I've been paying closer attention to how I stim lately, and I've noticed I often stim with my toes and legs, and sometimes my face.

I wiggle or twiddle my toes, I bounce my legs, and with my face I squint, wrinkle my nose, and roll my lips.

I don't see these kinds of stims talked about much... anyone else do these too?

#ActuallyAutistic #AuDHD #Neurodivergent

Before discovering my neurodivergence, I spent my life trying to better understand myself and came up with all sorts of models and concepts to describe my behaviour.

One of those ways was to describe my state of being as either "reactive" or "intentional".

The reactive state usually looked like:
- No structure
- Reacting to either internal or external forces
- Last-minute decision making based on feeling in the moment
- Often feeling rushed and panicked but not always

The intentional state usually looked like:
- Consistent structure and routines
- Mostly following pre-defined and pre-decided plans
- Often felt much more calm, peaceful, and sustainable

Now that I'm learning about IFS, I'm gaining a new perspective on that model of my behaviour. I'm thinking that the intentional state is my true authentic Self, and the reactive state is one in which one of my parts has completely taken over.

I've been doing a better job eating healthy lately. I was buying bagged salad and pre made dressing for a while, but this week I decided I had the spoons to buy romaine lettuce, pre-cut carrots, and a bag of broccoli slaw (which has chopped broccoli, carrots, and red cabbage) plus ingredients to make dressing.

I chopped a full head of lettuce, mixed it with the other veggies, and put it in a container in the fridge for easy access throughout the week. I also made a big batch of home made sesame dressing to last the week.

Now the challenge is going to be: what do I do when I no longer feel like eating salad?

Spending some time this morning reflecting on this podcast episode that was recommended to me about people pleasing.

I'm trying to whittle it down to a couple of key take-aways that I can put somewhere to remind myself.

So far, I've got:
- People pleasing is like setting yourself on fire to keep everybody else warm.
- As long as I'm honest with myself and I'm not being rude about it, I'm not responsible for how other people react to a boundary.
- Commit to open and honest communication with myself and those around me.
- Saying yes out of obligation/people-pleasing is not really saying yes and is not showing up authentically
- Every time you force yourself to say yes, you are abandoning yourself.

Looking at this list, the absolute hardest one for me to internalize is that I'm not responsible for other people's reactions.

I get it, in theory. But I'm struggling to fully internalize it. If I say no, and someone is disappointed or upset because I said no... it's because I said no.

Maybe I'm not responsible for it, but I started it, and I made them feel that way.

This stuff is _hard_!

https://pca.st/b1dd24m2

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My current earworm. IYKYK and I'm not sorry if this is your earworm now 😀

Reflecting on my experience last night at the autistic adult social meetup... I'm still struggling to express the difference between being in a group of neurodivergent people and a group of neurotypical people.

I guess the difference, in terms of how I feel, is that in a group of neurotypical people, I struggle to keep up with the conversation, I'm always the quiet one, and I almost always feel out of place.

In a group of neurodivergent people... I don't feel that.

What makes that difference? I don't know. Maybe that's the double empathy problem.

#ActuallyAutistic #Neurodivergent #ADHD #AuDHD

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