The Friday Five and About Concern/Feelings
1. If you are old enough, are you registered to vote?
No. I can't vote in Japan and I don't think I can vote overseas as a Canadian.
My boys have been voting since they were 18, in Japan.
2. Did you vote in the November 2023 election?
I'm not American and glad I'm not. That's not to say candidates here in Japan are any better.
3. Do you vote in primaries?
4. Do you plan to vote in the November 2024 election?
5. Do you vote early, by mail, in person, or some other way?
If I were to vote, I'd probably vote by mail.
I once voted for a referendum regarding Quebec leaving Canada while I was in University. I think I went to the local school that time. I voted for it to stay, and I'm glad we still have Quebec as part of our country.
I think it was Monday that I finished a Japanese book on Adult "Developmental disability" Diagnosis. The doctor who wrote it was one of the first to create an adult ND clinic in Tokyo and a lot of what he wrote was from experience. He is very obviously not ND. He had some good insights and a lot of what he said was true and correct but there was one main thing that he got totally wrong. He described autistics as incapable of caring about other people (except for people they are particularly attached to - like their main caregiver) and selfish. He literally used that word selfish. He gave an example of a man from the viewpoint of his wife. It seems he had a tendancy to get angry with his wife and child/ren after coming home from work and at one point, when his wife's father died, he watched a funny show on TV and laughed while his wife was in mourning. The first part, we know to be overwhelm leading to being unable to control his emotions (although the doctor never explained it this way - he is going only by his own experience and obviously has not done the reading I have LOL). He noted though that this calmed down later when the man was older and had an easier job that was less overwhelming after he retired from the first job. The second part, though. He talks about this as an example of how autistic people don't understand other people's feelings or empathy, but it is obvious to me that the man just did not know how to handle the emotions or show empathy to his wife in a way that she understood it. It is quite possible that he was trying to cheer himself and his wife up by watching something he felt was safe and comforting. Maybe if they had just talked about it, he could have explained it to her. (Maybe he did - we don't know what happened between the couple, just what the doctor took away from the situation.) There were numerous other places in the book where the doctor talked about not being able to understand NDs and their uncaring behavior toward other people, but then surprisingly being able to get along with other NDs in group counseling sessions. Ummmm that's because we do have empathy, and just show it differently? Why wouldn't he figure that out himself? Grrrrr.
I fell down the stairs on Tuesday. The trial and 2 other classes were canceled, so I only had an hour and a half of class, but rushing there, I slipped on the stairs in our home and went bumpy bump like Winnie the Pooh, getting bruises and scrapes on my right arm and leg. When I told my husband that night, he sort of laughed at me saying it must have been a curse (of the gods) from not saying anything when he had added carpeting stickers to the stairs as requested. He had been holding this grudge all this time and it must have felt good to let it out. I thought I remembered talking about the carpeting with him, but maybe it wasn't at the timing he had wanted. But getting back at me for "not saying anything" about some carpeting that actually did nothing to prevent my injury was just, I don't know, weird. And I felt hurt that he didn't express any concern for my wellbeing and kind of made it my fault by saying it was a curse. Why does he have to always make it my fault? Even such an accident as falling down the stairs?
Since he was inebriated at the time, I wrote out the conversation and messaged it to him so he wouldn't conveniently forget about it while it stuck in my head and kept bothering me. He apologized later - after he read the message, which was Wednesday evening, I think - and I, of course, told him I understood his feelings of not being validated and was sorry he had felt that way. He was especially nice to me that night. He called me to bed when I was sleeping in the living room and put a cold compress on my arm, which was swelling from the fall. Friday, he finally noticed the bruises on my leg. Wow, did you see that bruise? Um, yeah, I felt it thanks. I was just glad I could walk ok the next day LOL
While hubby tends to make light of my troubles, I also have the tendancy not to make a deal about them either, and maybe he gets his cue from me in a sense. When we first got together, he'd rush into the kitchen when I cut or burned myself etc., but he soon stopped - first because he can't stand blood, but probably also because I was so depreciating. So when I told him about falling down the stairs, it didn't sound that serious either. Notice the way I wrote about it here even. It's downright comical. Again, like my recent conversation with Akiyo about my tooth falling out. I have a problem with expressing pain/injury. It's not like I don't feel it, but when I try to talk about it, I can't be as serious in my tone/expression as it requires. One reason is probably that I just don't know how. I've spent too many years masking - basically smiling all the time - that I can't feel or say anythng with the proper seriousness. I guess this could be a form of alexithymia. It's also true though that it makes me uncomfortable. Like many NDs have trouble with complements. I can usually handle complements (say thank you and change the subject or infodump about the object of the complement LOL) but it's concern that really gets to me LOL I appreciate it (and think I deserve it, naturally), but don't know how to handle it, which also maybe makes me not look deeply into or express my emotions.
Thinking about that example in the book, and then how hubby reacted to my injury, they seem similar in that both resorted to disassociation or deflecting the issue. It's frustrating because in the above case mentioned in the book, I could see the bigger picture, while when I'm in the middle of it, I am a lot less understanding. It might be something to talk about with hubby - if he also has trouble knowing how to show concern so he avoids it by deflecting or trying to ignore it and make it about something else. Or maybe he just needs to make everything my fault because he's a narcissist. There are good arguments both ways.
He reacts much more openly when plans are changed - remember when Alex told us he made plans with his friend for the day we were going to go to the hot spring. Hubby just said it was impossible, said we couldn't go at all then, and it took him a couple of days to figure out that Alex's plans wouldn't affect our family outing that much. I knew that he would come around though so I told him just to think about it. And he did. That's something I have learned through past experience - that he will say things he doesn't necessarily mean when he is upset, while I've learned to bottle a lot of it up and shut down or stop myself from panicking and calm down instead of having a meltdown.
Wednesday was my dentist's appointment. And I got some really bad news. According to my x-ray, the tooth that he fixed previously and reapplied the filling last month, actually had a cavity that went way down to the root. The tooth itself was very close to one of the main arteries in the jaw. He told me that it was dangerous to leave this tooth as it was - if the cavity progressed to the artery, something awful would happen (I'm not quite sure what, just obviously a lot of pain and suffering). But because of the place it is, he can't pull the tooth and I have to go to a big hospital, just in case the artery is nicked and there's a lot of blood loss. He also told me two other teeth on the other side were loose and he was worried if we could salvage them.
He gave me some medicine to lessen swelling in my gums etc. and I'm going to see him again at the beginning of September, so it's been prolonged a bit more. I am at a loss and clicking on every ad on FB about toothpaste and gum restoration. I know they are all just schemes but I can't help but hope. I haven't bought anything yet except for these herbal pills that are supposed to work on the gums from the inside.
Basically, it's because of menopause, right. And maybe stress. And possibly covid and burnout and all the things. Less estrogen has a big impact on bones and gums. Maybe if I had gone for cleaning, I could have saved my teeth, but now I feel like I might be losing a whole bunch of teeth in the near future, which will make me lose more memory and become a granny overnight. My daughter is still 16! :'''''''''( Tooth loss is so humiliating, it's hard to talk about it. I told hubby about going to the hospital and he wouldn't believe that after all these years suddenly I needed a major tooth extraction, but it's also true I haven't been to the dentist at all.
That day though I wasn't feeling that devastated yet. I went to bed early because hubby was accomodating, and maybe due to the medicine from the dentist and HRT, I had a good sleep. The next morning (Thursday) I felt good, and had a lot more energy than I had in a long time. I even practiced my clarinet for an hour. Thursday was a normal schedule. No classes were cancelled, and my energy was quickly depleted in the afternoon so that I was feeling fatigued already in my first class. I shouldn't have practiced the clarinet maybe...Worries about my teeth kept me up and I felt like I didn't get any sleep last night.
I finally decided to buy the first season of The Lost Girl on Amazon sometime this week. I enjoyed watching it online previously and probably have the files somewhere but my HD is inaccessible atm and it's a bother watching anything on my computer.
I watched a reel on FB that made me realize that yes, my memory was a curse, but it was also a blessing. By forgetting past events, I've been able to move on and not dwell on the past. All due to inattentive ADHD. I wonder what my life would have been like without it. I may not have been able to deal, you know?
That's about it for this week, I guess.