synesthesia

A quest to know myself better through synesthesia

~ Helen White ~ Leave a comment

I’m beginning to sense that in synesthesia lies the key of so many aspects of my long running chronic pain. If I could only gain a better viewpoint of what actually happens to me when I sense things, I suspect I might be able to catch a glimpse (like some sideways-on reflection of myself reflected back at me in a shop window) of some of the causative aspects of pain where no other provocation for pain seems to exist. This feels like a worthwhile line of enquiry for anyone who is neurodivergent and weary of how unusual levels of pain never seems to abate, especially as I think it is possible to have one of the less talked-about versions of synesthesia and not even realise it since it is your version of normal.

Synesthesia or salience: autism and environmental sensitivity

~ Helen White ~ Leave a comment

In the case of those of us most sensitive to environmental factors, is "weather (or whatever it is) salience" a more apt term to describe a higher degree of awareness that leaves other people wondering what on earth we are talking about and does synaesthesia sometimes get recruited by our neurodiverse brains as a means of extending the basic sensory tools so that we get to gather far more "data" from our environment in an attempt to better "systemise" our experience of the otherwise random-seeming world we live in?

Autism and feeling too much (not too little)

~ Helen White ~ Leave a comment

There are so many areas of human experience where autism is assumed to mean less than or shortfall whereas it’s often a case of more…so much more that it’s untenable and excruciating to be in the experience. Sometimes, the very appearance of so-called shortfall should prompt the question “is way too much going on in there, so much so that it can’t be handled or made sense of, can’t be articulated or processed in conventional ways?”.

Quieting the echo-effect: neuroplasticity for the very highly sensitive

~ Helen White ~ 2 Comments

Are sensory-sensitivities in autism the same as being a Highly Sensitive Person and what can you do, in either case, when your sensory experiences seem to play on loop, especially if they trigger physical symptoms? Sharing some insights as someone with both traits and ways I am starting to rewire my own highly sensitive responses.

Are you on the autism spectrum?

~ Helen White ~ 2 Comments

I’m sharing these thoughts because I’ve been swept over by a sort of epiphany that I am on the autistic spectrum and I'm by far from the only one discovering this in my 50s! The more I delve, the more I (a) discover anecdotes that sound like myself now or as a child/young adult (people … Continue reading Are you on the autism spectrum?

High-sensitivity, synesthesia…and hearing tones, seeing lights or other anomalous experiences

~ Helen White ~ 3 Comments

Some people, and I count myself among them, are prone to experiencing anomalous experiences; that is, experiences that lie outside the so-called "norm", from high-frequency "tones" ay and night to flashing "lights" and many more special effects. These count as some of the most disturbing and supposedly detrimental to quality of life of all experiences people are said to be encountering in their health today; alarming and even depressing them into states of hopelessness in many cases. Yet what if these sensations are not what they seem, via the rundamentory five-senses system we currently rely upon. What if, like the artist scrabbling for the right colour to express a brand new hue that seeks expression and having to draw on many pigments, textures, all kinds of materials mixed torgether just to get even close to an aproximation of this new "message" that is coming through, our bodies are forced to mix up all our sensory messages...yes, like synesthesia...to try and get through to us something that is just so very important...and its all for us to hear.