Hi. Name's Alex. He/him/they/them.
I have Autism. I'm excellent at math and science, kinda good at psychology (because of its scientific nature), and relatively savvy at memorizing random vocabulary words and diagramming sentences. (Pretty much, I made high grades on my tests in school.)
Unfortunately, that seems to be all I'm really good at though.
I am quite verbal and well-spoken: the verbal part, however, is mutually exclusive of the well-spoken part, and when under duress, I can hardly verbalize at all...
I am an introvert, who enjoys playing classic Rare Ltd. games (aka Rareware), and loves Dragon Ball (Z/Super, as well as the original, where Goku was still a kid).
Sadly, that is where my actual personality kinda ends... other than that, I am a boring, moody, nerdy vegan. It is because of this, as well as depression/low self-esteem, and because of pretty bad social anxiety, that I grew up with no friends.
Luckily for me, being semi-verbal was more than good enough for my ex-neighbor's feral flock of chickens, and their body language is extremely easy to read. I had to regulate the "aggressive" parts of my moods, in order to be able to get closer to the chickens, which helped me tremendously with mood regulation. These "feathered neighborhood friends, and their growing families", as I used to always call them, also helped me with social anxiety: it was like being surrounded by a village of tiny highly-intelligent nonverbal/semi-verbal people, who were covered in feathers, and I was revered as a king (partly due to my size, of course), and did not feel anxiety in the least...
As strange as this may sound, when I was 11, my mawmaw got really sick. My parents worked all the time, my mom came home dead tired and had no energy to raise me, and my dad was addicted to the television (and was quite annoying on the rare occasion he did interact with me: he acted more like a kid brother than a dad.)
Because I was more or less a virtual orphan, a small broody mama hen took me "under her wing" and helped raise me. (At least in the familial/emotional sense.)
Growing up, I caught on rather quickly of their social hierarchy (perhaps the only social skills I had at the time...), and often referred to roosters as "kings", and the top-ranking mama hens, were... mama hens. (The way I used the term, however, it was clear that the "Mama Hen" title was used as a royal title, as well as to signify she was the head of her "household"/family. More or less, it meant she was not only a king, but a very good mother with a large family. This perhaps had even more prestige than the "King" title.)
Over time, I also came to refer to the families as my own family members. "Little Ann" was my (adopted) mom, Brad was my (adopted) son... etc.
Each hen had her own last name, and all her babies inherited the family name. Her girls would someday pass on the family name to their own kids as well...
Being socialized by chickens, the first meat to leave my diet, obviously, was chicken, followed closely by turkey. Red meat soon followed, because it made me feel sick. Fish was last, meat-wise, because I felt I needed the nutrition (My parents were the "meat with every meal" type, and my dad didn't even believe fruits and vegetables were even "real food"...)
To this day, my social skills suck. Not nearly as bad as my mom's, however, and I try my hardest to have a better personality than my dad (and hopefully not be as obnoxious, and intolerant of other beliefs...).
But what progress I have made so far, I can directly attribute most of it, to my ex-neighbor's feral chicken flock, that resided in a tree in my parents back yard.
I have Autism. I'm excellent at math and science, kinda good at psychology (because of its scientific nature), and relatively savvy at memorizing random vocabulary words and diagramming sentences. (Pretty much, I made high grades on my tests in school.)
Unfortunately, that seems to be all I'm really good at though.
I am quite verbal and well-spoken: the verbal part, however, is mutually exclusive of the well-spoken part, and when under duress, I can hardly verbalize at all...
I am an introvert, who enjoys playing classic Rare Ltd. games (aka Rareware), and loves Dragon Ball (Z/Super, as well as the original, where Goku was still a kid).
Sadly, that is where my actual personality kinda ends... other than that, I am a boring, moody, nerdy vegan. It is because of this, as well as depression/low self-esteem, and because of pretty bad social anxiety, that I grew up with no friends.
Luckily for me, being semi-verbal was more than good enough for my ex-neighbor's feral flock of chickens, and their body language is extremely easy to read. I had to regulate the "aggressive" parts of my moods, in order to be able to get closer to the chickens, which helped me tremendously with mood regulation. These "feathered neighborhood friends, and their growing families", as I used to always call them, also helped me with social anxiety: it was like being surrounded by a village of tiny highly-intelligent nonverbal/semi-verbal people, who were covered in feathers, and I was revered as a king (partly due to my size, of course), and did not feel anxiety in the least...
As strange as this may sound, when I was 11, my mawmaw got really sick. My parents worked all the time, my mom came home dead tired and had no energy to raise me, and my dad was addicted to the television (and was quite annoying on the rare occasion he did interact with me: he acted more like a kid brother than a dad.)
Because I was more or less a virtual orphan, a small broody mama hen took me "under her wing" and helped raise me. (At least in the familial/emotional sense.)
Growing up, I caught on rather quickly of their social hierarchy (perhaps the only social skills I had at the time...), and often referred to roosters as "kings", and the top-ranking mama hens, were... mama hens. (The way I used the term, however, it was clear that the "Mama Hen" title was used as a royal title, as well as to signify she was the head of her "household"/family. More or less, it meant she was not only a king, but a very good mother with a large family. This perhaps had even more prestige than the "King" title.)
Over time, I also came to refer to the families as my own family members. "Little Ann" was my (adopted) mom, Brad was my (adopted) son... etc.
Each hen had her own last name, and all her babies inherited the family name. Her girls would someday pass on the family name to their own kids as well...
Being socialized by chickens, the first meat to leave my diet, obviously, was chicken, followed closely by turkey. Red meat soon followed, because it made me feel sick. Fish was last, meat-wise, because I felt I needed the nutrition (My parents were the "meat with every meal" type, and my dad didn't even believe fruits and vegetables were even "real food"...)
To this day, my social skills suck. Not nearly as bad as my mom's, however, and I try my hardest to have a better personality than my dad (and hopefully not be as obnoxious, and intolerant of other beliefs...).
But what progress I have made so far, I can directly attribute most of it, to my ex-neighbor's feral chicken flock, that resided in a tree in my parents back yard.
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