Autistic burnout, monotropism, and living in the in-between
Fergus Murray posted a link in the Monotropism Discord today about Flowing-Afterglow Mass Spectrometry. The title pulled me in, even though I struggled to understand the specifics of the actual chemistry. It made me think of my own internal energy as an Autistic ADHD monotropic person, and how this may relate to burnout.
I think I’m living in the afterglow right now — and I’m noticing it has two different kinds of ember.
I have been ebbing in and out of a perpetual burnout my whole life. It intensifies periodically, the last time was in 2020-2023 when I completely crashed in a mental health crisis, and it hit a new intensity again earlier this year. The embers of that burnout always linger longer than I expect, a low burn that takes my energy, under the surface, long after I’ve supposedly “recovered” or it looks like I’m doing “better.”
There’s a second ember in this afterglow too. Despite occasional bursts of energy like this now, just writing my thoughts about what I am interested in — which I find really rejuvenating — the full tunnel of my highly focused, energetic monotropic flow isn’t open to me at the moment, but I’m not completely empty or in crisis either. Something is still glowing, like a flicker of my attentional resources, which sparks connections and thoughts when something pulls me in, like the title of this article.
My bodymind is in what Tanya Adkin describes as meerkat mode — alert, scanning, half-aroused. I think this is that second ember, still seeking flow and connections, still searching for something to hook into, but I just don’t have the energy to do much with it in a very productive way outside of writing. My executive functioning has been impacted recently, I am forgetful, struggling with basic tasks and have very little energy to communicate. I have had to cut back on my work just to get through my day and continue in a survival state.
On the Wikipedia page about Flowing-afterglow mass spectrometry, it describes afterglow as the plasma that lingers after the initial energy source is switched off. Ions keep colliding; they keep drifting through the flow tube, slowly thermalising and settling towards an equilibrium rather than snapping into it and fully engaging. Reading all this without understanding the actual technical side of the chemistry, all I could do was interpret the article in my own way; it felt like reading a poem that described how I am at the moment.
I have written a lot about living in the liminal, in the in-between states – socially, cognitively and systemically. I am not in a full crisis, not in a complete shutdown, but I know I am not flowing the way I sometimes do when I have more energy.
Perhaps a good word to use is ‘thermalising’. Things are still trying to connect and fuse, slowly, bit by bit, in my liminal state, without my usual intensity. I am conserving my energy; my attentional resources are being reallocated and redirected into a kind of survival mode.
The article notes that as the cost of helium rises, some researchers now use interrupted helium flow “to conserve gas” rather than a continuous stream. Reading that felt like it summed up my burnout. Not broken, not failed, more the result of monotropic split — the exhaustion of a monotropic bodymind repeatedly stretched past its limits trying to meet demands built for a polytropic world — and constantly having my natural flow interrupted day after day, because I need to function, do shopping, clean the house, cook food, care for my family – none of that can stop, it is life.
I don’t fully understand the chemistry about flowing-afterglow mass spectrometry, and I don’t think I need to for this (although sciencey people may argue against that!).
As an Autistic monotropic person, I think I understand the afterglow as the residue of interest still moving through me, unhurried, unforced, finding its own quiet equilibrium until there’s fuel enough for the flame to flow and grow, when I can return to my work again.
… For now, I am flowing in the afterglow…..