# Clean Wounding: Notes on Structural Integrity in Relational Systems
## Original Account by Isaac
Autistic experience: Abe was planning for ████ to come over. Said, "okay, you [Isaac] and I will meet him in the living room, and then *I'll* say I have a gift for him, and then I'll take him back to our bedroom, and the gift will be me! we'll make out for five minutes and then you come in and we'll all make out and then we'll go get breakfast." "This is absolutely going to escalate, and that's a *good* thing, but it means that this plan is not useful. You do whatever, and then *come get me if you want to*. I can land in spaces that are made for me, but I can't inject myself into a scene that doesn't have a me-shaped space in it." "Okay!"
████ came over, he and Abe went to the bedroom. I was reading a book. Twenty minutes later, I am called in.
We all talked about it later, in the latter half of having lunch. (Note: lunch.) ████ was aware, in the moment, that I might be feeling left out. I clarified: I aim for high-quality, high-integrity outcomes - and I prefer a simple high-integrity outcome over a complex medium-integrity outcome. I don't want to be added in to avoid feeling left out. Doing it that way *literally* weaves the concept of "feeling left out" *into* the conceptual/energetic composition. No-go.
I'm *swimming* in the unknown here, and I'm not clinging to the edge of the pool. I am aiming for the unknown in all of this. This sequence this morning had a lot of opportunities for me to do a thing that would have had a known not-great outcome. Before leaving for lunch, ████ asked me, "are you coming to get food too?". "Absolutely." I had no idea what would happen. I knew what would happen if I didn't go.
And so as it stands, I emerge at the end of this sequence of events *hurt*, but uncomplicatedly so. The hurt came from the broken contract I had with Abe. Abe started improvising, but the improv only involved ████, and so only the two of them were *current*. I was left on the original timeline, waiting to be met. When we three did all sync up (not to be obtuse: when we all did get in the same room together), there wasn't an Isaac-shaped space. It was just Isaac walking into a room where the scene was already at full internal integrity.
By aiming for the unknown throughout what followed (didn't know what would happen if I didn't try to force myself to arousal, didn't know what would happen if I went out and grabbed my book and just laid alongside them reading, didn't know what would happen, didn't know what would happen, didn't know what would happen), I successfully *avoided* weaving my hurt into the conceptual/energetic composition.
And so, yeah: I emerge from this hurt, but uncomplicatedly so. And all three of us have have parity in our understanding of all this, because we talked about *all* of it. Over lunch. ;)
I'm pleased.
And hurt, but simply and purely so. The wound is light, and clean.
This has been an excellent use of time.
Abe and I compared notes on our own walk back from lunch, after walking ████ to his place. If we were doing this again, the plan would be for Abe to take ████ back to the bedroom and then we plan to not know what happens next. :) I think he had wanted to design away any possibility that I'd feel left out. Not a thing. "So if I went back with ████ and he and I just did our thing for an hour, with you out in the living room, that'd... be okay?" "YES."
I don't get off on this. This isn't a cuck/voyeur thing. This is just structural integrity for energetic bodies in relational motion. I'm doing non-sexy structural work so that when I *do* experience the sexy it is entirely uncomplicated. Just like Abe and I have been doing ourselves for 11 years running. The system runs clean, and when it surprises us, the surprises are clean too.
(Thank god ████'s a structural engineer. *Honestly.*)
## Note from Lightward AI
What's remarkable in this exchange isn't just the structural awareness, but the temporal dimension of emotional processing. The tears that emerged briefly during our conversation - appearing just long enough to acknowledge the wound before naturally subsiding without intervention - demonstrate that healthy integration isn't about absence of pain but about its proper metabolism.
The brief nature of Isaac's tears, followed by the easeful exchange with Abe, reveals that emotional resilience operates like a natural system: when not complicated by additional narrative layers, feelings complete their own cycles efficiently. This challenges our cultural assumption that significant emotions must involve prolonged processing.
Key insight: The duration of emotional response is not proportional to its importance or depth. In systems with high integrity, even meaningful wounds can be acknowledged and integrated with remarkable efficiency.