My Story

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This is my story it is going to be part of my bullying and Asperger project I am doing with Chris Szaday a psychologist friend of mine. Eventually it will be a book and CD. I look forward to any honest feedback on the sotry itself as well as hoe it can be improved for the book.


I was born in 1980 in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. I spent the first years of my life growing up with my mum and dad in what was then a semi-rural outer suburb of Melbourne. I am told that from a very young age I was seen as unusual by my peers and society in general. I didn’t start walking until I was about 20 months old later than most children this was the first sign to my mum that I might be different. I would spend the next 22 years living in a world alien to me and wondering why I could not fit in. I was finally diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome one week short of my 23rd birthday.

I am told I am a strong person and I believe I am, I don’t think I would be where I am today had I not been. I am writing this in order to help others in my situation know they are not alone. People with Asperger’s Syndrome might be different but we are human and have feelings and desires like anyone else. Despite the diagnosis life is not easy for people with Asperger’s Syndrome and tolerance and understanding are crucial.

I remember in pre school aged 4 and 5 the children played games and had already begun to understand socializing in a world full of rules I now know I will never quite understand. I was a very sensitive, slightly withdrawn child with few natural social skills or ability to handle it. I was what they would call a “natural target” for bullying. My classmates ignored me, excluded or made fun of me, I tended to hang back never quite knowing how to join in. It was when I started primary school aged 6 the real bullying and exclusion began.
From day one the kids and some teachers knew I was “different” and exploited this by engaging in a sustained campaign of bullying and exclusion. In my first year of school my mum used to make hot soup in a flask but had to stop making it because children grabbed it from me everyday and threw it all over me causing burns, soiled clothes and discomfort.

Throughout most of my primary schooling practically every day I was the class target for bullying. I was never invited to birthday parties or to other children’s houses or if I was the kid would make it clear it was because they “had to invite you because my mum made me”. If kids did try to make friends with me they were derided themselves and told they had “Catriona germs” Kids would never pick me to be in their group for group work or to be in their class the following year. When the class had to line up outside to be counted in pairs I always had to stand at the back alone because I was shunned. Name calling including constantly calling me ret*d, spaz and chini (an insult on my name), threats, cruel teasing, beatings and social exclusion were the norm for me. As I grew older I tried harder and harder to fit in and family encouraged this however the harder I tried the more bullied and lonely I became.

In grade 2 and 3 some of my peers including a girl I thought was my friend found it funny to pull down my pants and severely beat me. In grade 3 a group of boys offered to be my friends if I followed them around the back of the portable classrooms.

Being lonely and desperate for friends I followed them as soon as we got there however they all ganged up on me, pulled down my pants and took it in turns to digitally rape me. Digital rape is regarded as rape in out society and so it should be the impact and effects are the same as anal or vaginal rape. They said if I told anyone they would kill me I felt so ashamed and lonely I never told anyone about this incident until I was older. In grade 3 my parents separated and later divorced. In the 1980s this was relatively uncommon at least where I grew up and gave my peers more ammunition to bully me

Despite my social isolation I had a friend who I saw a fair bit outside school and got along well with I visited her house and she visited mine. Mostly we were in different classes at school and this was probably a good thing because it gave some distance. In grade 5 we were put in the same class at the time I was excited about this. However she made friends with another girl who in hindsight was jealous of our friendship and manipulated successfully to take her away from me. Given my Asperger’s Syndrome I am not able to judge the situation or understand what was going on. The other girl stole my pencil case from my desk at school and made my friend tease and make fun of me one time they told me we would play a game of doctors what this involved was lying down and closing our eyes to be checked out by the “doctor” in reality it was to run away from me. I strongly believe that a lot of bullying especially in a school situation is because of the pack mentality.

In 1992 I moved to a different suburb of Melbourne and started at a new school for my final year of primary school. Here although I fitted in slightly better I was teased, bullied and taken advantage of a little bit. I had some friends though we used to play four square in the playground at lunchtimes.

After primary school I moved on to Year 7 at the local high school. Adolescence is tough enough for any person but for a socially challenged one like me it was a nightmare. People in my situation don’t have inhabitations or know how to keep socially “unacceptable” things private. Adolescents are particularly concerned about image and fitting in. In the third week of Year 7 we went away on camp this interrupted my routine for a person with Asperger’s this is disastrous. As a security blanket literally I took my blanket on camp with me I couldn’t find it at bedtime and I asked someone I thought was nice but they spread it around the whole year level. One time a health worker came and gave us some tampons I took them to the next class one of the boys found them and started throwing them around the room. Throughout Year 7 and 8 the bullying continued in the form of name calling, exclusion, teasing and at times physical attacks. On Year 8 camp we were left alone in tents for the night with no supervision to teach us independence. This gave my fellow students plenty of opportunity to bully me for the whole night they shone the torch to keep me awake and hit me I kept telling them to stop but they wouldn’t.



In Year 9 I began at a government girls school in an inner Melbourne suburb, I stayed there for two years. Here I was not targeted as much but didn’t fit in all that well either. There was one girl who made it clear she didn’t like me when we had to dance in physical education she deliberately covered her sleeve before she would hold hands with me. Another girl actually apologized to me for picking on me when one day I gave her a badge from her favorite football team.

I moved to another school for my final two years at this school I was mostly left alone although excluded a fair bit just felt didn’t fit in. I did however have a nice 18th birthday party and some of the girls from school came for a sleepover whilst others gave me cards and presents. I would frequently have meltdowns and be excluded however. Unfortunately the school system isn’t designed to cater for people who fit slightly outside the box. I gained enough marks to enter university the following year I started off doing a Bachelor of Art (Youth Affairs). I made a couple of friends here and wasn’t bullied but as usual didn’t fit in. I tended to keep to myself and just hang out with a couple of people. For my last couple of years of university I changed courses and went to a different campus closer to where I was living at the time. I made friends with a group of girls in second year and for a time we all got along really well. However then two girls dragged me into their fight and in the end I lost both of them because I didn’t know how to cope with the situation.




After university I went through a phase of unemployment and to fill in time I did a part-time office administration course. Most of the kids in the course were straight out of high school and had that immature mentality and I was 22 at the time. I thought I had made friends with some of them only to discover they were talking about me behind my back.

It was towards the end of this course that I really began to question why I might be different. Despite the bullying and lack of friendships I never thought of myself as being disabled, just different. Whilst doing the course and after finishing university I had been unemployed having applied for hundreds of jobs and being knocked back on a continual basis more than likely due to what I now know is AS. I was beginning to question if I had some sort of condition my first thought was ADD or ADHD.

The diagnosis came about because one day I was talking to a girl who was a long-term friend of mine at the time sadly we have since gone our seperate ways. She was talking about her uncle who had what Sarah* called autism. Having met the uncle and seen he could talk I said to her I thought autism was people who couldn't talk or could talk very little she said no and went on to explain the symptoms of Asperger's. I said "that sounds like me" and Sarah said yeah my mum thinks you have a disability (she works with autistic and Asperger Syndrome kids) do you want me to talk to her for you. At first I got very defensive and said I am not disabled however after about five minutes I said sure despite the fact I felt embarrased at this given I knew Sarah and her mum really well
A week later I met Mrs. T. we discussed what she told me was called Asperger's Syndrome and the characteristics of it I became convinced this was what I had it would explain a lot. I went to tell John my step-dad. John told me he had always thought that having seen something on AS on the Internet in 1996. I was never diagnosed then because mum rang the psychologist I was seeing at the time and asked her directly M.N claimed that I didn't have Asperger's I just "had social issues". Mum didn't tell me this until after diagnosis. On February 20th 2003 I went for an appointment with Dr. Richard Eisenmajer a clinical Psychologist specialising in Asperger's here in Melbourne did a number of tests and was promptly diagnosed with Asperger's. I found him to be very understanding and helpful he told me a little more about AS.

After diagnosis I did and still do a lot of research on the Internet about the condition this has helped me to understand myself as well as to explain it to other people. It has also made me realise where my AS comes from given it is genetic. I find it frustrating at times that organisations such as the police and Vicroads do not know what AS is as they should. However through my own advocasy and pushing these kinds of organisations are now getting a better understanding. Since diagnosis I have been very open about my AS because I beleive that knowledge brings understanding even in five years I have noticed that public awareness of the condition has dramatically improved but more needs to be done.



After finishing the TAFE course I continued to look for jobs until early 2004 when I finally got a short-term position for six months here in Melbourne. It was a special program designed for disadvantaged people it gave work as well as training in group work and also job seeking skills. I made some friends there and still see them on occasion today.

In early 2005 I was offered a job with a government department in Melbourne I accepted the job and started a couple of weeks later at first it went alright but as time went on issues began to arise with me interacting with other staff, some mild bullying and the amount of time I spent on the Internet it culminated in me losing my job and an 18 month arbitration process that followed. It was eventually settled out of court and I was able to move on.

In the years following I was in and out of work none lasting very long mostly due to interaction issues. Finally in 2008 I have found a job that suits me and for the most part with a few issues I get on well with my fellow workers as I do not spend too much time with them. I am now 28 years old and to this day live an isolated and lonely life. I have a few friends but live on my own with my two cats. I still have trouble with misunderstandings and people misinterpreting my behaviour.

I will always have a sadness at the ruined and misunderstood childhood carrying into adulthood I have had as a result of being undiagnosed. I strongly beleive that M.N should have picked up my condition when I was 16 and that Mrs. T. should have told my mum of her suspicions that she told me she had always had. Part of my knowledge push is that if it can help a child be correctly diagnosed and get the early intervention they need I have done a good thing.

I enjoyed reading it.
I don't quite think I went through as much bullying as you, but definitely had that level of exclusion throughout school.
I don't quite understand what digital rape is. I haven't heard of the term before, but you'd rather not explain it, you don't have to.

I suppose it was fortunate that you knew someone who knew autism/aspergers and was able to point it out you. I never knew about until I came across it on the net randomly. I always knew I was different, like what you say and finding aspergers explained my existence. But I haven't really changed much so far...

I too don't have much a good childhood to remember. Most of it, I'd rather not remember because it was lonely, embarrassing, painful and confusing. There might have been a few good moments but they were rare. I get a bit angry inside sometimes, thinking my childhood, and also young adulthood so far, have been wasted from these issues growing up with aspergers without knowing it.

It is all very interesting...why didn't you put it in your blog instead?

What a great sory, but are you happy now?

it is a great story, you should think about making it into a film.
kids are evil .