Nuts! Got screwed up again (Patreon)

Hi everyone! I got a bit overloaded again... 😬 Some unexpected non-optional things got dropped on me and getting it all done took more energy than I had. It put me back into "dead battery" mode again.

So what I've done is I've paused payments for July since I figure we can all use a break (you won't be charged but you'll still be patrons and you'll still have access and all of that) and I'll use that time to try to get myself back to a regular posting schedule.

Sometimes the guilt of having falling behind paralyzes me from moving forward, so taking this payment pause is just a way for me to forgive myself and get back on track :)

Jam what happened

Not to spoil the punchline of what I was trying to explain (poorly) in journal comics, but I think I might have autism. The "smoking gun" symptom for me is autistic burnout, which is what I think I've been dealing with for 2+ years now. 

It's very hard to explain. It's like I have physical energy, but not mental energy. Like right now it's 2pm and I know I need to eat but I'm having trouble putting the steps together of making something that I want to eat. (But I just remembered that I have some Ensure, score.) This morning I could make waffles. But it took me wayyyyyy longer than usual. 

I could go to the gym tomorrow and deadlift 60kg and that's fine, because the steps for doing that are now a well-worn path in my brain (and exercise helps this particular issue a LOT). But if I wanted to go to a nice quiet park, which would also help, (or god forbid the grocery store, which I had to tackle yesterday), the steps involved in getting that done are borderline overwhelming. Getting to the grocery store yesterday was the only big thing I managed to do. 

I can write this post, but it's extremely rambly, and it's probably not going to land well. 😅 I can drawwww...? But the drawings aren't..... good. imo. And it feels like pulling teeth. 

I have trouble breaking bigger tasks down into steps and focusing long enough to execute them. This is not normal for me, these are skills that I'm normally quite good at, which was one of my big tip-offs that something was unusual and wrong and it wasn't just an innate way of being for me.  

It "feels" like I'm tired. Like I have to lay down between tasks to recover a bit before I can do something else. But I'm not physically tired. Just my brain. 

So what

So, I'm still getting used to how this works. There isn't much research to help, and the community is still working it out, too, so I've been testing stuff and just being careful but sometimes I misjudge the energy needs or something unexpected like this happens. 

I know what I have to prioritize to get myself back on track now, but it takes time, and it's not exciting :( Today I'm going to try and clean out my fridge.... h aha...... ew. Hopefully sweep too 🤞And that's a big ask for myself when it gets like this.

If I disappear again please know that I am ok but most of my energy is going towards keeping myself fed and clean and employed. I promise to always get back as soon as I feel like I can get a post together.

You know what has been saving my tired butt? Moat method...

I'll post the studies and stuff I managed to do this month as well and then we'll try to pick this up again in July and hopefully be back to normal by August :)

Thanks so much everyone 💜