.Being.Us

Mental illness makes it hard for me to tell what's going on with my body. I seem to demonstrate a complete inability to conceptualize time, which may be more related to autism than mental illness, which makes recounting my symptoms to a doctor difficult. I also have trouble recalling feelings, physical or emotional, when I'm not feeling them right that moment. If I don't think to write them down when I experience them, I may not realize later that I have ever experienced them at all. Additionally, I have trouble grasping what has and has not happened. I may have a splitting headache on Wednesday, but by Friday, I'm second-guessing myself so much, I'm lucky to be sure that I had a head on Wednesday. I also used to deal with a tendency to find my identity in and obsess on new medical diagnoses, but this is a thought pattern that I am better , although not perfect, at keeping under control now. As a chronically ill person, it's important for me to be in t...

As a chronically ill person, I spend a lot of time at doctor's appointments, and, as a chronically ill, autistic, and mentally ill person, I find them overwhelming and draining. I want to talk about some of the things I do to make them easier for myself. Use mobility aids - If you use mobility aids, and your doctor is understanding about it, they can make the trip a lot easier. One mobility aid I use is forearm crutches.   Make visit notes ahead-of-time - I try to make my notes complete enough that I can hand them to the doctor if I'm having trouble with verbal communication. I take notes in my planner.   Present accommodation needs in writing- Carry a printed report of your accommodation needs to each appointment, and present one to each doctor's office to have on file. Discuss it with your doctor. Use an AAC program - Personal Favorites are Talk for Me for laptop and tablet and Speech Assistant for mobile. These are good if you prefer text-based AAC. I use Let Me ...