Hello Wrong Planet, I am a seventeen-year old Australian male and have long been diagnosed with High Functioning Autism. As a new member I am here to post my first message as an introduction to who I am and my experiences with and perspectives on Autism.
I was born in the year of 1992 into a hard-working family of a semi-rural region of Victoria, Australia. As a first child, my parents saw to it that I was looked after and kept in company as much as possible, my mother having to give her up her offer as a sergeant of the local police force in order to care for me so. In my first stages of life I was like any other newborn - constantly crying and in want of amusement. However, it was clear in the same period that I was then, and to pose in the future, a greater challenge than my mother had probably expected of a child. She notes now how I incessantly screamed and cried despite my parent’s devoted attendance, forcing my mother oftentimes to fall to her knees in tears. The only way to temporarily relieve her of my cries it seemed was to wrap me up in my blanket and place me alone in my cradle. Such a process illustrated only the beginning of my unusually strong desire for independence and solitude (something parent’s should not have to endure seriously until adolescence!)
In my early years I developed a habit to learn things later than usual, both language-based tasks such as speaking and motor-skills such as walking. Soon enough, I had reached the age of three years at which time was the norm to place young children in their first years of ‘schooling’. I was placed at the local kindergarten where, although my social skills improved greatly, I appeared in behaviour and thought quite different to my peers (more on this later). Despite these differences in my character I was considered by my parents and other close adults to be simply a unique child with no particularly special problems or requirements, physical or psychological, and so I was sent two years later to my first primary school. The usual problems were evident as soon as language-assessment tasks were enacted; I apparently spent a much longer time learning to read and write than my fellow students, whom to the surprise of my mother I often got along well with. Expectedly, Apart from Maths I needed special attention in most areas of class. This wasn’t because I was unintelligent, however, but simply because I lacked attention and thought in ways incongruous with others - I liked to associate whimsical names with colours (like ‘Gubbi-Gubbi with the colour green) and assort objects in unusual and oftentimes highly intricate fashions (forming Lego and pencils into models of equiangular spirals and inverted triangular prisms). Accordingly, my mother especially, although without a lot of success most of the time, tried to press the education system to assist me with my special learning requirements and, at a stage where any help seemed unattainable, was very close to giving up and committing me to home-school. Nonetheless, we managed to attain some basic supervision in the form of extra attention from the teachers and I proceeded at my then primary school reasonably stable until the end of Grade 2, at which time I, for whatever reason, had had enough of and wanted to move to another school.
It was my time during this school that much of my problems were to be seen in their greatest intensity and explained in a way that inevitably had a considerable effect on both my and my family’s life. With my other three siblings all having been born by this time, my mother was unable to devote to me the same amount of attention that she had so desperately tried to before, and so I was left to develop to a more independent accord. Fortunately, I experienced little problems during my first years at my new primary school until about mid-Grade 4, where after my first experiences with realities such as bullying I had apparently descended into a bout of depression that had me threatening to take my life (although I’m not sure how much I intended to carry out these serious statements). Needless to say, the collapse of my stability had instigated in mother the dire need to employ specialists that could isolate the root from which all my unusual problems stemmed. By the end of that year 2001 it had become apparent to the psychologist that I had ’Autism’. Although I was too immature and ill-knowledged to understand the concept then, the diagnosis allowed my mother to seek more appropriate and effective services that would allow me to better able to get a hold on life with the aid of better understanding from those around me. Through a lovely developmental psychologist and speech pathologist I was, luckily, able to improve both my lacking of verbal and expression skills to the point where, for the next two years that marked the end of my venture at primary school, I had head straight to the top in most classes. My love of drawing and knowledge prospered in these years, allowing me to claim the opportunity to both earn the top prize in a state art competition and represent my school at a state school trivia championship.
Soon enough (and probably too soon so much was my love for my last two years) I had embarked into my secondary school years. I was the youngest student in the private Christian school and with notable achievements under my belt and a better understanding of my personal needs I faced the challenge with great aspirations. I was still, despite my triumphs, battling with depression and the unfavourable environment I was to find myself in exacerbated my pain. I had just come out of my final year free of being bullied only to be sent into my early secondary years confronted again with students who seemed obsessed with the act of harassing me. Moreover, the tendency to find people in those first days whom I had some past connection with meant that I fell in a group whose mentality was far from decent and rather deviant. Accordingly, my psychological and academic performance faltered down to troughs not seen since my first primary school years and it was not until I made the decision to change schools again three years later that I was able to prosper again in a new and more caring environment. It was a tough decision to make for my mother, who although was both distraught and angry at the school’s incompetence in handling bullying issues and provide for my needs, had spent so much time at that particular school that to change from it would entail her and I to restart on another long period of pleading and informing with teachers to cater for my neurological differences.
After much deliberation I decided on another private Christian school (this time in very close proximity to home) to renew my interest in life and what a success it was to be. It was only a few years before the start of my senior years at this school that I had ended my treatment of sorts with said specialists and, with the aid no doubt of my increasingly independent adolescent being, sought to improve my academic, social and psychological condition as a new person who would from then on try to ignore and speak little of his diagnosis. Without informing the school of my Autism it was here that I somehow managed to take a hold of my life again and steer it to new heights that saw me prosper in all fields. I became dux of the thousand student-strong school population come the end of year 11, established myself as an extraordinary debater and have made much better and caring friends along the way.
I am now in my final year of secondary school and simultaneously my first year at University, excelling in all fields of academic study, with more friends than I have ever managed, and mostly free of the depression that once nearly destroyed my life. I still have my nuances - I have hitherto never learnt to tie my show laces properly, have next to no sense of direction (I oftentimes forget the way from which I turned into a driveway), and have little experience in independent living (scared to bored a train by myself, without a part-time job and have little luck in forging significant relations with the opposite sex). However, my biggest challenge now is my struggle with panic and anxiety. For over a year I know I have suffered from intermittent panic attacks and continuous hand tremors that although can greatly frustrate me I am learning to deal with. I have just finished my last assessment and involvement in a research study involving adolescents living with Autism and the like, but am keen to contribute to its understanding further. I dream of being a spokesperson for young people living with Autism and through presenting to the world my thoughts allow them to realise my vision as follows:
Like so many mental illnesses, Autism and associated conditions are grossly misinterpreted. It's not a disability, but an ability - allowing those who possess it to engage in deeper, different echelons of thought processes than those experienced by decidedly 'normal' beings.
Indeed, Autism appears somewhat to be part of an evolutionary process. As humankind relies increasingly on interaction with machine as opposed to man, and as our world becomes more competitive and structurally fragmented success accordingly has become more dependent on an ability to think outside the square and to think in opposition to norms (common traits of Autistic beings). Perhaps those like me with HFA are the gifted; those persons who despite being diagnosed with the apparent 'disorder' of Autism have managed to employ and capitalise on their unique neurolological difference to achieve an overall better wellbeing than the average individual.
Ultimately, we are the same as anyone else. We do NOT have a ‘disorder’ but merely certain neurological differences. I am frustrated greatly by organisations such as ‘Autism Speaks’ who perpetuate the idea of the ‘need for a cure for Autism’ when it can not and needs not to be changed. The world needs to realise this for the benefit of all.
06 Jul 2009, 10:22 am
