http://www.thinkingautismguide.com/2019/03/meltdowns-how-autistic-humans.html
This is one of those rare autistic points of view on meltdowns. Because they're mistaken for tantrums in small children (they're not tantrums and shouldn't be treated that way), and are considered extremely socially unacceptable, few people are willing to talk about them. The vast majority of those that are willing, are professionals or parents, as the author mentions.
Professionals and parents have valuable things to tell us about meltdowns. But nothing replaces firsthand experience. Unlike most of the things I link on this blog, this article is not a textwall. It includes comics and artistic illustrations, each of which includes an accessible text description.
A sidenote about accessible text descriptions: they're meant for the blind or otherwise visually impaired. The idea being, if you can't see the picture very well (or at all), you can instead read the description of the picture and get the gist of what it's trying to convey. But like closed captioning, they can help populations they weren't intended to help. As a person with vision corrected to 20-20, I should reasonably have no use for text descriptions of pictures. However, possibly due to the weirdness of my brain's detail processing, I find it can be useful to read someone else's interpretation of what's happening in a picture.
This is especially true for art, and I found the descriptions invaluable in this article. They pointed out details I'd completely missed when I looked at them myself. For depictions of this particular subject, it was valuable to have those descriptions around.
Even after reading this description, I'm uncertain as to whether I've experienced meltdowns in my life. I have had the immense privilege of having my own room when I was young, and usually having someplace reasonably safe to flee if I can't handle things while out of the house. Sometimes that's just the bathroom, but if it works, it works. This lets me escape situations when I'd start getting agitated the way the author describes here. At worst, I've socially-ineptly had to shoo a friend out of my room, or had to go sit in the car instead of socializing with my family members. My actions in both those situations hurt feelings, but don't really compare to the situations and pain the author describes here.
I do think I experience the building up sensations and low energy effects described here. They just don't end in an explosion, they end in me hiding until I calm down. Or canceling everything in my day so I can go home. Again, I have the privilege of making those decisions to leave. Not everyone does. Especially children, who have far fewer choices in life than adults.
Regardless, I found this point of view piece very educational, and I hope you do too.
This is one of those rare autistic points of view on meltdowns. Because they're mistaken for tantrums in small children (they're not tantrums and shouldn't be treated that way), and are considered extremely socially unacceptable, few people are willing to talk about them. The vast majority of those that are willing, are professionals or parents, as the author mentions.
Professionals and parents have valuable things to tell us about meltdowns. But nothing replaces firsthand experience. Unlike most of the things I link on this blog, this article is not a textwall. It includes comics and artistic illustrations, each of which includes an accessible text description.
A sidenote about accessible text descriptions: they're meant for the blind or otherwise visually impaired. The idea being, if you can't see the picture very well (or at all), you can instead read the description of the picture and get the gist of what it's trying to convey. But like closed captioning, they can help populations they weren't intended to help. As a person with vision corrected to 20-20, I should reasonably have no use for text descriptions of pictures. However, possibly due to the weirdness of my brain's detail processing, I find it can be useful to read someone else's interpretation of what's happening in a picture.
This is especially true for art, and I found the descriptions invaluable in this article. They pointed out details I'd completely missed when I looked at them myself. For depictions of this particular subject, it was valuable to have those descriptions around.
Even after reading this description, I'm uncertain as to whether I've experienced meltdowns in my life. I have had the immense privilege of having my own room when I was young, and usually having someplace reasonably safe to flee if I can't handle things while out of the house. Sometimes that's just the bathroom, but if it works, it works. This lets me escape situations when I'd start getting agitated the way the author describes here. At worst, I've socially-ineptly had to shoo a friend out of my room, or had to go sit in the car instead of socializing with my family members. My actions in both those situations hurt feelings, but don't really compare to the situations and pain the author describes here.
I do think I experience the building up sensations and low energy effects described here. They just don't end in an explosion, they end in me hiding until I calm down. Or canceling everything in my day so I can go home. Again, I have the privilege of making those decisions to leave. Not everyone does. Especially children, who have far fewer choices in life than adults.
Regardless, I found this point of view piece very educational, and I hope you do too.
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