A few weeks ago, Musings of an Aspie wrote a post about her “No” reflex, and how she needed to work on pushing her boundaries. A lot of us need to work on that, to avoid turning into recluses (or at least, that’s the worry my mother has constantly had for me, which may also be linked to my depression).
However, there is another side to things, and I had a dream last night which reminded me of it: Working on recognizing when we need to say “No”. Continue reading
So, for Musings of an Aspie‘s Take a Test Tuesday on Feb. 12/13, she took the Two-Factor Imagination Scale (TFIS) Test, which looked at “spontaneous” vs. “controlled” imagination.
Spontaneous imagination is defined as effortless, surprising and instantaneous. For example, you’re washing the dishes and suddenly have a great new idea for a drawing. It feels like your idea literally “came out of nowhere.”
Controlled imagination is defined as a process that is consciously initiated, guided and terminated. For example, you’re washing the dishes and consciously decide to think about how to resolve a conflict with your roommate. You intentionally stay on task, brainstorming ideas and refining until you have an answer, at which time you stop thinking about it.From Musing’s entry re the TFIS test.
In the comments section, Mados, Musings, and I (mostly Mados and Musings, I just contributed once and read the convo in fascination) ended up getting into a conversation about different modes of thought and types of imagination (which are heavily linked, I believe, thus this post covering both), which provided the inspiration for this post. I actually meant to get this done a week and a half ago, but… yeah.
I had to go to the grocery store today, to pick up some things for dinner tonight along with my meds. By the time I got back home, I was shaking and in sensory overload. I spent about an hour curled up in my dark room, part of that sleeping, and when I got up, I felt better.
Talking to Mom later, while dinner was cooking, she mentioned what I have since found out is referred to as “medical students syndrome” – a problem encountered by medical students when they are studying certain diseases, they start to associate any problems they might have with that disease, and worry that they have it – because I didn’t used to have this extent of problems going to the grocery store. (Note that it doesn’t affect just medical students, but they’re the most-affected group.) It’s apparently a type of hypochondria. My father is also worried about me demonstrating this. (Quite honestly, I’m sick and tired of being accused of that. As a child, I had psychosomatic complaints, not hypochondria.) I think I need to write this out, and I’d like other opinions.
(Okay, experiencing crying jag here – a red flag, as my previous psychologist put it, that we’ve walked into a sensitive issue. Which being thought a hypochondriac is.)
The thing is, it could also be what I wrote about in my Coping Mechanisms post. It could be a lowered sensory threshold, whether because of the stress of the last several months, or some lingering issue caused by my incompatibility with Effexor. Or it could be that I am becoming more sensitive as I age.