Bruh.

Bruh. If I ever lose Shaun, I swear I'm not even gonna attempt to find another person who's so willing to try to understand me.

I've discovered that I struggle with transitions. It's probably yet another neurodivergent thing to add to the list of things I'm learning that I struggle with. There's been a lot of discomfort in my life, and I didn't always understand why or what the cause was. But the more I learn about neurodivergence, the more I feel like I understand myself.

Shaun does this thing sometimes where he tells me "Goodnight" and kisses me. Then he brushes his teeth and comes back through and starts talking to me again. And it's SUPER FRUSTRATING for me. I get grumpy because I feel anxious. Then he's like "Are you mad? Is something wrong?" and I'm just like "I'm fine! I just want you to go to bed!" which (understandably) does not assure him that something isn't wrong. 😂😂😂

Because once he tells me "Goodnight" I have transitioned very quickly into "Not-Shaun time." Him starting to talk to me again is prolonging the transition and causing me discomfort. I said that to him a few minutes ago and he was like, "Oh, so you shut down after "Goodnight."" and I'm like "YES!"

So I think he'll stop talking to me after telling me goodnight. I feel like I sound like an asshole, but I hope he does. 😂 It would be much less frustrating.

In general, I struggle with going to bed and waking up/getting up. If I'm ENGAGED in an activity, I will not stop to eat or use the bathroom or sleep until I literally feel sick from not eating or it feels like a bathroom emergency or I'm passing out from exhaustion. I've been this way for as long as I've been out on my own and left to my own devices.

I have zero balance. I'm either going hard or doing nothing. I don't really have a moderate/medium setting. And I am quite sure it's frustrating for the people around me at times, but I don't know what to do about it.

I feel like routines are important for me, especially in the morning and at night when I have to take medication. If my morning gets thrown off (like it did on Friday when I was woken up early to get my flu shot), then I'm grumpy until I get back to something that is part of my routine. On the instance of Friday, it was walking with Caitlin. I was fine once she picked me up and my routine was resumed. Before that, I asked Shaun and the kids to please stop talking to me. 😂

(And I could only be so honest with Shaun and the kids because I rarely mask for them anymore. They know me and understand me. I really suck it up for almost everyone else, though - often to my own detriment. But I'm working on that.)

The problem is that strict schedules feel like prison, so I struggle with them, too, even though they are helpful for me. So, I really don't know how to win at this, but I understand if anyone feels frustrated with me, because, I, too, often feel frustrated with myself. 😂 I've wondered for literally YEARS why I can't just function like a "normal" person and I believe I'm slowly, but surely discovering my answer. Fun stuff.

Anyway. I hope y'all are doing well. I'm mostly good. Just prepping for the bootcamp and inching closer to making press-on nails to sell. I've invested time and money into it, so I hope it works out. I guess we'll see.