11/20

I feel...paralyzed… an overwhelming need to disappear.  The simple question is why? Unfortunately,
there is no simple answer...just a million little reasons that feel like a million stones placed on my
chest...weighing me down...making it hard to breath. 

• Lack of hours at work today and the session that I did have felt pointless (a solo visit without a program book therefore no way to review progress and know what skills the child is working on, substitute teacher so I could not really review how things are going since my last visit including what has been helpful or not helpful)

• Asked to take on a new case in Newtown and not knowing if I should

Reasons to take

• Hours
• Could schedule on days that I may be going to Waterbury for ESDM cases...that is if I receive the advanced training that I have been waiting a year on that may be happening in December/January

Reasons not to take

• No other cases in Newtown area
• Great therapist but very needy and tends to expect me to change all that is broken with our system

I am generally unhappy with job due to lack of structure, lack of training for therapists, lack of objective measures, and no real goals...I think we are supposed to be training caregivers in implementing NDBI strategies BUT therapists do not know how to implement NDBI strategies, many caregivers view our time as babysitting time and do not participate, cancelations and no shows, lack of a team approach (slps, pts, etc all working on different and sometimes conflicting skills such as slp teaching child to sign more when I am trying to have them vocalize, lack of individualization in goals and recruiting parent input in goal development,  small talk which I can handle when it is with people I have gotten to know but there are constantly new therapists and new parents, constant scheduling and attempting to arrange co visits with therapists, children, and caregivers who have their own changing schedules (wish I knew where I was going each day and that there was consistency), no shows that i do get paid $15 for including my time for traveling, rescheduling, trying to pop in somewhere else, etc)....generally feel like there is no point to my job but do not know what else to do. 

• Feel like I am trying to do 3+ jobs at once and just cannot do it because I feel the need to give each one 100% and they are all part time projects and I have an inability to multitask and shifting between tasks is extremely difficult. I wish I could focus 100% on something that I really care about...research ... maybe I should focus on podcast as that may help perhaps lead to more research with ASF….but I also need to make $....
• • Work
  • Parent training study 
  • Podcast 
  • ??Burke study and research??
• My birthday is coming
• Holidays
• Maeve almost drowning and me having to jump in pool to grab her and now need to call to cancel swim lessons and maybe membership but i do not want her to be afraid of water and therefore feel like i need to take her swimming even though I hate swimming in the winter when it is cold (purple numb fingers, dry skin, unbearable chill) which is why I signed her up for lessons but then they had a new teacher every week who wear all nice kids but had no idea how to teach children, and then the drowning episode
• My weight is down and I am completely addicted to my fitness tracker
• Cognitive remediation therapy?
• Need to clean house
• Need to paint trim
Unfortunately, this is not the first time I have experienced this…

11/29

Happy Happy 35

Let’s add some fun new updates and anxiety stones 

• Overwhelming anxiety continued to build since last entry leading up to intense de ja vu, dizziness on Sunday that ended with me in the ER due to a seizure and concussion. I last remember spraying down the shower after showering and then apparently I had a seizure, fell down, and whacked my head on the bathtub. Luckily my husband found me and called 911, called my parents, and kept me safe while the ambulance came.At the ER, a CT scan showed an arachnoid tumor that “does not appear typical”.... Visit to neurologist → Keppra and 3 months no driving...3 months no driving in a job that requires me to be driving as much as I am actually interacting with clients...how do I schedule that? Oh and add in appointments for the doctor, eeg, mri, neurosurgeon, and neurologist. 
• How do i do this? My mom, Brandon, and coworkers are amazing and willing to drive me around and I am very thankful for that...unfortunately it goes directly against my intense need for control, to be on my own and by myself, to work on my own schedule and routine...and basically adding in an inordinate amount of stress. I just don’t have any idea what to do…
• Oh and most importantly, How do I entertain and socialize my daughter? She needs to go around to play groups and play dates and now I cannot even do that...she does not have siblings...she needs to be with peers…
• A few positives..
• Sent in my podcast and received wonderful feedback
• Fitness tracker is gone

11/31

I walked into my second visit with a client today two weeks after my initial visit. and upon seeing me
he walked around to the back of the class room, took a bin of cars off of the shelf, dug through the bin
to get the green garbage truck and a police car, walked over to me, and put the police car in the
garbage truck just as we had done over and over again during our initial visit. I am completely
astounded that not only did he remember me but remembered the exact play routine we engaged in!
This reminded of another little girl who upon seeing me enter her daycare for my second visit ever
retrieved a particular yellow dump truck from a shelf, walked up to me, and grabbed for my clip board to
roll the truck down just as we had done during our first visit a month ago!

Spectacular memory and association!

ASD mind is truly amazing and makes me think that the real goal of early intervention should be to help
these child communicate with the world all the wonderful things that are going on in their minds and
share their gifts.

11/3

Need ASD screening for vulnerable/ at risk girls (eg those exhibiting signs of anxiety, depression,

disordered eating, self harm). To do this we need 

• a valid instrument for screening ASD in females
• Identify gatekeepers (school counselors/psych, pediatricians, psych)
• Educate gatekeepers on ASD in females
• Provide gatekeepers with screener 

 Where to get funding? Autism research foundation? Spectrum women?
University programs researching ASD in females ?

11/1

I have learned a whole lot about myself over the past month or so as I learn more about ASD in

verbal women and definitely feel like I am not alone in this world and that there are in fact many people who do think like I do and have the same struggles…. For example,executive functioning and set shifting are two things that I have incredible difficulty with and I think that is why I have such difficulty completing everyday tasks from cleaning the refrigerator to writing a powerpoint training for therapists (executive function) and switching between tasks and especially going from one client to another (set shifting).

The self-awareness that I have is fantastic but now I need to take action and figure out how to work

with my strengths and weaknesses. I really identify with how Temple Grandin talks about the importance of protocols and checklists. I feel like if i had a checklist for everything then there is nothing that I cannot do because when given a task I get so overwhelmed by the details and steps that I never seem to make adequate progress.

10/27/2019

While my in-laws were visiting yesterday I came to the realization that I really just do not have the
energy to mask anymore, I am who I am and well...that is all. I am sorry that I am not bubbly and
outgoing but that is just not who I am...I also really cannot do my job anymore...all of this scheduling with 13 different families
(and multiple therapists each with their own schedule)  including several who currently have
their phones disabled and are therefore unreachable is just too stressful...I just do not know what
to do...I love working with the kids but hate the scheduling, driving around, lack of structure,
working around everyone’s schedule which leads to me not being able to have a schedule at all and never
knowing where I am going or when..am I in the wrong job? What can I do?

10/28

Female Client’s last session, happy go lucky =, we are playing, reading, smiling → sing happy birthday
-->shut down → I completely identify and empathize because I DESPISE the Happy Birthday Song as
i hate the attention and personally request that it not be sung. i even request for my birthday as a whole
to  be ignored because the attention makes me extremely uncomfortable.
i wonder if this could be common among individuals on the Spectrum with higher social motivation
tendencies??

Camouflaging research (Hull, Mandy, Lai, and colleagues) is fascinating...
especially personal accounts by late diagnosed women because I completely relate and honestly
thought I was broken because social interactions (even basic conversations) exhaust me. 

October 23, 2019

Upon realizing that I may be on the Autism Spectrum I copy and pasted a list from Tania Marshall of
common Aspie Women traits, highlighted what I identified with, and as I made certain connections in
my head between my past and present self and  traits on the list I would add comments.
But the list is becoming quite messy and in order to show the progression of my understanding I am
going to write the connections down separately as I make them. The format will be very similar to
every day Aspie In which the author wrote an entry each day for a year upon realizing she had
Aspergers/ My writings will most likely be daily and probably after I run because I tend to make the
most connections while running and listening to podcasts and research. Anyhow, to begin with here are
today's connections that I made when I was driving to work this morning (running late in traffic, trying to
navigate where a new client lives, worrying about communicating with new client through a translator,
and trying to schedule upcoming sessions) and then walking my dog while listening to the Podcast
Them Aspergers.

• I hate the job that I love
• I LOVE working with children on the Spectrum, they are a joy to interact with and I find
• helping them acquire new skills to be incredibly rewarding. HOWEVER, there are many

• aspects to my position of being a BCBA in Birth to Three that I do not enjoy and cause
• me great anxiety which in turn leads me to controlling the things in life i can control (e.g.
• exercise and food).
• Specifically, scheduling co-visits with 5 other therapists for 12 different clients (each therapist
• and client with their own unique schedule) is a massive head ache as i struggle with
• organizing and scheduling as well as constantly contacting others to arrange visits not to
• mention I find it hard enough to schedule something a simple as a hair appointment and

therefore simply go to walk ins. 

• 
  

While it is frustrating when people have to cancel last minute, I completely understand that 
illness and family emergencies do happen. However, canceling or not showing up for your child’s
therapy session because you forgot, slept in, decided to take a last minute vacation --even though
you have not paid your therapy bills--, Netflix unexpectedly released a new season of your favorite show

early, is incredibly frustrating (especially since we do not get paid). Clearly, my job works directly against my internal need for consistency and routines

• not knowing where I am going to be each day makes me very anxious.
• Small talk. Because I work with so many people, each session requires a certain amount of small talk that can be exhausting and really just unpleasant. I avoid going to the office at all costs (especially after 9 am) so that I do not risk seeing people and having to make small talk.
• Lack of a manualized procedure. I feel like most of my time is spent without a purpose. I do like the structure that comes from following an organized program such as that detailed in Project Impact sessions as well as the Parent Training study I am involved with which requires parents to complete a module each week and then the purpose of our visit is to discuss what they learned, clarify anything that they did not quite understand, discuss what worked what did not work and how to improve.

• I find small talk incredibly aversive largely because I am constantly reminding myself to
  make eye contact, rehearsing what I should say next, and monitor conversational turn taking and apparently other people on the Spectrum find this to be true as well. I am not the only  one! 
• Because of the extra effort i need to put into socializing, I do not find it rewarding and in fact  avoid it. BUT again I am not alone in this, as many individuals on the Spectrum feel the same way. Unfortunately, I have always felt incredibly guilty about backing out of social gatherings in the past and the way that I “coped” was to binge/purge, self-harm, or overexercise. I never quite understood why I engaged in such self-destructive behavior but i now understand that I felt overwhelmed by guilt and feeling that there MUST BE something wrong with me to back out of social events that were supposed to be pleasurable and that in  order to suppress these feelings I engaged in incredibly harmful behaviors. 
• Doesn’t everyone have routines?

• I like my routines and schedules and find them to be very calming and I know this is
• characteristic of someone on the Spectrum but doesn’t everyone have routines? I guess not
• everyone gets as frustrated and frazzled as I do...because when sudden changes happen
• I do get extremely anxious and agitated.