After some introspection and therapy I've come to realise that one of my main hurdles to actually improoooving is that my partner and I keep holding ourselves to neurotypical standards. Pretty regular internalised hustlecel productivitycuck, stuff, really, but the brainworms are nested pretty deep. It's been pretty bad recently. It always just ends in my going down a shame spiral and being completely overwhelmed and not doing the things I "should" be doing and just escaping the Bad Vibes with video games. It's unsustainable, and it's putting a lot of strain on myself and my relationship.

Rationally we understand that we're not the kind of people to handle the regular nine-to-five combined with keeping up our own health and relationships. But still the brainworm keeps whispering to me that "Shouldn't you have gone to the gym twice already this week...? I bet your partner is disappointed in you because you didn't clean the bathroom like you said you would. Idiot. When's the last time you even rode your bike? Not to mention all your fancy expensive dust-collectors you have decorating your synth desk. You paid for all this!!!". Always the emphasis on the money aspect of it, too. Probably comes from growing up dirt poor.

But anyway, I've tried to come up with a fuck load of different ways to manage my energy and not get overwhelmed by all the things I have to do, none of which have really worked. When I went to therapy last time though I managed to put the feeling into words for the first time (tl;dr: "I keep holding myself to NT standards"). Granted, I've had probably a hundred revelations like that in therapy, but this feels like a real one (this time for really really real ACTUALLY really).

So, I'm gonna try to approach the day-to-day with that in mind from now on. I even made up a little schedule that follows the ground rule of max 1 thing per day. Like, that I can only expect myself (and my partner from me and vice versa) to do ONE THING each day, and try to never schedule more than one thing on the same day. Food prep = 1 thing. Cleaning the apartment = 1 thing. Gym = 1 thing. etc etc. For example monday = food prep day, tuesday = gym day, wednesday = cleaning day, thursday = gym day, friday = grocery shopping day. Doing that one thing means I'm DONE and don't HAVE to do anything else that day (unless I actually feel like it). Kind of like an exercise schedule but for regular chores. I'm hoping that eventually my Executive Function Muscle will get strong enough that I can do as much as TWO thing per day. That'd be pretty neat.