Autistic Inertia

In autistics it keeps us stuck, makes us unstoppable and won’t let us change direction. Do you struggle with getting up in the morning, stay in a job you don’t like or focus for hours on a special interest? You’re experiencing inertia. Learn what these three types of inertia look like in autistics.

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Transcript

Autistic Inertia

Welcome to Meet My Brain - A Field Guide to Autism. I’m your host, The Autistic Woman.

You may have heard Captain Kirk in Star Trek tell Scotty “I need more power” and Scotty reply with “she cannot take any more, Captain” Somehow Scotty always saves the day, usually by diverting power or by doing something that involves dilithium crystals and the rear deflector shield.

All objects, starships and people included, have the tendency to resist changes in their state of motion. They have inertia. What does autistic inertia look like?

Stay tuned to this episode and find out.

You can’t have a discussion about inertia without talking about Sir Isaac Newton’s first law of motion.  It’s the principle that says "An object at rest stays at rest and an object in motion stays in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force." 

That’s a lot of words to say that an object tends to "keep on doing what it’s doing until it’s forced to change.”

There are 3 types of inertia:

Inertia of Rest.

• Inertia of Motion.
• Inertia of Direction.

Examples:

          Continued swirling of water after you stop stirring it (Inertia of motion)

• When you’re on your bicycle and go around a curve and your body still wants to go forward (inertia of direction) which is why we’re told to lean into the curve
• When you’re in a car that suddenly stops and you are thrust forward what you are feeling is the inertia of rest.

In this episode I’m talking about how an autistic person resists changes in the motion of stopping, moving and changing direction.

Autistic inertia has not been well-studied and most research has been limited to what’s been called “delayed initiation” in children. It’s surprising that there isn’t more research because many of us experience inertia on a daily basis and it has a profound impact on our lives.

A research study of autistic adults published in 2021 was led by an autistic researcher. That study involved data from autistics about their personal experiences. This promising research is a step in the right direction to understanding what it looks like in autistics.

Some psychologists hypothesize that inertia is part of executive functioning but there’s no real proof of that yet. How it works in the brain is not exactly known.

Some ways we experience inertia might be:

• As thoughts we can’t stop; 
• With stimming; 
• With things that capture our interest and focus; 
• Researching until we are certain we have answers,
• Meltdowns
• With transitioning from one activity or thing to another 
• Feeling stuck
• Delaying decisions
• Analysis paralysis

You know how you keep hearing the same song in your head all day repeatedly until it hurts? That’s inertia.

Or when you find it hard to transition from focusing on your interest to making dinner.

When you work at a job you don’t like and won’t look for a new one.

 It’s a small thing but I avoid checking my mail because it means I’ll have to deal with it after I pick it up. I throw 90% of it into the recycle bin immediately (yes, that’s how much junk mail I get.) 

Unfortunately I then usually put the rest in a pile to “deal with later” which results in big piles. When I finally get around to handling it I often find something I forgot to take care of. I’ve tried to open the mail immediately like so many organized people do, I just don’t. 

Much of what we deal with as autistics is energy management. It takes energy to move, to change direction or to stop. Challenges of daily autistic life can deplete our energy quickly which increases resistance to handling inertia.

If I am resisting exercise I might decide to take a walk, at least that’s something. I have to develop some level of intrinsic motivation and I can’t just say I’m going to walk a mile and think it’s going to happen. I have to reduce my resistance and I do that by telling myself all I have to do is walk around the block. 

If a friend were to walk with me, first, I would have that outside force acting upon me, i.e. a friend to encourage me, second, I wouldn’t have to be so vigilant about my surroundings and third, there is often an exchange of energy when two people are interacting. Hence phrases like “he or she drains my energy,” or when we refer to someone or something that energizes us.

One thing about the autistic brain is that its ability to change is limited. We can practice and repeat things over and over and it doesn’t mean it will be easier the next time.  We aren’t always able to build skills we want. This means we may be dealing with the same inertia each time we try to start, stop or change direction.  

Stress also can cause inertia. It takes energy to handle stress and energy to move forward. Stress might leave us depleted and keep us stuck.

I often bump into walls and counter tops and now think it’s due to inertia. Once I’m going in one direction my brain doesn’t change direction and I meet an immoveable object.

I see the effect of inertia when I’m in an emergency situation. I was walking with a friend once when a car came slowly down the street. It crashed into the curb, the driver’s side door opened and the driver started to fall out. 

My friend ran to the car faster than I could blink. I stood on the sidewalk unable to change direction from taking a leisurely walk to running to help someone.

Inertia results when something breaks or stops functioning. There are times when I’ve stopped a whole project when a tool quit working and have yet to get back to it…or to get a new tool!

And there’s the inertia of motion. I’ve talked before about visiting an interesting place and then wanting to move there. Not well thought out to be sure, but the energy I experience from the beauty and fascination of a place propels me. If I can even think of reasons not to do it, I convince myself I can handle obstacles or that there aren’t any. Logic doesn’t stop my forward motion.

I used to go horseback “trail” riding and I was getting bored of the same route so I told my friend I was going to take the horse to a different pasture. 

“No,” my friend said, “that’s not a good idea. She’s not familiar with riding there and won’t like it.” 

“Don’t worry. It’s all good, “ I said.

I got to the pasture with the somewhat reluctant horse (I thought she was just being stubborn). As I put one foot in the stirrup she started bucking and threw me off, my foot stuck in the stirrup for a few seconds as my life flashed before my eyes. 

Once I’d gotten the idea that I could do it, I wasn’t going to stop. Once I tried to get on the horse she wasn’t going to stop either.

It’s said that autistics experience challenges with changing direction when we’re focused. But didn’t our parents or teachers tell us not to start something new until we’re finished with what we’re doing? 

I had a friend whose autistic son resisted going to bed each night. He also hated getting up in the morning. At night he hated being in bed, in the morning he hated leaving the bed. It doesn’t seem logical. It was the change in direction, not the sleep-wake routine that was the issue for her son.

Stimming or fidgeting is another way autistics experience inertia. It’s a direction we need to go and we can’t easily stop it. 

Do you struggle with getting going in the morning? I reluctantly admit that there are too many days when I need several hours after I wake up before I can do anything. On work days I get up a few hours before I have to leave for work in order to have time to fully energize.

Do you ever have days when you want to accomplish something but you just can’t? You don’t have the energy?

There are days I feel bored which definitely means I WANT to do something, yet I feel like I can’t. I need extrinsic force, in other words, something from the outside motivating me. 

For me inertia is not consistent. I can be motivated for hours or days and then be unable to do much for long periods of time. It’s not on a predictable time table and often not related to any particular thing. It’s waking up in the morning and not knowing how much energy I’ll have that day.

There is no relation between inertia and intelligence. I believe inertia is not due to or a cause of laziness, although we often hear it called that. If we have trouble moving, stopping or changing direction it’s not necessarily related to motivation.

There are benefits to inertia. It allows autistics to be highly focused and we can accomplish and learn a lot. 

In my opinion it may be why there are many autistics who become researchers and software engineers for example—they can focus and stay the course no matter how long it takes. Often it’s called “dedication.”

It seems that nearly every action might  involve more than one type of inertia. When we’re highly focused we struggle with stopping, we don’t want to change direction and we prefer not to start something else.

We’re not just objects at rest that need an outside force to cause us to move. Our brains are more complex than that. 

What I would want a non-autistic person to know about autistic inertia is:

• It’s not a question of will, it’s a matter of can
• When I’m focused I can’t always change direction
• If you want to help bring me lunch if you see me working through it. Pick up groceries for me if I can’t get off the couch. 
• It’s okay to check in with me but not to criticize or judge me
• Provide support not blame
• Prompt me but don’t nag me
• Understand that my routines can help me with inertia

A few examples of how I deal with inertia are these:

• At night I write 3 things in a notebook that I intend to do the next day. They are not big things. Might be like one load of laundry, make doctor’s appointment and email John. When I get up I have a purpose rather than sitting around and wondering what to do. 
• I put notifications in my calendar for things like snack breaks or take meds.
• I keep a running list of things I need from the grocery store so I don’t let “I don’t know what to get” keep me from shopping.
• I tell myself that one step forward is movement.
• I ask friends and family to tell me when they’re mailing something to me so I have a reason to handle the inertia of ignoring the mail.
• Remind myself that the three types of inertia may look different in me than in someone else.

How does inertia affect you? How have you overcome it?

I could keep going but for now I think I’ll stop and focus on something else.

In the great words of Engineer Scotty “I'm doing the best I can, Captain! I canna make it go any faster.”

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This has been Meet My Brain - A Field Guide to Autism. I’m the Autistic Woman. 

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