a ‘good day’) and exhausted.
This was so helpful, thank you! As someone who’s AuDHD, with a fair dose of Demand Avoidance, schedules and appointments stress me out! However, I love rituals and find certain routines soothing and energy-saving-just as you explained.
I loved the explanation of Type 1 and Type 2 thinking. I often feel overwhelmed-or even assaulted-by Type 1 thinking; I sense and feel things immediately and deeply. Yet, I’m uncomfortable making decisions from that place. It’s challenging to advocate for the time and space needed to reach the Type 2 zone, where I know my best decisions are made. The world isn’t patient with that process, and I’ve recently realized I’ve adopted that same impatience with myself. It’s difficult to unravel and reframe this zone as something acceptable rather than viewing it as an annoyance or weakness…
I find your videos soothing to follow! Thank you for all your work in researching and making them flow so well!
New autistic af video: move to bed, call cat over, get cozy, watch, enjoy!
Awwwww, watching YT with cats is the best! 🧡
@@Autistic_AF ...or with rats!
Believe it or not: I'm just lying in bed with my cat on my lap and finished watching the video and your comment was the first shown to me. I couldn't believe it by myself how accurate you described my situation 😅👍
Best way to enjoy videos! My cat is always there when I watch videos, especially in bed, when I have my tablet because ahe loves to lay right in front of that to block half the screen 😂. I love cats. May you and your fluffy friend have many lovely years together!
@@PiaPaola I love all the live for cats here! 💖
I think the ADHD in us AuDHDers makes us have micro routines rather than full on schedules. I suppose non ADHD auti people might be more prone to having the later.
@@linam.9675 I will make a to do list and schedule time for the list lol
Or allow myself options within boundaries, like "I don't know where I want to eat, but I will go to this specific street with 5 restaurants and see which one looks most inviting in person". That may sound chaotic, but I'd still get upset if a parameter to my not-quite-a-specific-plan got changed, such as the street or the time I plan to be there, or the order of things done on the way :P
The way I differentiate this is routines vs habits. Routines are algorithms for tasks I perform a lot, and are executed in response to something else. I just used the toilet? Time to wash my hands, and think about something else cause the autopilot brain is doing the handwashing. Habits, on the other hand, are task sequences that are supposed to run unprompted, like doing exercises at a specific time of day without feeling the need for it. I can generally form routines no problem, but establishing habits is basically impossible due to my ADHD. It's why having a dog is helping me go outside more - now it's not an arbitrary idea, but rather my companion's need, and I can skip the habit part and go straight into routines.
@@OutfrostI think you’re mixing up what habits are scientifically with what toxic productivity bros say habits should be. What you describe as a routine is what a habit is supposed to be. An action that follows a certain prompt automatically. It’s incredibly difficult to build „should be“ habits with ADHD, but our brains do form habits
@catagecat Do you have any sources I could study? I'll be honest I've just been following how the words are used in informal language, and trying to find a useful distinction. And if habits are what I describe as routines, then how would you describe routines and rituals, and how do they differ?
@Outfrost You got routine and habit mixed.
Routine: (can be negative too like overtraining/ overworking)
-delibrate and conscious decision.
- clear shedule and pre planned and followed
- external influcen or guide by time tables and appointments
- can be changed
Habit: (can be negative drinking to much alcohol/nail biting
- less cognitive effort
- repetive
- automatic response
(Close to reflex)
Routines and sometimes rituals can also be a was to know that every step is made, because if you don't follow the protocol you will miss something... like checking all your gear. Before starting a project... I'm generally caring everything with me because otherwise I will forget something I need like an warm jacket in winter, because I'm too warm for it in this moment... or putting the lunch in the fridge at work before I go to my desk so it doesn't sit in the bag and I can't find it, and it will be even harder to actually manage to eat lunch during the work day...
Ah, I also found this confusing, I have been diagnosed with it, but I always wondered why this didn't apply to me because I HATE lack of change. I like creating schedules and structure, but I HATE following then for too long. I do have several rituals outside and inside of work but thats a lot more to do with helping me to not forget a step because so often Im zoned out if Im not engaged that my conscious brain cannot recall a missed step, but my unconscious brain will feel the ritual feels off and itll cause my conscious brain to turn back online and assist unconscious brain out and so it leads to less missed steps.
You are so calming!! Thank you for being a walking, talking,relief package.
Falling off a cliff. That is a really good way of describing the feeling of interruptions in my autopilot activities. It feels like I’m going to forget everything if I can’t complete the task at hand. A similar but stronger feeling happens if I have to travel to a new place or a far away destination and don’t have time to research the area, plan activities, set up rentals, find good restaurants…
Oh, I hear you around rituals and decisions.
When I'm in the zone I do things like count eights when I'm washing my hands or cleaning my water bottles. I will shake the bottle for eight times eight because that's the rhythm that feels as if the world is right side up.
My sister sometimes gets annoyed with me when I don't make an immediate decision on a little thing like 'Do you want a cup of coffee?' It is not enhanced by her way of asking 'Do you want a cup of coffee or no?' Then I'm caught in the web of indecision because I don't know how I'm supposed to answer. Even worse is when the word 'no' is omitted, as in, 'Do you want a cup of coffeee or ...' Does she actually want to make me coffee or is she hoping I'll answer in the negative? Will I feel guilty if I answer yes, or deprived if I answer no? Aaaarrrgh.
Yet, enforced schedules like regular work hours have always been difficult; partly due to my lack of circadian rhythm due to no vision, partly due to 14 years of enforced residential care growing up and partly due to possible autism? That'll be a challenge for the assessor.
This video is very helpful in thinking around how we respond to supposed rigidity.
This woke me up to not feeling disappointed in myself. For 20 years now at least, I make very detailed plans for parts of my day. I believed if zi would follow my commitments and adhere to the schedule and plan then I would be "good", what that meant morphed over time but always had a good/bad judgement to it. I would dissolve or veer from the plan in someway in some detail and beat myself up for it. Probably, I just felt safe and more comfortable with my next step and a tiny creative license in that moment. In a way I got mad with demand avoidance from myself and wanted autonomy from my plan.
This was a great one.
I am so happy I found your channel! I am late diagnosed autistic/ audhd, going through the formal diagnosis routine. I think you are awesome and I enjoyed watching you. This was the first video of yours I came across and I'm looking forward to watching all the other ones. Thank you so much for making such great videos! Have a great day. XX
The one thing that decides whether my day is manageable is having my morning coffee and 2 hours to myself. When i dont get that, the day becomes a total loss because this routine is grounding af for me. My twins have learned (mostly) not to talk too much or bother me during this time, from experience. Lol
This exactly
Great video! Congrats on your first year 🎉
Thank you, Jacque!!! 😊
I used to have a really hard time with the social experience of doing job interviews for dev jobs. Especially being asked to write code on a white board. I would get so terrified in my mind that I would not be able to remember the appropriate syntax that it was almost paralyzing to me. I was used to always being able to look things up as I go. Checking and re-checking in programming are ways I can feel good about my work, like doing my own personal code reviews. It took me until only just recently to realize hey, I've never had bug I've fixed come back to me. My code generally works and doesn't go out with bugs in it for other people to find. I don't usually have a coding problem that ACTUALLY goes unsolved, even though I've spent lots of time in my career worrying that I couldn't solve a certain problem (right up until I could). I've sortof embraced that I need comfort objects around me and tools like active noise cancellation or working from home to be able to work to my full potential, and since doing that, I just feel a lot better about myself and more sure of my process.
It might be the dyspraxia but I don't ever feel that my movement is automatic, I always have to think about it. Less so for walking, but I still have to think about it, the way my feet land, the pace, trying not to bump into things which inevitably I fail at. Driving lessons never got easier, not one bit. Every time I drove felt like the first time. And I had over 70 lessons, each lasting 90 minutes or 2 hours if I remember right. I gave up after failing my practical test with 3 majors in the first 5 minutes. Every time I drove I also went into fight/flight, and on my final lesson/test I had such intense anxiety that I tunnel visioned and after it I couldn't remember what happened, when I was told why I made my majors I didn't even remember it. Then when the pandemic happened I decided I didn't want to go through it anymore.
I have dyspraxia, too, and I definitely relate to this. I don't have automatic (controllable) movement a lot of the time. Some days are better than others. The worst days are when I can't "remember" how to make my morning coffee. I just do kettle, instant coffee, sugar, and milk. I know WHAT to do, but just can't seem to remember how to perform the function of turning the kettle on, getting the sugar from the jar to a cup, etc...
Those are the worst days. Diagnosis really helped, though, because I just accept it as normal for me, rather than keep trying to "get better." Still annoying, though! 😂
I'm a special education teacher, I see the differences you describe here. Schedules are so helpful in reducing my student's anxieties but they do not prevent my student's upsets. I love when they surprise me and indicate or tell me a change in schedule is needed. Those are the best times because it tells me the schedule is doing its job. Reducing anxiety and making our classroom a collaborative environment.
Congrats on one year! 🥳
Well done. Wonderful topic. Routines are incredibly important, because they keep me from fouling up, forgetting things, and frankly…thinking. I’m always thinking, and it’s exhausting. (Expensive example: I have a specific routine for packing up a piece of equipment. I unscrewed it, and prepared to move, when the soft case, which I rarely use, lid closed. I took three steps, opened it, and totally forgot that the equipment was still on tripod. It fell 5’ to the forest floor. $30,000+ mistake, because I did a single thing differently, and didn’t turn off my autopilot.
I take over twice as long as my peers, to complete any job, but my attention to detail helps me create perfect jobs(digital maps), while my peers routinely turn in garbage.
I have the almost perfect job, for a person with AuDHD, but it can be overwhelming. My company accommodates me, in many different ways. They don’t hold me to a rigid schedule, and I pretty much do whatever I want, as long as I produce something. Bonus: I’m outdoors, my coworker is a robot, and my human coworker’s task is to bring me water, because I work without breaks.
Your discussion on schedules / routines matches my experience. I've never thought of myself as having schedules, but I'm often fulfilling a routine, or doing a ritual. The tea ritual has always helped me. I've tried most of the teas at the local Woolworths supermarket. Japanese green tea. Chinese burdock tea. I go to the Chinese supermarkets and randomly pick tea and repeat if I enjoy it. Same tea ritual but different teas.
I’m AuDHD and medicated for the ADHD and being in college has resulted in EVERYTHING being scheduled in a Google calendar. And I mean EVERYTHING. Waking up, meal times, walking between classes, etc. There are simply too many tasks I’m expected to complete that if I do not schedule them out, they will simply not get done.
To me, everything I need to do is just floating around in my brain like clouds, and that lack of tangibility means that without some kind of organization and management of my time, I will not remember and/or will get overwhelmed by my tasks.
Part of me is hoping that after college, when I’m working from consistent hours and have more free time not dedicated to homework, research, clubs, etc, I will be able to let go of the schedule. It’s interfered a bit with my ability to do proper self care as it feels like I must schedule in time for myself, which feels like a task and is therefore counterintuitive to self care.
All my routines/ rituals have to have flexibility built-in to satisfy the ADHD side....like writing a job list at the start of the day and then spending the whole morning doing something completely different 😂
Clothing/fashion routine didn't work out for me because of neurotypicals around me. I don't even had the same clothes like Steve Jobs, just every piece in my wardrobe was either black or white. And I never had to think about what to wear & if the pieces will fit together or look good at me & I loved it. But people started to complain and/or make fun about my clothes. That I always look like a chess board or like I'm in mourning, or something. So, I started buying other colours. And tbh, I like colours. But it never got easy again what to wear. And I have to waste way more time to think about it, than I'd like to do :/
Something I have done is consolidate to a certain pallette of colors and combinations that I like and look good on me. I don't have a ton of different greens, it's specific greens that go well with the specific neutrals I collect. It's like combining a little variety with a lot of consistency. Hopefully this makes sense!
@@nerium.nerium Yes, it does. 💚 Plus, green is my favourite colour :)
"about conserving energy" - Wow! Yes! That's kind of all I am about in my life. While I do seem to have more autistic traits than usual for neurotypicals (according to tests), I might not have autism (I have another neurodivergent diagnosis, though - so there will be overlaps anyway). But seeing videos about autism has helped me so much accept and understand myself more - and find coping mechanism and for a nervous system often stuck in freeze mode.
I relate a lot to your experience with coffee, I started visiting the same coffee shops regularly, ordering the same coffee and now all the baristas know me. I enjoy not just the drink, but also the latte art and the experience of going to the coffee shop.
What coffee do you order? I’m an oat-milk-Mocha-with-vegan-whip kinda guy! 🧡
@ They have a coffee called Tokyo that tastes like the color pink. It’s basically a Latte with cherry blossom flavor.
🩷 I love that idea!
It’s always good to see your videos. I think there’s a lot of value in having new questions as opposed to answers
I've been thinking I might be autistic lately, and the segment on social interactions really speaks to me. The analogy I use to describe how it feels to talk to someone is it's like DI-ing to try and escape a combo in a platform fighter, which is using the joystick to change your launch trajectory when you get hit. Proper DI entails giving the correct response to the other person's actions on command and adapting to all sorts of different situations and matchups on the fly, and it requires constant focus because responding with the wrong DI at the wrong time can be catastrophic, much like how it takes me a ton of effort to figure out what to say in a conversation based on what I was told, who I'm talking to and the social situation I'm in, and I feel like I have to make absolutely sure I'm saying the right thing before anything comes out of my mouth.
I learned from the video though that apparently neurotypical people seem to come with the training mode auto-DI so they don't need to worry about it at all, but more importantly that just like DI, social interaction is a skill I can learn through experience, figuring out what the correct responses are to specific situations and being able to use them on command, and while I'll definitely still mess it up from time to time and do the equivalent of dying to a random back air at 70% it's something I can work on and improve at. I used to think that being autistic just meant you had no filter in social situations and would sometimes say really rude stuff without realizing it, but viewing it more as your brain not coming pre-packaged with the social interaction features everyone else has and having to put them together manually is a much nicer way to look at it as well as one I identify with much more
Although I'm not totally strict with a schedule, I do find reminders definitely help me to get stuff done. Because I can hyper focus on something, or ruminate, and totally forget to do certain things. Like eat food. Like it's 6:30 pm and I haven't ate all day. That's pretty normal for me. I should probably go make food.
So, my perspective on this based on myself. Autism loves freedom just as much as routine. My autism loves to follow my minds eye to be free to do whatever my thoughts choose. My perspective also includes our thoughts, which have some autonomy and needs to be free to choose. I find a balance between the 2 makes a huge difference in mental well-being. The most important thing I also have to do is stim regularly physical and vocal stims. Adding music to my focal points of routines allows better focus, such as while cooking allows more focus on that task and better results. Self-acceptance was my biggest hurdle, but I have prevailed. Perspective of our "abilities" is key, our abilities can be honed to our benefit and well-being. I am researching a different perspective of our traits and traits of adhd. What I'm achieving for myself is huge. I would also like to add that many of us who are also empath can hone those traits to our benefit as well. Wr have great abilities and we only need to relearn these traits that are being hidden and blocked. Humanity is becoming a lost art.👻🤪🌶🤘😎♾️
As I have AuDHD I don't tend to develop completely automatic routines/habits (except bad habits) very easily; the only one I do almost completely without thinking about it is brushing my teeth (the process itself; not initiating it; I have to think about it every time; and I regularly lie in bed feeling my teeth with my tongue to figure out if I have brushed them already or not), locking the door when I leave, and bringing my backpack when I leave anywhere, and driving a car.
But that only happens with really simple physical actions like brushing teeth and how to steer a car etc. and things that I can decide is completely mandatory every single time, no exceptions. I learned to bring my backpack to school and very rarely went to school without it; and once I decided backpacks (or at least one piece of luggage) are mandatory every time I leave anywhere even if I'm not going to school (since after all it's almost always useful to have a backpack anyway) I stopped forgetting my backpack, because this rule made walking outside without a backpack feel very weird. But because we only had gym class once or twice a week; I never developed a habit for bringing two pieces of luggage, so whenever we had gym class I either brought my backpack and forgot the gymbag or brought the gymbag and forgot the backpack; but around age 14 I realised I could fixe the problem by attaching the gymbag to the straps of the backpack that way I still only had "one piece" of luggage to remember.
A lot of my "routines" are just arbitrary but absolute rules I've made up to follow without spending minutes worrying about a decision every time; like after having my electric car for maybe 6 years, and every time I parked I spent so much energy trying to figure out if I need to charge it or not; I finally came up with a completely arbitrary rule that I should always charge whenever the battery had less than an estimated 70 km left. That way I don't need to think about it every time. It does have some logic to it though, my wife's job is about 14 km away; and I often drive her to work whenever she's running late for the bus in the morning; so the round trip is under 30 km; so by always charging before the battery has less than 60 km I still can always make 2 round trips before it complains. So even if the charger occasionally fails to charge (usually because I've pulled out one the other end of the cable without noticing) or if I forget to even consider my charging rule; I will still be fine.
thank you for the computer analogies - it really helps me understand concepts better (and even makes me more interested!)
Nobody should dare to change my plans. It might be in good intentions, but their plans won´t work for me.
Last year when I didn't give a bigger thought of ASC yet I was thinking to myself "oh dear, my brain loves routines", especially morning one (evening one too, but shhh). And everytime I hear "why you're getting up so early, can't you just..." no, no, no, if I could I probably would. I need time in the morning to prepare, even thinking of just getting up, put some clothes on and in 30 minutes being ready to leave the house - insert hissing sounds here. And speaking about learning new skills like driving a car... when for the first time I was driving a car (during first lesson in a school) I hadn't any idea that people can get sweaty in so many places on a body 😅 I didn't want to hit anything and anybody on the road so badly and at the same time do everything properly that I bearly remember anything except being totally worn out later that day.
Well, still long road for me to solve my own jigsaw puzzle, but I'm really happy that there are channels like this.
I agree completely with your advice to carers. It is a dangerous path to walk, if one becomes so rigidly bound to own routines, and schedules.
I came with and idea, if I introduce a predictable in outcome, and positive change, while not too often, and not too rarely, I might not be as anxious as I was, when unexpected something happens.
So, when it comes to eating habits, where routines are a necessity, in order to be able to manage planning, procuring ingredients, and making meals, I added such introduction, and I called it “Try something new Wednesday” for a dinner, since for me it is less disruptive to everything else, than if it was breakfast.
There, this video goes into my playlist I intend for infodumping. At least on my birthday it should be me who chooses the activity. So no escape from talking about autism tomorrow 😅
Well worded about rituals being important to feel grounded. My current favourite is to watch my shrimps in the evening with my cat in the lap. He never did that before and I'm taking in every moment of it.
🦐🐈🧡
Happy birthday, Lollie 🧡🎂
@Autistic_AF Nooo, not yet. In Germany it's bad luck to congratulate before the birthday 😂 But thank you anyway 🥰
@@plutoniumlollie9574for tomorrow! 😂😅
@@Autistic_AF Yes. I'll put it into my coffee mug, so it's the first thing I'll find, when I get up tomorrow 😁
BTW, it always astounds me when you talk about struggles. You seem so well put together. Your wording and communication skills are on top. And then there are quirks like struggling with sticky fingers. For some strange reasons all of this makes me happy, and maybe feel less broken, if that makes sense?
A lot of it has more to do with being meticulous with details and being really bothered by “fly in the ointment” types of situations.
If I plan on doing X, Y, and Z, but a problem arises preventing me from doing X, I might get so upset that I procrastinate instead of doing Y and Z.
I don’t like schedules because I’m not good at schedules. I can’t predict how long something will take and absolutely HATE being interrupted before I can finish something. I’m too perfectionistic to enjoy things I’m not good at, so schedules kind of go out the window. Basically, if something feels contrived and interferes with my preferred pace I’m going to hate it.
Congratulations on 1 year 🎉
Thank you for being here!
In burnout, it's is harder to have a type 1 processes
This a topic I often talk about with my partner because it can be very confusing, especially when it comes to drawing the line between the neurotypical and autistic approach. Thank you for explaining this in simple words!
Thank you this was very helpful. I struggle to follow my schedules because I see them as burdens, and not mechanisms to reduce decision making. Time to change that :)
I appreciate the fuzzy cat cam, maybe a higher definition one would be a good addition going forward lol. Im working on obtaining a diagnosis for Autism and ADHD, if thats what I actually am, and found myself not being able to understand or relate to the "rigid adherence to routine" because I absolutely hate schedules and being forced to do things I hate and switch from things I want to keep working on or finish and feeling rushed or late all the time... but this video showed me thats waaay too narrow of a definition. I find that when looked at as actual routines/rituals instead of schedules and dividing up every minute of the day into a plan, I fit the description much more accurately. I do have a lot of weird routines, some I would go as far as calling rituals to be honest, that I HAVE to do or I dont feel right. What I do when I first wake up, what I do when I get ready to leave OR what I do going somewhere specific, the way I have to wash my hands, the way I have to wash my hands after doing very certain things, the way I have to go about starting and setting up certain tasks/relaxation periods... Once I started looking at myself through the lens of the video, and being more analytical and less "I dont feel like I am/like I do this" I started seeing how rigid I can be in the way I do things AND how irrationally frustrated I can get when those little things are disrupted or unable to be done MY way. Thanks for these videos, I've self diagnosed, now Im trying to talk to some professionals to get an official opinion and maybe some help finally.
Yeah, I've come to realize that routine isn't really like a strict schedule to me, but more of a "I know what to expect and how to do it" kinda thing. If I have a plan, I can't just switch to a different one in 2 seconds and be fine. Also in conversation I've come to realize I actually have like these very specific ways I talk, which kinda feels like a "fill in the blank words" sheet. Like I have the blueprints for most conversation situations and then I just need to fill them in with the appropriate words. So because of this, my sentences actually follow honestly quite predetermined tracks, which allows me to succeed quite well in most conversations. The problem just comes when someone badly interrupts me or asks me to skip ahead or something since that takes me off the track and I end up having literally no idea on how to continue or what to say so my entire way of talking just completely breaks down and I become almost unable to talk until I figure out what the heck to do.
Rituals are very important, how else am I going to summon more support demons?
There's a TH-camr that sells emotional support demon plushies. Your comment just reminded me of that.
@@LadyLenaki I enjoy The Click too
I'm not a plushie person, but it's tempting
😁
@@zeratir7873 hello fellow support demon enjoyer! I hope you get all the support you need from the squishy demon friends you summon 🥰.
@@qlue7881 That's the name! Mostly I just remembered the emotional support demon plushies, because it's so specific.
Man I never new about these kinds of rituals... just the annoying way I have to do things to feel like I do them right. I could really use a few dozen support demons. For emotional and militaristic support. I think I could really make some change with enough. In my life I mean.
What I can do in a day depends entirely on how the day is going, how the day before was, and how much distress I'm experiencing - I don't plan out my days, but I really really (Really) like routine.
- If I reel ok enough, I might be willing to do something that stretches me.
- Give me indecision or give me something else!
- I have done a lot of practicing how to say things and it helps a lot... and it can also be masking, and I think originally was for me, so I could produce an expectable response. - Ah, you got to that point...
yes! this is such a good way to explain it. for me (audhd) it's like doing the subroutine is starting up my brain so i can do other things. morning coffee = it's morning now, so it's time to be productive and work. showering at night = it's night time and i need to sleep now. it allows me to automate tasks that otherwise take SO MUCH energy and effort and the associations my brain forms from doing those things at similar times or places then makes it easier to flow into the next task.
It's really cool to learn that the way I've come to understand my own information processing and decision making - "foreground thread" carefully and deliberately considering one thing, and "background thread" running routines - has been studied and described scientifically :) It's doubly important with ADHD, as I have to manage focus and distractions in varying ways throughout the day, for example making sure the background thread has nice music to listen to, and stops poking the foreground one, which is trying to focus on programming.
Congrats Mike for your first youtube anniversary. You are my favourite youtuber. I brew coffee every morning using an aeropress and freshly ground beans and occasionally pour over. Pour over certainly has a stronger flavour, but you can avoid the bitterness by using a larger grind size, which increases the flow rate of water, and by also reducing the total steep time.
i can't stick to t schedule very well. At least the kind that's the same everyday. I worked for 20+ years in a various biochem research labs and had to work on very different experiments from day to day and each type of experiment was done in a very specific routine way. Any deviation screwed up the data and had to be repeated.
Another type of routine/ritual I had was that at each place I worked I went out to eat at the very same place and ordered the very same thing. At UNLV it was a combo burrito no onions . At University of South Carolina it as chicken nuggets, hushpuppies and dirty rice.Went through the drive through and ate in the parking lot. That way I had a quiet break from the people in the lab and didn't have to deal with restaurant staff.
Evening Mike, im here and your video is very helpful.
Good evening, Suzanne! Nice to see you here again 🧡
I have never done well with schedules. I do have my own routines, but schedules are really hard for me because I'll start doing something I like but when my schedule alarm rings, it throws me off and I don't want to change what I'm doing. I don't know if that's more PDA, but routines are much more flexible and as long as I brush my teeth before bed then that's perfect.
Thank you 🙏🙏🙏.
I can see it clearly now. The tendency towards type 2 decision-making burdens me unnecessarily in small everyday decisions
After I found out I am autistic I started embracing my rituals and rutines even more and realized how mutch komfort and happiness they actually give me :).
Thank you for this video. Just realised my subroutines are outdated. Changed countries and the old one's don't work here. Struggling to build new ones. I am also stuck in read only mode most days. For me everything is a database with facts and dimensions and needs to be stored and catalogued in the best most efficient way. Writing is my preferred form of communication. And so many channels available to communicate - breaking focus - its exhausting.
I’m going thru autistic shutdown and all my routines are out of whack. It’s like my brain is just buffering. It really is incredible how different the mind can be when it’s doing “ok” vs when it’s not.
Ugh, routines. This is actually a huge problem for me because I have so few of them, even though I'm in my mid 40s. I have gotten masking routines and some driving routines, but self care routines? Home care routines? Everything else? NOPE. All the decisions all the time, and my significant other wonders why I hate choosing what to have for dinner. I am choosing everything I do all the time and analyzing all the consequences and... I'm tired. I'm so tired.
Not related to the video. But I finally got my chance to speak to my GP earlier this week. I was refused an assessment but not for a normal reason like my age being "42 so they would have caught it by now". Turns out that in the Oxford area at least, the waiting list got so long (7 years) that instead of doing something to fix the problem they just decided to completely remove the assessment service altogether. There's no chance I'll be able to afford to go private as there are far more important things for me to worry about financially speaking.
I was wondering how common this is in the UK. Having my mental wellbeing get pushed aside because people like me are considered not important enough to do anything about. 7 year+ waiting list, this must be 1000s of people left in limbo in my one area alone.
From what I have read from social media, TH-cam, and forums is that it's a thing in the U.K. But that just from my experience of what I've seen. But like Autistic AF said, finding a doctor who knows what they are doing is an issue. A lot don't seem to care enough to look into autism without an issue. I'd say it's the biggest obstacle.
I'm in Canada and I got a psych doc that took 8 years to finally realize I was autistic after decades of misdiagnoses from other ones. I'm late diagnosed as well. The quality of care that late dx'd autistics get from the mental health profession is pretty non-existent even when you get the diagnosis.
I'm so sorry, that's terrible :( Unfortunately, from what I've heard and seen, this sort of thing is becoming more common across the UK as the services continue to strain under the high demand, if not the scrapping of whole-ass services, the insane wait lists for sure.
I'm not sure how it would go if it's down to area, but if you haven't, perhaps ask your GP to specifically refer you to Psychiatry UK. You'll probably still run into a lengthy wait list by the time you fill out all the questionnaires and hand over all the information, but hopefully it won't be as long as 7+ years! Last I heard, the wait list for an assessment through them was about 2-3 iirc.
Good luck! Hopefully you get the support you need, even without a formal diagnosis 🤞
@@bluecheesehasmoldinit The doctor I spoke to was sympathetic to my cause and said I do fit the criteria to go for an assessment. But she was in a position of not being able to refer me due to the fact there is nothing to refer me to.
@@Vandassar Oh wow! I actually brought my known traits to the psychiatrist after I learned about autism. I asked my gp to refer me to one cuz I needed a new one again. I got one but even she isn't up to date fully and I have been overmedicatd for a long time. It's a hit and miss, it seems, when you aren't a kid being diagnosed. I don't understand why your doc said there was no one to refer you to. I guess your doctor forgot that this is the area psychiatrists work in. I didn't need to do a full assessment thingy.
I definitely relate to this. My routines provide structure to my day so I don't constantly have to think about what I'm doing. But I can break from them if I need to.
I actually do like to write schedules when I go on holiday. But its more a list of places to go and activities I want to do each day so I fit everything in. I usually allow a few options if I need to make changes.
I think I read that Barack Obama when he was President followed a similar clothes rule to Steve Jobs. He also wore the same design of suit so he had one less decision to make. So it's not just Autistic people who do this, though we probably do it more than most.
i can’t believe i’ve only just heard this song. i didn’t know there was so many songs i hadn’t heard yet.
I make a weekly menu on Sunday. My breakfast has been the same for about 5 years coffee, instant oatmeal and toast. It is ritualistic and if I don't have a component, my morning is often ruined. Since doing the menu consistently, my stress level is much lower. My life was in constant chaos because any time I made accommodations for myself it would be destroyed. I could go on and tangent about that but that's a long drawn out story.
I heard a podcast a while ago that suggested using random chance to make decisions. It was really helpful for me. Plenty of times I have the urge to try to maximize the outcome of the decision. While carefully weighing options can be nice, sometimes just randomly choosing can be freeing. Too much type 2 thinking makes the entire situation less optimal because I wasted too much time and mental effort.
Insight! ❤❤❤
Routines have saved my life.
I have a 40 min routine to get up.
1) drink the glass of water with the morning meds (Ritalin et al.) waiting by your bed. Open your eyes.
2) Find bathroom without touching your phone. Have a leak and take a 30 second cold shower.
3) dress up using the sport clothes, socks and shoes you have ready.
4) get out and walk/run to a lamp post or a tree 200-800 meters/yrds away. Return and take a proper warm shower.
5) Check your phone, dress up and get breakfast.
I have automated my medication and breakfast so well that might have a butler but notice no difference!
Omg that's exactly how/why my routines work. It's like I make the optimal routine, upgraded every once in a while, and then I do that so I don't have to think. Once I have my routine I can even run it quickly if I need to. And I just do that. It doesn't feel rigid per se, minus my washing and eating routines. This is the area that always has me questioning, but since you've explained it this way it's allowed for more understanding and insight.
I have diabetes, so when I get an English muffin on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday I have peanut butter and sugar-free strawberry preserves. But I'm not restricted about that. Sometimes, for a change, I'll use sugar-free raspberry preserves. So variety is as important as predictability.
Your description of driving explains why I used to hate driving when I started. It was too overwhelming and I never realized. I thought it was how everyone experienced driving, but others enjoyed the challenge more than I did. It never occurred to me that others didn't have the same experience.
Okay, how was there NOT a single TCP/UDP joke here about handshakes? xD
I like the programming metaphors.
Great episode.
We have social subroutines. They just have different goals and produce different outputs compared to nt.
Congratulations on one year 🎉
First time seeing your videos pop up and I am positive god got lazy with me and just hit spawn new instance. Reframing standard neurotypical behavior into tech speak made my night and might help me out in the future. A like & Subscribed well earned!
You really made a good video about this topic. It helps me a lot in understanding several aspects of me, others, my problems and in the process of the question "Am I actually autistic or just traumatized into the same patterns and symptoms?"
Even though I'm not really sure why this distinction is so important, especially for society, because in the end I have the same, or at least, very similar problems and experiences.
Additionally as I also have ADHD (that is diagnosed and VERY obvious) my need for routines, maximize overthinking and decision paralysis is NOT helping with this question! 😅
Sometimes it's just easier to follow Impulses, even though their unconscious, often problematic and seldom to my liking. But the other option is what you so perfectly described in this video.
ADHD and schedules are like two poles of a magnet! 😂
But with medication, therapy and new way of viewing and interacting with the world, the more 'autistic' traits become more and more obvious. Because finally I have (barley) "enough" energy to do that at all. But it just shifted the focus to another aspect in my life I struggle with. Which often ends in me burning out, freeze and isolate to an extreme matter, so I don't have to deal with so much input and keeping up a living that stresses me out.
Well I do work on that and accumulated a ton of help (Doctor, psychiatrist, therapy, social worker, therapy groups) that will hopefully work in my favor.
I will do trauma therapy next, also to better distinguish which traits are rooted in that or could be, as mentioned, indeed in the autism spectrum. And I did a degree as office management assistant to hopefully find a flexible home office job (if I ever get around to do the decision what and where exactly I wanna work). 😂
Anyway just wanted to thank you, because I find it very easy to follow your explanation and way of thinking.
Great work! 💖
Hit me like a brick wall, especially the part about indecision. Sometimes it's bad enough that I've endearingly been dubbed a "deer in the headlights".
As a student, I remember keeping my class schedule folded up in my pocket for the first month or so of the new term because I simply couldn't remember my schedule without it. As an adult, my wife helps me by writing out the weekly family schedule. Otherwise, I easily forget all the errands I have to run for my kids.
There is a plethora of information here, thank you for another video that I will be discussing with my therapist. :)
(4:50) Hahhahahaha, BRILLIANT!!
I love the analogy for "profoundly autistic" that we don't use terms like "profoundly male" hahaha
Great analogy!!
(I am diagnosed autistic, and although the diagnostician didn't explicitly write it in the report, I would probably be something like ASD-2 / Substantial Support needs )
Sure can relate to that coffee ritual. I’ve also never agreed with strict schedules, I change my mind and mood too often to want to be restricted to sticking to a schedule. I wake up feeling quite different day to day, drink coffee and think about a plan for the day, if this is messed with, I go into chaos.
Thanks Mike, I've saved this to my playlist. Cheers
I really hate schedules and plans. When I have one I need to go with it. All deviations from plans cause anxiety and it can get overwhelming fast. That's why I am a happy go lucky type of guy with no plans.
I am extremely fast at making plans. It is both a curse and a blessing.
7:30 I say instantly yes to everything because I don't want to disappoint anyone. Afterwards, however... the pondering is gonna never end: if I really wanted the thing I agreed to, would I've been better off without, if/how I can politely decline afterwards after already agreeing etc. (tbh, I think I automatically agree to everything because I've realized I'm too slow to make decisions so I'll just choose the option that's most likely the least catastrophic on autopilot lol. 8:10 oh this was the very thing that was being explained right after I wrote the comment 🤦) 😂
As someone who has been diagnosed since childhood the whole "routine" idea is mixed; for some things I like a schedule and for some things I prefer not to have one. I don't like having formal schedules but often end up doing the same things at roughly the same time; and even if I schedule free time at a certain time I hate it when I have to change things due to someone else wanting my time. And if I ever do have a formal schedule either of my own making or that someone else has created but I agree with I don't like changing it.
I have rituals when I wake up and when I go to bed. I have to do it the same way every day. If I don't, I can't do it properly.
As a freelancer I have flexible work plans. I have a lot of health problems so it depends on how I am feeling that day.
AuDHD here.
I pair all of my work clothes when I hang them so I don't have to think about what to wear in the morning when I'm already thinking about the day ahead. It was like the clouds parted and the light shown down from heaven when I realized I could just do that and not have to think anymore.
Omg love it. Search index, call subroutine, relax..... That is my day!. Worker crying at the door? Call subroutine, run subroutine, end programme. Shallow water cooler encounter? Call subroutine, run subroutine, end
I find any list that involves timestamps just makes me anxious. If even one thing happens too late the rest is doomed.
What does seem to help is a list of things you could do in certain situations. If you find yourself pondering what to do next (before getting distracted) you can look at it and pick something up from there that seems to fit the moment.
It is slightly different from a todo list in that it's not a list of things that need to be done, but things you could do and in what context.
Note that you can still have routines for things on that list, an unwritten step-by-step chain of actions you usually go through.
By having an overview of several things you can do and then picking one, it feels like a more conscious data driven motivated choice to do that, instead of doing the first thing that comes to mind and then forever wonder if you should be doing something else.