I was looking at my blogposts, and the ones that have gotten the most views and interest are the ones where I am telling you a bit about myself. So in the same theme I decided to tell you something about me that not alot of people know (It isnt that exciting, dont get your hopes up).
I have something called synesthesia.
Synesthesia comes from the word anesthesia, which is to have no feeling. Similarly, synesthesia means to have lots of feeling and connections. This will sound weird. Keep reading. There are many different types of the condition, but none of them are life threating, contagious, or anything of that sort. Quite the opposite actually. Synesthesia is a neurological phenomenon in which people experience colour in a different way. Imagine it like this; most people have a whole lot of sections in the brain. There is one for smell, one for taste, one for sight, etc. They are all somewhat separate. But in a synesthetes brain, these are all muddled up and connected. Some synesthetes can hear colour, or taste words, or smell numbers. I am not that degree of awesomeness (unfortunately), but do have some of those sections minorly linked.
For me, when I see letters, numbers, shapes, words, etc, I associate them with colours. So the letter A is yellow, and B is green, and C is red or pink (depending whether it is in a harsh sounding sentence like cat, or a soft sounding one like celebrate). I also see sounds as colours, which is kind of cool when listening to songs. Except when I see the music video it ruins it for me because it doesnt match the colour that I hear it as.
There are alot of myths around synesthesia. I will now list a few common misconceptions about it.
MYTH ONE- SYNESTHETES ARE LYING AND ONLY TRYING TO GET ATTENTION.
We are not 'faking it'. No. No. Nononononononono. Just no. Oh, you have a lung problem. ARE YOU SURE? ARE YOU SURE YOU ARE NOT JUST DOING IT TO GET ATTENTION IT DOESNT SOUND REAL? I MEAN I CANT SEE IT AND YOU DONT SEEM DIFFERENT YOU CANT REALLY HAVE IT CAN YOU? People who says these things need to stop. My synesthesia is just as valid as someone elses lung disease. (That is a sentence that I never thought I would have to write).
MYTH TWO- YOU HAVE TO HAVE AN OFFICIAL PIECE OF PAPER GIVEN BY A DOCTOR TO ACTUALLY BE A SYNESTHETE. A doctor doesnt have to 'diagnose' it. A doctor doesnt have to tell you that you have brown hair or you are an introvert or that you like nutella. Doctors need to diagnose cancer and ear infections and other scary diseases. Nobody needs someone else to confirm their thoughts and feelings. I am a synesthete because I associate words and sounds with colour. If you have a problem with that, GO AWAY I DONT LIKE YOU. YOU ARE A PEASANT.
MYTH THREE- SYNESTHETES ARE ALL JUST HIGH.
Instead of getting mad at these people, I will instead educate you. No, we are not all drugged. Some of us, probably, but then again basically every catagory of people have some people who are. Where people get this misconseption from is that when you are high, you actually have similar experiences. On drugs people sometimes can also create the links between senses, which is what synesthesia is in a nutshell. Although this sounds like synesthetes may just be high, it IS scientifically proven to be a thing and that there are differences between being a druggie and a synesthete.
So thank you for reading this weeks blog post! This is like the first week where it hasnt been deep or oversharey so you guys are probably all relieved. If you want to learn more about synesthesia you can:
-Read the book A Mango Shaped Space, by Wendy Mass. Very very good book. Even if you dont really care about synesthesia I still recommend reading some other Wendy Mass book because she is amazing.
-Watch the Good Mythical Morning episode on it! It is actually such a good description and makes much more sense than me. It came out quite recently, but I am pretty sure that they have a previous one on it too.
-Google it. Plain and simple. The best way to learn about things.
Again, thank you for reading! Please please let me know of some blogpost ideas for upcoming weeks because I am running out of ideas.
The Socially Awkward, AKA Melissa xx
p.s. no there is no scheduled day to post anymore deal with it x
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