Why People with Aspergers Feel Stuck and Scared (and what do do about it)

[Keigan]

I suspect Keigan is a charlatan. He dismisses other people's marketing, but promotes his own. Perhaps he can prove me wrong.

Interesting, no offense taken.

I think I have mentioned my site once on the board and I completely forgot that I did place my site in the signature line, as per the rules of the board.

I have no marketing, and I've never had a single inquiry from the site - though I have had multiple inquiries regarding relationship issues through private conversation on this board. I extended that offer in one thread as a way to help an individual without the noise and distraction of others within the conversation.

I think you'll find that I am a very active member of the community.

Good luck dealing with your hurt and anger.

I'll gladly remove my site from my signature, just take me a moment.

 

[Keigan]

Found this on a site called Aspergers Experts. This site contains much useful information for those who are on the Spectrum along with their caregivers. The Freeze Loop: Why people with Asperger’s seem stuck & scared (and what to do about it) — Asperger Experts

Thanks for posting the link. I use to live in Seattle and I tried reaching into the organization, in fact I paid for their services only to later realize that they could not deliver their services because I was not a member of FB, their support is through a private FB group which they do not mention until after you have paid. Later I sent them multiple emails and had no response, a good friend of mine did make it onto their email distribution but they never responded to an individual email request.

If you pursue their services, maybe your experience will be better than mine and that of my friend.

 

[tachyon]

Good luck dealing with your hurt and anger

Thanks Keigan - hurt and anger all under control

Good luck dealing with all the cheeseburgers & milkshakes

 

[Keigan]

Thanks Keigan - hurt and anger all under control

Good luck dealing with all the cheeseburgers & milkshakes

Cool - all good.

 

[Bella Pines]

What what what? Yes, I'm live in the freeze loop. Yes, I am so beyond fight or flight that a tiger could literally walk through the room and I wouldn't react (seriously, a doctor told me this after measuring my fight or flight response, I don't have ANY response).

But what's the solution? I don't get it? Look in a mirror? What?

 

[Chance]

What what what? Yes, I'm live in the freeze loop. Yes, I am so beyond fight or flight that a tiger could literally walk through the room and I wouldn't react (seriously, a doctor told me this after measuring my fight or flight response, I don't have ANY response).

But what's the solution? I don't get it? Look in a mirror? What?

Its sad to be just numb at times... To not even have a response no matter what just went down.
Like you, on some days I guess a lion could come and sit beside me and would just sit there and wait to his lunch...

Yet some small idiotic nothing, at times can light me up like the space shuttle at take off.
I often don't get myself, so I don't guess I should expect others to get me either.

All I know to do is strive to be the best person I can be minute by minute and hope that someday I will understand myself to the point I can show others who I really am inside this mess of a meat suit. : )

I cant help but know inside that we are all always on a journey to something better. It depends on every choice we make minute by minute, and how we respond to life minute by minute until those minutes equal a lifetime that equalled what we call a LIFE.

 

[Mr Allen]

I've always told myself I have a life beyond the Internet, it's becoming clear to me that I don't, because Society won't let me get OFF the 'Net and into a job or anything resembling a "normal" life!

Contrary to popular opinion I am NOT "special" (even in 2017 that words means Retarded IMO), so why am I still an unemployed singleton at 41?!

 

[mw2530]

i

That because Aspergers Experts is in a way, a fraud. I can tell you right now that nobody that works for Aspergers Experts is on the spectrum. The head guy that looks like an aspie is, in fact, an NT acting like an aspie. I know, I met him in person up in Seattle and saw the studio he works at. It's owned and operated by group of doctors.

I took a trip to Seattle and decided to pay a visit to the AE studios and I would say that I was very disappointed with what I saw.

I'm not saying that what they are doing is bad and do have some good information there. It's just the fact that they are pretending to be aspies that I don't like. I consider it deception.

How do you know that he in fact is an NT? Is it b/c he appeared to be an NT b/c he had good social skills, etc..? If his solutions work, then it is possible he picked up social skills after he got himself out of the freeze loop, defense mode or whatever else you wanna call it. Based on his videos, aspergers is nothing more than having extreme sensitivities that cause us to shut down and cycle through the freeze loop over and over again. It is b/c we are shut down, that we cannot learn social skills. We pick up certain pieces over time, but never the whole picture. This just creates greater anxiety and destroys confidence leading to layers on top of layers of problems which someone decided to call aspergers. Because everything has to have a label, of course.

 

[wight]

What what what? Yes, I'm live in the freeze loop.
But what's the solution? I don't get it? Look in a mirror? What?

The "freeze loop" (to use their terminology) essentially is an infinite software loop:
Freeze (self protection)
Thaw (natural process)
Feel (natural process)
Feeling causes anxiety/panic (natural process)
Shutdown/Freeze...repeat

Get stuck in the loop, and you end up with a huge amount of pent up emotions that have to be processed, which exaggerates the anxiety/panic step. The way out of the loop is to feel long enough to learn to process emotions without immediately going into panic and shutdown.

I had to work through a similar process for PTSD, so I know of where/what I speak. It is unpleasant and painful and takes a lot of work (in my case years). Here is how it worked for me:
Feel something
freak out
remind myself I'm allowed to feel things
try to let myself feel things (1 second, 10 seconds, 20 seconds, 30, 1 minute, 2 minutes...etc.)
shutdown.

For starts, I had to do this is a safe place where I absolutely knew there was no danger and no interruptions. Replay an "incident" in my mind, try to recall how I felt, try to feel those things again, let those feelings just happen. Sometimes I used guided meditations to calm myself down first or after. Sometimes I'd play a song that I knew was connected to a particular incident or feeling. The point here is to purposely advance to the "unfreeze" step, so that I could actually feel something (anything!)

Described another way... imagine a planet, it has an orbit around a gravity well (like the sun), it's pretty much stuck there...apogee (closest) is "freeze" and perigee (furthest) is "feel". Every time it reached perigee you give it a little shove (allowing feelings) further away. Eventually the orbit will get more and more eccentric. It spends more time closer to feel and less time closer to freeze. An inexact analogy, but it gives you a sense of the dynamic at work.

 

[isthisreallife]

There's something off-putting about him and his way of explaining the 'freeze cycle'. I dunno, something just seems not right, I sense a snake oil salesman

 

[Bella Pines]

The way out of the loop is to feel long enough to learn to process emotions without immediately going into panic and shutdown.

For starts, I had to do this is a safe place where I absolutely knew there was no danger and no interruptions. Replay an "incident" in my mind, try to recall how I felt, try to feel those things again, let those feelings just happen. Sometimes I used guided meditations to calm myself down first or after. Sometimes I'd play a song that I knew was connected to a particular incident or feeling. The point here is to purposely advance to the "unfreeze" step, so that I could actually feel something (anything!)

Described another way... imagine a planet, it has an orbit around a gravity well (like the sun), it's pretty much stuck there...apogee (closest) is "freeze" and perigee (furthest) is "feel". Every time it reached perigee you give it a little shove (allowing feelings) further away. Eventually the orbit will get more and more eccentric. It spends more time closer to feel and less time closer to freeze. An inexact analogy, but it gives you a sense of the dynamic at work.

Yes, this makes a lot of sense. The song idea is brilliant, I do associate songs with recall. Usually crappy girly pop songs but songs nonetheless. I'm going to remember this next time I actually feel anything. ... that's if it ever happens again!!

 

[wight]

Yes, this makes a lot of sense. The song idea is brilliant, I do associate songs with recall. Usually crappy girly pop songs but songs nonetheless. I'm going to remember this next time I actually feel anything. ... that's if it ever happens again!!

[teasing] Of course you feel things, all the time, I think you mean the next time the feeling gets through [/teasing]

Aside: I should really start putting "tone tags" around the things I write, when I'm not being tone neutral.