Switched On: A Memoir of Brain Change and Emotional Awakening, by John Elder Robison, is a stunningly powerful account of the famed speaker's experience with being a test subject for an experimental therapy for autism. The therapy is called TMS, or trans-cranial magnetic stimulation. It is an energy-based therapy, like neurofeedback, but instead of electrodes there's an electromagnetic coil and a lot more energy involved. So naturally I started drawing parallels to my own energy-based therapy, LENS.
This is not right, it is not fair, and it is certainly not acceptable. Dr. Temple Grandin addresses this mentality with her "Different, Not Less" philosophy. And while that's a beautiful, shining example of how things should be... it's one thing to mentally accept and earnestly try to live a philosophy, and quite another to believe it down to your bones. And from Mr. Robison's writings, he was about where I am now when he started this study: rightfully proud of his strengths and accomplishments, but tormented by the nagging doubt that because of his social weaknesses, disabilities, and eccentricities, he was a second-class person.
That nagging doubt was why Mr. Robison left two successful careers. The first was in musical engineering, making unique sound and lighting systems for KISS and other bands of the time. He made the flame-spitting guitars, for example, along with many of the odder sound effects they employed. But he left because he didn't feel like he was doing well enough, despite being a resounding success. He went to work at a big toy company, designing innovative circuit boards for the newest toys. And there, too, he did an excellent job. But he felt like a fish out of water, unappreciated and disliked, unable to improve his ability to read people and work with them, and so eventually he left that field too. Both things he excelled at, despite his social difficulties and disabilities. But the guilt and the doubt undermined him until he couldn't stand it, and left. You can read all about this in his book "Look me in the Eye," by the way.
I would probably say that that same doubt might be why I've never really succeeded a lot at any one thing. I have known, since I was pretty little, that I'm different. I've never really fit in, and that takes a toll on a person. I have some talent in music, but between my very musically gifted (and slightly judgemental) parents and my anxiety, practicing regularly was quite beyond me, growing up. And you can't learn an instrument without practicing, so eventually I failed out of that. I still sing, but not a lot.
I went to college for psychology, where I promptly failed to fit in and was even kicked out of a group project for it. All the eggheads in the psychology department promptly failed to either notice or make any accommodations it. And it turns out not even college could make formalized learning fun and accessible to me. So I chose not to subject myself to graduate school, which would simply have been more money and more suffering.
I'd minored in software development, so I did that instead for a few years, first for the public library and then for a company that used some of the same technology I'd worked with at the library... but I don't love coding, and I'm not a natural-born, intuitive coder... so between that and the lack of social skills as padding for when I didn't succeed, I failed out of that, too.
In theory, I might have succeeded at any of those fields. In practicality, I just... couldn't. It was depressing to notice that parallel between Mr. Robison's experience and mine. With the exception, of course, that Mr. Robison has been a smashing success by objective measures at least three times in his life, whereas I... can pretty much just say I graduated college. Woo...
I was so overwhelmed because the way Mr. Robison describes TMS is very similar to how I've experienced LENS , over the last couple years, and even my learning how to interact with people over a decade and a half. And even beyond that, in some ways. He describes being able to look into peoples' eyes and see their souls (though that ability didn't last), and suddenly being able to recognize how a person was feeling and why. He started being able to recognize intent and behavioral abuses better, and was able to prune out the nasty people in his customer base at his car repair shop as well as relationships in his life that were destructive.
In short, he was able to do in a couple years what's taken me most of my adolescence and a good chunk of my adulthood to manage. If you read the book carefully, you'll notice that it wasn't specifically the TMS that gave him the lasting ability to do that. The TMS energized his brain and activated brain pathways that gave him those abilities in the short term, but what made them last was the fact that he tried very hard to use them once they were energized, and kept trying to use them. He compares it to sled tracks. The more you use that pathway, the more ingrained it becomes. Effectively, the TMS made it possible for him to learn those skills and abilities.
The LENS, on my end of things, has increased my social skills capabilities. I'm able to smile at things more, for example, and the smiles are actually believable and more genuine-looking rather than clearly forced even though I'm trying to be genuine. I'm not as emotionally blocked up, either, which helps in sorting and dealing with issues in my life. Which isn't to say it's not challenging. Just that it's progress. I am thus able to express myself and my emotions better, which is more comforting and relatable to neurotypical people than a stone face and stiff body posture.
Reading this book and the various side effects and experiences of Mr. Robison and some of the other volunteers for the experiment, I can fairly safely say that it sounds like LENS is a slower, more careful version of TMS. Not all of the test subjects of Mr. Robison's study had so happy of results, and in truth, because the changes happened to Mr. Robison so quickly, his marriage became strained and finally fell apart. He tells how he eventually bounced back and all seems more or less well at the present time, but if he'd had more time to process the changes, perhaps he might have found a way to make the marriage work, or at least gotten some help rather than standing by feeling helpless.
Our brains are very delicate instruments. I've mentioned how the LENS has sort of built up the circuits in my brain to function better. If all of that had happened at once, I might well have had a mental breakdown. This is actually why my LENS-doctor tends to be very careful about how she uses the LENS. She works with people of all kinds, and has found through years of experience that change is best introduced gradually and carefully, especially to people who already have sensitive systems.
John Elder Robison is a very stable, grounded guy, I feel, from reading this book and some of his other works. But some of the other participants weren't, as much. As a rule, I feel like it's not wise to assume stability in a population that's put under so much pressure. So while TMS is definitely an option for therapy, I'd be more inclined to support LENS as the therapy of the future, particularly if the costs could be reduced. That said, in my view, almost anything would be preferable to the medication-mill that is our current system of treatment... TMS and LENS work directly with the brain, which is where the autism, the depression, and the anxiety live, as far as we can tell. Medication takes a much more indirect route to its results, and the side effects can be brutally awful.
That Accursed Nagging Doubt
Why do this? Well... Mr. Robison and I share a common trait, which I suspect is probably common amongst the autistic population as a whole. That is, we indelibly, irrevocably know, from a lifetime of having it drilled into our skulls silently by society's actions and words... that we are second-class people. Broken, or twisted, or sick, or not quite right, the wording varies based on the person. Social skills are a meta-skill that almost every job, place, and situation in life requires, and lacking them is an unutterable, unacceptable, intolerable sin. It makes people draw away from you. It hinders relationships, stunts personal connections, and places a giant "AVOID" sign on your back.This is not right, it is not fair, and it is certainly not acceptable. Dr. Temple Grandin addresses this mentality with her "Different, Not Less" philosophy. And while that's a beautiful, shining example of how things should be... it's one thing to mentally accept and earnestly try to live a philosophy, and quite another to believe it down to your bones. And from Mr. Robison's writings, he was about where I am now when he started this study: rightfully proud of his strengths and accomplishments, but tormented by the nagging doubt that because of his social weaknesses, disabilities, and eccentricities, he was a second-class person.
That nagging doubt was why Mr. Robison left two successful careers. The first was in musical engineering, making unique sound and lighting systems for KISS and other bands of the time. He made the flame-spitting guitars, for example, along with many of the odder sound effects they employed. But he left because he didn't feel like he was doing well enough, despite being a resounding success. He went to work at a big toy company, designing innovative circuit boards for the newest toys. And there, too, he did an excellent job. But he felt like a fish out of water, unappreciated and disliked, unable to improve his ability to read people and work with them, and so eventually he left that field too. Both things he excelled at, despite his social difficulties and disabilities. But the guilt and the doubt undermined him until he couldn't stand it, and left. You can read all about this in his book "Look me in the Eye," by the way.
I would probably say that that same doubt might be why I've never really succeeded a lot at any one thing. I have known, since I was pretty little, that I'm different. I've never really fit in, and that takes a toll on a person. I have some talent in music, but between my very musically gifted (and slightly judgemental) parents and my anxiety, practicing regularly was quite beyond me, growing up. And you can't learn an instrument without practicing, so eventually I failed out of that. I still sing, but not a lot.
I went to college for psychology, where I promptly failed to fit in and was even kicked out of a group project for it. All the eggheads in the psychology department promptly failed to either notice or make any accommodations it. And it turns out not even college could make formalized learning fun and accessible to me. So I chose not to subject myself to graduate school, which would simply have been more money and more suffering.
I'd minored in software development, so I did that instead for a few years, first for the public library and then for a company that used some of the same technology I'd worked with at the library... but I don't love coding, and I'm not a natural-born, intuitive coder... so between that and the lack of social skills as padding for when I didn't succeed, I failed out of that, too.
In theory, I might have succeeded at any of those fields. In practicality, I just... couldn't. It was depressing to notice that parallel between Mr. Robison's experience and mine. With the exception, of course, that Mr. Robison has been a smashing success by objective measures at least three times in his life, whereas I... can pretty much just say I graduated college. Woo...
Other Parallels
I noticed other very familiar thought patterns in reading this book, too. There's an entire section near the back where he talks about finding out he has prosopagnosia, or face blindness. I'm not sure how badly you need to score on the tests to qualify, but his experience sounded very similar to mine. I am horrid at learning and memorizing faces, requiring 5-10 introductions before I really get a person's name and face put together properly unless something really memorable ensues. Go figure, that is intensely unhelpful for trying to meet people and network. For kicks and giggles, I took the face blindness test on Test My Brain. I then proceeded to score at the lowest possible rung in recognizing regular faces in one test, and only slightly better at recognizing famous faces. So maybe I should add "prosopagnosia" to my list of diagnoses...
Mr. Robison also described the "realization cringe" where you look back at memories past and realize you've been horrible to someone without knowing it, and only with the benefit of understanding social rules better, or having more social intuition now, does it finally hit you. The memory then haunts you, a reminder of your failure, forever. Autism can lend itself to a lot of accidental cruelty. I'm unsure if I ever personally did this, but one of my friends is fond of relating a story about a young autistic relative, who, upon receiving a birthday present, responded, "Thank you, but this isn't what I wanted." I wince every time I hear this story, because of course that hurt the gift-giver's feelings, but the autistic kid likely had no idea he wasn't being polite and also helpful.
Time (and maybe the LENS) has kindly dimmed most of my memories of growing up, but I suspect my parents could likely tell a few choice stories about similar interactions. And so could my peers, I'm sure. I have never, as far as I know, lacked empathy, but having empathy and having a situation trigger that empathy are two very different things.
LENS vs TMS
I spent a lot of time reading this book. Over a month, in fact. I'd meant to read it and review it quickly, to have it as part of my buffer for last month. That... did not happen. At all. I spent so much time reading and being overwhelmed by what I was reading, that the book loan actually expired twice before I was able to get this written.I was so overwhelmed because the way Mr. Robison describes TMS is very similar to how I've experienced LENS , over the last couple years, and even my learning how to interact with people over a decade and a half. And even beyond that, in some ways. He describes being able to look into peoples' eyes and see their souls (though that ability didn't last), and suddenly being able to recognize how a person was feeling and why. He started being able to recognize intent and behavioral abuses better, and was able to prune out the nasty people in his customer base at his car repair shop as well as relationships in his life that were destructive.
In short, he was able to do in a couple years what's taken me most of my adolescence and a good chunk of my adulthood to manage. If you read the book carefully, you'll notice that it wasn't specifically the TMS that gave him the lasting ability to do that. The TMS energized his brain and activated brain pathways that gave him those abilities in the short term, but what made them last was the fact that he tried very hard to use them once they were energized, and kept trying to use them. He compares it to sled tracks. The more you use that pathway, the more ingrained it becomes. Effectively, the TMS made it possible for him to learn those skills and abilities.
The LENS, on my end of things, has increased my social skills capabilities. I'm able to smile at things more, for example, and the smiles are actually believable and more genuine-looking rather than clearly forced even though I'm trying to be genuine. I'm not as emotionally blocked up, either, which helps in sorting and dealing with issues in my life. Which isn't to say it's not challenging. Just that it's progress. I am thus able to express myself and my emotions better, which is more comforting and relatable to neurotypical people than a stone face and stiff body posture.
Reading this book and the various side effects and experiences of Mr. Robison and some of the other volunteers for the experiment, I can fairly safely say that it sounds like LENS is a slower, more careful version of TMS. Not all of the test subjects of Mr. Robison's study had so happy of results, and in truth, because the changes happened to Mr. Robison so quickly, his marriage became strained and finally fell apart. He tells how he eventually bounced back and all seems more or less well at the present time, but if he'd had more time to process the changes, perhaps he might have found a way to make the marriage work, or at least gotten some help rather than standing by feeling helpless.
Our brains are very delicate instruments. I've mentioned how the LENS has sort of built up the circuits in my brain to function better. If all of that had happened at once, I might well have had a mental breakdown. This is actually why my LENS-doctor tends to be very careful about how she uses the LENS. She works with people of all kinds, and has found through years of experience that change is best introduced gradually and carefully, especially to people who already have sensitive systems.
John Elder Robison is a very stable, grounded guy, I feel, from reading this book and some of his other works. But some of the other participants weren't, as much. As a rule, I feel like it's not wise to assume stability in a population that's put under so much pressure. So while TMS is definitely an option for therapy, I'd be more inclined to support LENS as the therapy of the future, particularly if the costs could be reduced. That said, in my view, almost anything would be preferable to the medication-mill that is our current system of treatment... TMS and LENS work directly with the brain, which is where the autism, the depression, and the anxiety live, as far as we can tell. Medication takes a much more indirect route to its results, and the side effects can be brutally awful.
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