MHM Magazine

Issue 5 | 2024 | MENTAL HEALTH MATTERS | 33 MHM By Jessica Prinsloo The relentless ruminations. The perpetual panic attacks. The suffocating stress. The first few months of my Bachelor of Applied Social Science degree pushed me beyond every limit I had known. I was no stranger to academics, but something had shifted. The weight of juggling a business, four children, and a household full of responsibilities left me unable to cope with the relentless pressure. I later found out from my psychologist that many women are diagnosed with autism after they have kids because we’re no longer able to make inadvertent self-accommodations like taking a day off or not thinking about food for days on end. I’d pace in circles, repeating to my husband, “It shouldn’t be this hard, something is wrong with me, it can’t be this hard.” Out of sheer desperation, I visited my GP, who referred me to a psychiatrist. Due to my inability to focus, we ran through the diagnostic criteria for ADHD, which as it turned out, I met. Unfortunately the medications only caused side effects without any relief. I remained distracted, hypervigilant and unhinged. Weeks passed, and I continued writing essay after essay, struggling to focus through the mental cacophony. I asked my husband if the static he saw got worse with stress. “What static?” he asked, perplexed. I’d grown up assuming that everyone experienced this visual interference. Dr. Google revealed that this was an actual, identifiable condition: Visual Snow Syndrome. The static in my vision had a name, plus it was connected to my tinnitus. While my eyes and ears are physically fine, the signals from my thalamus to my visual and auditory cortices are, for all intents and purposes, wonky. This was the first concrete explanation for why certain things were harder for me than for others; my brain was different. My research into VSS led me down a rabbit hole, and soon enough my YouTube algorithm was altered. I stumbled upon a video that would change everything. A British woman described what seemed to be my entire childhood, trait by trait. Why was she saying that these were AUTISM LIVING WITH... MHM | 2024 | Volume 11 | Issue 5 | Living With Autism MHM