Working

I am tired. I enjoy my job, but it exhausts me too. I would ask about switching to part time, but the pay is so low that this would not be practical. And theoretically it is part time anyway – considering I only work during term time, and supposedly only work 30 hours a week (it’s more hours really – not that anyone’s forcing me to stay later or arrive earlier, but I need to in order to know what’s going on).

I know I’m fortunate to have a job. I know I’m also fortunate in that it’s a rewarding job (as well as being very challenging!). I really enjoy forming rapport with the pupils and helping them learn. As always, I find it easier forming rapport with clients than colleagues. I think I get on fairly well with my colleagues, but I’m not good at social chitchat, so mostly I am just talking with them about work, so they probably find me dull. There have also been a few times when I’ve taken them literally when they were joking – and then I worry that they’ll suspect I have Aspergers. I wonder whether and when and how to tell them this myself – whether it would be helpful or harmful to disclose. There is no easy answer to this, so I play it safe and don’t tell them.

I am finding myself more organised in using my strategies than I have ever been. I need to be, in order to survive. I am generally in bed asleep by 8:30 each night – not so much from organisation and self-discipline, but more because I just can’t stay awake. Often I wake up at 2:00am, having fallen asleep in bed at 8:30pm with my laptop on my lap and the light on – and then I turn the light off, put my laptop on the floor, and fall asleep again. I am eating healthily in general – because I know that if I don’t, I get bad pains in my abdomen, and when I’m exhausted it’s harder to deal with that. I listen to theta waves each day, I make sure I get lots of exercise and fresh air – trying very hard to manage my physical reactions to the sensory overstimulation I get each day. I find it a bit ironic, really, that a lot of the children in the class will also have the same reactions as me (I naively thought that a special school would be more sensorily friendly) – and they will be less able to manage these, so they act out instead and have challenging behaviour.

Sometimes I want to disclose my Aspergers, because I want to be able to say about certain pupils: ‘I think I understand why he is doing this – what is going on in his head.’ I find it quite amusing to imagine the other staff’s reactions if I were to say ‘Actually, my behaviour at school was pretty similar to his when I was a child’. But I don’t say it.

To begin with I was terrified I’d be too exhausted to continue the job. I don’t have that fear any more, because I can just about manage the exhaustion, and my fears are more about not becoming good at the job. I think I am doing fairly well, but some things are taking a while to get the hang of, and I don’t really have a comparison point, as the other staff have been there for years and years, so I don’t know how long it is supposed to take. I do some things very well, and find other things more difficult. Even though this is only a temporary job, until I get a job in the field I was trained for, I want to do very well in it. I know I can be a perfectionist though, and am trying to have more of a relaxed attitude, because that might help me be less exhausted.

Something I really like about my job is being able to go home after work and know that my time is totally my own – I have no preparation to do, no assignments. I realise in retrospect how draining it was being a student – in a completely different way from the exhaustion I get from this job. It was draining on my self-esteem – I lost a lot of confidence, due to lecturers making negative assumptions about me based on my diagnosis, and acting like I was difficult and demanding when I asked for reasonable adjustments. I am feeling more confident now. And happier. There is generally an atmosphere of mutual respect and support amongst the staff, as it is a very challenging and difficult job, and we all need each other. There is also quite a bit of ‘politics’ and gossip – staff still grumble about each other behind each other’s backs, despite being supportive to each other’s faces – and I find that more difficult and confusing, but I just try to accept is as an inevitable part of any workplace.

I also realise that for the first time in my life, I have a routine. I have nearly always worked shift work in the past – different shifts each week, so some days starting work at 7:00am, and other days starting work at 2:30pm, and yet other days working night shifts. But now I start at the same time each day. I take the same bus each day. Although each day is different, and the job can be very unpredictable, there is a timetable. I have made my own little ‘rituals’ for every day (things like making a cup of tea – really everyone has rituals, and it’s not exclusive to Aspergers) I can start forming my own habits, which can be the same every day, because each day starts at the same time, in the same place. I don’t have any ritual for weekends though – I tend to spend weekends sleeping and reading and thinking about things I would like to do if I was less tired!