Workplace Bullying: Anxiety and Abuse

This is a topic that part of me thought I'd never write about on here. After all, it has to do with a company which, for the longest time, was my employer and source of income. As unhappy as I was with certain things, I also didn't want to shoot myself in the foot and blacklist myself from any possible career advancement. I am, of course, referring to my now-former job as a retail supervisor for a local telecommunications company in the town where I live. I've mentioned before how my regional manager was not my biggest fan, and how he bullied me for several years, but recently I've come face to face with just how much damage he did, and how much damage bullying can do to anyone who's subjected to it. Research into bullying shows that it results in permanent, negative changes to brain chemistry which causes things such as anxiety, depression and a propensity towards drug abuse. In essence, bullying changes the way your brain works, and the results can be felt every day. 

I recently started my new job in technical support at another local telecommunications company, and I've found it amazing just what an impact my former boss' abusive behaviour has had on me without my even realizing it. Take, for example, my new manager. She's a sweet lady who genuinely cares about all of us on the support staff, and I know that she only coaches with the intent of improving all of our performance at our jobs. Despite understanding this intellectually, however, I still find myself wincing and cringing in fear when I'm told I did something wrong. My former regional manager never provided me the proper training I needed to do my job properly, then would proceed to yell at and berate me when I didn't do what he expected me to do to begin with. It literally sent my brain for a loop when my new boss told me that there was no such thing as a stupid question. Again, I know this intellectually, but its a testament to the destructive power of bullying that even now, having escaped my former manager's clutches, I'm still struggling through the anxiety and wounded self esteem he gave me as a parting gift. 

I made the conscious choice not long ago to let go of the negativity I was carrying around from that old job, and the results have been very rewarding for me. I feel happier, more whole and more healthy emotionally than I have for a long time. Even still though, it often amazes me how much an effect abusive situations have on us. I still often have to remind myself that, when anxious feelings arise regarding my coworkers and managers, they are in fact in my head. Bullying negatively affects everyone, but we Aspies are prone to living in our own headspaces, and because of this it can often cause many difficulties. Ending bullying is each of our responsibilities, and we need to stop creating situations where bullying behaviour is excused and even encouraged. As an employee in a workplace, it is infinitely more difficult to stand up to an employer since they control whether you can put food on the table and pay bills. That is a dangerous amount of power for any bully to hold, but it happens every day.

Let's all work together to end bullying, both for our children, and for ourselves in the adult world.

As always yours in diversity,

Adam Michael

Aspergers In My Daily Life: A Study

As I've said in a previous post, I've recently started writing a book about my experiences growing up and living as an Aspie. The support I've received for this project has been immense and really heartwarming but it has frequently caused me to wonder; am I autistic enough to write this? Aren't there those far more severely on the spectrum than I, and would they really be served by my work on this subject? Ultimately, I'm not self shaming with this; I know I'm definitely an Aspie and that this blog helps loads of people daily (as I hope the book will too!). The thing of it is though, if anything this project has made me more aware of my little "aspie moments" on a daily basis. In light of that, I'd like to share a few examples of how Aspergers influences me in my every day life:

Sarcasm: Oh boy. Let it first be said that I absolutely LOVE sarcasm! The wordplay, the double entendres...its the stuff of language geek porn! Needless to say, I am an extremely sarcastic person, and I fling it with wild abandon at both my customers and coworkers alike. I am not, however quite as good at getting it back. Like anyone on the spectrum, I have an extremely hard time distinguishing between genuine comments and sarcasm. Sure, I can read the obvious cues, but when a person is consistently sarcastic with a deadpan facial expression, I start to worry and wonder. We recently hired a new guy at work for example, and while I think quite highly of him as a human, he is a perfect example of what I'm talking about and as a result I didn't know how to take him at first. Now? My obliviousness has become a running joke among all of my coworkers and I.

Verbal Motor Skills: I am obviously a lover of language and writing, and yet there are so many times throughout any given day when I find myself fumbling over my words, unable to articulate what I know my brain wants my mouth to say. This contributes to my clumsiness and social awkwardness, and it feels as though my brain is literally running a billion times faster than what my mouth can keep up with. In many ways, this is why I've embraced writing; I can take my time and communicate far more eloquently than my verbal skills allow for. This is especially true when I'm nervous, such as when my boss is standing right over my shoulder...

Sensory Overload: I know I've already devoted an entire blog post to this, but I just wanted to reiterate it as part of this entry; sensory overload is definitely a thing. And it sucks. In my case, its very much brought on by crowds of people, loud noises, and when things get busy at work. Working in retail, you can imagine this happens all the time, which leads me to....

Anxiety: To be frank, I feel anxiety about almost everything. What should I do for breakfast? Is my friend upset at me? Am I texting too much? Am I NOT TEXTING ENOUGH? My list could go on indefinitely, and as one of my best friends is fond of pointing out, "Adam just has THINGS about THINGS." Since its tied to Aspergers, my anxiety manifests mainly in terms of social situations. Typically, my responses to these situations at work progress as follows: crowds/hordes of humans --->loud noises----> sensory overload -----> anxiety. I also have a bad habit of questioning myself on every decision I make, and then second-guessing it as well. This makes social situations interesting to put it mildly.

I know I'm missing many little examples, but I hope this serves as just a small taste of how Aspergers influences my daily life as an adult. Everyone's experiences are different, however, and your mileage may vary. We all have challenges after all, and no two people are alike. Just because someone you encounter may not seem to have challenges and quirks, it doesn't mean that they don't. Me personally? I know I'm weird, but I prefer to think of it as different. And proud!

Yours in diversity,

Adam Michael

Sensory Overload: A Survivor's Story

Today, I'd like to take a break from the political and activist sides of this blog and focus on something more practical. I'm sure we are all quite familiar right now with the stereotype that autistic individuals lack empathy and appear detached from their environment in any but the most specific (and often ritualized) ways. While there is no denying that this may appear to and even be true for some, I would like to share today my own personal experience in this regard. You see, far from lacking empathy and attachment, I have found that quite the opposite is true. In fact, I would argue that those of us on the spectrum feel and sense others and the environment TOO MUCH.

I'm going to tell you a story that will hopefully explain this a little better. I've said it before, but I'm a manager at a small Canadian telecom company who works in a retail kiosk environment during my day job. We happen to be the busiest and most profitable store in the company, so naturally such an environment is often stressful and busy. I won't say I have an easy time with that normally as an aspie; the amount of people, the multitasking and constant demands on my attention tend to get to me fairly easily, but after long enough working in people-oriented jobs, I've developed coping mechanisms for it. The other day, however, pushed the limits of my tolerance. We were crazy non-stop busy, the customers were getting grumpy from waiting in line, we were short staffed and I had to accommodate breaks for my team, and to make matters worse, we had received a massive product shipment that I had to work through receiving! My coping mechanisms were pushed to the breaking point and I could feel the spectre of sensory overload setting in. My anxiety was building, and all I wanted to do was turn inward and curl up in a quiet ball with not a sound to be heard. Were it not for the fact that I had to make frequent trips to our back room to sort and put away the already received equipment, I don't know how I would have done it. My stress and anxiety was that crippling.

Now, imagine that level of stress. That “go away world and leave me alone!” level of overwhelming anxiety developing over something as simple as caring too greatly for someone, or being unsure how to respond to the affection of other people, and you start to have a rough idea of what it must be like for those autistics and aspies who are more severely on the spectrum. Simply put, the appearance of emotional detachment doesn't necessarily mean these individuals are emotionally detached; it can be representative of feeling and perceiving the environment in too much detail, and needing to take a step back from it to process things. As another example of this, my sister loves blasting music loudly in the car while either one of us is driving. When it's in my car, however, I find it so grating when she does it! While she may enthusiastically hear her favourite song drowning out her other senses and wrapping her in a familiar melody, I hear each note as a punctured audio nail being driven into my conscious mind with the stabbing and piercing clarity interfering with my thought processes and cognitive ability. It is simply too much!

I'm not going to say that there isn't a certain amount of difficulty understanding emotion inherent in ASD; far from it. I myself have difficulty reading the subtle differences in facial expression between, for example, angry and serious, and it usually takes my brain a split second to register sarcasm, sudden emotional changes, or big, tragic events. Even so, however, I wouldn't call this a lack of empathy. In fact, I can assure you that my empathy for others and capacity for love each run quite deep. If anything, my emotions run hot and strong right beneath the surface of my being. What Neurotypical society interprets as a lack of empathy is really just the obliviousness towards emotional nuance in others' outward reactions that comes with a place on the Autism Spectrum, while the environmental detachment is simply a coping mechanism for the taxing sensory experiences overwhelming our highly attuned nervous systems. In either case, it isn't due to a lack of ability to feel; its that those of us with ASD are so acutely aware and sensitive that even a minor sensory experience such as a scratchy shirt can be pure and utter hell.

All of us, whether Neurotypical or otherwise, experience sensory and emotional overload, and none of us are good at reading every situation perfectly. The key isn't dismissing anyone as being incapable of something because of it; rather, we should be encouraging and teaching methods of coping with the crazy realities of the world. Next time you meet someone who seems to be hiding in their own mental world, remember; it probably isn't because they don't want to come out and talk, they just find every day life overwhelming and need to recharge and re-center themselves. This is all part of learning how to speak the languages of other neurotribes, and it is something which must happen if we are to move forward as a species.

As always, yours in diversity,

Adam Michael

"OH MY GOD WHAT IF...???" A Few Reflections on Generalized Anxiety Disorder

By Adam Mardero

Truthfully, this is a post that I’ve wanted to write for some time now. It’s been a topic that has been on my mind a lot lately, and has prompted me to reflect deeply on how my own life has been impacted by anxiety. The truth is, Aspergers itself often comes with elements of anxiety baked in like one of so many ingredients in a neurosis pie. I’ve always felt the sting of social anxiety, and I firmly believe that it comes as a result of social mores not always being easy to grasp...at least for me. Anxiety can be a debilitating condition to any who have even a twinge of it in their lives...a fact I can attest to.

Even so, this blog post is not about me...not strictly anyway.

This entry of Differently Wired is, if anything, a love letter to all those in my life who struggle with anxiety in any of its many forms. It is a shout out to friends, family, loved ones and anyone else I hold near and dear to my heart. Anxiety is something which has always affected me, whether directly or otherwise, and I know many people for whom it is a constant struggle. This is even a love letter to those I don’t know well or at all; to the faceless masses of humanity, any number of whom struggle with anxiety, depression or countless other mental health conditions. The overarching message I want to convey to all of these people is a simple one, although it is one which is remarkably easy to lose sight of.


You are not alone.

I know, it seems silly to say. The thing is though, to many people struggling with anxiety, it can feel incredibly isolating. Speaking from personal experience, it can often feel as though I am the crazy person for being irrationally nervous about some trivial thing or another. It’s important to remember that you are not. Anxiety may be a condition, but there is nothing wrong with who you are and how you are. You also don’t have to fight alone. I recognize that often times, there really isn’t much of anything that any one of us outside of a panic attack can do to help, and that too is a difficult lesson to learn. Even so, I can say with certainty that even knowing someone you care about is there can help, no matter how helpless they may feel. Having a support circle of people who love you and understand what you are going through (or want to and are willing to learn) can be a lifesaver.

So if you are someone who doesn’t have anxiety, or has it to a lesser or different degree from someone you know, what can you do to help? Based on my own personal experiences, and my own desires from other people, there are a few things:

1)     Be patient. It sounds like a given, but I can’t stress this enough. There will be times where neurosis will kick in. Where I, or example, may stress about the stupidest little thing (whether I remembered to fill the printer at work before leaving my shift, for example). I grant you, it can be frustrating to constantly reassure someone with anxiety, but believe me it is appreciated.

2)     Learn. Educate yourself about anxiety. This has to be one of the most important things that any loved one of someone with anxiety should do. As those kitschy 80’s G.I. Joe ads always proclaimed, “Knowledge is power!”  

3) Look after yourself too. I know it's going to sound selfish, but its totally true. I long ago realized that I tend to act as a conduit for the emotional energies of others, which would then drain and drag me down. Remember, its noble and admirable to want to help someone you care about, but not at the expense of losing your own mental sanity in the process. Balance is key!

At the end of the day, like with every other condition under the sun, having an anxiety disorder does not define someone as a person. As with everyone else, there are moments of laughter and moments of tears, days when the sunrise fills you with hope and joy, and others where you don't want to crawl out of bed. In other words, we are all human beings first, and we all have our challenges to face. Hopefully, this entry has helped some of you out there who have been impacted by anxiety, depression or any other condition.

Remember, there is only one unchangeable thing which should define us, and that is our common humanity.

Yours in Diversity,

Adam Michael