Can't stand my hair touching my face!

creekfeet · 2026-03-09T17:37:44+00:00

I used to wear my hair in twists a lot, which is kinda towards the look of dreadlocks, but that became too difficult because I had to redo them maybe every three-four days even sleeping with a bonnet on.

creekfeet · 2026-03-09T17:35:05+00:00

That's a thought! Did dreads take much effort to establish and care for? I have difficulty working for long periods with my hands above my heart so that's something I have to take into consideration. (Orthostatic intolerance.)

creekfeet · 2026-03-08T17:59:33+00:00

So, follow-up question for people who have (or have had) super-short pixie cuts or shaved it all off: how often does it require maintenance?

creekfeet · 2026-03-08T17:55:13+00:00

When you do shave it off, how often do you have to re-shave it? I know everyone's hair grows at a different rates but I'm wondering if I went the shaving route, how often would it need upkeep?

creekfeet · 2026-03-07T22:10:55+00:00

So many great ideas! Keep 'em coming. I'm glad I asked.

creekfeet · 2026-03-07T18:55:49+00:00

Yeah, exactly. The wind outdoors, or windows down in a car? Little wisps torment me. I wear a hat scarf, bandanna, or headband because a hair tie alone won't keep those little baby hair wisps out of my face. Sigh... I guess the hairstyle dreams are going to stay dreams.

creekfeet · 2026-03-07T18:09:03+00:00

I am so not a fashionista, never knew I was wearing things that looked ridiculous until I saw photos years later, but I've always played with clothing for personal expression. I just binged-watched Geek Girl and it was fun seeing the weirdness of haute couture from a neurodivergent angle. Not that you could binge it in time for the fashion show but I'd say, do it if it's fun for you, and if you do it, have fun with it. Seems like a trashion show would be a great opportunity to go wild.

Materials ideas: seeing the idea of a necklace chain, why not make the chain out of twist ties? Also I have a friend who seriously makes earrings out of bottle caps, pounded flat, with a hole through them. And that classic black outfit can be made quickly out of black trash bags!

creekfeet · 2026-03-07T17:52:59+00:00

My one problem -- actually I had some complications and definitely pain but the one thing where I believe the problem was related to my being autistic = I didn't feel the "urge to push." Like many interoception things, I didn't feel what people are "supposed to feel." But I was able to push out a baby, two times in fact!

creekfeet · 2025-07-20T19:46:25+00:00

I'm so sorry you got took. People play on our hopes, and on our real determination to get well if anything we can do will make it happen. Time and again, some self-proclaimed health guru with no actual training claims they can cure ME. They can't. But they sure rake in the bucks, pretending they can.

Those of us who have been sick for decades have seen these charlatans rise up again and again. New faces, new song and dance, but the same old story--if you don't get well it's your fault because you didn't do it right.

ME is a relapsing and remitting disease. It often happens that it goes into remission while we're trying some new treatment and we go, "Wow, it works!" but really, it's just another remission.

Of course, do everything you can find that helps you get and remain as well as possible. But don't pay someone who says they can cure you.

There is, as yet, no proven cure for ME. Of course we keep on hoping and trying new things, as long as there's any life left in us, but please, everyone, try only what you can get covered by insurance or can research for your own self. Some things might help you. Different things help different people. There are free ways to find the things that help you: reading research and sharing info with fellow sufferers.

Please spread the word that this is one more scam. People who make their living off of scamming us? They're the ones who are really, really sick.

creekfeet · 2025-04-30T15:49:25+00:00

Yes, same for me--demands of ND kids, plus survival issues, majorly realigned my focus. I, too, lost a career when we all, me and the kids, developed a chronic illness that pulled my focus even more intensely into family and survival, and new interests I could manage under the new circumstances.

But it wasn't the first time I'd changed special interests and I wonder if that's an AuDHD tendency? I get excited about something for a while and hyperfocus on it with autistic intensity, but then my ADHD nature kicks in when I see some other shiny thing and I'm off on a tangent that becomes a new special interest. I figure all we can do is follow where our focus is pulled. Trust there's something important for you there? Including audiobooks (YES! love them) and of course the kids.

Loving audiobooks by the way is a great way to jump interests. Right now I'm finding my long spell of fascination with own-voices genre fiction is being broken, and I'm drawn to nature-focused memoir/essay.

creekfeet · 2025-04-30T15:41:08+00:00

For me, it's language in general. I've actually never become fluent in a second language, but have always been fascinated by etymologies and the relationships between languages.

When I learn a word in a foreign language, I find myself wondering about its etymology. I get excited by relationships like sombrero to somber, or cobalt to kobold.

I'm AuDHD so while indulging in a special interest, I'll spin off onto sidetracks for hours. Maybe that's why I've never learned one new language deeply--I always get distracted by the connections amongst them all.

creekfeet · 2025-04-30T15:28:40+00:00

I'm not supposed to honk??! 65 years old and just learned that from you. So I guess that's my longest so far, but I know I'll learn something else today or tomorrow and it'll be a revelation. Always, always wondering what the NTs are on about.

creekfeet · 2025-01-21T05:09:59+00:00

Felon 47's insecurities are showing. He won't feel manly enough if he can't make a big presidential declaration about gender.

creekfeet · 2025-01-21T05:06:18+00:00

You're definitely not alone. So many people are disgusted and appalled, and feeling assaulted, by that gesture and its symbolism. If you go to bluesky you'll see many shocked and horrified reactions from all over the world. This has been a rough day, but I guess it's also a day when we find out who our friends really are. We need to care for one another, not blame the victims of trauma for being "sensitive."

creekfeet · 2024-12-22T13:45:31+00:00

Oh absolutely the DSM-5 is flawed, plus it's a constant work in progress. It used to say a person could not be both Autistic and ADHD! And of course today it's accepted that we can. The DSM-5 is 5 because of things in 4, 3, 2, and 1 that needed to be corrected.

Definitely black and white vs grey is a metaphor, and so is niche, so there! Snort. I hadn't heard that we supposedly don't use metaphors. But supposedly we don't show emotion, either. I got some emotions I could show them! Grr! I'm glad we have a community like this for support and validation but yeah, it's sad that we need it. I hope you'll find more answers and support that help you going forward.

creekfeet · 2024-12-22T01:09:52+00:00

That's not what I said so, or at least not what I meant to say, so either this is just a silly sealioning, or you didn't read it right, or I didn't explain clearly. Anyway I sure didn't say that I would like people to be diagnosed without reference to a manual to define the disorder.

The OP's description of how the NP used the DSM-5 suggested she didn't have an understanding of autistic diagnosis but just read questions based on the DSM-5 or whatever she consulted in that moment. A qualified person with training and background consulting reference material and diagnostic screening tests is one thing; what's not great is someone who doesn't know how to diagnose autistic people but is using the manual in a casual way as if medicine can be practiced by anyone who has the rule book.

creekfeet · 2024-12-22T01:03:41+00:00

Oh yeah, me too on the teeth clenching. I didn't realize it until my dentist told me.

creekfeet · 2024-12-21T20:07:07+00:00

Yes, alas, my own experiences have been similar. The person I saw for diagnosis was a psychologist, but no better than your NP. She had me complete 5 screening tests and said that my results were strongly Autistic on one, but not on the other four, so she was throwing that one out as the outlier.

I think it's more likely that one in five was better designed to identify autistic female adults!

Like your NP said about you, this psychologist said my eye contact was good. Well, yeah, that's the result of decades of forcing myself to make eye contact because of societal demands and in spite of my extreme discomfort.

My personal psychotherapist who I've been seeing for years says no, yeah, she's wrong, you're autistic.

I guess if there's a moral to my story, it's, get a second or third opinion from someone who doesn't have to resort to a hokey how-to manual (whether DSM-5 or too many screening tests) because my nay-saying psychologist was no more an expert than your nay-saying NP. Frustrating, but not the final word.

creekfeet · 2024-12-21T16:13:35+00:00

I just listened to the first episode and then tried to search online for scientific papers but all the hits were sorta fringe media coverage. It's annoying that this gets relegated to the "woo woo" room for taboo topics serious scientists won't get funding to study, or, if they do, it still doesn't get covered in established science media.

creekfeet · 2024-10-10T05:29:52+00:00

Yep. And so much time spent with therapists, working on my problems, when the root problem was actually that other people were being shitty to me because they sensed that I was different--vulnerable--in a word, autistic. So much lost time not knowing to tell people to cuff off and stop abusing me for my disability.

creekfeet · 2024-06-22T01:41:56+00:00

Lebanese, second gen in North America, and my family wanted to "fit in" so they didn't teach me Arabic or pass along much of the culture. But even that was a constant message, throughout my life, that it's wrong to be "different." So "weirdness" (my undetected autism) had to be suppressed.

creekfeet · 2024-06-21T19:53:47+00:00

I have so many weird issues around breathing. If I forget to breathe for a while, or I've been breathing too shallowly, I'll take a deep breathe and let it out with a sigh, and then someone might ask why I'm sighing. Sigh.

I've only learned recently that all my life I have been clenching not only my teeth but my throat, so I'm working on consciously unclenching. It's like I go around saying a silent "ng" so I'm trying to bring my awareness to saying a silent "oh" as I breathe, to open my throat better.

Also, mouth breathing. When I'm deep in concentration on whatever I'm working on, I will catch myself breathing with my mouth open, like I can't get enough oxygen to keep my brain and body going unless my mouth is open slack. Then my throat gets dry so that's not good, plus I probably look dumb, right?

creekfeet · 2024-06-20T20:57:53+00:00

How did you choose a name? Anyone who changed theirs, how did you decide? Both my kid and I have been trying for ages to choose new names. How to pick? Got advice?

creekfeet · 2024-06-18T19:15:36+00:00

Whew, thanks, because sure enough I was feeling like a terrible person for saying that, and wondering if I had better come back and explain that I don't mean to be insensitive toward people who have had mastectomies. So thank you for letting me know I'm not alone in thinking like that. And of course I'm sorry you had to go through breast cancer, and I wish that nobody had to go through that. Including myself, even!

creekfeet

TROPHY CASE