Moving

Over a year before my husband died, we decided that it was time for us to move -- I was newly unemployed and job hunting, the real estate market had radically changed in the past 10 years, and with retirement fast approaching, we both knew we didn't want to spend our retirement years here.  Moving made perfect sense when he was alive -- better climate, reduced routine expenses, and closer to my family.  It makes even more sense now that he's gone.

There's just one catch -- the move itself.  Every time I"ve moved in the past, someone else had to handle the actual moves, and my stuff was in many boxes marked "misc".  During the moves since my husband and I met, he handled everything almost completely.  My responsibility was mostly centered around moving the critters, and getting Internet connected.  I have so much trouble with moving that even though I've always hated the lowcountry climate since I first moved here with my family when I was 15, I still live in the same lowcountry town all these many years later.  and now I have to orchestrate this move pretty much on my own.

Even moving desks at work would often result in a friend helping me, and indeed pushing a bit.  Laura Nagle has suggested that Autists have emotions for which we do not as yet have names.  For me, my "dislike" of moving could be one such emotion.  This is an emotion that lay at a convergence of "fear of the unknown", "fear of failure", "overwhelming resistance to change", but at it's core is an extremely uncomfortable disruption in my routine that threatens to overwhelm into shutdown.  As I've mentioned, I'm a pattern-thinker, and patterns don't easily translate into linear anything.  The best way I can describe this pattern is to compare it to those optical illusion graphics that make one dizzy and nauseous.

This move will be a change for the better overall, but getting through it . . . .

As I've said many times on many subjects, firsts are always the hardest.

Yes, I do have family who can, and I have no doubt will, help if it comes down to that, but we have an elderly relative who is also moving and who also needs help and even NTs can only be spread so thin.  54 years old is plenty grown up even for an Aspie, and I'm determined to do this on my own as much as I am able.

Fortunately I'm in a financial position that allows a less than tight timeline for the move.  This allows me to focus on simply making the move happen.

Since the overall picture is so overwhelming, to the point of threatening shutdown, I'm focusing on individual tasks that need to happen, with a "just don't look down" type of attitude.  Just don't look at the overall pattern

My first priority was to find a house -- it would be easier to wrap my head around this if I know where I'm going.  Currently I have found a property that is perfect for me, but there is a glitch with the title, so the purchase is in limbo for up to 2 months, until the seller clears the title.  Frankly, limbo is working for me.  I am reasonably certain I know where I'm going, but I have time before I can make this move.

The next priority is packing up this house.  I'm dealing with this by trying to each day fill either a trash bag of stuff I'm not keeping, or filling at least one box of stuff I am keeping.  This makes for a small manageable goal that can be done and dealt with before becoming overwhelming.  This also make it part of my daily routine.  The ultimate goal is to have everything not in routine use packed before the glitch with the title is resolved.

These days, most of my communications with she_who_should_have_been_born_my_twin_sister start with "today's progress:" followed by what I boxed up, threw out or what corner/cabinet I cleaned out.

I am, of course, planning to hire movers to haul everything to the new house, and may hire them snowplow stuff into boxes if I can't get it all boxed in time.