The Need to Justify Everything

Tags

anxiety, Asperger's Syndrome, Autism, books, He Was Weird, social settings, stereotypes

This has been something I always find myself doing. Anything I do or say, I need to justify it for some reason or another. But why do I feel the need to justify myself? That is the big question. It has only been recently that I have realised that I really don’t need to justify everything.

So why? The answer comes from my early years when I suffered social exclusion, teasing, ridicule and like in “He Was Weird,” outright bullying and it resulted in me believing that whatever I said or did, it was going to be wrong. Mainly because, someone else said that it was wrong. Therefore, out of fear of some reprisal, real or imagined, I would offer some sort of explanation to deflect the verbal and sometimes physical onslaught I perceived to be coming my way. What aggravated the situation more was as a child and teen, others coming up and asking questions about me or my life and why I did something. Some of these curiosities were genuine, however, there were others who simply wanted ammunition to use against me or they wanted to tease or patronize.

In “He Was Weird,” this sort of situation happens in the very first pages. On the first day of his new school, at his first at bat at kickball, Mark clears away some stones that are in his way before the ball is rolled to him. Then, like he did at his old school because he played for an American Football team called the Tigers, he let out a roar when he kicked the ball. Nothing was said at the time but at lunch, there were a couple of kids wanting to know why he did those things. Due to his autism, Mark was perfectly honest. Unfortunately, it is on account of his condition, he explains it in a way that children could use it against him. Instead of saying that the stones are in the way, he states that he was making himself a runway. To his future tormentors, this was all the ammunition they needed.

Like Mark, I often thought that I was always wrong or misunderstood and therefore, I had to explain everything or justify myself. At times, this may be warranted but often times it’s not. Now, I realise that I don’t have to justify things in my personal life or I do something that someone doesn’t understand because they choose to be narrow minded. However, if you ask and are genuinely interested and I feel that you should know, I’ll tell you.

To buy He Was Weird, go to: https://www.amazon.co.uk/He-Was-Weird-Michael-Lefevre/dp/1909740942/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1467053292&sr=1-1&keywords=he+was+weird

 

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One Extreme to the Other

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anxiety, Asperger's Syndrome, Autism, bullying, christianity, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Marine Corps, Mormons, religion, social settings

This has been the story of my life for most of it, especially during my early years. In fact, an former girlfriend once told me that I had led a very contradictory life. I have to agree with that. After all, in the space of a few years, I had gone from someone who had grown up in a staunch Republican household and served in the Marine Corps to a fully confessed Marxist. To quote the college chaplain at Queen Mary College in London, the American dream wasn’t working out for me so I began looking East. However, my affair with Karl only lasted about a year.

I went from this

To this.

If you read my experiences with religion, you might remember that I had similar experiences with it. In my teenage years, I was a hard core Born Again Christian, eager to go out and live for the Lord. By the time I was eighteen, I was beginning to get disillusioned with it all because it wasn’t solving all my problems. As a result, I began going totally the other way. Inside, I felt that if I couldn’t be the best of the best, I would become the worst of the worst. In my thirties, I had another dance with religion when I joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, (Mormons if you haven’t guessed.) In many ways, that was and still is the right faith for me. However, no matter how much I tried following the rules of the church, it didn’t seem to be enough in the end and then when my first marriage ended, that was the catalyst for me moving from any religion. For a while, I did go the other way again. I think I was having a mid life crisis and tried to recapture my early and mid twenties. I even broke out the old heavy metal attire and followed a local band around the pubs of Bristol. That didn’t last long. It ended when I was sitting in a coffee house in Amsterdam, all fuzzy from some of the goodies available there and realising that I wasn’t twenty-five anymore.

These are the two big examples of the extremism of my life. There were many small instances as well. One reason why I let bullies get away with so much was because when I did stand up for myself, I would totally skits out. Often times, the trigger would be something really small but all of the other larger events fueled the explosion. People would only see me lashing out and conveniently forget anything that was done to me. Of course, with my Aspergers mind, the condemnation from ignorant onlookers had me thinking that I was in the wrong and it became a case of damned if I do damned if I don’t. One can imagine what that did to my mental health.

Most things in my life swayed back and forth between the two extremes. That middle ground didn’t exist for me or I couldn’t see the grey area. At first, I took the lesser of two evils approach and that worked for a while. However, it did cause problems when I couldn’t determine which was the lesser evil. Now a days, after years of painful trial and error, I find the grey area much easier to spot and head there straight away and work out a compromise in my mind. That works best for me.

To buy He Was Weird go to: https://www.amazon.co.uk/He-Was-Weird-Michael-Lefevre/dp/1909740942/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466625482&sr=1-1&keywords=he+was+weird

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pathetic or Brave?

Tags

anxiety, Asperger's Syndrome, Autism, books, bullying, He Was Weird, Self Esteem, social settings

This has been the million dollar question I’ve been asking myself ever since I first put pen to paper over five years ago when I began to write “He Was Weird.” I’ve had people from both camps put in their two cents worth as well. When I posted the forward to the book, stating how being bullied so badly inspired me to write the story, there were many words of encouragement given by a good number of people on how brave I was. That it was good that I was standing up and talking about the hell I went through all those years ago. To those people, I said a hearty “thank you for your support.”

Obviously, I have responses from people who weren’t so supportive. I remember on one comment web site some woman stated, “Poor victim.” I could feel the sarcastic tone in her writing, especially as she went onto say that maybe I could get some government grant or sponsored support on account of it. Then there were the more obvious ones like I’m an adult now so I should just get over it and the one saying I should have just gone and punched all the bullies in the mouth. Yeah, right. To these people, I say you are no help, keep your opinions to yourself as you don’t know what I experienced.

With all my Aspergers induced anxieties, many of which were brought on by the experiences I write about, I find myself asking that question still. With last week’s post, “Billy No Mates,” I have had a lot of feedback, all positive, but I still can’t help feeling that I must have sounded rather pathetic when I wrote it. On the other hand, I get a good feeling when I have written about an issue and gotten it off my chest. Furthermore, I feel quite bold to have written it. This constant battle between the feelings of pathetic and brave continues in my brain. So, I have come to the conclusion that the best way to deal with is to feed the dog representing the brave camp. Much of what I post about have been feelings that have been antagonising me for several decades and therefore, I need to be brave and silence them. Writing about it does the trick. Yes, the pathetic dog will bark at times but if I am comfortable with the fact that while everyone is entitled to their opinion, I know that what I am doing is the right thing for me.

To buy He Was Weird, go to: https://www.amazon.co.uk/He-Was-Weird-Michael-Lefevre/dp/1909740942/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1465938557&sr=1-1&keywords=he+was+weird

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Billy No Mates

Tags

anxiety, Asperger's Syndrome, Autism, books, friendship, He Was Weird, Self Esteem, social settings

Last Saturday night, I celebrated my birthday out in town. I invited loads of people from work, both of my jobs and members of my softball team and of course all of my family who were of age. My two stepdaughters came as well as my youngest stepson and stepdaughter in law. Since I was running late, my wife took me and the family for a nice meal that went longer than I expected. Therefore, before I took my wife home because she wasn’t feeling well, I dispatched my stepdaughters and stepdaughter in law to the pub where we planned to meet. When I finally arrived at the pub with my stepson, the only ones there were those three. I did text one work colleague who promised to be there but he text back saying he had left. My stepdaughter who knew him said she never saw him. I would find out the following day he went to the wrong pub but at the time, the Billy No Mates effect was beginning to fill inside me. Fortunately, all of the ladies from my other job, who were on a night out, showed up at the pub and those anxieties left, so I had a rather good night.

My feelings that nobody likes me stems way back in my childhood, even before the time period that “He Was Weird” was set. Because of my Aspergers traits, I was often perceived as weird on mentally retarded by many children. Furthermore, this was added on by my lack of fine motor skills making me not very good at sports, although I didn’t give up trying. My overactive imagination which most people tried to discourage instead of encourage didn’t help matters either. Throughout many chunks of my childhood, I had few friends, especially during those years “He Was Weird” was set and that started a feeling that nobody liked me which has haunted me all through my adult life. This pattern repeated itself during my early to mid twenties when  I left the marines simply because I was “that freak with the long hair and boots.”

One suggestion that was made another of times was that I should approach them with the offer of friendship. In theory, that sounds great but with my past experiences, I found it hard to do so because I feared rejection. Going up to people was just not in the cards. Of course there were times when the reverse was true. During times of severe bullying or exclusion, combined with the fact that some so called friends only became my friend in order to exploit me, I would have my guard up. In a few cases, someone may have approached me with a friendship offer but because my guard was up, they saw my apprehension as a rejection of their offer. This misunderstanding sent my anxieties skyward because I would then believe it was all my fault and that played havoc with my self esteem as well.

As usual, I have written a lot more than I originally planned but once I get onto something, I find it hard to stop. So, in conclusion, I can say that those fears will be with me, probably forever but I have found ways to counter act them. For instance, many of the no shows had prior plans. I’m cool with that. I also try not take things like that personally although it’s not always easy. However, it’s the only way I can keep my sanity and realize that I’m not the hated person I used to believe myself to be.

To buy He Was Weird go to: https://www.amazon.co.uk/He-Was-Weird-Michael-Lefevre/dp/1909740942/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1465333764&sr=1-1&keywords=he+was+weird