Finding Peace in Getting Lost

There is a funny little story that we tell a lot in our family - the time my nibling (‘nibling’ is the gender neutral word for a sibling’s child - in place of ‘niece’ or ‘nephew’) had to stop me from trying to enter someone else's house, because I thought it was my house. We often share a laugh at my inability to tell things/places apart, or to remember enough of the landmarks or distinguishing features of - well, anything. The memory of that particular story came up in my social media feeds today, and I had another laugh about it!

I have (mild) prosopagnosia (a.k.a 'face blindness'), so learning people's faces has always been a bit tough, as is accurately decoding facial expressions. I do eventually learn faces (in most cases - however, there are some people I have known for a long time, who’s faces I still can't memorize). I have no control over which faces I remember, and which ones I can't memorize. It is as if my brain chooses a random 'shuffle' and says, 'yes... we will store this face in our memory for all of time, but that other one - nah.'

I have embarrassingly been unable to recognize the face of a close friend to our family, and I never know who he is until he starts talking (or until my husband nudges me and says, 'that is so-and-so'). Recently, at a hockey game, my husband pointed out a colleague of mine who was sitting a row in front of us. The colleague was turned facing us, talking to someone else, and when my husband pointed him out I said, 'where? I don't see him'. My inability to recognize this person was absolutely unbelievable to both my husband and I - I have worked with this colleague for 8 years, I see and talk to him every day. For whatever reason, I cannot recognize him outside of our work place.

The darker side to this is I also have topographical disorientation, something that can rarely occur with some kinds of prosopagnosia. Basically - I can't recognize stuff even when I see it or travel it repeatedly. So, I get lost easily and this can be risky. There are many ways that these impairments in recognition can (and have) put me into dangerous situations.

There are also ways that these impairments have made me more sharp in using other observational skills. We also joke that I have a 'witchy intuition' and may be a little psychic. (I don't pretend to believe there is anything magical about my intuition, I believe I have had to become more in-tune with some observations to compensate for the observational skills that I have had to live without.)

Having something pointed out to me that I hadn't recognized, or becoming aware that I am lost, can trigger a massive threat response in me. I slip into a quick mini panic attack, and usually burst into tears for a minute. I have learned that as soon as I have that threat response feeling, to set aside the reaction for a moment to get myself to safety. This way, I don't get into a car accident or some kind of self-induced physical emergency. My brain sort of dissociates, gets me to safety, then freaks out, then allows me to come up with a plan.

These are interesting aspects of myself that I was not so kind about before I discovered that I am neurodivergent. I was ridiculed at times growing up for 'not using my head' or 'not paying attention'. I internalized that there were parts of me that were in fact really not smart. 'If this is important to you, you'll pay attention and remember this!' I would beat myself up for the observational skills that I lacked, that seemed to come so easily to those around me.

Now - I can laugh about these single instances. I mean, COME ON - they're funny! We have to be able to have a bit of fun with this stuff. But also, I’ve come into a much deeper acceptance and kindness to myself. The science that we have on the matter is this: this is how my brain developed, there is nothing wrong with me just because my brain works this way, these issues can be accommodated so that life is easier to navigate, and no matter how hard I try, the science tells us that these recognition matters do not improve with time and practice, and there is no treatment for this. So we shift into a space of radical acceptance. This is me - I can let go of trying to change it or hide it. There is nothing wrong with me.