Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: hidden disabilities

What gaming has taught me

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I got bored with my way of titling (and numbering) my posts so I’m switching it up. I will be talking about the same thing I was talking about yesterday, but I slapped a different title on it. Here is yesterday’s post. I was musing about how gaming helped me realize (agonizingly slow over time) that I had actual disabilities rather than just flaws or something wrong with me.

Side note (yes, already): It boggles my mind that it took a friend gently mentioning that several of the things I had told her sounded like autism to her (not that directly, but that was the meat of it). Why did it boggle my mind so much? Because I had never even considered that I might be autistic. ADHD, yes, but autistic? No way! I had the stereotypical image in my mind that everyone has: male, jittery, constantly stimming, not able to make eye contact, not emotionally connecting with people, not liking to be touched, etc. In other words, my brother. Who, ironically, I must say, did not realize he was on the spectrum until I pointed it out to him months before I ended up in the hospital. I just assumed he knew because he fit the stereotypical description so neatly and his son was also autistic.

But for me, I never considered it. I’m highly empathetic (because I’ve been forced to do it since birth), don’t stim, can look people in the eyes, and I am good in social situations (mostly). My friend, A, and I have several long discussions about it, and what she said really opened my eyes. I had mentioned how as a kid, I felt like an alien among the humans. I paid close attention to everyone around me to see what they were saying and doing. And reacting. I couldn’t know how they thought, but I tried to estimate as best as I could, anyway.

She said it was common for autistic people to feel as if they weren’t part of the human race. She mentioned masking, which I knew about. I hadn’tquite made the connection, though, between masking and feeling like an alien. I thought there was something wrong with me because I didn’t automatically intuit what I was supposed to do in all and every situation. I felt as if I hadn’t been given the manual on how to human that everyone had gotten. A told me that was a common feeling for autistic people.

Side note: I get why Harris and Waltz are emphasizing the weirdness of Trump and Vance, but I wish they (and the other Democrats) would give it a rest. I’m weird. I have been weird all my life. I feel somewhat diminished when the Dems harp on how weird Trump and Vance are (especially Vance. The word you’re looking for there is ‘creepy’). And I get it. It’s pushback on Trump and Vance (and the Republicans in general) trying to portray Harris and Waltz as weird. Which the Republicans have been doing ever since I started following politics. Trying to portray the Dems as out-of-touch, elite, limosuine liberals, etc. Weird, though, is a new-ish one. Yes, they pulled it first on Harris and Waltz.


So I get it. And it’s a smart choice. Doesn’t mean it’s not alienating. I have been a weirdo all my life. I don’t want to have to give that up, damn it. Even clarifying good weird and bad weird doesn’t really sit right with me. Yes, it’s a small thing, but i’s emblematic of what it’s like to be in the minority in almost every category.

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Hidden disabilities are insidious

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I’ve been playing Elden Ring (as I do) as a dex build. In my decade+ years of playing FromSoft games, I have never played a dex build or even a hybrid dex build. The reason is pretty prosaic: I’m shit at them. I have tried, mind you. Oh, I have tried. It ends with me either abandonning the run or adding other aspects (usually magicks) until the build could not be considered a dex build.

I will be controversial about it. I don’t like the katanas in the games. At all. One amendment. The great katanas in the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC were cool, but they’re more greatswords than katanas. I don’t know why I’m not more enamored of them, but I have tried them in almost every game. I have used Rivern of Blood in Elden Ring, but that’s more for the Skill (Corpse Piler) than the weapon itself.

I have tried to do a dex build in Elden Ring, starting as a samurai. I abandonned that because it got frustrating. This time, I started as a vagabond with two scimitars. I have said many times that one of the reasons I don’t do dex is beacuse you’re expected to play without a shield. Then again, most people seem to play caster without a shield as welll. One reason I don’t like Bloodborne is because there are no shields in it. Well, there is one, but it’s a joke shield.

I have tried. I really have. Playing without a shield, I mean. I’m so glued to my shield, it’s embarrassing. I hold it up way too much. There are times when I realize that I haven’t lowered it in literal minutes. I decided with the vagabond to see how long I could go without using a shield. I struggled from the get-go, but I managed to limp along. You probably won’t be surprised to find out that hitting fast and furious does a sick amount of damage. I power-stanced two daggers (including the blood-letting reduvia) for a bit, which was fun. But I never really got the hang of it.

Then I switched to the halberd+8 that Edgar gives you (after he invades you), infusing it with either Hoarfrost Stomp or Sacred Blade, depending on the situation. For the first time, I’m actually using holy on the undead so they don’t come back–and to deal massive damage to the undead who don’t revive. I will say, it makes a huge difference. I may keep upgrading this weapon specifically for this purpose.

Then I got the Bloodhound’s Fang, which is the classic dex weapon in the base game of this game. Many YouTubers use it for the whole game whereas other YouTubers declare it cheese/pussying out/making it too easy. You know how I feel about this by now. It’s in the fucking game. It’s legit. Period. End of.

Someone in the RKG Discord (on the way FromSoft keeps nerfing anything considered too OP): Who cares if a weapon/incantation/spell is too OP? Why not let people be OP if they want?


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Neurodiversity and me, part six

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In yesterday’s post, I was musing about not even considering that I might be autistic. Plus a bunch of other things, too. I was saying how because of the norm being so engrained (and pushed), you can’t even see that there might be something else. Social skills? Of course everyone knows that when someone asks you how you are, you’re supposed to say ‘fine’. That’s just, like, you need to know it by osmosis!

Side note: So many of the things we think are normal or natural really aren’t. I see it on Ask A Manager when someone who was either in retail or in a blue collar job starts working in an office job. So many of the things that the commenters take for normal are questioned–and when you get down to it, there really is a lot of things in the white collar world that don’t make sense.

Things like why is it better to be salaried rather than hourly (in general, it’s not, but it benefits the employer to say it is). Things like what to wear to the office (there was a rousing debate recently as to whether not wearing a bra in the office is unprofessional for women), do you have to join in on after-work activities? (Depends on the office), etc. It’s a lot to think about, and it’s hard because it differs from office to office.

Same with culture in general. Cultural norms in the Midwest is much different than cultural norms in the Northeast, for example. Or New York. In New York, the culture is to be direct and forthright. In Minnesota, it’s to be the exact opposite. There’s a reason what we do is called ‘Minnesota Nice’. It’s because we are so very nice to your face and then tear you apart behind your back. Not really the second part, but the first part is true. Nice to your face regardless of how we feel about you.

When it comes to being neuroatypical, so much of it is couched in negatives. Meaning, that the person who is neuroatypical is deficient in some ways. Not reading social cues is considered a negative. Being obessesd with one thing. Not making eye contact. The stimming.

I mentioned in the last post that I don’t care about things like wearing makeup, fashion, etc. I also don’t care if people care that I don’t care. What I do care about, however, is maknig people feel heard. That’s because of my upbringing, and it’s not something I’ve had success in getting rid of. Mitigating? Somewhat. But also, I’ve learned to not care while performing caring. I mean, I’ve always just been performing caring, but now, I can not care about it as I do it–more so than before.


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A letter to my younger self, part two

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In yesterday’s post, I was talking about how I had so much sympathy for Mini-Minna and all she went through. I don’t know when I went from actively hating her to feeling sympathy for her to wanting to protect her. I will say that it started with Taiji, probably, because everything good that I’ve done/thought/believed started with Taiji.

Side note: I will never stop saying how Taiji has saved my life. But, more than that, it has given me self-confidence, assurance that I deserve to live, grudging acceptance of my body, and more. It has also given me a love for Taiji weapons that I did not know existed deep within me. It has made me more comfortable in my body, and I’m better able not to hurt myself when I trip/fall/runt into things, etc.

Taiji helped me with my personal relationships, especially with my parents. I was more able to deal with them and not blow up or want to throw myself into the ocean. Believe me when I say that this is a vast improvement from my first twenty years.

Here’s the thing about Taiji. Hopefully, I will never have to use it for its intended purpose–which is self-defense. Despite what Westerners want to believe about it, it is a martial art that can be used for combat.

Side note to the side note: When I used to frequent Twitter, I would wax rhapsodic about Taiji weapons. I would get a markedly different response from men and women (yes, this was specific to people of the binary). Men would tell me how hot it was and want to mention Kill Bill and similar films. Women, on the other hand, would recoil from it and scold me for doing something ‘violent’. The former response, sadly, was not unexpected, and it’s something I could ignore. The latter was from women I respected, so I would actually try to engage with them.

I tried to explain that it wasn’t that I was violent–at all. And that while they were weapons, it was still Taiji. It did not matter. One was so disappointed in me! I felt bad about that, but at the same time, that was more about her than about me.

Side note to the side note to the side note: One thing my teacher and I talk about is how different men and womn (yes, the binary again) are raised in this world. And how that affects their approach to Taiji. Men are taught to be alpha, aggressive, and dominant (in the real world). When they try Taiji, they have to be told to relax and go softer, as it were.


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When I am the monarch, part five

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I’ve been musing about how I would order the world once I am in charge of it. Which will be never, by the way. Yesterday, I veered into family dysfunction and empathy, which were related (hah), but not the main point I wanted to talk about.

In my ideal world or my diversity town, I would come up with a way to show people how they are privileged. I mean, that’s the whole point of diversity town. For those in a position of privilege to realize that what they consider normal is, in fact, privilege.

One thing I remember was being in a diversity training (not as the trainer) in which we were talking about how people of minority are treated on the daily. Microtrangressions, if you will. I mentioned being followed in stores plus other microtransgressions, and several white people tried to argue each incident and why it might not be racism.

One incident I mentioned was that at the Cubs I’ve been going to for all my life, I was once asked to show identification when writing a check (yes, this was in the Stone Ages), and I watched the next several people after me check out. One, a white woman, wrote a check, and she was not asked to show ID. Yes, I made sure to test this because I wanted to make sure the hunch I had was right. I wasn’t going to do anything about it, but I needed to check it for my own sanity.

In the training, a white woman trotted out the tired excuse that maybe the checker was having a bad day or maybe she was checking everyone. I mentioned that I had watched her NOT check a white woman, which shut down that vein of conversation. While maybe the checker was having a rough day, it’s not a coincidence that she chose the Asian person to exert a bit of power on. As I said, I had been shopping there for several decades and had never been asked for my ID before. It was racism, pure and simple.

One thing that is so frustrating about any ism is when a person of the majority simply will not believe the words of the minority. I am not saying never to question someone who is speakng on the topic, but the first thing a non-minority person should do is listen. This is something that is emphasized more these days, much to my appreciation.

Still.


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In an ideal world (hidden disabilities, part seven)

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In yesterday’s post, I started talking about the minority town I would build as a way to improve DEI. More to the point, it would be to let people in the majority expeience what it’s like to be in the minority. None of the truly cruel stuff like physical attacks or sustained emotional harassment because that’s not ethical or moral. More to the point, I most emphatically want anyone to experience that.

Except. The problem is that for many people, it’s not possible to truly empathize with someone until you actually go through what they did. There’s a mystery book I read several decades ago in which the female protagonist was a cop. Her boyfriend was also a cop. One side plot was that her boyfriand had to go out on a case of a woman being mugged at midnight. He came back and said that she should not have been jogging at midnight, which really got under the woman’s skin.

Putting aside whether anyone should be running at midnight, the boyfriend had been implying that a woman specifically should not be running alone at midnight. This was in the ninties or the early aughts, so it wsa quite a feminist statement that the womna decided not to stand for it.

Her boyfriend had a little garden in the front yard that he was meticulous about. Or lawn. The details are fuzzy, but the main gist is that the woman started messing with the garden–pulling up flowers and things like that. The guy lost his mind and started plotting how to catch who was doing it.

She confessed after a week or so, and he was furious. She explained her thinking, which was that she wanted to give him a taste of what women had to go through all the time (constantly being vigilant about all the things that could happen).

I’m explaining it terribly, but it made sense to me. I appreciated it at a time when women were given a long list of things that they should and shouldn’t do. It becomes second nature. Some of it is reasonable for anyone (giving the name and number of a first date to your bestie, for example), but is overly emphasized for women.

When I think about my mythical town, I immediately run into problems. It’s easy to say that it’s for cishet white men (to have the ‘experience’), but what about, say, cis gay white men? Many of them are almost as privileged as cishet white men, and they have many of the same blind spots. If they are middle/upper middle class, that is.

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Hidden disabilities and me, part five

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In yesterday’s post, I talked more about the medical model of ‘fix the broken thing’. I also ranted about a variety of things as is my wont; now, I’d like to actually talk about the social model of disability. Or not. We’ll see where my brain goes.

The basic premise is that it’s not the person who’s wrong, but the society. Or rather, our society is set up for ‘normal’ people. In many different ways, but in this case, let’s give a ‘for an example’. Let’s talk about time. Most jobs are 9-to-5, if not earlier.

Side note (but a related one for once): I have recently learned of a disorder called Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome (DSPS) in which people affected can’t consistently go to bed at a ‘normal’ time. 2 hours or more than the recommended/normal/randomly chosen time to go to bed. It’s fascinating because one of the suggestions for adjusting your schedule to a more ‘normal’ one is to push your sleep schedule forward/ahead an hour at a time.

Let’s say you go to bed at 3 a.m. normally. The old advice would be two go to bet at 2 a.m. until you get used to it, then 1 a.m., etc., until you get to the desired time. I have tried that. A few nights of fucking that up and it’s back to the old time again.

The suggestion I mentioned was to go to bed at 3 a.m. for a few nights, then 4 a.m., then continue that until you get to the desired time in the opposite direction. I have not tried that, and it’s so involved. It would take months to do that.

I have a wild third option. What if we, hear me out, allow people to follow their natural biorhythms? Outrageous, I know! Acutally letting people sleep at a time that’s good for them? How dare I? Look. I know that there are reasons for business hours being what they are. Well, no. I don’t, actually. I mean, I know that it’s ‘always been this way’ (yeah, right) and that there is some sense to getting it done first so you can have time afterwards for personal life.

But I just don’t function at eight in the morning. I am at my best at two in the morning, which is not normal at all. After my medical crisis, I did sleep from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. for a year. That was a magical time, honestly.

It’s not me, though. My sleep schedule started sliding back to what it had been before (4 a.m. to 12 p.m., basically), even though I tried to ffight it. I’m struggling with it again now. I’ve gotten it to 3 a.m. to 11 a.m., but it keeps bumping towards later.

My best thinking time is when the rest of the world is asleep. That’s when I feel the most alive, when my brain is the sharpest, and I am at one with the universe.


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Hidden (and undiagnosed) disabilities and me, part two

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So, in yesterday’s post, I was musing about growing up with hidden disabilities. Well, presumed because I haven’t been tested for them. And I mentioned in the last post that I was scolded for not paying attention to what I was doing as I was doing it (as a kid). I absorbed that I was clumsy, ungraceful, and a dolt. Even though I did several different physical things with dexterity (including ping-pong, tennis, volleyball, dancing (tap, jazz, ballet), playing the cello, just as a few examples), I still felt like a total clutz.

In talking with a friend about various neurospicy issues, she said that many people with neurodiversity issues feel that way (that there is something wrong with them). I knew that ,but it’s hard to personalize it. What I mean is that if someone else said that they felt that way, I would sympathize and bolster them as much as possible. I don’t think someone should feel bad about neurospicy.

But. And of course there’s a but. I didn’t feel that way about myself. In part because I did not know that I was neurodivergent. Or rather, I knew my brain didn’t think the way other brains thought. That was pretty obvious. When I was a kid, however, I just thought there was something fundamentally wrong with me. Oh, and my family. Not in the dysfunctionla sense, but because we were Taiwanese in a very lily-white area.

I felt like an alien. I had no idea how to act around other kids. It was partly the very isolating Taiwanese Christian family, but it was also just…I did not think the way other kids did. I didn’t care about what they cared about, so I spent most of my time lost in the worlds of books. That was my safe space, and I read almost every moment I wasn’t in school.

I read as I walked, too, which contributed to me thinking I was clumsy. But, see, I had to occupy my mind in order for it not to be flooded with bad thoughts. It kept the demons at bay, if only just. I was deeply unhappy as a kid and wanted to be dead. I just did not want to be alive. I had a mental breakdown when I was in college, but managed to fight my way through it. Not well, and it left me but a husk, but I scraped by. I garduated magna cum laude, but that was just because school was easy for me–and somewhat of a a safe space. Meaning, I liked learning. It was one way to keep my mind occupied. So that was almost cheating for me. School, I mean. I put in about a fourth of the effort of my classmates and managed to get mostly As, regardless.

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Hidden (and undiagnosed) disabilities and me

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I’ve been playing Have a Nice Death (Magic Design Studios) daily on easy mode, and I still can’t beat the game. There are like half the enemies with less health and they do less moves.  Same with the bosses. And I still can’t beat the goddamn game. I can get through the first three worlds easy-breezy (well, mostly so, depending on what items I have–and we’ll get to that later (or not because that’s not the point of this post)), and then the fourth world presses me before the boss utterly destroys me. By the time I get to the final area (I think? Who knows? I have not got past the penultimate boss yet), I’m worn down.

Here’s what I noticed. This is a roguelike-lite that depends a great deal on twitch responses. And coordinated responses. Neither of which I’m good at. There is a thing in the last area in which you have to jump up disappearing platforms and then jump through narrow slits that have spikes pointing out. I can’t do it. I don’t mean I won’t do it, but I literally can’t. My brain just won’t process it in real time. So the second time I went into this area, I had full health and all my heals (three ‘big’ ones). I had to do a section like this to get to the mini-boss before the big boss. By the time I got to the mini-boss, I had no heals left because I used them up on the fucking disappearing platforms/spiky slits bullshit.

This is when I had it confirmed for me that things that I have thought of as minor inconveniences were actually probably hidden disabilities that I had never had diagnosed. I am not faulting my mother for this because, I mean, these kinds of things aren’t even dealt with well in our time now, let alone forty to fifty years ago. Also, I don’t even know what exactly this would be. I was talking about it with a friend, and she mentioned dyspraxia when I said I was clumsy. After looking it up, I didn’t think that was what it was, exactly. This was in a conversation about me tripping on things and knocking things over.

From what I’ve read, dyspraxia is about poor physical coordination and not being able to do physical things well that other people can do, two-handed things like playing an instrument or not being able to type well. Hm. I’m reading more now and there’s a section on perception that really rang true for me. Sensitivity to light/sound/touch, not being able to gauge distances correctly, etc. The latter has only gotten worse after my physical crisis, by the way.

I’ll have to read more into dyspraxia. Maybe it will help me deal with the problem. Additionally, it’s comforting to know that maybe it’s not just me being a clumsy oaf (which was my friend’s point), but an actual thing. This, by the way, is what I like best about diagnoses–it’s a way to say, “It’s not you being clumsy or not paying attention–it’s your brain.” Or more to the point, my DNA.

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Hidden disabilities are, well, hidden

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I’m on the last bit of Stray (BlueTwelve Studio), and I have mostly enjoyed my time being a cat. They have captured accurately the feeling of being a cat, I think, and I love that you can just take the time to sharpen your claws, lap water from a puddle, or curl up in a ball and snooze. You can also have a few specific NPCs pet you, which is really sweet.

I almost quit the game, though. I’ll tell you why. I mentioned in the last post about my difficulty collecting the things I needed to make progress. I finally realized I had been in both places before, but I just hadn’t looked around thoroughly enough. In one case, the item was under a mess of papers on the floor, which means I didn’t push them around enough to find it. In the second case, it was that I missed the safe that was nestled on the bookshelves. I had the keys, but I had forgotten about it when I didn’t find the safe during my first walkaround.

I could say this is my fault for not looking closely enough, but it’s not completely my fault. I have spatial issues and the camera controls aren’t terrific. Or rather, it’s easy to miss cues if you swing the camera around too quickly. In addition, it’s not always clear why you can jump on one ledge and not another. It’s frustrating and I wasted hours trying to find these two items.

It’s somewhat on me because I could have just looked it up, but I didn’t want to. My brain was like, “YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO FIND THIS YOURSELF, YOU DOLT!” When a game is cozy, I feel extra pressure to figure it out myself. That’s just from me, though. It’s not as if anyone is saying, “Do this yourself, numbnuts.” That is what my brain is telling me, though. “Why are you finding this so hard? Anyone can do this!” I know that’s what people with disabilities are made to feel, and I have to say, it’s corrosive.

I know it’s me a lot of the time. Rather, I know it’s my issue and not the game. Just like my shitty reflexes (we’ll get to that in a second) is me. I try to keep my mouth shut about it, but it makes my enjoyment of a game really take a nosedive if I can’t find a way around it.


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