Weighted blankets

Your mentioning the fan reminded me of an old friend of mine from California. He once recommended freezing a 3 litre bottle filled with tap water, and then putting the frozen bottle in front of a fan, so the fan sprays cold droplets through the air!

(I don't get on with this method because the fan just keeps me awake all night, though)

 

THANK YOU. I'm autistic too. That is really helpful!

 

For the last five years I have slept in an unzipped light sleeping bag (due to having severe allergies). It's rarely too hot. Good luck.

 

@Kitty This is so interesting. I'm not autistic, but I need weight on my feet and ankles. I use a 4 tog IKEA duvet, which cost about £4, on muggy nights. But I keep my 13 tog winter duvet on the end of the bed to anchor my lower legs down.

There are times that my shoulders feel horribly "floaty" though, and this idea might really help. Thank you

 

@NelliePledge Doing the weight thing, but with flexible cool packs! Such a good idea!

 

Not everyone with sensory integration issues is autistic. Essentially, if your proprioceptive sense doesn't work well, your brain has trouble working out where your body and limbs are in space. For instance, when I'm awake, my toes twitch every few seconds – my GP thought it was some kind of neurological problem, but it's just my brain enquiring where my feet are! Weights help provide this same kind of feedback, which stops you getting overstimulated and is comforting and relaxing.

We have proprioceptors all over our bodies, including major ones in muscle spindles. However, people with ME often have sore muscles, so weighting them directly can be problematic. This is why I suggested using joints instead – these have their own proprioceptors, but also there are muscles close enough to them to sense the anchoring effect of the weight.

Another curiosity in autism – which probably occurs in non-autistic people too – is body boundary issues. Although I could read by age three, I was late learning to write because my brain couldn't work out where my fingers ended and the pen started, which made it hard to co-ordinate. A former colleague has to sleep on the floor, because in a soft bed he feels as if he's floating in space; he can't work out where his body ends and the bed begins, which is horribly overstimulating. (I feel exactly the same, but it's never bothered me.) This might be why your shoulders feel 'floaty'.

You don't necessarily need a lot of weight to help you relax. Once you know why the sensation is happening, you can experiment with simple solutions that'll give your brain just enough feedback to stop worrying about it and switch off.

 

@Kitty This is fascinating, about the proprioceptors - thank you. It explains a lot, that I hadn't had the brain to investigate.

I get vertigo from just looking down from a kitchen stool to my dog gazing up at me from the floor - my body rarely seems to know where it's positioned when vertical. It makes so much sense that it loses it's bearings when lying down, too!

 

I only know because it was explained to me during my (very late) diagnosis for high functioning autism! It would be impossible for most people to elucidate these sensations themselves, specially when they're in the middle of them with a tired, foggy brain.

I always knew I had a malfunctioning vestibular system, as I couldn't even use a child's swing without blacking out, let alone go on a boat or a fairground ride. I thought nobody could tell where their body ended and the outside world started, though, and that having my cat on my lap was only calming because of her contented purring, not partly because of her weight on my leg muscles. It's a fascinating aspect of human functioning!

 

I can't begin to imagine going through life without an accurate diagnosis @Kitty. I'm neurotypical, and it's hard enough that way.

I have a friend on a Facebook group who also has high functioning autism, but is otherwise physically healthy, and we both find her lifelong physical responses to crowds, over stimulation, light, smells and sounds VERY similar to the ones I only developed with ME and migraines.

I wish I still had enough brain to say something sensible and scientific sounding about this, but all I've got is white noise going on where that language used to reside.

My vestibular system was normal before I got ill, although I wasn't a fan of roller-coasters. I can't look up at a building over about 5 stories high without my head spinning. A proper sky scraper and I fall over. Looking up at the stars when standing - fall over!

I saw a photo of a tall building last week, taken from street level, looking up and felt very queasy. It was very odd.

 

I have a solution to that - lie down and then look at the stars, of course it may not be transferable to skyscrapers but that's what elevators are for, so you don't have to look up to see the top of them. This is not transferable to stars because no one has built one tall enough yet. So, lying down.

Thank you @Kitty , that explains a few things about why I tend to lose consciousness when I experience sudden shifts, such as when flipping the banking on a motorbike as when coming off a roundabout. It might also explain why I am rarely conscious when I'm not in contact with the ground. Maybe.

It does not explain why my cat, when I had one, used to cause severe pain by lying on me when I was trying to get to sleep.

I'm just 'odd' lol.

 

Hi there,

Has any one tried these kind of products to improve sleep/restlessness at night?

• http://gravityblankets.co.uk/faq/what-is-the-28-day-sleep-guarantee
  
  
• HIGH LIVING Weighted Blanket Sensory Sleep Reduce Anxiety (Large (152cm X 203cm))
• Highams Weighted Blanket 8kg for Adults Therapy Anxiety Calming Sleep Effect Quilted Glass Beads, Double King Size - 150 x 200cm
  

 

If you search there was a discussion with lots of comments on The MEA association facebook page fairly recently

 

Thank you

It seems more about weight, rather than super heavy weighted blankets though (8kg for example).

Should I move the post there?

 

I must check that out! Thank you

 

I think these weighted blankets are a totally different thing from heavy blankets or duvets - as the heat:weight ratio must be different, I assume. I think the weighted blankets have glass balls inside them achieve the weight

 

For others' reference