Please consider donating

If you're on Facebook, you know that they always suggest that you do a fundraiser for your birthday. This year I am doing one for the Lexington Humane Society, our local animal shelter. I'm very much an animal lover. I believe animals love us unconditionally in a way no one else does. They enrich our lives, become part of our families, and deserve to be loved and taken care of. Lexington Humane Society takes in animals that for whatever reason have been abandoned by others. They help them get adopted through training, getting their pictures and descriptions posted, and taking care of them on a daily basis until they are adopted. They also provide medical services and have a pantry for people who may not otherwise be able to feed their animals. If you wouldn't mind, consider donating to this very worthy charity. If you don't want to go through Facebook, there are other ways to their donate. They have an Amazon wish list where you can buy food and other items that are needed. You can also link a Kroger card to the Lexington Humane Society so that they get a percentage of what you buy there,

I'm including a link below to my fundraiser. I set the goal only at $150, to start small. Every year I choose the charity, and every year I don't quite make it. I think this is something that many people can get behind because they love animals too. I've made my own donation to start things off. If you do donate thank you so much.

Elisabeth's Facebook fundraiser for the Lexington Humane Society

Fourth meditation

Let it be thy earnest and incessant care as a Roman and a man to perform whatsoever it is that thou art about, with true and unfeigned gravity, natural affection, freedom and justice: and as for all other cares, and imaginations, how thou mayest ease thy mind of them. Which thou shalt do; if thou shalt go about every action as thy last action, free from all vanity, all passionate and willful aberration from reason, and from all hypocrisy, and self-love, and dislike of those things, which by the fates or appointment of God have happened unto thee. Thou seeest that those things, which for a man to hold on in a prosperous course, and to live a divine life, are requisite and necessary, are not many, for the gods will require no more of any man, that shall but keep and observe these things.

It is so very difficult for me to act. Part of that is that I have ADHD, so it is very hard to concentrate on any one action. I think of something else, and it's gone. The thought evaporates, and so the action never comes. That's not all of it. I overthink every action and choice I make. That is the anxiety speaking--the monkey chatter as my therapist likes to put it. In this meditation, Marcus Aurelius basically says you have to get rid of all that and focus on the task at hand without all the different things that go with it. You can see a very simple task to be done right then once and forever, and then move on to the next task. I once said a long time ago that I was a multitasker, which was totally untrue. My friend still makes fun of me for that.

On the other hand, I get into trouble at work, for not multitasking enough to produce the numbers they want,  even though they can't explain why the numbers are lower than those of others. Basically, because I know that I lose an action so quickly even though I mean to do it, I do it right then or at the very least make a note so that I can go back without losing that idea in my head and not performing the action. Apparently, other people do three things at once. The Emperor is on my side I think. What he says is to do not only the action without all of the trappings of overthinking of hypocrisy,y of self-aggrandizement but to do it in a true and unfeigned gravity. In other words do this in a pure state of mind without any distortion in terms of what others want, what the Gods want, how you think about it, that's the thing. It doesn't mean not talking about it or thinking about it.

It just means that you should do the action for its sake without all the monkey cheddar. Which I think is very wise. I hope to include that in my future actions, and not try to multitask but rather do one action as quickly as necessary, move on to the next action or notate it so that I can come back to it, but most importantly be one in the moment of that action.

Thirteen

13. Asperger's and Adulthood: A Guide to Working, Loving, and Living With Asperger's Syndrome by Blythe N. Grossberg

Ten, eleven, twelve

10. Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding Your Diagnosis, Finding the Best Resources and Support Team for Emotional Regulation, Self-Advocacy, and Obtaining Employment by T.G. Alexander

11. Essential Art Therapy Exercises: Effective Techniques to Manage Anxiety, Depression, and PTSD by Leah Guzman

12. Asperger Syndrome: A Comprehensive Guide For Understanding, Living With, And Treating Asperger Syndrome by Frank Ryan

Numbers eight and nine

8. Looking After Your Autistic Self  by Niamh Garvey

9. Autism and Asperger Syndrome in Adults by Luke Beardon

Yay!

So, I have had a long dearth of reading for several years now. I've skimmed books, even maybe finished a few, but nothing impressive. I find my attention has been very short--probably a consequence of my ADHD and scrolling through the internet. So this year, I've decided I want to get into it again, as I have been a librarian who no longer reads. On Goodreads, I've joined the 2024 Reading Challenge in an attempt to read more. I set a reasonable goal, of 36 books, to try for.

I am happy to report I'm ahead of schedule, having read seven books so far this year. They're all non-fiction (I'm going to shoot for both fiction and non-fiction, print/e-books, and audiobooks. We'll see how it goes.)

Here's what I have read so far:

1. Shoulder Treatment: Guide To Recover From Shoulder Surgery: Typical Shoulder Surgery Recovery Timeline by Jaime Knecht
2. An Adult with an Autism Diagnosis: A Guide for the Newly Diagnosed by Gillan Drew
3. Very Late Diagnosis of Asperger Syndrome by Philip Wylie
4. The Shoulder Patients' Handbook: The Rotator Cuff Tear Guide by Paul B. Roache
5. How to Recover from Shoulder Surgery: Safe, Effective Recovery: A Physiotherapist Shares 40 Years Experience Rehabilitating Shoulders by Bruce Paulik
6. The Ultimate Guide for Shoulder Surgery Recovery: Your Complete Guide to Recovery, Tips, Strategies, Diet and Essential Must-haves to Speed Up Shoulder Surgery Recovery Time by Morgan Gray
7. Shoulder Surgery Recovery: Over 100 Tips and Strategies to Make it Much Easier by Anne Talmage Cooksey

Currently reading:

1. Looking After Your Autistic Self  by Niamh Garvey
2. Autism and Asperger Syndrome in Adults by Luke Beardon
3. Pandora's Jar: Women in the Greek Myths by Natalie Haynes
4. Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna (audiobook) by Edith Sheffer
5. Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

This explains so much

So recently someone I know had me read an article he'd been looking at due to a friend we have in common who has high-functioning autism, formerly called Asperger's Syndrome, He'd originally wanted to understand the friend better, but when he read the article, and the symptoms, he decided it might be good for me to read, too, without his comments or indications, but just to read. I didn't really know much about autism, or Asperger's, but once I read the article it was clear that there was a chance it applied to me, which was a surprise. I did seek to be assessed, but the one centre that diagnoses in the area has a five-year waiting list and gives priority to students of that university (Eastern State University, in a nearby city). The two universities in our city do not appear to do this. They did suggest local resources, but the only therapist on it that did assessements charges a lot of money and I just didn't care for the vibe of her website.

I reached out to a Facebook on neurodivergency and was pointed to a website called Embrace Autism, run by a psychologist and another person who is an autist, which contains the same validated tests used to diagnose. The website has the scoring built in, and while it does not provide an official diagnosis by any means, I took six of the tests, five of which are validated by research and are used professionally, and I came out as autistic on all of them, which kind of surprised me, and one, on emotional quotient, indicated much less awareness of appropriate emotions and empathy than I expected. One of the tests asks questions regarding your childhood vs. now, and it was stronger as a child but still clearly within the area of being autistic as an adult. I am pretty highly functional by the test results, and before the diagnosis of Asperger's went away to be included as part of Autism Spectrum Disorder, I would have been considered a person with it. I am more functional than our friend, for example. But this explains a lot of the issues I had a s a child, and one of the tests measured masking and assimilation as an adult in trying to seem more 'normal'.

So I've been reading a couple of books on self-care for those with autism. And I recognise several aspects of the MRI issues today to be directly related to sensory integration problems (found in autism, though it can be a separate issue as well).

In addition to the tests, the website has a lot of resources for people who want to learn about autism or who have it. I'd really recommend it. And the main book I'm reading right now is Looking After Your Autistic Self: A Personalised Self-Care Approach to Managing Your Sensory and Emotional Wellbeing by Niamh Garvey (ISBN-13: 978-1839975608).

Anyway, for what's it worth, it does really make a lot of my life more understandable, and it would explain a lot of my sensory integration and anxiety issues. I just wish I could get assessed officially.

I don't like MRIs, and this is why

 Today it took everything I could to finish my annual liver MRI/Elastography. [My mom died of non-alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver/fatty liver disease, and I have a fairly mild case of the same disease that we're monitoring and trying to improve.] I'd gotten a Valium to take a little before it to take the edge off of my anxiety because I'm claustrophobic. Because of that, I took the bus to UK rather than drive, since I couldn't drive back. Usually, I'd ask someone for a ride, but I'd asked them if I could go home by bus instead, and they said that would probably be okay.

I meant to wake up early, take a shower, and go in without too much trouble. I overslept, giving me twenty minutes to throw clothes on and brush my teeth in order to catch the bus. I couldn't even put my contacts in, which is okay because when I'm in an MRI machine I don't want to see it, and while I usually close my eyes, a fuzzy machine is better than a clear one. I didn't take my anxiety or allergy medicine, which became an issue. By the time I got there on the bus, my mouth was so dry I could barely talk because I couldn't have any liquid or food for four hours prior.

I got taken back to get into the gown and  I did have to get other patients to help me tie and untie the gown since I can't raise my arm or put it back without pain, and the tech had left me to undress and later, dress.

But then it came time to do the test. The techs were so good. I told them about my injury and they positioned me so that I'd be comfortable on that side, or at least as much as possible. I never felt any different from the Valium I'd taken as directed before. I'd had an MRI last month on another part of the body and there was a sort of floating-head sort of thing that lasted just long enough to get through the test. This time, nothing. To get the abdomen, you have to go really far into the machine, as the centre of the body has to be in the middle of the machine. I've been stuffy the last few days (no Covid, but a really light cold) and I'd woken up with no congestion, so I thought I'd pretty much gotten over it.

If you've never had an abdominal MRI focusing on the liver, a voice tells you when to breathe normally and when you should exhale and inhale then hold your breath. I found that in the tight space, lying down, my congestion built up and I could barely breathe through my nose. By the end, I was having to breathe through my mouth only and barely kept from hyperventilating. They have changed the protocol so the test is much longer. I wound up counting numbers to distract me and get through it.  You particularly need to hold your breath when the paddle hits against your abdomen for the elastography, which measures the pliancy of the liver. It got harder and harder to do, and the period of holding my breath was about at my limit with the breathing issues.

They asked me how I was doing because I think they knew I was breathing hard (I coughed at one point) and I asked how much time we had left, and it was about five minutes, some of the longest minutes I've experienced. By that time, I was in a state of moderate panic, although I did finish it. I'd arrived at 8:30 AM, probably started the test about 9 AM or shortly thereafter, and got out at 10:40. I immediately bought some water and then realised I had to get down from Chandler to Kentucky Clinic for my follow up in just a few minutes. When I'd made the appointment a year ago, they'd been on different days, but they had to change the appointment a couple of months ago and had put it on the same day. I'd been dubious that the results would be read in time, and that was true.  My time with the PA was spent talking about my health in general, but she'll have to get the results to me later through the portal. We will change to another drug next year. I then had to go back to Chandler on the shuttle to get my insulin from the pharmacy, then caught the city bus to the transit centre. I brought some paperwork my PCP had signed to allow me to get a disability ID so I'd pay less for bus passes and fares, since I'm coming up on a time when I can't drive and will have to go into work on the bus for four weeks. So I got the ID and pass and then caught the bus home.

By the time I got home I was exhausted by the noise, the lights, the people, and all the other stimuli on the bus, at the hospital and clinic, and mostly the MRI. I came home, changed clothes, and immediately went to bed with some soft music on, and slept for three hours before venturing out of my room.

I am so glad this is a once-a-year thing, and that I took off from work due to taking the Valium. But it was a difficult day. :(

[Update: I got the results through UK's portal. The images were fine, but the elastography did not give usable information. So the whole thing was a wash. :( The physician assistant gave me three options:

1. Repeat the MRI/Elastography in a year.
2. Repeat the Elastography itself 
3. Take a biopsy of the liver to see the amount of fibrosis.

I decided on the first. I'm not sure how the elastography without MRI works. I've had an ultrasound elastography and it had me in a much worse condition, giving erroneous results. And as far as the biopsy...no.]

Third Meditation

From Marcus Aurelius' Meditations:

Book I. XVII.

Whatsoever proceeds from the Gods immediately, that any man will grant totally depends from their divine providence. As for those things that are commonly said to happen by fortune, even those must be conceived to have dependence from nature, or from the first and general connection, and concatenation of all those things, which more apparently by the divine providence are adminstered and brought to pass. All things flow from thence: and whatsoever it is that is, is both necessary, and conducing to the whole [part of which thou art], and whatsoever it is that is requisite and necessary for the perservation of the general, must of necessity for every particular nature, be good and behoveful. And as for the whole, it is preseved, as by the perpetual mutation and conversion of the simple elements one into another, so also by the mutation, and alteration of things mixed and compounded. Let these things suffice then; let them always untoo then, as thy general rules and precepts. As for thy thirst after books, away with it with all speed, that thou die not murmuring and complaining, but truly meek and well satisfied, and from thy heart thankful unto the Gods.

One passage from the Hays translation is: 

Even chance is not divorced from nature, from the inweaving and enfolding of things governed by Providence. Everything proceeds from it. And then there is necessity and the needs of the whole world, of which you are a part. Whatever the nature of the whole does, and whatever serves to maintain it, is good for every part of nature.

Given the present-day concerns for climate change, we should remember that humankind cannot be divorced from nature, but that we are a part of it entirely. What is good for nature is essentially good for us, therefore. This is the situation for everyone.  But as a Pagan, I feel that it is especially important to tie ourselves to nature, both in the enjoyment in it and the maintenance of the world around us so that we are part of that circle of life/global organism.

Keeping it short tonight, but that's how that meditation speaks to me.

So I didn't quite make it daily, but here is the second one

 From Marcus Aurelius' Meditations: 

Book I. XVI.

Whatsoever I am, is either flesh, or life, or that which we commonly call the mistress and overruling part of man; reason. Away with thy books, suffer not thy mind any more to be distracted, and carried to and fro; for it will not be; but as even now ready to die, think little of thy flesh: nerves, veins, and arteries; think no more of it, than so. And as for thy life, consider what it is; a wind; not one constant wind neither, but every moment of an hour let out, and sucked in again. The third, is thy ruling part, and her consider; Thou art an old man; suffer not that excellent part to be brought in subjection, and to become slavish; suffer it not to be drawn up and down with unreasonable and unsociable lusts and motions, as it were with wires and nerves; suffer it not any more, either to repine at anything now present, or to fear and fly anything to come,, which the destiny hath appointed thee.

So reason is what should be valued most, as that which should rule the body and spirit, and which also must be cultivated so that it does not become distracted with emotional desires, or for that matter, I think he would agree, minor matters of no consequence.

This is so hard for me, especially because I have a mood disorder. Without my medicine, I become very labile. And beyond my ADHD, I get so distracted by what is happening in my present life, as well as anxiety for the future, that I don't actually think things through a lot. I have a fairly high IQ (149), and I used to be good at recitation and learning, and I certainly learned critical thinking (mainly studying history at university), but I don't apply them to my life. I've always compartmentalised my theoretical knowledge and actual real-life applications. As a whole, I do much better at theory than practical/applied actions. And I hate that, but I've gotten used to not really thinking much. And that is sad. I'm trying to read more to stimulate my brain (although he specifically values reasoning over learning from others, including through books). I need to really start considering subjects, ruminating upon them, and coming up with reasoned outcomes, hence these exercises.  There you go, that's how this section applies to my life, and I need to take it to heart and really improve my thinking, which will, in turn, improve my life.  In short, I need to stop being lazy in my thinking.