I was listening to an old Radiohead album ‘OK Computer’. And I was struck by the following lyrics:
“Karma police, arrest this man
He talks in maths, he buzzes like a fridge
He’s like a detuned radio”
Obviously, I don’t want someone arrested and nor do I talk in Maths. But the Autistic Thinking Style of Maths/Music is well documented. What does apply is the fact that with sensory overload, I do feel like I’m buzzing under my skin and over my skin. My head and body often feel like a detuned radio as I try to regulate and gain control from my sensory overload. This track is not meant as an ‘Autistic’ song, it’s about an inside joke, where if a band member did something bad, the others would threaten to call the ‘karma police’.
As I thought about some of my favourite songs, I realised that Linkin Park’s ‘Crawling’ also expressed how I feel with sensory overload. It is all consuming, it’s frightening and there’s the internal struggle to regain control between reacting and distraction techniques.
“There's something inside me that pulls beneath the surface
Consuming, confusing
This lack of self-control, I fear, is never-ending
Controlling, I can't seem
To find myself again, my walls are closing in
Without a sense of confidence
I'm convinced that there's just too much pressure to take
I've felt this way before, so insecure
Discomfort endlessly has pulled itself upon me
Distracting (distracting), reacting
Against my will, I stand beside my own reflection”
I then asked our members if anyone else had a song that resonated with them. One member talked about a song that resonated with her specifically in relation to how she feels the NHS treats her as an autistic woman. As she resonates with all the lyrics I’m not going to retype them here. Her song was “What Have They Done to My Song Ma" by Melanie Safka. This song is about how the artist feels others are treating her and her music. It’s about feeling powerlessness and questions the destructive impact of others to her artistry. Unfortunately, for this member, her experiences with the NHS have not been positive. She has felt invalidated as an autistic person as well as being a woman. Hopefully, as the Oliver McGowan training continues it’s rollout, these experiences will change.
I then started looking to see if there were actual songs about Autism. Whilst there are loads for children, for adults not so much. The main one seems to be from Rap Artist Cupcake. Again, I’m not going to copy and paste the full lyrics as the whole song is about Autism. But the chorus line does resonate:
“A unique thinking individual really matters”
My Autistic Thinking Style is verbal. (Can you tell?) But in this case, all of our Thinking Styles matter. We matter.
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