Not fitting in
I seem to only go to Wrong Planet when I have a personal crisis. The last time I was here, I had issues at work. At that time, I was fired from two teaching positions in consecutive years. It appears that I am following the same trajectory at this time.
I had a friend ask me if I ever had a teaching job where there were no interpersonal issues with me on the job and that I was happy. I couldn't think of any. I taught for over 15 years; I have a master's degree and several certifications, allowing me to teach in various unique education settings. People who know me believe I am competent and understand a lot about my job. But I always have conflicts. When I am fired, there is little about my actual job performance and more about those soft skills.
I am currently working as a special education teacher in a mid-sized district that has high and low-economic-status students where they have to import Filipinos from the Philipines even to fill the positions.
At the beginning of the year, I got into a conflict with the aides in my class, without going into weeds, my principal refused to back me up, in fact she blamed me for the mess. Although I agree that I had a hand in it, the aides themselves felt entitled to criticize me in front of the kids and call me a liar to my face, with the principal present (when I confronted her, she stated that is just how they felt). It cumulated with the police being called, yes, the police were called, and I was escorted off campus. I didn't do anything wrong; in fact, I was waiting for the admin's direction on the next steps. This happened because one of my students was escalated, and I asked the aides to ignore his behavior instead of barking orders for him to be quiet, and they all dog-piled on me. I was transferred to another site because the principal did not want me back.
On the 2nd day I was in class, an aide got into a conflict with me. This time, I was throwing out junk binders, but she started to take them out of the trash bin and look through them. I was halfway across the room. I raised my voice to get her attention, and that is when she stated I was yelling at her. When I saw her again, I tried to apologize, but she wouldn't even look at me and pretty much refused to accept the apology.
If this were an isolated event, I would write it off as a personality problem, but given the history, I do not know.
By all metrics, I am successful. I own my own house, I have three kids (my oldest is on the Spectrum). But I am not as successful as I would be if I did not have this social handicap. \
My wife says I am too loud, and I look pissed off all the time. I call this b***h resting face. And during the year of COVID, I would see myself on Zoom, and yes, I looked pissed. I would try to smile more and try to make small talk. I even took my mental health seriously and was able to get my generalized anxiety disorder under control with medication.
I am convinced that social ability is innate, and you learn to go through the motions, but you will always seem a bit off.
In one letter of reprimand, it was pointed out that I was "socially awkward" about a complaint that an aide went to HR about me in another district.
As I write this and read it back to myself, it would appear that complaints and controversy have marred my whole history. This is not the case; it seems it is in particular situations. It appears that the aides have the most issues with the following:
- white females
- older and have been working as an aide for over five years
- have strong personalities where control is a primary focus
I can see why so many people on the spectrum struggle to find full-time employment or able to keep a job for very long. I am just really tired of all the social tripping that I seem to do.
we do have to have social and communication struggles to get our diagnoses as autistic. It is a feature of autism we have little control over. Our neurology/ sensory systems process input we experience in so many different ways! I am always behind and lost in "real time" things such as meetings, demonstrations, live instructions, videos, movies, conversations, lectures, because my processing is so slow for anything I see or hear. No matter how many times I am yelled at for "not paying attention" "not listening" "not trying" it is my sensory processing that gets in the way.
It is a true handicap.
Many people think you can tell an autistic person to watch for social cues, listen for hints and nuances, tone of voice, etc etc... by the time any of that registers, the conversation and the action is on to something else, if it registers at all.
Knowing how we fail and being told we have to do better is not enough. sometimes our neurology simply does not allow us to understand and keep up with "real time" interactions.
Some people have similar processing struggles with reading, writing, or forming spoken words. No wonder we have such a hard time getting through things that neurotypical people do with ease.
Sometimes accommodations may be arranged, other times, we may have to get the help of specialists from many different areas of life for help, including a disabilities or handicap specialist lawyer.
No answers, each struggle is different. Hope you can find things that work for you with the support of an understanding team at work as well as at home.
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https://oldladywithautism.blog/
"Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.” Samuel Johnson