Tracking My Energy Through Autistic Burnout: What I've Found So Far
So! Spoons has been officially out for around a month now. It was really exhausting getting to this point but since I have a bit of energy to write this blog post, I wanted to share my thoughts on how the quality of my life has been throughout developing Spoons, how my energy has been holding up ever since I finished, if my burnout state has even remotely gotten better ever since it started?
My Experience Developing Spoons while in Burnout
As you expected, and is a clear reality for most of us, I was very exhausted when I was working on Spoons since the reality of my current job and living with my family, there's still a large amount of sensory overload that exists despite my efforts to counter it.
I'm also strongly convinced after tracking my energy for even just a few months that not just autistic burnout, that I developed c-PTSD which I believe has been preventing my nervous system from recovering fully as well.
So another thing I have to accept for now is that my energy won't fully recover itself until I leave my family and my current job, but I'm doing the best I can until then by doing the bare minimum at work and not making small talk unless absolutely necessary.
I've been tracking my energy periodically throughout the past few months, on and off. Some days I'm too exhausted to use it consistently but the mental note it has given me in terms of patterns and data has been especially helpful.
Insights From My Own Data
Things such as:
My right eyelid specifically would twitch all throughout the day, even when indoors and not outside (Since I'm sensitive to light)
-> Outcome after realizing this and aggressively wearing light sensitivity glasses every time I go to work and outside (Has gone down significantly. There's still some frequent twitching sometimes, but it's far less intense than it was before. This was something that was really bothering me and made it hard for me to focus.)
- My phone constantly vibrating via notifications from addicting apps such as YouTube, Gmail, and even my fitness app such as Garmin Connect.
-> Outcome after switching to flip phone most of the time, with occasional phone usage: Far less draining simply due to the fact I keep less apps on my alternate phone by default simply due to the fact of how draining and aggressive most notifications on my apps are.
One of the main reasons it made it blatantly obvious to never allow notifications for Spoons. From what I've noticed from the habits of most apps and even rideshare apps, they'll show notifications if I planned to place an order or ride a few minutes ago to get my attention and so on.
But at the same time, I still heavily depend on Uber and Lyft to get to work and get home, and I can't disable the notifications from the Uber Eats part of the Uber app etc. without disabling all of them entirely, which is a stressful cognitive load especially as I need to check when my ride will get here on time, but isn't super annoying.
Also the task switching of these apps from one to another is something I subtly noticed? Not very strongly, but after switching from app to app especially in the context of chatting with friends it was draining my energy quite fast. So rocking a flip phone (At least as much as I possibly can since I simply cannot use a flip phone as my only device due to having to rely on rideshare) is both very motivating and far less exhausting for me most of the time, since there's no:
- Internet
- Social Media
- Browser
- Navigation
- GPS
Most of the things that make a phone addicting by default were largely cut off, but could still be accessible on my other phone that I'm using for Spoons most of the time, so I had to be careful!
As you can see on the screenshot below, my average energy from the past 7 days and past month has mostly remained at 2.
Showing weekly and monthly average energy data, with energy currently at 1.
Occasionally I'm at a 3 or 4 at some periods after stimming for a while or sensory overload at home is really low, but most of the time, my stamina to work or really engage in anything that demands a lot of brainpower from me can only be sustained for around 1-2 hours before my energy drops here, which is where I stop immediately.
Conclusion: Thoughts & Future Plans
I have found Spoons personally for me to be a modest help towards using a subtle personal marker on not only how my energy is currently holding up right now, so I can be more patient and pace myself more often especially to minimize meltdowns, but to see how my habits (Especially subtle ones like masking that I still often do subconsciously sometimes) stack up over time, without having to think about every single thing throughout my day.
I can just take a few seconds to log it and then come back later in the week and gently reflect on it and see if there's any more unnecessary drains I need to remove, if I can.
I have also updated Spoons a few times, fixing a few bugs but mostly to fix clarity issues and recently added the weekly and monthly average for better comparison on how my short and long term habits are positively or negatively benefitting my energy, and stuff like that. Just to make noticing patterns easier without increasing the cognitive energy to do so.
Also the Diagnosis Funding Mission for Spoons is something I'm still very excited for, but requires a lot of planning on my end such as global diagnosis cost amounts, the structure of how it is going to work and flow nicely without being draining etc.
So I've been trying to be very patient and as conservative as possible. Mostly baby steps especially since my energy constraints are still kicking my butt as of right now.
Note: I'm sharing my personal experience as an autistic adult, not medical advice. If you're experiencing severe burnout or crisis, please consult a healthcare provider familiar with autism.