The sensory processing paradox
The other day I was shopping and using a self-checkout machine to pay for my groceries. It was a noisy, busy store and I was having a hard time hearing whether the machine was beeping to signal that it had scanned a bar code. After a while, I put in my earplugs, frustrated and thinking at least I would have peace and quiet. And lo and behold, with my earplugs in, suddenly I could hear the beeps. The earplugs had cut out just enough noise that I was now able to filter out the relevant noise from the irrelevant.
This is something that many of us with sensory processing issues know: Less is more. Block out some of the input, and you can more easily interpret the rest. Put on sunglasses, and you can see better; wear a hood to block peripheral vision, and you can navigate better. Sensory processing disorder, whether it comes with autism or without it, can give you such a flood of sensation that you can't make sense of any of it. That's why so many of us avert our eyes, curl into balls, huddle into our blankets, shy away from noise and light. The hyposensitive may deliberately seek intense sensations; the hypersensitive seek to block out all the subtle things that confuse what we're trying to pay attention to.
Why don't the therapists understand this? When they make us seem to be paying attention, when they force us into eye contact and "participation", they aren't involving us; they are blinding us. When a person understands better what they aren't directly looking at, forcing them to look at it--and worse, training them to force themselves to look at it--can mean denying them the experience of it altogether. But I suppose, when looking normal at all costs is the priority, a little bit of distress and an inability to actually participate while seeming to do so, is a small price to pay.
This is something that many of us with sensory processing issues know: Less is more. Block out some of the input, and you can more easily interpret the rest. Put on sunglasses, and you can see better; wear a hood to block peripheral vision, and you can navigate better. Sensory processing disorder, whether it comes with autism or without it, can give you such a flood of sensation that you can't make sense of any of it. That's why so many of us avert our eyes, curl into balls, huddle into our blankets, shy away from noise and light. The hyposensitive may deliberately seek intense sensations; the hypersensitive seek to block out all the subtle things that confuse what we're trying to pay attention to.
Why don't the therapists understand this? When they make us seem to be paying attention, when they force us into eye contact and "participation", they aren't involving us; they are blinding us. When a person understands better what they aren't directly looking at, forcing them to look at it--and worse, training them to force themselves to look at it--can mean denying them the experience of it altogether. But I suppose, when looking normal at all costs is the priority, a little bit of distress and an inability to actually participate while seeming to do so, is a small price to pay.