Is it easy to change my routine? See for yourself

This is what it feels like for me (an autistic person) to change my routine or add to my routine.

Reality to an autistic person is a confusing, interacting mass of events, people, places, sounds and sights... Set routines, times, particular routes and rituals all help to get order into an unbearably chaotic life. Trying to keep everything the same reduces some of the terrible fear. Jolliffe (1992) in Howlin (2004), p.137

Also-

Routines play an important role in the lives of people with autism. The everyday hustle and bustle that most people view as normal can be an overwhelming combination of frightening crowds, intimidating sounds and overbearing lights for people with autism. Routines help to create stability and order. 

People with autism quickly learn routines and are naturally motivated to repeat them. If the steps in a routine are presented with a clear beginning and end, the total routine is often learned quickly. Since people with autism are naturally motivated to repeat routines, the completion of the routine is in itself reinforcing. This includes daily, weekly, monthly and annual routines, as well as structuring tasks as consistent routines. 

A reliance on routine to provide certainty in the lives of people with an autism can potentially lead to their behaviour becoming ritualistic and obsessively rigid. This may be most evident during times of change or disturbance. If this occurs it is possible to support people away from this behaviour towards a more balanced approach to routine.

So anyway, there you go. A visual for you

In praise of habits

I like habit. Routine I guess is closer to the truth. Doing the same things day after day and week after week is like a security blanket that wraps around you and warms you as it enfolds you in security. Not that I dislike change, or spontaneity or adventure. Insouciance has attractions as well. But the careful scripting of my days as they roll one into another has an attractiveness that I find compelling. I like knowing that on Friday afternoons I will be at the County Library, browsing the new bookshelf in anticipation of good reads over the weekend. I like knowing that at 10:30 am on Saturday mornings, my laundry will be hanging on the line, waving in the light breeze, and that immediately after hanging them I will check the progress of the figs on the fig tree. I like knowing that on Sunday mornings at 10:50 I will be speaking to my Sunday School class about the previous week's prophecy indicators. I like knowing that on Monday morning I will be driving to Danielsville Elementary School with coffee cup in hand and Gregorian chants on the CD,  then working with children.

The springtime routine is wonderful to behold. The buds, then the flowers, then the fruits; the grass growing then cut, growing then cut; all beautiful to watch and take part in. God established a routine in the seasons and the tides and the weather that is a comfort and brings not only a sense of peace, but renewal.

Child care specialists (including parents!) know that establishing a routine for their children is utmost for creating a sense of peace and stability. I don't think that feeling of needing peace and stability through routine goes away as adults. And as adults we can also intuit when a routine has become a rut, and break out of it when we need to. But for now, my weekly routine is  working for me, and I am glad.

Magnolias are blooming.

Robins are hatching.

Figs are ripening.

Flower baskets are swinging.

"Amazingly consistent"

I went to the Electric Office to pay my power bill. I like that the local utility has an office in town, so I try paying in person rather than electronic pay or snail mail. I asked the lady to show me my bill history and it was the same throughout the months, even over the year. Almost exactly the same. She looked at me, smiling, and said, "You are amazingly consistent."

"I am amazingly frugal," I said, and we both laughed.

I got to thinking about consistency. I AM consistent. I like routine. It is comforting to know ahead of time what I am going to do and where I'll be. I get up between 6:15 and 6:29am, do the same morning tasks, complete a devotional, and go to work. Each day I arrive home at nearly the same time, have tea, read my bible, and begin research for my blog and for my e-mail newsletter, and I write, write, write. I watch the same two or three television shows (Supernanny, Touched by and Angel, and either Top Chef or Real Estate Intervention), and then I go to bed. On Fridays, I don't go straight home but I stop at the library to get a new slew of books for the weekend and week ahead.

Recognizing that routine can easily veer into a rut, I decided that I would shake myself up. No ruts for me! So I went to the Library on Thursday, I did my dishes on Friday, and on Saturday, I will make cranberry-oatmeal muffins instead of blueberry. Maybe, if  I'm feeling wild, my weekly pot of soup will have a beef base instead of chicken. We'll see how it goes. There's such a thing as going TOO crazy.