Advice for an everlasting shutdown

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Around September or November from 2012 I had my first noticeable and i-can't-ignore-this shutdown. It also didn't help that a person saw me in the aftermath, unable to talk, to move, and completely detached from reality for I could not keep fooling myself into believing I did it on purpose, thing that I remember telling myself since I was a child. Long story short, this along with other reasons made me believe that I was "insane" enough to seek advice elsewhere, and I went to see a psychologist for the first time at the age of eighteen. The psychologist made me go see a psychiatrist right away and after a year of changing psychiatrists because nobody could deal with me or understand me I ended up with five diagnosis, until I was told that maybe I had Aspergers. It hasn't passed that much time, and now I'm in a safe place, living on my own and studying what I believe I love, but even if the context in which I am seems ideal my mind is slowly rooting away since that shutdown and again, now I fear I can't ignore it anymore.

The "shutdown" –as I call it for lack of a better word– was unleashed after seeing an emotional film, but of course the rapid thoughts I had were not about the film, but about everything wrong that was with me and the world. I paced a lot, could not stop going in circles until my legs gave up and I started rocking in my bed all the while while sobbing, talking fast, biting myself, scratching my arms and legs and then hitting myself. Then I lost the ability to form ideas or sentences and then I was unable to talk, a fact that I could prove because I was trying to call my friend and she was on the other end of the line but I could not even say hello. I remember blabbing "help" with great effort and then going to full detachment from everything. Next thing I know is that I'm outside, on the street, and my friend finds me and takes me to her place and gives me at least an hour to be silent and just compose myself.

This has never happened again with such force (only small bearable ones giving the circumstances) but since then it has been very difficult to form ideas in my own language, Spanish, (weird enough my English is fine. Not great but still handy) and since then the asperger traits I have been told about have been taking control of my life more than usual. I get tired more easily because of the movements and noise of outside, I have to leave the classroom more often because I fear I'll start rocking in the place, and I have mini-shutdowns every end of the week. My mind simply cannot take all the data of the day, and I'm starting to see more faces that I can't decipher and "sayings" that are no longer in my memory disk. My memory is getting worse with each day that passes, and I not only forget regularly how I end up moving a thing or being in a room but I also forget vocabulary. I'm starting to get really childish when talking and it annoys me, but I can help it as I can't form my ideas well enough as I believe I used to. I fear I might be changing from a child to a apathetic woman, back and forth, and it scares me to have such definite and different personalities depending on the circumstances and the day, which change my perspective of the world and what I want in life again and again.

I cannot see a psychologist/psychiatrist because first: they scare me and I don't trust them since all the pills they used to gave me, and second: I can't afford one, and if I ask for money to my parents they're going to worry all over again, and maybe ask me to leave college again. So I ask you: if this situation rings a bell to you, if you know about it as something that is a "thing" that happens, maybe even not Asperger related, or if you have any advice that doesn't involve a doctor please enlighten me.

Finally, If you have made it this far in the reading, I thank you.

Welcome to Wrong Planet!

Yes, shutting down and melting down can happen, and if you become frightened of doing so and try to avoid anything you think might lead to shutting down or melting down, the fear could take over your life. And the fear might be much worse than any actual shutdowns in it's effects on you.

My suggestion is to try your best to think of this as similar to a college age student having a tantrum, and to understand that at your age, there is still some tolerance for this. Or think of it like a panic attack, feels terrifying but ends.

My guess is that trying to avoid another shutdown is what is exhausting you, the worry about it all the time. So the only solution I can suggest is to accept the occasional shutdown as part of your neurology, something that may improve with time, and not allow yourself or anyone else to pathologies you more than as having occasional shutdowns. I don't mean to sound harsh, and reading and posting here may help you a lot, maybe there is a social group you could join where you are. It's just if things keep on as they are and continue to get worse, and if you can't get help for the problem from professionals, I think you hurt yourself by labeling this as sick. And if you can't stop labeling yourself as really messed up, than trying again for professional help for it from someone else, really may be a good idea.

Thanks for the reply. I think I get your point. I believe I'm scared of the shutdowns mostly because I've been locked up on a psychiatric ward because of it, but I still believe is equally my responsibility to realize that maybe I'm doing this to myself –that at being scared I'm making myself more anxious than usual. Sounds logical enough, so I'll try to think less of it and put my mind onto other things. Still, the thing that most concerns me is the memory loss which I can't seem to make sense of. I can't remember much about my childhood either, and I have the sense that once I could. My mother keeps bothering me about it, asking me if I had a bad experience than I'm repressing. I can't really tell her anything in those situations: I know that in the big picture I was bullied physically and mentally, but I don't know details, and I never talked about it with someone –not that I remember.

Anyway, about getting professional help: I really can't right now. I know is childish of me, even irresponsable, but after a whole year of psychiatrists I don't think I'm ready to get though that all over again. I mean I'm diagnosed as having Asperger Syndrome, a thing that makes more sense than being Bipolar as I was diagnosed earlier, but I'm still not even sure that they're right about that either. Maybe my problem is that I want facts and hard evidence, but when mental conditions are concerned that's too much to ask. Partially I don't want to get disappointed again by psychiatrists who tell me they don't know what to do with me, and they end up resenting me for it.