Hey it's tay with Mom on the Spectrum and today we're talking about boundaries
and how they can help us avoid autistic meltdowns and shutdowns.
Boundaries can be a scary word. A lot of people are very uncomfortable with boundaries.
Setting boundaries is maybe one of the most important things for your relationships
and for your relationship with yourself. Women, a lot of times are raised to be nurturers,
caregivers, to take care of everybody's needs which can be a really wonderful thing but a lot of times
it's at the expense of the self. I'm learning that not setting boundaries in combination
with autism, it's a really really challenging combination that can oftentimes result in burnout,
meltdowns, shutdowns, all of the above. What are meltdowns versus shutdowns? Different
people have different definitions. For me an autistic meltdown is when I'm not listening
to my sensory needs and I keep going and keep going and keep going until I get so frustrated
that I just start feeling kind of panicky, I get really irritable and it's almost just like kind
of this wall of silence comes over me and I'm just kind of done. I don't want to talk, I don't
want to do anything. My mood seems to have changed really quick to the people around me. So for me a
meltdown is a result of me not listening to my sensory cues when things are too loud or I've
been too busy, I've been in social situations too much. A shutdown is when I push past the meltdown
and wear myself out to the point that I have to have some serious recovery time. A shutdown can
happen for me if I'm not sleeping very well and I just keep running on fumes and I don't recharge.
Eventually it leads to a shutdown where I just want to cancel everything on my calendar. So for me
a meltdown versus a shutdown... A meltdown is shorter, a shutdown is longer. The meltdown is usually for
me, more so a result of sensory overwhelm that I didn't respond quick enough to. A shutdown is
more of kind of like an overall power down. I've realized that setting boundaries is crucial for
avoiding meltdowns and shutdowns. One relationship that I'm really learning how to foster, maybe for
the first time in my life, is my relationship with myself, which might sound kind of weird or cheesy
but think about this: if you don't feel safe with yourself, like if you don't feel
you can trust yourself to only put yourself in environments where you feel safe and protected,
then where else are you gonna feel safe? If you don't trust yourself to set a boundary, let's say
your friends are having a party and it's a loud party and there's some people there who make you
uncomfortable, and you don't feel like you can say no, what you're telling yourself is I'm gonna put
you in a situation where you feel uncomfortable or you feel overwhelmed and I'm not really gonna
give you an option other than to go. Think about the relationship that you have with
yourself and the things that you make yourself do without considering what you really need. It's
especially hard for people on the spectrum... for females on the spectrum who have gotten used to
social cues and social routines in order to make other people feel seen and appreciated. It's almost...
we go on autopilot and think about what we can do to make the other person feel seen, and so
a lot of times that means saying yes and we'd rather say no. But i want to challenge that idea
and just say that our body knows a whole lot more than we think it does, and when we start
paying attention to those really subtle clues about being overwhelmed or those subtle clues
about when we need down time or when we need to say no to a social activity or no to taking on
an extra project at work... being able to listen to that and not talk yourself out of that need. Hannah
Gadsby has a great line, I'm gonna have to find... To paraphrase Hannah Gadsby, she kept trying to find a
way to start at the normal starting line and she realized one day that there was no way she would
ever start at the normal starting line because that wasn't her starting line. She says it better
a little differently than I did but it just is... you know once we realize that we don't have to say
yes to as many social engagements as other people do, we don't have to say yes to as many different
work-related functions as other people do, and I think the sooner that we can accept that our
starting line of normal is different than others, it gives us a lot more freedom and flexibility to be
able to define the things that we say yes to. And that's where it gets really fun. You can start
saying yes to the things that you want more of in your life. What i'm finding is that I actually
have a whole lot more power than I realized I did to shape and sculpt my life. It just means
that i have to say "no" more often than I used to, and at first I was very scared of that word.
You may have heard the the phrase "No is a complete sentence." That's very true and that
that idea was scary to me but I've since gotten a lot of practice in saying it. That word is very
empowering. You don't have to have an excuse for why you say no, you don't have to have a good reason...
Sometimes your reason internally could just be that you need to chill on the couch and
watch Netflix. I think that's a great reason, especially for an autistic person who might have
had a big day, might have sensory overwhelm, and the best way that you can show yourself care and
love is to lay on the couch or take a bath. And so you say "no" to a party even if it's a once a year
party, whatever. You don't have to have a reason and "no" is a really great response. And we can work on
saying it with kindness and respect but just work on saying it in general because I think it's so so
important. I've noticed this in my life where I'll have a plan and I'm noticing that I can handle way
fewer social events than I thought originally. I follow Alexandra Pearson on Tik Tok sometimes.
I think she had said in one of her videos that she limits herself to one social engagement a week and
I was like "oh my gosh that sounds amazing." As a mom I think it's really hard to stick to that because
we also have social engagements for our kids... complicates things. Since I heard her say that
and be brave in saying one social engagement a week, I too have kind of considered, okay like maybe
just having one thing on the calendar is all that I need to have on the calendar and that's been
really liberating for me. But let's say I have a plan on the calendar and that day is crazy. I
didn't sleep well the night before. I forgot to eat lunch. I'm irritable. I forgot to eat lunch?
I don't forget to eat lunch. Different example. The kids woke up on the wrong side of the bed and it's
just been a hard day. It's totally within my power and my choice to say "no" to the event. So I think
just kind of waking up to that idea that you do have power over what you give your energy to and
I think that's especially important for autistic people to realize because we especially have to
be careful about how we manage our energy. So much of our energy I think goes towards navigating the
ins and outs of our daily routine and daily social interactions that we really might need to conserve
more energy than other people. Brene Brown has this quote... I think she said she actually heard it
somewhere else years earlier before she used it, but she says, "Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind." She
said, "I saw the data about how most of us avoid clarity because we tell ourselves that we're
being kind when what we're actually doing is being unkind and unfair." I feel like I can relate to that
on the flip side and maybe this is an autistic thing too, but when someone is clear with me
about what they want, that is a gift. That helps me know exactly what's required of me or expected of
me ,it helps me plan and helps me kind of mentally figure out my responsibilities. So if we can flip
that and realize, okay when we are clear, we're being kind to the other person as well.
Two really great resources that I want to share with you on boundaries: Number one, it's the book
called "Boundaries" by Cloud and Townsend. It's been around forever. You will probably, if you're a
used book store person like me, you'll probably find an amazingly outdated cover. There's so many
editions of it, or you can get it on Amazon, and i'll put a link in the description. "Boundaries"
is a great book and I think that it should almost be required reading for being a human.
Second, if you are on social media, Nedra Glover Tawwab. Nedra is a therapist who has an amazing social
media presence. Here's something from one of her instagram posts. "Signs That You Need Boundaries": 1. You
feel overwhelmed 2. You feel resentment towards other people asking for your help 3. You feel burnt out 4. You
frequently daydream about dropping everything and disappearing and 5. You have no time for yourself.
She's phenomenal and she just released her first book, I believe. She is like the Boundary Queen.
So if you're interested in this concept, there's actually so much to it. There's strategies for
setting boundaries, there's communication guides, because a lot of times you might find
that relationships are tricky to navigate with boundaries because people don't like it when you
set them. Be warned that people will be upset if you set boundaries. But it's just like riding a
bike. You practice it and it gets easier and easier and easier. And you start realizing, "hey, why did
I ever feel like I was responsible for managing other people's feelings?" So I just want to let you
know that you can practice it. You can get better at it, and I feel like I show up so much better for
myself and for the people around me when I know that I have enough energy to do what I'm there
to do. So if I say "yes" to a social engagement and I'm paying attention to my sensory cues and needs,
and it feels like a good thing to do, whenever I'm there I'm going to be present. I'm going to enjoy
it, and I'm going to be more myself because I know that I can trust myself to take care of myself and
to remove myself from a situation when it becomes too overwhelming. So I want to leave you with that.
Take care of yourself, foster the relationship that you have with yourself by helping yourself be able
to trust that you're going to take care of your needs. I would bet that you might notice a decrease
in your meltdowns and your shutdowns over time. Like I said, it is a practice. It does take time, it
does take patience , it does take giving yourself a lot of grace to figure out how to do this the
best way for yourself. You might say some things that upset other people. That doesn't mean you're
doing anything wrong, necessarily, it just means setting boundaries is a skill that requires
some time and effort but is highly highly worth it. I will leave the links to the resources that I
shared in the description. If you could SUBSCRIBE to my channel that would be amazing. That's the
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all it means is that you'll be updated anytime that I post a video. Alright, keep being weird.
Own your neurodiversity and I'll see everybody in the next video. Thanks for watching! Bye.