A Spectrum of Hyperfixations
We all have things we are obsessed with, and I have taken to the mic to share about mine! From mental health matters to fandom, the spectrum of hyperfixations can be random and unrelated because you never know what may grab your attention and refuse to let go.
Being autistic, a hyperfixation for me can last for months or just a few days. But it's not just about me. I'll be having guests on periodically to "geek out" over what their hyperfixation is so we can celebrate and embrace the things we are passionate about in the absence of judgement. You just may learn something new along the way too!
A Spectrum of Hyperfixations
Unexpected Adventure with a Colorado High
Ever wondered how a seemingly harmless medicinal gummy could lead to an unforgettable and hilariously absurd adventure? Join me as I recount the surreal experience of consuming too much weed in Colorado Springs. With intense anxiety and paranoia setting in, my friends Alexia and Maria had to step in, providing comic relief and unwavering support. We’ll revisit the bumbling journey down a curvy mountain road and the amusing antics that unfolded when Maria’s kids decided to check on me. From being buckled in like a toddler to eventually finding solace in the care of friends, this episode is filled with humor, heartfelt reflections, and the unpredictable joys of life’s unexpected moments. Tune in for a story that’s as enlightening as it is entertaining!
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Hello and welcome to another episode of A Spectrum of Hyperfixations. I'm your host, miss T, and the T today stands for tired. I honestly don't know if I've used this one before, but it's pretty accurate. After the week I've had, I currently have the house to myself. I live with my mom and she is out in California, so the doggos are alone with me this week and they are certainly missing their mama. So if you hear any potential dog noises, that is them, because I didn't want to close the door. They just they're so nervous. So we have three corgis and two cats, and the two that are quote unquote hers are Jesse James and Annie Oakley and they are just ready for their mama to come home.
Speaker 1:So let's go ahead and start off with our cheers and jeers for the week. There was not a lot of cheers, to be honest, and I guess one of them would be let's think I had one in my head before I even started oh oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. So the Ignite program started and it was fabulous. Like the first session was really great, learning the framework for one of the techniques which I actually just watched the replay and tweaked mine. I'm much more happy with it, so excited for that to have started. Also, I'm much more happy with it. So excited for that to have started. Also, I'm getting distracted because Annie and Jesse have now decided that they want to play a fight while I'm recording this, and so I hope you don't hear some dog sniffles here and there. Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness. So cheers for the week would be.
Speaker 1:I learned that my grandpa has decided to stop a dialysis. I think he only did it a couple of times. He was under the impression, though, that it was going to give back kidney function, and it's actually to just maintain it, and currently he is at 10% kidney function, and it's actually to just maintain it, and currently he is at 10% kidney function. He lives in Loveland, colorado, and so now it's just, you know, time and trying to you know think of planning an unexpected trip back to Colorado. Um, my body is already kind of remembering the trauma it felt that started two years ago.
Speaker 1:Um, because my 2022 was horrible, and it feels so reminiscent because two years ago, in September, my friend Alexia lost her mom to COVID, and I again did an unexpected trip out to Colorado to go be with her for a little bit, because they were so close and I was very worried that she was going to do something to harm herself. She was going to do something to harm herself. So, in a fun I segue saying fun when I'm talking, you know about some heavy stuff, but this I thought maybe it'd be a good time to share this funny story that happened while I was out there for my friend, and so, in September of 2022, the company that I work for and still do they got hacked. They they call it a cyber incident and, you know, chaos ensued. Nobody knew what to do. There were no policies, procedures in place of what to do.
Speaker 1:Um it, it was a lot of uh, what you call it lack of foresight, I guess, and planning, and so that was just completely stressful, because work, as everything else in my life was. Oh my gosh, can you hear them? Kids, hey, hey. Have any of you listened to kevin smith's podcast when his little dog, shecky, used to be alive? I feel like I'm kevin smith right now. Say shecky, shecky. I might legit have to kick them out. They are like so distracting, please hold so you won't hear any difference, but I had to tell them to settle down. They are still in the room. So, my goodness, these dogs. So Anyway, as I was saying, work was kind of my place to have things very routine, very structured.
Speaker 1:Kind of my place to have things very routine, very structured and coming out. Just you know, several months after being diagnosed with autism, it made a lot of sense. Why, you know, the rest of my life may feel like it's coming apart in various ways and feel very overwhelming, but work was a constant study. So to have this suddenly be like what the heck are we doing? It was a lot. It was a lot, and so I was very much looking forward to getting away for a week to go to Colorado Springs and be with my friend. So I fly to Colorado through the Denver airport and then to Colorado Springs, and it is my first time flying and staying in Colorado. So I've, you know, had connections through the Denver airport, as I'm going to California, but never actually stayed in Colorado after a flight, and I think that has a contributing factor to this story. Also, little did I know that Colorado Springs has a higher altitude than Loveland, if I'm remembering that right correctly. So I've never really experienced altitude sickness, and so that's another thing that will come into play here.
Speaker 1:So second day comes. This is when we're going to spread her mom's ashes with a friend of her mom's uh, her name is maria. So we go to maria's house and you know, weed is legal in colorado. And I had done some gummies before, liked, liked them. I've tried smoking before, hate it because I feel like I'm having a heart attack, like I'm gonna die. I need the ambulance. I'm on the floor coughing up a lung. So gummies are great. So Maria had some medicinal gummies and Alexia had explained to me that you know, these are a little more potent than what I'm, you know, accustomed to in the past.
Speaker 1:So I start with a half, as I as I usually do, to take it easy and see how it goes. We eat lunch and then, probably 30 minutes later, 45 minutes later, I'm not feeling anything. I'm like maybe let me just take the other half before we get on the road. So I take the other half. Hindsight now tells me that I was already feeling it because my choice here in judgment was very poor. So I thought, well, I can't put back half a gummy into this container because one that's gross, I don't want them. Like taking my half a gummy that I bit off of and I don't really have any pockets in my purse, it would just be hanging out in there. So let me just go ahead and take that too. So now we're up to one and a half.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we're in the car, maria's driving, we're going up to like Cheyenne Mountain and Alexia asks me at one point. She's like are you feeling anything? And I go no, well, as we get higher and higher, I'm starting to feel something. I'm starting to get that like underwater feel, if you know that where your movements are kind of slow, your body feels heavy, like I'm knowing I'm feeling it, but I'm not going to say anything because you know that's for pansies. Like I just said, I'm not feeling it and I don't want to suddenly be like, oh yeah, so we get up to the mountains. This is when. This is when I start vaguely remembering things.
Speaker 1:So we drove up to as far as we could and then we circled back around because we're looking for parking, we're looking for a nice little space. We, we find it, we park, we walk a little ways to a picnic table and it's also next to kind of like a stream area, mind you, the sun is also. It feels so close. It feels so close, so warm and I'm kind of starting to have some trouble. So we sit at the picnic table and they get out their necklaces that they were going to put some of her mom's ashes in and then we were going to spread some.
Speaker 1:So I remember her, like Alexia, asking me if I can help her open something, and I remember barely being able to see what she's handing to me. Um, I'm starting to feel nauseous, I'm starting to feel panicky because I'm like I feel like I'm going to have some issues coming out both ends. There's no privacy. What am I going to do? I just met this lady too, maria, and I don't want to book like a crazy fool in front of this person that I just like barely met, right.
Speaker 1:So at one point I finally just had say like I don't feel so good, and Alexia tells me that, or they both tell me that I looked pale as a sheet, I looked a rough shape, right. So Maria is like okay, let's get you back to the car. So she again just met this lady. She escorts me back to her Jeep, gets me into the chair the you know second row seat and makes sure I'm comfortable, asks me if I want the door still open. I said yes because I just want a little bit of air. And I said yes because I just want a little bit of air and that is where I remain for the next five hours. Um, they, I could. I could hear everything around me. I um was talking to myself in my head.
Speaker 1:It is one of the most unsettling and bizarre experiences you can have is to be passed out on too much weed, and I think they occasionally checked on me like, hey, how you doing? I can't say anything, right, because totally passed out. I remember at some point alexia asks maria I think this is that we're heading like they're packing up, they're getting ready to go back down the mountain, and she goes um, can you overdose on too much weed? And at that point in my head I'm screaming yes, take me to the hospital, I need help. Oh, my gosh, help me. And I'm freaking out. But of course they can't hear me, maria. Maria is sure oh, no, no, no, no. She just needs to, like, sleep it off, she'll be fine. And I'm thinking like, no, please take me to the hospital.
Speaker 1:So we start down the mountain and you know it's very curvy and suddenly Maria's like oh, I don't think we buckled her in. She pulls over, buckles me in, and I can hear her asking like hey, you know, you, okay. And later on she said yeah, when you didn't take the seatbelt from me, like you didn't even offer to help, I knew that you were like gone, gone. And I remember like thinking, thinking, yeah, let me help you. And trying to tell my arm to move, but it would just not move. So, bless her, she buckled me in.
Speaker 1:We go back to Maria's house. We park in the garage. They decide that it's better to just like leave me in the car rather than carry me in. All that, plus, I'm a heavy girl. I'm just going to say I'm a little bit heavy, I'm a little bit curvy, okay, and I didn't want anybody touching me either.
Speaker 1:I'm like I just barely met these people. I maybe I think I met her husband when we were there eating lunch and maybe I think I met her husband when we were there eating lunch. Again, briefly, I don't know these people and I'm already telling myself I am so terrible. I am a horrible friend. I am supposed to be here for moral support and to be a part of spreading her mom's ashes. I'm completely passed out.
Speaker 1:I am like this is terrible, but they were laughing about it that that was a good sign. So I'm sitting in there, maria's garage, and it's so funny because they I think it was evening when they finally thought, oh yeah, maybe we should get some air movement in here so they opened the main garage door so, like, get a breeze going, open the car door. I remember it was always like it would go from dark to light because the light would go off and Maria's kids were just having a ball. They thought it was so funny that here is this girl passed out cold in their car and they kept saying like something with the chicken strips and the chicken nuggets. They made like a bunch of little videos, which I guess Maria made them delete later, but I still have them on my phone if I ever want to go back.
Speaker 1:And I have a picture from Alexia that says, like famous last words, I don't feel it. And it's then a picture of me just passed out the high heaven in the car. Luckily she left my purse in there with me, because when I finally finally was able to come to it, my body felt so heavy and so I kind of reached down in my purse take out my phone. By the way, I was supposed to call my mom when we were done, so she's. I got a text from her, so I had to text her real quickly and be like call you tomorrow. Couldn't say anything else. I couldn't say anything else and I texted Alexia and I said I think I need some help getting out of the car.
Speaker 1:And so shortly later, here they come, here comes the cavalry, she helps me into the house, they sit me down at the breakfast bar and Maria just starts piling out food like what would you want to eat? We've got this, we've got this, we've got this. And they had already had like hamburgers or something. And, um, stupid me. I'm thinking like I feel so nauseous. Please just give me water and saltines. Mind you, I forgot to mention this.
Speaker 1:I had horrible dry mouth up on the mountain because the weed gummy made my mouth so dry and I was so nauseous up there that I had actually taken like one of those like anti-nausea pills. It's like a pepto-bismol and pill form. I thought I was gonna choke on it because my mouth was so dry. It was just like caked in there and I could barely swallow. So that's what ended up with, like the saltine, sitting there just trying to eat a saltine to get something in my stomach. But then it's like doing that cakey, like it's not going anywhere, I can't swallow. So then I'm like trying to chug some water back to get to get it down. And then I remember saying like I I need to go like to the bathroom. I'm either gonna barf or I'm gonna do the other end.
Speaker 1:So Alexia escorts me to the nearest bathroom and I just sit on the floor and I put my head down to like try and weave off the nausea. And then I get so hot so I tell her I'm really hot. So she gets like a cold washcloth, puts it on the back of my neck um, you know kind of what's my hair with it a little bit too and just kind of lets me sit there, um, I guess. Uh, later on they told me that, uh, another one of maria's kids like passed by the bathroom and I'm just sitting there head down, eyes closed, you know, and they're like who is that weird chick in the bathroom like just hanging out there? And they start dying, laughing again. They. They're like oh, don't worry about her, she's just she got a little too much and she's just trying to work it out.
Speaker 1:Eventually, I think I'm in the bathroom for probably like 30 minutes or something, and then Alexia's like hey, let's get you out into the cool air, right? Oh, so can you hear the dogs? They're back at it again, oh my gosh. And so she helps me outside. I lay down on like this really nice chair, it's nice and cool air, it feels so nice outside, it's just so peaceful, and so we're out there for probably like another 45 minutes and then finally we're going home. So, mind you, oh my gosh, the yard. Hey, hey, hey, knock it off. Finally we're going home. So, mind you, oh my gosh, the yard. Hey, hey, hey, knock it off. So, mind you. We got to Maria's house probably about 2 o'clock and hit the road between like 2.33. And now, once we once Alexia, finally put me in her car and we go back to her house and she puts me to bed, it is like 10 o'clock at night.
Speaker 1:So the day is gone, it was passed out for the majority of it. It was like a horrible hangover the next morning I don't think I woke up until probably one or two in the afternoon, something like that, and my mom was like what the hell happened, and so I had to tell her all these things and be like I didn't want to worry you and yeah, and my Alexia was just so kind about it because I felt like a terrible friend. Like I said, I was supposed to be there for moral support and here I am passed out so high off my ass and no, she and Maria still laugh about it to this day. Maria loves me. Now I'm like, well, that was not the impression I wanted to get Maria for the first time meeting her, but they still laugh about it.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad that I was able to turn kind of like this somber moment into something, I guess, extra memorable. You could say, um, but yeah, so that was my last unexpected trip to Colorado. I know now that, uh, I'm gonna stay away from the medicinal gummies and again, I need and it was not like Alexis said. She kept saying that she felt bad because she should have known like my tolerance was not as good as hers. I said, well, there was no way for you to have known that. I took the other half, like you saw me take the one half, but you didn't see me take the other, because I decided that was not going to be a good idea to put it back like you had no way of knowing. So look at this, not your fault, it was my stupidity. Um. So yeah, that was the time in Colorado I got so high that it passed out. I do not recommend um.
Speaker 1:It is a funny story now that I'm out of it. It was scary as hell at the time. But, yeah, I thought that would be a fun little story for the heaviness that has been this week and I'm feeling kind of better from talking about it because it is, it's still just a funny funny thing. It is, it's still just a funny funny thing. And yeah, so who knows what will happen with my grandpa for how much longer I have. I think I'm going to try to go out with him in the next couple of weeks for a few days. And it's also just a reminder that your body can definitely hold on to trauma, like it remembers. You may have heard of that book the Body Keeps the Score, and it's absolutely true that your body can remember all those sensations and those feelings of the trauma and you may be like have forgotten, like your brain forgot the memory, until you're like, oh yeah, that's what this is probably in relation to, so thank you for listening again.
Speaker 1:Um, and like I said, with these being just my hyper fixations of the moment, these are going to be such random episodes, so I couldn't even tell you what next week is going to be about, and I hope the dogs weren't too distracting. This will not happen again. I will keep the door closed, I'm sure, but they are just. They wound up for whatever reason and without their mama being here. I wanted them to have access to me. So, and how do we end this again? Oh yeah, Until next time, time, my beautiful humans, bye-bye.
