Church woes

Church was exhausting today, as usual.

(I say 'today' because if I actually want to sleep, my day ends no earlier than 4 am. Which is problematic at times, but what can you do?)

My mother, sister, and I team-teach a group of ten six-year-old kids. In our church, we have an hour of Sacrament Meeting, an hour of Sharing Time (which is all the kids ages 3 to 7 together, with the 8 to 11-year-olds the next hour), and an hour of class time, where we split into classes by year and separate into different classrooms.

(Our room this year happens to be just off the stage in the auditorium, which is possibly the worst room in the building: it has little-to-no ventilation, making it uncomfortably warm even in the winter; being elevated means that every sound the kids make carries like nothing else; and the kids, being curious little fiends, keep trying to pull back the folding wall that separates the room from the stage.)

Church is about the only place I'm not 'out' as Autistic. Not because I fear backlash or anything of the sort; I know of at least three other Autistics in the ward, at least two of whom can't pass as NT. It's more because I've never really found a good time, or a good way, to come out, and I'm not sure who would need to know. I certainly don't want to stand up in the chapel and make an announcement, but only telling certain individuals somehow makes it seem (to me, at least) like I'm hiding something. But not telling anyone still seems like hiding....

The worst part about this is that I am actually having problems that being out could potentially help with. For one, I have a lot of trouble with noise and light, and while I'm well known by now for wearing sunglasses indoors, I've only recently begun wearing hearing protection, and I don't know how to explain to the kids why I'm wearing headphones or earplugs, especially since I haven't done so yet and they might not react well to the change. (One little girl in particular keeps trying to steal my sunglasses, even though I've explained to her that I wear them because the light hurts my eyes; I really don't want to know what she'd do to my headphones. Eep.) For another, I have trouble recognizing people I don't know really well, so if I had to find someone's parents in an emergency I would be in serious trouble--I only know two of the kids' mothers, and I might recognize one of the fathers. Extreme social anxiety prevents me from getting to know the rest of them, and makes it harder to ask for help when I need it. (It also makes it awkward when someone I should know starts talking to me, but I'm fairly adept by now at making pleasantries and escaping.)

The worst, however, is the days I need extra support to get out of the house, like last week when I had vertigo. I usually use a walker when I'm out of the house, but there's not really room for it in the Primary room--we have a pretty large ward, so the room is crowded almost to the max already. Even worse, our classroom is up a flight of stairs. So when I have vertigo, my only option is to stay home. I generally miss about one Sunday a month. (And if more than one of the three of us stays home, we need a substitute, and all three of us are extremely phone-phobic. Not fun times.)

It's kind of hard to be Autistic and LDS. We put high importance on attending church--but I usually can't make it all three hours if I can come at all, because large echo-y room followed by two hours in close proximity with lots of children is pretty much impossible if I want to stay sane. It was a bit easier before we were called as teachers, but going to the adult classes opens up another problem: a room full of women who've known me for years, but whose names/faces are unfamiliar to me, and with whom I have nothing in common, socializing for two hours. Furthermore, my personal theology tends to differ a bit from official (or commonly recognized) Church doctrine. Which all means that I usually end up spending a lot of time hiding in the corner in the hope that no one will notice me and try to call on me. (I use the same strategy a lot of time at school, unless I'm really comfortable with my classmates.)

But it doesn't end with attending church. We do a lot of service projects, which generally require either homemaking skills (which I lack completely) or involve a lot of heavy lifting (like helping people move) or bending over (like doing yardwork) or other physical abilities I also lack. Doing temple work requires spoons and unfamiliar clothes and getting wet, and that's if I can find someone to drive me. Visiting the sick? Pretty much out of the question. And so forth.

And the worst part is that I really want to participate, but I don't really know how I, personally, can.

Don't get me wrong: I still like going to church. I love to learn new things and feel all spiritual and develop my own theories about why things are as they are, and I love it when the kids actually listen to what you're saying and remember it and learn something. And I love my little rebellions, too, things that don't really matter but make me feel better, like wearing pants instead of a skirt, and my sunglasses indoors, and only bringing materials in Japanese. (I still sing in English with the kids, since I don't want to confuse them, but Sacrament Meeting is a different story.) The people in my ward are really nice and fun to hang out with, even if I can't really talk to them, and they've always accepted my (extremely weird) family without any hesitation.

I just wish that Church wasn't so exhausting.


(But today, I was walking down the hallway during class time to get a drink, and the only (to my knowledge) Autistic kid in our Primary was lying on the floor in the nice quiet hallway, wrapped in a blanket and rolling around, with his mother/caretaker/I'm-not-quite-sure-who watching him and smiling, and I grinned and flapped at him a little, and I'm soooo glad that they mainstream him with the other kids but still let him leave the room and stim when he gets overwhelmed, because that place is NOISY. It kind of made my day to see him there.)