Kids on the spectrum don't belong in mainstream school

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Yes if you're the person everyone has singled out to pick on, they're only as powerful as you let them be....it has nothing to do with them outnumbering you or having teachers and school staff favor them and thus refuse to take action or even more or less encourage it at times. If only I hadn't let them all do that then I wouldn't have been bullied so of course its my fault I didn't get the opportunity to develop any self esteem/feelings of self worth, worsened anxiety, depression issues.

You're right its time I went back to blaming myself instead of acknowledging the role mistreatment from others had on my mental health issues.

Even if you learn coping skills at a young age, that doesn't make you immune to damage due to long periods of time when people repeatedly bully and ostracize you throughout your childhood development.

For me, the damage was so deep I am only full realizing now how bad it was. Unless you have experienced years of nearly constant ostracization, you have NO IDEA what kind of damage it can do to any sane person. You literally begin to question your own sanity when literally everyone is taking turns bullying and attacking you. It's the same way if you took one of the 'tough' kids and locked him in a dark room 24/7 for a month: the mental health damage is inevitable!

When I started reading this board almost two years ago after thinking there was nobody like me in the world I was gobsmacked at how close some of the stories were to mine.

True, a person with AS being bullied equals a NT person being locked in a dark room for a long time.

NTs strength is being able to take a lot of bullying (what they therefore call "teasing") without getting angry and depressed about it, while the strength of a person with AS is being able to be left alone for a long time without getting depressed.

Unfortunately, since we live in a NT world, it is the former ability that is important, not the latter.

It taught me

1. How to watch out for the signs of subtle bullying.

2. That I needed to stand up for myself if I didn't want people to walk all over me.

3. That the world was not my friend and that if something was important to me, I had to get it myself, and to expect people to obstruct me at every step.

4. That people were vicious little bastards and that if I didn't want to be hurt, I should be very, very selective with who I trusted.

5. That I should never be too surprised or disappointed when people hurt me.

Lessons that continue to serve me well.

I think one problem I had was being to aware of subtle bullying...when I tried standing up for myself I just got called 'ret*d' and/or further ridiculed and mocked. So I guess I learned no matter how much you try and stand up for yourself people will still walk all over you.

I became quite selective of who to trust early on, as*holes still got through and ended up using me....and it didn't stop people I didn't trust from causing me pain. It seems irrelevant whether when is surprised or disappointed about peoples mistreatment it doesn't really make it less painful either way.

But glad all that serves you well....though.

Then what would you call it when an aspie feels depressed about being isolated and alone too much of the time?

This isn't true. People you might describe as NT have been driven to suicide by bullying. It is widely recognized as a potentially traumatic experience, often contributing to or leading to PTSD.

If someone is trying to say that bullying is just teasing, odds are that they are part of one or more rather specific groups:

* Bullies or former bullies trying to make excuses as to why their antisocial behavior is or was okay
* Ignorant people who can't relate to the experience of being bullied
* People who should be responsible for the safety of children subjected to bulllying, but who let it happen anyway - some of whom also passively or actively participate.

If someone is actually just being teased (a thing that really only happens among friends who know each other) then that is not bullying.

As far as the thread goes, students should be placed where they can benefit most. Some autistic children are fine in mainstream schools, others are not. Rather than saying it should be all autistic children in mainstream schools (or as one poster ignorantly declared earlier, all aspies), it's a matter of identifying a child's needs and placing them where they will benefit the most.

I don't think lot of people even realize how bad bullying is because when they hear the term, they think it's teasing someone or making fun of them and to them it's no big deal and you just learn to ignore it. They don't realize what also happens in bullying because they have never had that experience or ever seen it. Bullying is a broad term IMO.

Lots of places have other options already available for people who don't like "mainstream school", like alternative school and night school. For me, I did one regular year of High School, then I started my second year of High School but I switched to alternative school because it's scary in HS and I wasn't taller than everyone anymore, and now I'm doing my first year of Running Start, which is basically completing college and high school at the same time for free. Running Start is going great and I plan on doing it again next year. We have lots of options where I live. (Small town in Washington close to Seattle.) The only problem is if your parents won't let you switch around like I got to.

I attended eight different schools in four different states. I was picked on, bullied, and even assaulted at every one of them. Homeschooling myself my last year of high school was a necessity.

It really depends on the child. About where there skills are and what services are even available. It can be quite expensive sending a child to a special school.

Also, special schools focus most on children who are behind in their studies so sending someone with an average to high IQ who can do their work in class will be a waste of time. Bullying can happen in special needs schools too.

I was teased in school but never beaten. I didn't have the non-stop taunting, rejection and humiliation as I'm sure most people on this forum did.

I just didn't say anything to people and often wandered off so if people were saying those nasty things about me I wouldn't have even realised it.

I think schools are an archaic system that should be disbanded. They're not good for anybody - autistic or not. Being in forced groups seems to bring out our most primal mentalities (like prison, or the army.) Why do we put children in this position? And not only that but expect them to learn at the same time.
I think homeschooling is the way to go. Also if people were encouraged to bring up their own children, perhaps there would be fewer of them.

It's probably why I can't adapt to the real world. The schoolwork? Pass without studying. The people? Fail whilst studying.

Bullying? Yeah. Physical? Just hit back harder. Get into trouble due to that ('cause you know, no one ever believes the side that doesn't talk).

Verbal? How can you respond when you can't talk to people? You end up hitting them and you then get into trouble, as usual.

You start avoiding. You can't avoid it when in the classroom. You start staying home. You fail at school because you don't show up to tests. You skip classes and hide under trees, full of hate. Teachers join in on the bullying too (the only difference with them is that they sometimes apologized).

You begin to wonder if shooting the place up would make it all better, or at least they'll feel your pain.

You eventually leave (because you aren't homicidal), and the people at school have ruined any human interaction you'll ever have again (in person stuff). You're left with mental illness.

And your bullies are doing just fine.

All I got was teasing and being made fun of and I got spat at and egged to do things and pressured and taken advantage of and the staff didn't care. Those kids were not in trouble and I was. The bullying was worse by 6th grade and it was harassment by then than just teasing and touching me to get me upset and it may have gotten worse if we stayed living there and my parents kept me in mainstream and had me go to Junior high with the rest of my grade from my elementary school. I had no clue kids got beaten up or stalked in their own homes and back then things like texting and photo sharing through cell phones and Twitter and facebook and myspace didn't exist so there was no cyber bullying but we had IM then for AOL which was a popular browser then. Things I have read in the media about kids who get bullied to death had it way worse than I did and no one has ever tampered with my stuff. Then it would infuriate me when people would say bullying is no big deal, kids are wussies, etc. and now I realize they are probably just being ignorant and don't realize how bad bullying can really get. I was ignorant too and would have probably thought the same if I was not aware of how bad it can really get. I give them the benefit of the doubt. The bullying I have heard in the media about how bad it can get I have never witnessed in real life and even this boy in my school who I suspect was aspie didn't get that treatment either. That just tells me how tame I had it and how it was mild and I thought it was bad back then.