For those of you who just discovered my blog, I am diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome. I was looking on the Wrongplanet website, and one particular thread caught my attention. It talked about an Autistic male who has been the object of a lot of ridicule on the Internet. I am going to attempt to describe the mixed emotions I felt when I first discovered him. His name is Christian Weston Chandler. He is known as the creator of Sonichu, Rosechu and the city of CWCville, VA. Sonichu is a spin off from the character Pikachu from the Japanese anime Pokémon and the sega video game Sonic The Hedgehog. Chris’s recreations of both characters are mainly criticized because of their lack of originality, but they are also criticized because they lack professional quality. 

He is now 29 years old and now lives in his widowed mother’s house in a small Virginia town. Now, you may be asking me one obvious question. Why has Christian Weston Chandler been the object of so much ridicule and why did you write a blog post about it? Well, first off he has a very bigoted, self absorbed and homophobic attitude. I am sure one can guess who he inherited this kind of attitude from. Parents are the two most important influence in an Autistic child’s life. Here is a YouTube video of Chris giving a tour of his house, and to describe it as “a little messy” is the drastic understatement of the century. After the video became viral, his mother and father were not very happy. Here is another YouTube video of him going into a rage about the fact his families living conditions were exposed to the entire world. He is very lucky that his families home was not condemned. He also films regular videos of himself exposing trolls who have “ridiculed” him over the years, an in each video he looks more angry and bizarre.

I guess one can say Christian Weston Chandler “inspired” me to write a blog post about something that may seem controversial to some people who don’t know me or who just discovered my blog. What I am about to write about something I’ve wanted to write about for a long time. We know parents are a key influence on any child, and that is especially true for people with Asperger’s and Autism. From the best of my ability I am going to try to share some qualities and skills that are important for parents who are raising a child with any Autistic Spectrum Diagnosis. All of these qualities and skills go hand in hand and they are important to guarantee their success in the real world.

1.) The ability to understand the importance of maintaining reasonable structure and discipline.  

I recently received a copy of Dr. Temple Grandin’s book “The Way I See It: A Personal Look at Autism and Asperger’s.” Right from the start, I noticed that Chris strongly lacked discipline from his parents. This immediately came to me when I read the chapter “Autism versus Just Bad Behavior”. In the first paragraph I provided a link to a website that is full unacceptable things Chris has done out in public and on the internet. His parents seemed to be very passive, which is the exact opposite of being consistent and firm. In a quote directly from this chapter, Ms. Grandin writes:

Bad behaviors should have consequences, and parents need to understand that applying consequences in a consistent manner will make gains in changing these behaviors. I behaved well at the dining room table because there were consequences: I lost TV privileges for one night if I misbehaved at the table. Other misbehaving, such as swearing or laughing at a fat lady, had consequences. Mother knew how to make consequences meaningful, too. She chose things that were important to me, such as my privileges.

I was always testing the limits, as most children will. Parents should not think that because their child has Autism or Asperger’s this will not happen. Mother made sure there was consistent discipline at home, and between home and school. She, nanny and my teacher worked together. There was no way I could manipulate one against the other.

Page 144, first and second paragraph

With that being said, maintaining effective discipline can be very difficult for parents who are not accustomed to this kind of environment. Determining how to maintain discipline depends on the child’s age, personality and where they are on the Autistic Spectrum. For kids with Asperger’s Syndrome who are able to communicate effectively, parents need to know the balance between being firm and reasonable.

Here are some essential tips and helpful suggestions for maintaining discipline for your Autistic child:

A.) The Asperger’s mind pays attention to detail, while the normal brain tends to be very generalized and abstract. One helpful strategy would be to write a specific list of rude and inappropriate behaviors on the Internet, at home, school and out in public. List behaviors that pertain to your child. For example, if your child has gotten into trouble for swearing, make sure you include this in the list, then elaborate more. If they have been in trouble for shooting the “F bomb” or using minority slurs, make sure you state that in the list of rules. You must also teach that using these words around strangers can not only cause people to feel uncomfortable, it could potentially provoke hostility and violence. If your child doesn’t like being called a freak or other offensive names, they should never use such terms around strangers. This is because you can’t tell whether or not a person is GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender) or of a different religion from your family. This can be done regardless of their age, gender and level on the Autism Spectrum. Be sure to list the punishment in the rules as well. Make the punishment creative so it fits the initial offense! After your child completes the punishment, sit with them and help them understand the reason behind it. If necessary, don’t give up until you know he or she understands! 

B.) Parents, you must think of trust as a two way street. If you can find time to do so, I encourage you to watch this segment on the Tyra Banks show. The segment titled “Parents Who Snoop” is about parents who spy on their kids for their own enjoyment. They nose into private aspects of their life that really are not anyone’s business. I must admit the first mother, Tanisha, was absolutely pathetic! She even went as far as reading through her daughter’s private journal to laying on the ground and sticking her ear underneath the door to listen to the conversations between their friends. That wasn’t even the end of her ridiculousness. As her daughter said in part 2, it was prom night and the clock hit about 11:30. Her mother walked up to the D.J booth microphone, called her name and said “It’s time to go, you’re ride is leaving!” Her daughters made it clear they have not lied to her, and I believe them!

However, watch Jeanine and her daughter Lilly from part 3 and part 4  What is the difference between her and the first mother? Lilly actually gave her mother a reason NOT to trust her by sneaking out and becoming sexually active. So, you are probably asking yourself “Should I Go To Extremes?” You should only go to extremes like installing a GPS tracker on their cell phone or installing parental controls to track their activity on the Internet if they have given you a reason NOT to trust you! As Tyra said, being an untrustworthy snoop parent is like keeping your dog tied up twenty four seven. Dogs are not happy when they are tied up! Therefore, they rebel by trying to get away and acting hostile. Your child with Autism or Asperger’s could have the potential to break any boundaries you set if you make the same mistake Tanisha made! There is a key difference between snooping and monitoring! 

(I know these teens were not Autistic. This could jeopardize the relationship between any parent and their child, regardless of whether or not they are Autistic!) 

2.) Willingness and ability to advocate.

Remember: Advocating is just as important as structure and discipline! Read this story about Chris to find out why I say this.  

If you were to have a conversation with me or my parents, you would be able to understand one thing. You will encounter people who are only interested in what they feel is better for your son or daughter. My mother did the best she could to advocate for what she felt was best for me, and the Freeport Area School District refused to listen to her. I have written about the Computing Workshop summer program in older posts. Right from their Facebook page, the description of the program reads:

Computing Workshop provides educational opportunities for students and adults on the autistic spectrum or with other differences or obstacles to success in traditional school settings. We offer adapted instruction across the curriculum, with particular emphasis on computing, technology, and the arts, along with social and communication skills, in a safe and supportive setting, during the school year and in an intensive summer program. We offer individualized transition services that help you to pursue your educational and career goals, rather than trying to make you fit into existing, low-level paths.

Before we discovered Computing Workshop, I was enrolled in the ADHD summer camps run through the Family First Resource Center and the Butler Memorial Hospital. During that time I was in elementary school, and the summer camp was a recreational/behavioral camp for kids with A.D.H.D (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). The camp was held at one of the elementary schools in the Butler Area School District. It basically ran on a point system. If we participated in their activities, contributed to discussions and followed directions we would be rewarded points. We would be deducted points if we exhibited behaviors like whining and complaining, teasing, verbal abuse, complaining and whining, verbal abuse, aggression towards a peer/staff member, and the list goes on and on. They would also give two or three individual behavioral goals to work on during the day at camp and one to work on at home. They had a traditional classroom component that provided instruction in reading, mathematics and art. 

The main concept of the camp was to teach how to be responsible for your own actions. If you earned enough points and met your individual goals, you were allowed to participate in a field trip at the end of the week. There was a punishment for students who did not earn enough points or meet their goals. You were required to stay at the school and do chores for most of the day. I was usually a good kid in that camp, but it got old after going there for three summers. Even though kids with “high functioning” Autism were eligible to participate, I felt it wasn’t appropriate for me.

I was entering the junior high, and my mother wanted me to be enrolled in a camp that would help me develop skills I could potentially use for a future career. The ADHD summer camp was focused on fixing my Asperger’s, not accepting it. I can remember I would get points taken off for some of my classic Autism quirks like difficulty with hand eye coordination. One day we were playing kickball and the kicker made the ball go right towards me. I reached my hands out to catch the ball, but it slipped out of my hand the staff told me it was a violation for not participating. “Oh, the humanity! A kickball slipped out of my hand! Such a serious character flaw that could jeopardize my chances of living a successful life!” I explained that it slipped out of my hand, but I got more points taken off for “verbal abuse.” 

You may be wondering why I would bring up such a silly detail like that. What if people mistake your child’s Autism quirks for “bad behavior” or stubbornness? This past summer marked my second year being a staff member and my sixth year being a part of Computing Workshop all together. My family members and I really loved how the staff members had experience in many different areas related to computers, technology, music and art. They also loved how the program provided one on one instruction rather than being in a classroom setting. We proposed for the Freeport Area School District to pay for my tuition in summer 2008, but they did not agree to do so. Instead, they proposed for me to work with a traditional tutor.  (Yes, I’m talking about the kind of tutor where you do repetitive problems with a pencil, paper and a textbook. If you get the problem wrong, they make you go back and do it over again.) So, we went to due process in 2008 and my parents won! In 2009 the school district proposed their own Extended School Year program, which was never done before.

The registration form for the Computing Workshop summer program has a list of all of the areas they offered instruction. You were asked to number them in a sequential order of interest. Administration from my school district only provided very general information about their program. All they said was they were going to work on math, “computer related things” and how typical kids were going to attend. They never said which organization was going to provide the tutoring, what kind of “computer related things” they were going to work on. There is no law that obligates the school district to provide such information, however it’s not very helpful in determining whether or not the program is the right fit for your child! There was one more thing the school district didn’t do that really made me angry. The Computing Workshop offered a course in GigaPan Technology, which is a robotic device that you set on top of a tripod. The robotic device pans around across the object or landmark you desire to capture, then the computer stitches the images into a large panorama. All the photographer needs to do is set the specific dimensions of the panorama and make sure the camera is set correctly. In 2008, this device was still a prototype. I submitted my panorama (on Computing Workshops account) and it was put on display for the robot 250 festival. My mother sent a letter to my school district informing them about my accomplishment, but my school district didn’t even acknowledge me. I truly felt they were not interested in my future success, they were just interested in pressuring me to give into their own agenda. We went to due process again in 2009, but we lost the argument. Needless to say, we did not give into the school district’s proposed Extended School Year program.

Wrapping It Up: 

My final thought for today is about a phrase people will often say to you or your child when you are in a dispute about their rights. When you are in a disagreement with somebody, they will often say one phrase along the lines of“I Respect Your Choice!” The administration at Freeport tried to convince me into believing the same thing when they kept rambling about why they felt their choice was better. They’ve never offered an Extended School Year program before, and they don’t have the specialized experience the staff members at Computing Workshop have. Had it not been for Computing Workshop, I would have never been introduced things like web design, video production, programming, photography and digital music software. I never would have been given the chance to get leadership opportunities. I got to be in charge of a social skills group. Had any of these opportunities been offered at my school, I would have turned them down because of my anxiety and fear. This experience taught me to be careful when people use lines like that! People who genuinely care for your child will fight for what you both feel is right for them!

I thank you for taking the time to read this, and I will be back in two weeks with “part 2.”

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The burning question is “how do I stand up to people who speak to me like that?” Well, this is not an easy question for many Asperger’s type teenagers to answer. This could possibly have something to do with the differences in the Asperger’s brain. Every person’s brain is equipped with equipped with cell’s called neurons. They are located in the premotor cortex. These cells “fire” both when you perform an action and when you watch somebody else do the same thing. This article from science daily.com explained the theory behind how these neurons do not work properly in the Autistic mind. It was believed that dysfunctional neurons were the culprit behind the difficulty understanding the actions of others and the lack of empathy. However, another Science Daily article was published in the year 2010. It argued the mirror neuron systems function normally in the Autistic brain. So, if it isn’t weak neurons, what is it?

I want you to take a look at this clip from the Kathie Lee Gifford show. Every week they do a contest called “Everyone Has A Story.” This particular segment was about a high school senior named Zach Hirsch and his younger friend Gram Jackson. Zach was a high school athlete. He was attractive and popular. One day when Gram was a freshman, he was sitting in the cafeteria by himself. Zach noticed it and he decided to sit with Gram and talk to him. As time went on, they initiated a friendship and started getting together after school. The friendship had a very positive effect on Gram, and so his mother wrote a letter to Kathie Lee about it. The letter basically described everything I just said. At first I was very happy to hear about this story. I was happy to hear that somebody like Zach would step out of his comfort zone and go out of his way to help somebody who was “different.” His (Zach’s) mother stated how this friendship caused him to gain the confidence to reach out to other people. However, my mood changed from a happy to furious at about six minutes into the video

This “thing” that happened actually caused an outrage in the Autism community. Opera singer Kate Baldwin sang a song about their story on national television. The song was titled “All Alone”. Just by reading the title, you can tell why this song makes me angry. This song was written by Kathie Lee! 

We see them everyday, but to often look away from the ones who are sitting alone. 

We seldom hear their voice because we make the choice to leave them right there all alone 

We see them everywhere, but to often we don’t care. We’re lost in a world of our own. 

We rarely realize, they’re angels in disguise, so we leave them right there all alone. 

Can you imagine if hello was a word you’d never heard? Can you imagine if you’ve never had a friend? 

Can you imagine if loneliness was all you’d ever known?  

It’s more than we could ever comprehend. A world, a silent world, without a friend. 

But miracles can happen, sometimes they really do. 

And sometimes, the miracle turns out to be you. 

When you embrace a stranger and show love you’ve never shown, you will make the greatest friend that you have ever known. 

Someone who used to be, someone who used to be, but now will never be all alone. 

If you thought the song was bad, just wait until you see the next part of the video. I transcribed what happened next.

Kathie Lee: You know, we’ve been doing this now since October of last year, and I was wondering if we were every time I say to myself “gee, are we ever gonna be able to capture it you know?” But, I looked over and there was Gram and you had tears in your eyes buddy did you like your song? 

Gram: Well, it was a little to sad. 

(Everyone in the room laughs, including Zach’s and Gram’s family)  

Kathie Lee reminds me of the annoying “drill Sargent” therapist who thought forcing the Asperger’s out of me would make me a “brand new person”. Here is a little glimpse on how our sessions would begin. Obvious question after obvious question, irritable answer after irritable answer.

(The therapist pulls into our driveway. Penny, our dog starts barking and whining, letting us know someone is here. We wait a few seconds until he comes up to the door. My mother or I open the door to let him in.) 

Therapist: So Derek, are you happy to see me? 

Me: (Irritably) No? 

Therapist: Why not? One of these days, I expect you to give me a big hug! What would you do if I gave you a big hug? 

Me: (Irritably) Push you away?

Therapist: Why not? I’m only trying to help you. Don’t you want that special friend who you trust? 

Howard Stern gave a hilarious reaction to Kathie Lee’s actions on his radio show.  (Don’t watch if you are offended by coarse language!) He said how Kathie Lee made “different” kids look like “angels disguised as monsters.” Also, when they laughed at him for saying the song was “too sad”, he was speaking the honest truth. He was trying to emphasize how his life doesn’t revolve around being this “angel disguised as a monster.” Gram is not the only one I feel bad for in this video, I feel bad for Zach. She made him look like a complete idiot by rewarding him with all of these sporting goods while all Gram get’s is their two tickets to a Chicago Cubs Game. She made him look like he came on TV to brag about how great of a guy he is. He should have denied the TV interview! He only did this because he wanted to step out of his comfort zone and make a difference in Gram’s life. I still do believe there should be more teens who are willing to step out of their comfort zone. 

There is a word that describes what Kathie Lee Gifford did to this Autistic boy, and it is called patronizing. It simply means behaving in an undignified, superior and/or offensive way towards a person. Patronizers often convince others they are trying to be kind. Some are bullies who want to see an angry reaction, while others don’t have an intent to offend you. Either way they are really frustrating to be around. It seemed to me that teacher who discouraged me from going to Lenape Tech wanted to get a reaction out of me. She wanted me to get into trouble then rub into my face how much of a dismal failure I would be if I went to Lenape, the “school with the terrible P.S.S.A test scores.”

I remember my mother emailed the school about how she did not appreciate them bullying me into making the decision to go forward with what they wanted me to do. It was great to know that my mother wanted to support me, but the title of this post is absolutely true. If you want to prevent your emotions from interfering with your job,  here are some tips I hope you found helpful.

1.) You must “nip it in the bud” before it becomes a serious issue. Rehearse what you are going to say to the person by speaking into a mirror. You will find out why later on. (Try to remember the situation in as much detail as possible.) 1.) What did the person do or say to make you upset? 2.) What tone of voice and body language did they use? 3.) Why did their actions upset you? 4.) From your perspective, did they or did they not intend to offend you?

2.) Refrain from being emotional. Expressing sadness or anger will cause others to think you are weak, therefore they will not take you seriously. However, you must be firm and make it clear that you don’t appreciate whatever they may be doing to make you feel bad. Being firm with somebody means that you should be polite. Politeness is something that shows you are a mature person that is capable of handling any type of conflict that may ensue, regardless of whether it is at work, school or in your own family life. This is why you should rehearse what you are going to say.

Never use foul language, slurs and by all means do not even think about putting your hands on the person! Many schools and employment organizations have zero tolerance policies towards verbal and/or physical abuse towards anyone! In the long run, this worth much more than being fired or even having assault charges filed against you.

3.) If the patronizing behavior continues, it should be discussed with whoever is in charge of the administration of the organization. Like I said, patronizers who continue to make a person upset are bullies! This is really the only time where I think it would be appropriate to discuss the issue via email. When you do so, be sure to keep in mind everything I said from the previous steps. (Stop it before it becomes a big issue, be polite but firm) Reiterate their actions, the steps you took to resolve the situation and the results. 

It should not be difficult for an administrator to understand why the person’s actions are offending you. Administrators who do not address disrespectful behavior in the workplace are not skilled enough to enforce rules of conduct for all employees. If this becomes the case, then I would consider looking for another job and resigning from the organization (while following their resignation procedure. See this article “How to Resign Gracefully”). 

(This tip can also be helpful for handling situations with your friends and family. After you have asked the person to stop, and they do not listen and understand why you are offended it is best to walk away from the situation.)

My former therapists approach which I described above was not the appropriate method towards helping me deal with issues in school, however I do believe that he wanted to help me. After all, he could tell that I didn’t want to participate in the sessions and he knew I didn’t like being asked question after question. He wanted me to step out of my comfort zone and stand up for myself. The truth was, it made me even more anxious and more uncomfortable. Going back to the Kathie Lee Gifford clip, I wonder how the friendship between Zach and Gram is going now. If that were me, I would definitely have some choice words for Ms. Kathie Lee after that hideous song. The refreshing thing about college has been that I have experienced no bullying situations yet. It is great to know that people are generally more mature and know that such disrespect is not acceptable.

I hope you enjoyed reading this post! Thank you for reading!

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The story is about a young man named Reginald “Neli” Latson from the small town of Statford, Virginia. The story begins on the morning of Monday, May 24, 2010. Neli was sitting in the grass outside the local library, waiting for it to open for the day. A nearby school crossing guard called the police, and reported a “suspicious black male who may have a gun.” Neli became tired of waiting for the library to open, so he decided to leave the library. He was then approached by a school resources officer, Deputy Thomas Calvary, and he was immediately searched for the suspected gun. Absolutely no weapons of any kind were found in his possession.  The officer then asked Neli for his name, but he refused to give it to him. This was because he perceived the officer was trying to harass him. So, he refused and tried to get away and stated he committed no crime. Deputy Calvary then grabbed him from behind and tried to arrest him without reading his Miranda rights or calling for backup. Neli resisted arrest and both he and the officer were “subsequently injured”.

Neli was held for 11 days without bail at the Rappahonack Reigonal Jail. The police allowed his school counselor to relay messages to Lisa Alexander (his mother). Ms. Alexander was only allowed one visit during that time period. During that particular visit, Neli was “in a catatonic state.” He was unable to speak! Later on, police interrogaters reported he was “nonresponsive” and “disturbed”. The judge ordered him to be transferred into a mental institution for 30 days of treatment.

Following the 30 days, Neli was then sent back to prison for another year. For eight months he has spent time in torturous isolation. 

Here is a YouTube video where Neli himself describes the harassment he received during interrogation.

Here is a YouTube video where a woman described the incident, the racial harassment and similar cases of injustice that have occurred at the same prison

The trial for the incident lasted three days, and Neli was found guilty of assaulting a law enforcement officer. The judge tried to push for him to serve 10 and 1/2 years in prison. His sentence was lowered. The judge decided to give Neli two years in prison instead of 10 1/2. Neli’s only defense was the he was officially diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome, the same diagnosis which I have lived with for my entire life. I have no desire to explain what Asperger’s is because I have already done so in my past 78 blog posts.

So, what are the thoughts that have gone through your mind after hearing about this story? I am going to say this right now, my blood boils every time I hear about it. I am a firm believer that law enforcement officials nationwide need to be informed about Autism and Asperger’s. Until I heard about the situation with Neli, I never had any idea this lack of knowledge was becoming a problem. I want to challenge my point of view with another story about Autism. This story is very different from Neli’s.

In order for a law enforcement officer to understand Autistic, there is one thing they must address first and foremost. Dr. Temple Granin pointed out in her TED lecture that Autism is a continuum of traits. You have the “severely Autistic” non verbal types, the geeky/nerdy kids who have lots of Asperger’s quirks, the kids who can’t function without assistance and the kids who are incredibly gifted. This story dates back to the year 2008. Adam Race was thirteen years old, weighed over 235 pounds and diagnosed with severe Autism. He and his family resided in Bertha Minesota and attended a Roman Catholic church named The Church of Saint Joseph. The church filed a restraining order which banned the family from attending Sunday Mass. Despite being ordered not to attend, they showed up anyway. The reason for the restraining order was because he demonstrated behavior that caused a “growing concern for the safety of parishioners.” 

Now, you may be asking me a big question.  “What has Adam possibly done to cause this restraining order?”  The reports from The Rev. Daniel Walz stated he would hastily bolt out of his pew and nearly knock over elderly parishioners in the process. He has struck children in mass. He sometimes spat and urinated. His family tries to restrain him, but it causes him to fight it. He assaulted a girl and pulled her onto his lap. On top of this, he ran into the parking lot, went inside two vehicles and revved their engines during Easter Mass. Walz also stated he would demonstrate self injurious behaviors, such as hitting himself in the head. 

A controversy immediately ensued when mother Carol Race decided to get the press involved. Some people say the church’s actions were too harsh, while others say they should have gone with the restraining order. I happen to be in the second vote, because it seems to me that Carol was the problem. The liturgy of the Roman Catholic church is very orderly. However, unexpected situations still can occur that can cause the child to become upset. Here are some quotes from the press release. 

Most of the time, Adam can walk through a crowd of people in a patient and gentle way. And because our family leaves the church service early, there should not be anyone during these times to “bolt through.” 

The worst of Adam’s behaviors resulted from lack of accommadations or cooperative discussions. Case in point: The car-revving incident. Normally our family left church before the closing song, which would allow three minutes before the congregation left. During Lent, Fr. Walz ommited the closing song and failed to ask the congregation to wait to leave until our family had left first. 

Carol said they would normally sit in the back of the church or in the crying room, therefore it would be easy for them to get up and leave the church before the recessional hymn. For any church leader, there is a lot to remember when it comes to preparing for worship. It is next to impossible for the priest to do everything by himself. While that is what acolytes and lay readers are for, what happens if they don’t show up for mass? The worship leader must perform tasks that acolytes and lay readers are assigned (lighting candles, opening the leaders book to the correct page, reciting scripture readings, setting up communion, leading communion, greeting parishioners before and after mass.)

The church has offered for the family to sit in the crying room and watch mass on a television feed. They also offered meditation through a local Protestant minister. Because Carol refused these options, so they decided to go through with the restraining order which banned him from mass. It seems to me that Carol is a “my way or the highway” kind of a parent, the kind I really can’t stand. None of her statements in the press release are about the safety and welfare of the other parishioners. Every parent needs to teach their child limits, whether they are Autistic or not. Here are some “what if” questions I have if Adam actually did injure or kill somebody. 

What if the police actually were called to have him restrained, and the officer had a “chip on his shoulder” and decided to use a taser to restrain him? (This actually did happen to one Autistic child. Read the article!) 

I must say that both the church and Carol could and should have handled the situation in a much more civil manner. While I don’t know this whole story, I think the church most certainly should have communicated with the family more. They should have tried to figure out ways to “enter his mind”, similar to how Elaine Hall did with her son Neal. I also believe the national news outlets should not have been contacted. Carol was just trying to grab attention to herself because the situation was not going her way.

So, the burning question is “How can we inform law enforcement about Autism and Asperger’s?” This is still a difficult question to answer, because the stories I shared about Neli and Adam are different. If you have a child with Asperger’s, I recommend the parent/guardian contacts all local emergency services (police, fire, ambulance) and use these questions as a guideline.

Where do you live? (Make sure you provide your street address and directions to your house. If you live in an apartment, be sure to provide the name of the apartment and room number as well.)

What does your child look like? (Provide a copy of photo identification.)

How can they reach you? (work phone, home phone, cell phone, email address, street address, pager)

Does your child have health issues? (sensory, medical and dietary restrictions) 

Where does your child like to “hang out” in their spare time? (Provide specific information. For example, if they like to hang out at Best Buy and buy video games, make sure you say the gaming department.) 

Does your child drive? (Provide specific description of the vehicle(s), license plate number and drivers license number.) 

What unusual behaviors does my child exhibit? Why might it cause authorities to think it is suspicious? 

What are your child’s favorite things? (Toys, objects, foods or discussion topics.) 

How does my child interact with others? (Sign langue, picture boards, written words)

What potentially dangerous places are in your community? “Enter their mind” and think about why they would be interested in being there. (Be sure to describe what the danger is. Examples: water/electrical/gas sources, elevated areas.) 

Make sure you provide some this information to neighbors and friends who you trust. Now, here are some pointers for your Asperger’s child if they are approached by a law enforcement officer.

1.) Do not attempt to flee the scene. Most police encounters happen unexpectedly, this might cause you to feel uncomfortable. This will cause the officer to think you committed a crime. 

2.) Refrain from making sudden movements. This will also cause the officer to think you are suspicious. 

3.) Let the officer know you are Autistic. (If nonverbal, use sign simple language)

4.) Ask for permission before you go into a glove compartment, pants or coat pocket. Tell the officer what you are getting out, then show it to them. (This will ensure the officer you are not attempting to grab a weapon.) 

5.) Always carry an Autism information card anytime you go out in public. 

6.) If your child is arrested, make sure they appeal for confirmation of the Miranda warning.  

7.) Carry contact information of an advocacy group, trusted friend or trusted neighbor anytime you go out in public. 

I truly hope you enjoyed reading my blog post. I encourage you to visit the website avoiceforneli.com and sign the petition to release him from prison. This is one thing that will help raise awareness about Asperger’s and Autism.

Have a great week!

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However, there is another side of college life that makes me extremely nervous when I think about it.To some degree, I still do believe in the phrase “it’s better to be hated for who you are than loved for who you’re not”. However, there are a few exceptions to it. The social life in high school took many turns, and it got worse each one. Freshman year at the Freeport Area Senior High School started out with realizing I was “different” and that people either didn’t know I existed or showed how they didn’t care by harassing and taunting me. I then was put under the false impression that I was beginning to fit in with people from the “popular” crowd. (The kids who played sports, had lots of friends and “hung out” outside of school.) I created a Myspace account and I pretended to like the things every “cool” kid does. I wrote about the “cool” music, the “cool” activities such as sports and dating. I began chatting with these kids online and they didn’t seem to mind, for a while at least. Unknown to me, they started to become annoyed with me each day I would start a conversation with them.

The “poor wiring” in my Aspie brain makes it difficult for me to understand social interaction. The Wesley Wonder Kids club used role-playing and art projects as a “teaching tool” for this topic. I remember one session our topic was personal hygiene, we would be instructed to perform a short role play about how people could potentially react to a person who does not shower or brush their teeth. Long story short, one group member lifts their arms up and the person’s offensive body odor causes everybody to fall on the ground and express their disgust. The art project would consist of cutting pictures of people practicing good hygiene habits out of a magazine and pasting them onto a big sheet of paper. It honestly felt like kindergarten all over again!. Personal hygiene was never a problem for me, but it was for a few of the kids who I can remember.

I used personal hygiene as an example because (as I said earlier) people will notice whether or not you practice it. It is just one of the many things that will cause an Aspie like me to become self conscious about themselves. While hygiene was not one of my major problems, there were many “flaws” regarding my social life that caused me to feel bad about myself. Pretending to “fit in” with the “cool” and “popular” crowd was something that actually did more harm than good for my social life. I can remember back in fifth grade when people would become angry with me in Physical Education class because I lacked the coordination, concentration and confidence to participate in team sports activities. Therapists and teachers thought of it as a “flaw” that needed to be forced out of me immediately. My peers used the “power of sarcasm” to try to convince me into believing they were trying to be nice. After gym class was over, they would turn around and say “Derek, you did such a great job in gym class today. You should try out for little league sports.” Many children and adolescents with Asperger’s Syndrome lack the language skills to effectively use a “comeback” to stand up for themselves.  So, I would tell them “quit making fun of me.” That obviously didn’t convince them to stop. Teachers were no help because they simply believed I was being a “tattle tale.” They were really trying to say “People will make fun of you if you walk, talk, act and look that way.”

Earlier in this post I talked about pretending that I “fit in” with the “cool” crowd in high school. People began to notice that I was pretending to be the kind of person I really wanted to be during that time. I wanted to be the kid with lots of friends, a girlfriend and who loved all the “cool” music. My therapist wanted to “force the Asperger’s” out of me and make me that perfect socialite who everybody loved. The truth was, it didn’t work. I tried to “come out of my shell” but people ignored and made fun of me even more. In fact, I’ve written other posts about a kid who actually told me he “didn’t want to be friends with me.” I then made a bunch of rude remarks towards him, but that fueled the fire even more.

Social networking websites are a great tool to stay connected with people. However, many Aspies are not aware of the potential dangers of online communication. Face to face interaction is something that takes a lot of practice to master, and it does not happen overnight. Later on, I plan to write a more detailed review of Jesse Saperstein’s memoir “Atypical: My Life With Asperger’s in 20 1/3 chapters.” There was one chapter in his memoir that described a cyber bullying before such a term even existed. Here is a quote from the chapter about online versus face to face communication.

It is no small wonder many Asperger’s individuals fall in love with their virtual universes and are more comfortable typing into an electronic box to a faceless individual. The internet is the only technological medium that allows us to talk to a woman without worrying about our monotone voices destroying an already fragile first impression.

Jesse Started an online relationship with a woman named “Elizabeth West.” It all started when he recieved a “sweet and flattering email”  that read “My name is Liz. I have seen you around school and think you are a nice person! I was always too shy to come up to you and say ‘hello,’ but maybe you would like to email me back and tell me about yourself.” They started regularly communicating. To Jesse, Liz was a person who struck him as an “unusually empathetic person who could accept him and even appreciate his Asperger’s quirks.”  Jesse was involved in the buddies program at school, which was a program that let him be a role model to a mentally handicapped student. “Elizabeth” called him on the phone and talked about her ambitious dream to become a special education teacher and stated how impressed she was with Jesse’s involvement in the Buddies program. She said “It is really nice to meet someone like you. Someone who gives something back.” They lost touch for a few weeks because Elizabeth was attending “an arts camp in Maine.” She ignored Jesse, whilst he was still sending her constant emails. A quote directly from this particular chapter read the reason behind this.

(Warning: May be sensitive for some readers!) 

While at the Maine arts camp, Liz and a few of her platonic male friends went camping in the woods. They had toted along some alcoholic beverages, and she trusted the guy who handed her the beer spiked with the date-rape drug. Liz was repeatedly violated by one of her friends before her naked body was discarded in the woods like a slimy plastic bag. She was left alone, unconscious, and exposed all night long. When Liz finally squinted against the July sunshine. . . the memory literally throbbed inside her.

Long story short, she decided to get an abortion. The shocking truth came out a few days before a school dance which Elizabeth invited him to attend.

A few days before the dance, I learned a traumatic lesson about the dark side of computers. Online predators are not restricted to pedophiles and amoral scam artists. About six months into our friendship, I finally discovered that Liz and her circle of friends were not real.

My cyber bullying stories were short lived and they did not plan their attacks as carefully as the heartless teens who came up with “Elizabeth West.” However, their motives and intentions were the same. While they probably didn’t know what Asperger’s was, they knew I had trouble making friends. They wanted to trick me into being friendly then turn around and back-stab me by sending inappropriate pictures of themselves from their cellphone. I turned them into the principal, and all they got was a “don’t do that again” lecture.

To wrap up, I still do believe that it is good for an Aspie to be proud of who they are. People can try to “force the Autism” out of me, but I never will give up the many strengths that make me who I am. Organizations like Wesley Wonder Kids focused on my “social skills” by overstimulating and making my weaknesses feel like a character flaw that should be “forced out for my own good.” I am hopeful college will teach me more practical skills that I can use to pursue a successful career. I also hope it will help me discover more of my hidden strengths that I can use to build on my weaknesses. So, here is the answer to the a question you might be asking after reading this.

Should I tell somebody I explain “why I am who I am”?

The answer is that it’s my choice whether or not to tell. It all depends on my relationship with the person. I have to realize that I do not know how they will react to me “bringing my Asperger’s out of the closet.”  

I hope you found this helpful! I will be back to write soon!

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“Normals” Not Taking Me Seriously:

Every learning support student in the United States is entitled to an IEP (Individualized Education Plan). My mother felt it was appropriate to add a social into my plan for my freshman year. My goal was to “initiate spontaneous social communication among peers without prompting.” The truth is it is not easy for a person on the Autistic Spectrum to meet this goal. This was simply because “neurotypcials” (people not diagnosed with a form of Autism) didn’t understand me and I didn’t understand them. Halfway into my freshman year my “drill Sargent” therapist wanted me to practice conversations with my peers in school. He wanted me to start working on this during my learning support class period. The teacher would ask a student to come over and we would pretend we saw each other in public. The other student would say the greeting, and I was to continue the conversation. However, this student decided to pull a “Mr. Clown” act. He talked to me in the same tone of voice of which a person would speak when giving attention to a baby or a cute puppy or kitten. “Hello! How are you doin today little freshman?” he said. I then heard the teacher say “don’t be silly.” I was obviously not the least bit amused by his attempt to entertain everybody in the classroom. I became aggravated, so I reluctantly said “uh, hi?” It was amazing how my teacher couldn’t figure out how my eyes getting big and the irritated look on my face showed that I did not have the desire to interact with this “comic genius”. After all, it was obvious he really didn’t have the desire to interact with me. I don’t socialize with people who treat me like I am stupid.

Feeling Lost Around My Own Kind:

This post is about something I have mentioned in my other posts before, but I never really thought about building on this topic until I read a post from somebody on Wrongplanet.net, a forum website for people on the Autistic Spectrum. This person complained about how he felt his Aspie peers were a “pain to talk to.” This post caught my eye because I experienced similar emotions myself. The Wesley Wonder Kids club really tried to push social interaction on me, but I also felt the group members were a “pain to talk to.” They were infatuated with topics that I felt were extremely ”weird.” They varied from video games, Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokémon. We had others who loved television cartoons and comic books, and another would always talk about gardening, reptiles and history. There was another group member who seemed to have a new cut or bruise on his arms or legs every single day the group met. At the beginning of each session, all group members were given the opportunity to share news in their lives. They would enthusiastically share stories about their new Game Boy, Xbox or Playstation games. The student who loved reptiles and gardening would share stories about his lizard and the vegetables he picked from his garden in the summer time. The clumsy kid would share stories about the new cuts and bruises he would get from horsing around with his friends at home. They expected the group members to ask questions about the news which came from the particular group member.

Me Not Taking My Own Kind Seriously:

Depending on the nature of the news, they would either ask questions right away or the staff members would have to prompt them. I would very rarely ask questions right away because most of the things they shared were about their “obsession”. There were also occasions where the staff members would put me on the spot and prompt me to ask with the whole group looking at me. They would say “Derek, we haven’t heard from you yet. Why don’t you ask ________ a question about his garden?” This was the thing which I loathed the most, because after all I knew very little about video games, cartoons, comic books, gardening and reptiles. High school was the time in which I loathed myself and other people. Why? It was because they didn’t understand me and I didn’t understand them. Here were the many thoughts that went through my mind when the other group members shared their introductory news stories:

“Oh my god, what is this kid, five? Who the f*** watches cartoons in high school? He needs to watch normal, age appropriate TV shows!”

“Does he ever talk about anything besides video games? No wonder this kid is unemployed and has no friends in school!”

“What kind of a teenager wants to plant a garden in their spare time? That sounds really stupid!”

“Something is wrong with a teenager who likes history. It happened hundreds of years ago, who cares about it now?”

I never blurted my opinions to those people, but they could probably tell I didn’t really have much of an interest to sit and listen to their “weird obsession.” In fact, I remember one time at the end of the session I put my headphones in my ears so I could ignore “Mr. Dirt Worshiping Treehugger History Geek” and his stories about the ancient something others and homegrown zucchini.

Trying To Understand My Own Kind:

My bitterness in high school really took a toll on my social life outside of school. The main reason I felt I couldn’t relate to the other kids in the group was that I felt they couldn’t function in the real world as well as I could. Therefore, I resorted to making snide comments about them behind their backs. I happen to know this emotion is common among many groups of people. Take the GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender) community for an example. They are a unique group of people among themselves. They all have different shapes, sizes, hobbies, interests, ethnicities and personalities. The main reason I brought them up is because very many of them know how it feels to not “fit in” and be harassed by people. They hate the many stereotypes they receive from the heterosexual community, just as we hate the stereotypes that come from the neurotypical (Non Autistic) community. Far to often you hear a gay man making fun of another gay man because he is too feminine. You hear about an Aspie making fun of another because they exhibit repetitive hand motions.

I completely agree with the statement that it is unacceptable to make fun of somebody, however it is understandable to feel disconnected from somebody in your own group because they fit the negative stereotypes that are given from society. When the staff members caught me making comments about the other students from Wesley, they would just say “We don’t talk about people like that!” or “That’s innapropriate!” One of the general reasons people may decide to make fun of another person is simply because they don’t understand. Just because you have Asperger’s doesn’t always mean you understand somebody else who may have it. The Wesley staff members could have helped me develop social skills by helping me understand my Aspie peers.

It’s been almost three years since I left that program. I know that many Aspies use their “obsession” as an outlet for the pain of not “fitting in.” I remember my obsession with fans when I was little, and back then I knew nothing about Autism and Asperger’s. I know how it felt to have people pressure me into becoming the illusion known as “normal.” I knew no other way than to ignore and make fun of other Aspies during high school because I wanted to eliminate my bitterness somehow. Writing has become my own outlet because it helps members of the “neurotypical” community understand me, and it hopefully helps kids who have previously experienced or may be experiencing many of these same emotions now.

I am not a huge “bible thumper” as many people call it, but I quoted a bible verse that I put in a previous post titled “Teachers, Counselors and Parents: Practice What You Preach!” because it relates to the topic I am covering today.

Matthew 7 vs 1-5

Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgment you make you will be judged and the measure you give will be judged, and the measure you get is the measure you get. Why do you seek the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, “Let me take the speck out of your eye”, while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbors eye.

I hope you enjoyed reading this, feel free to leave a comment!

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People tried to convince me that life in the Freeport Area Senior High School would get better as my years went on. I was very lacking of Math skills during that time. As a result, they put me in a low-level math class with the life skills students. The class consisted of very elementary, “rinky dink” skills. Some of them included telling time, counting coins, reading TV guides and your elementary addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. The students in that class seemed to enjoy teachers babysitting them all the time. We had one student who would get into trouble for running through the hall , yelling and pushing people out of the way. It happened two or three times every week! The teacher’s eventually decided that he should stay in his classroom for that particular period after the class change bell rang, then they would walk him to his next class after the tardy bell. The woman who taught this class was the same person who lied that Lenape was going to require a mandatory fee for all students to be admitted. There are many lessons that I have learned during my four years of high school, but I am going to go over a few that I am sure will have a profound impact on my life at IUP (Indiana University of Pennsylvania.)

1.) Ask for help when you need it. 

You may be asking why I included this in a blog post. Many people in the “neurotypical” community can’t seem to figure out how the Autistic mind is a specialist mind. It means they are really good at one thing, and bad at something else. The thing that gets me really fed up with Special Education programs is how they only push the student to improve the weakness instead of building on them using their strengths. Freeport was only interested in evaluating my math skills and writing an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) that stated I had profound difficulty in math and that I should only be in a class with the life skills students. They completely insulted my intelligence, because I knew I was a smart person despite all the issues I had in school. They never showed me how math can relate to my interests and how it can apply to the real world. I had a teacher during my freshman year who was a very similar story. However, she hated her job and (from what I saw) she wasn’t willing to try new things. Anytime she explained steps to me, she basically sounded like “Derek, you do this, this and this. I am sick and tired of having to explain this to you! Finish your problems and turn them into me by the end of the class period or you get a zero!” On top of that, she would fall asleep in class while she yelled at us for not paying attention. Teachers can’t figure out that every student has somewhat of a different style of learning. Some learn visually (charts, graphs and handouts), while others learn kinesthetically (experiencing and doing things) and some learn through hearing instructions read and explained to them. For the most part, I am a kinesthetic learner when it comes to something I am interested and/or gifted in. However, it does help to have a visual and for somebody to read and explain instructions to me when I have trouble understanding something.

It is difficult for some teachers to figure out how they can help a student improve a weakness through building on it using their strength. For example, I always had difficulty in math because many of the textbooks I have used in the past did not explain the steps in the detail I needed in order to grasp it. I hated how all through high school my math classes were very abstract and repetitious. They only taught the material because it was a graduation requirement. They never showed me why these skills are important to know in our everyday lives and in our future career. The thing I learned about asking for help in high school is that you have to emphasize to the teacher that you are having trouble understanding the material. If it does not help you understand it, you should ask if they change their approach towards explaining the material. If I had to power to fire my math teacher from freshman year, that is most certainly the action I would have taken. We can blame tenure as the reason for why teachers like this are still allowed to keep their jobs. 

2.) A true friend must make time to spend with you.

My frequent readers know that I had a profound difficulty with friendships in school. Not only were my parents, therapists and teachers aware of this, my peers seemed to be aware of this as well. There were some who tried to be nice to me, while others were just trying be rude to me and manipulate me. I even encountered people who would try to convince me into believing they were trying to be friendly, while they were really trying to do the exact opposite. I described one of those situations in an older blog post titled “Bullying: Ignore or Report?” 

Freeport also did not handle bullies in the professional way the should have. There was a student during freshman year who kept sending me inappropriate pictures of himself to my phone, and in the text description he wrote “this is for you Derek”. I replied “stop sending me these pictures”. He probably sent me about ten more pictures when I told him to stop again. He then said “Wanna fight you fag”? My mother called the school the next day. I had erased all the pictures from my phone, because I became sick of looking at them.The next day one of the boys walked up to me and started threatening me, calling me a “liar” and a “faggot”. He made the excuse “I was only trying to be your friend, and you told the principal on me”. There was also one incident where he grabbed my backpack and threw my things around the locker room. He also touched me inappropriately and I told him to “get his f***ing hands off me”. He then said “Derek, you shouldn’t swear. I am going to tell the principal and you will get detention. I am only trying to be your friend. Why are you not talking to me”? I obviously didn’t buy that, because I have made the mistake of believing that line before. My mom reported the incident again, and all they did was give him a warning.

I have always been very careful when it comes to figuring out who I should consider as friends. However, that most certainly does not mean I don’t crave social interaction with people. I made the mistake of trying to interact with the people from the “cool” crowd. While I didn’t see them in school that often, I would initiate conversations with them via instant messaging or text messaging. I would then try to “break the ice” and ask if they wanted to get together on the weekend. They would either respond with a “I’ll see” or make an excuse such as “I’m busy, sorry.” Here is a situation I described in one of my post “What Does Cool Mean” where I described a “cool” students snobbish reaction when I inadvertently sent a text message to him late at night.

 The next day, I text messaged him and his friends. I asked them what they were up to, and then “Mr. Cool” snapped and said “You woke me up at midnight! What the fu** is your problem”? I then asked him what he was talking about, then he told me about the text message. I looked at my sent messages and I saw I addressed it to him instead of the person I intended to send it to. I explained to him that I did not intend to send that message to him, but he then said “whatever, just don’t talk to me”. I asked why he was being so rude to me and he said “I don’t want to be friends with you. Don’t talk to me”. I then started making nasty comments to him, and said things like “You are only going to work at Burger King after you graduate from high school. You may be Mr. Cool now, but you will be a loser after you graduate”. He then responded to me “Yeah, my friends and I are Mr. Cool. You just fu** off and leave me alone”.

Now I realize I handled this situation inappropriately, but at the time I had absolutely no idea how to handle it. He had absolutely no desire in getting to know me as a real person and not as a member of his “clique”. That situation took place during the summer after my freshman year. I haven’t talked to this student since, and I am actually pretty glad about that. Looking back, the transition to Lenape Tech improved my self esteem because I no longer had to be around him or any of his friends on a daily basis. It is still hard for me to figure out whether or not someone is willing to be a “true friend” or a “good friend”. 

3.) People who discourage you from pursuing your dream career don’t know enough about the field to “help” with your decisions. 

While this statement is not always true, I must say that I can’t stand adults who are judgmental about your abilities. I have encountered many people who spoke to me like that throughout my years in high school. I’ve heard this from teachers, therapists and my parents friends. My teachers who tried to discourage me from going to Lenape were a perfect example. There was talk of Freeport and Leechburg to send students to pull out of Lenape and send students to a different vocational technical school. It was rumored that students would only have the option to attend the Northern Westmoreland Career and Technology Center for a half day program. We had the opportunity to see tour both schools, and Northern Westmoreland didn’t impress me very much. The day we went to tour the school, they acted like they were completely surprised to see us. Lenape had specific dates set and all of the sending schools came on their assigned day. Some of the instructors at Northern Westmoreland weren’t even in their classrooms. We would then just move onto the next technical program. When we got back to Freeport, my teachers patronized me by making me say “positive” things about the school. By doing this, they would be hopeful I would let them push me into doing what they believed would be the best option for me, which was going to Northern Westmoreland for a half day program as opposed to Lenape for the entire day. The reason they believed the half day school was a better option was primarily based on financial and the fact Lenape doesn’t have a structured learning support period.

Lenape’s former electronics instructor Mr. McCauley was a very enthusiastic man with quite a bit of knowledge. He was very encouraging of me, and he didn’t make judgmental comments about my abilities even though I literally just met him when I walked into the room a few minutes beforehand. However, he retired the year before I came. My junior year was a very difficult experience, and it was not because of the replacement teacher. The seniors who spent a year with Mr. McCauley were used to him, then all of a sudden they had to adapt to somebody with a different teaching style and different expectations. They had a very bitter and disrespectful attitude towards him. They thought taking their bitterness was an appropriate way to ease their animosity. Mr. McCauley was a great teacher, and I really could feel their frustration with change. However, was that really an excuse to take their bitterness on the juniors? After all change is often an inevitable. That means it is a fact of life and we can’t stop it. Judgmental teachers and therapists are one of the reasons many kids with “special needs” are stereotyped and are not given the funding to attend a college of their choice. As a result, they are lead to low paying jobs. I hope my experience in college will help me change the stereotypes that are given to a lot of the people out there like me.

Wrapping up:

I gave you three lessons that I learned from high school. I am pretty sure they will have a profound impact on my life in college, and throughout the rest of my life. I know that life is a constant learning process, and I am sure that throughout my life I will learn many more. While I am very excited to enter into the world of the unknown, I am also very anxious. I know this is a common emotion, but anxiety about entering into this new world is far from over. I am pretty confident that it will not be perfect, but I am sure it will be a better experience than high school. I have the support of my family and friends who can help me through any obstacle I may experience throughout this long journey ahead of me.

I thank you for reading!

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Part 1: “Rituals, Manners and Quirks”

Part 2: “Emotions”

I will blog about parts 3, 4 and 5 in the near future!

I don’t know about you, but I absolutely hate reading clinical reports about Autism and Asperger’s Syndrome. The only things they really focus on are the symptoms and treating methods. I urge you to take a look at this article on Web MD.com. It is a perfect example of something that absolutely drives me crazy. These reports only show a list of symptoms in childhood, adolescence and adult hood. I have tried my hardest to explain the emotions I have experienced in my life through the writing of my blogs. This brings me to another reason I can’t stand articles like this. It mainly focuses on the “cant’s” of Asperger’s. I am the proud owner of John Elder Robison’s new book “Be Different”. There have been people in the Asperger’s community who have given his first effort “Look Me In The Eye” negative reviews. It is hard to describe experiences throughout a person’s life, then explain how they overcame them in just one book. This weeks blog is going to describe how I can relate to my favorite chapters of this book.

John would probably agree with my statement that we have come along way when it comes to understanding Asperger’s. However, we still have much farther to go. The chapter “Asperger’s and Me” mentioned his son Jack Robison (nicknamed “Cubby), who is now twenty-one years old. He was officially diagnosed when he was sixteen. John was not officially diagnosed until twenty-four years later. A quote from the chapter reads “I look at him today, and see how much he’s benefited from understanding how and why his brain is different from other folks. In many ways, he’s the young man I could have been if only I had known what I had.”

Social skills groups did not work for me, because they focused on “fixing” my weaknesses instead of building on them using my strengths. They seemed to think threatening and scaring tactics would magically cause me to become “reborn” into a “socialite who had lots of friends”. My last blog was about teachers, counselors and parents who don’t “practice what they preach.” It showed how they all push students to learn more about “social skills”, while they behave in a way that shows a lack of social skills. The teacher at Freeport who tried to convince me into believing there was a fee to attend Lenape was a prime example. Remember the situation where they purposely put me on the spot in front of everybody? I liked the chapter Finding Your Path to “Fitting In” because there was one thing that showed me why I didn’t function in the Wesley Wonder Kids “social skills” group. A quote from the chapter read “competence excuses strange behavior. That’s a very important point for those of us on the spectrum, because our special interests can make us competent in whatever we find fascinating”. Wesley Wonder Kids only focused on “fixing” my quirks, not building on my strengths to improve my social skills.

With that in mind, I want to draw your attention to a story about Florida mother Melissa Barton and teacher Wendy Portillo. She is a kindergarten teacher at Port Saint Lucie elementary school. Her son’s teacher allowed her students to vote him out of class. Alex, was five years old when his teacher allegedly asked each student stand up and say something they didn’t like about him. They commented “Alex is disgusting”, “Alex is annoying”, “Alex sits under the table”, “Alex spins in circles” and “Alex eats his crayons”. After each student spoke, she asked him. Fourteen classmates voted him out of the classroom and two voted to let him stay in the class. In this CBS interview with Melissa, she talked about  Alex’s only friend in his kindergarten class. Mrs. Portillo asked the little boy if Alex should be allowed to stay in the class. This happened not once, but twice! The first time he said Alex should be allowed to stay, but Mrs. Portillo sternly said his name. The boy eventually decided to vote him out of the class to prevent the teacher from potentially being punished for disagreeing with him.

Wendy Portillo’s punishment was originally a year suspension without pay and loss of tenure. However, the West Palm Beach school board decided to change that punishment and give her tenure back. In September 2010, she behaved discriminatory to another student with a disability. This teacher is now working at Allapattah Flats in She and two other West Palm Beach teachers were discriminative to a partially deaf girl. The two teachers were supposed to wear microphones so the female student could hear them, but the female student claimed they would “sometimes would not wear them”. According to this news article, the mother filed a complaint with the department of education. There was a claim in the report that said “that one teacher never wore the microphone and screamed and yelled at the student to pay closer attention.” The report also stated another teacher wore the microphone but did not turn it on and “laughed sarcastically in the face of the student”. When Alex Barton’s mother heard about this incident she commented “I can’t say that I’m surprised. I’ve fought very hard to correct this district and this teacher, and here we are again!”

Alex’s mother was very lucky the school board took any action about this teacher’s behavior, however Mrs. Portillo should not have received her tenure back. Discrimination against people is something that we unfortunately can’t erase, but society has a long way to go when it comes to enforcing the laws regarding it. However, we still have a long way to go. During John’s upbringing, anybody who exhibited these characteristics was perceived as “bad”, “ignorant”, “selfish” and “self-absorbed”, just to name a few. I am sure his mother was also very worried about his self-esteem after this unfortunate incident.

Let’s take a look at the chapter “A Reason To Care“. John’s mother suffered from Bipolar disorder and his father was a raging alcoholic. As a result, he dropped out of high school in the tenth grade. A quote from the chapter read “I loved computers and electronics, so I naturally imagined myself becoming an engineer. Yet, even with that dream secured, it was difficult for me to see a clear path from high school through college to professional engineerhood in my head. There were just too many problems. My home life was awful, with a drunken father and a mentally ill mother. And I didn’t seem to focus on what my teachers wanted.” Nobody was really there to motivate him and push him in the right direction. His behavior caused resulted in frequent trips to the principal’s office. A school like Lenape Tech sounds like something John really could have benefited from. I hated most of my classes, and my grades started to plummet because of my many issues with self-esteem. I was so bitter about the fact that nobody liked me and truly appreciated me for who I was. Just like John I felt “I wasn’t getting a thing out of class. No one wanted me there. There was no good reason to be in school”. 

My freshman and sophomore years at Freeport were dreadful because I simply because I had to be there for about 6 hours every day. The teachers were not motivated to fit my needs, and they didn’t do a very good job motivating me because none of my classes really interested me. Most public high schools hire teachers for the sole purpose of filling employment vacancies. They don’t consider matters like their ability to teach the material in a way the students will understand. I urge you to search for your school on the website Rate My Teachers. Reasons like what I just described are why this website has sparked such a controversy. Every school out there has at least one teacher who seems to think that giving assignment after assignment out of a  textbook will “light the spark” and help them truly understand the material and want to learn more about it. The thing that annoys me about teachers who give nothing but book work is the fact they never explain any of the terms or (if you are in a class that involves math) formulas in the chapter you they assign you. It is also really no use to ask the teacher for help, because they just tell you how to do the steps instead of showing the steps in a way the average student can grasp it. A “bad” teacher would say “Derek, I’ve told you the steps countless times. Why aren’t you paying attention?” A “good” teacher would say “Derek, let me explain the steps in another way. You don’t seem to be getting it.” The simple fact about teaching is they have to get used to the fact that every student has a different learning style.

A visual learner needs to be taught how to take notes, remember important ideas and they need to have notes and a visual to look at and help them remember information that is going to be on a test. Visual learners would most likely excel in classes like geometry and trigonometry. Algebra can be very challenging for these learners because it is a very abstract

A kinesthetic (hands on)  learner should be allowed to make models of the topic they are learning about. Field trips are a great way to show real world applications of the topic you are covering. They should have the opportunity to use tools and put their skills to the test.

An auditory learner may have difficulty reading passages in a textbook or handouts and they may take longer to get the work completed. They often have high confidence to contribute to class discussions and they are good with words and language. Both oral and written instruction are essential.  

The problem with many teachers is they are unwilling to adapt to the many different learning styles of each student. I am mostly a visual learner, but the hands on an auditory approach towards learning can be helpful for me. It is also important to remember that not every single Aspergian learns the same way. I am a person who needs specific instruction when it comes to performing a task.

Let’s skip forward to the chapter “(Not) Reading People”. Awareness of things like facial expressions and tone of voice can be very difficult for people like me. The chapter opened with John describing how his grandma Richter would make faces at him when he was a toddler. Instead of smiling and laughing at his grandmother, he would just stare. He had absolutely no idea what to make of her action. The circus clown faces coming from his grandmother caused him to wonder if they were supposed to be “funny” or “dangerous.” This agrivated her, so she asked “Why aren’t you smiling at me? You are just a mean little boy.” She finally had enough and plopped John onto the ground. His initial reaction “I was not able to fully grasp what had just happened, but I got the message that she didn’t like me very much.” The therapist I described in many of my former posts (especially “You Need To Laugh More”) seemed to think that pushing me would magically cure me of this problem. He took a similar approach to how Elaine Hall handled her son Neal. He would mimic my facial expressions, film them with my video camera and laugh at them in the process. After we watched the video tapes, he would sit there and tell me how I needed to fix them “immediately”. I am surprised I “kept my cool” and didn’t punch him after I encountered that whole experience. That was an approach that caused me to put even more of a wall. I most certainly didn’t think it was funny, so I refused to open up to him. The fact is, I will not open up to somebody who tries to push me to the limit. To me, it seemed like he was trying to blame me being me for the fact that I had self esteem issues and was bullied a lot. I was emotionally drained by the end of every session with him. I am gradually improving on my ability to recognize facial expressions in people, but never again will I let anybody shove them down my throat! 

If grown-ups are aware, they can do a whole lot to help by explaining what the kids are missing.” 

John Elder Robison

Friendships in high school have been very difficult for me. This was because of my difficulty with facial expressions. The chapter “Making and Keeping Friends” illustrated how his views of friendships have changed. Social skills groups like Wesley Wonder Kids weren’t very helpful when it came to making friendships. The group members were lost in their own worlds and I was lost in mine. I could not figure out how to interact with them because I was not into the same things they were. I met my good friend Aaron from the Computing Workshop program, and we automatically got along because he was a very laid back guy who wasn’t interested in normalizing me. The group members from Wesley Wonder Kids seemed to be lost in their own world of video games, cartoons, Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon. When they would talk about their interests, the staff members would put me on the spot and make me ask questions about it. I had no idea what to ask them because I am not interested in any of those things. I was just to stressed about the whole social pressure of high school that I didn’t really want friends. Mom would try to encourage me to find out more about the things they were interested in, but I chose not to because I feared I would get even more lost into my world. Reading this chapter described how I felt at just about any social event with people close to my age. There was another thing about friendships that really frustrated me during junior high and high school. The following is another quote from this chapter “Like anyone, it cuts me when a friend I care about turns on me, but if someone I just met fades from the scene, I’ve learned not to be troubled.” I know now that friends who come and go are not true friends. I’ve come to realize that it is their problem if they don’t want to truly get to know me. Very much like John, I thought of friendships as “all or nothing”. People have different groups of friends and not every category of friends share their deepest darkest secrets.

There is one more chapter that I want to talk about in part 2. “Keeping Cool In A Crisis” can be very difficult for many people. People often joke about tragedies like car accidents and school shootings because they don’t realize the seriousness of the situation until it actually happens to them or somebody they care about. John was involved in a serious car accident, but he and the passenger were not injured. The following is a quote that described the situation “Everything happened in slow motion, though the crash played out in a fraction of a second in real-time. Jim saw a rainbow as the other car’s window glass exploded in our headlights. I remember a tremendous jolt, and struggling to twist my wrecked steering wheel as our car slid to a stop. When we stopped moving we both looked back and forth for a moment, and wiggled our arms and legs to ascertain that we were still alive and intact.”  The driver of the other vehicle was killed on impact. Head on collisions are among of the most serious types of car accidents because they involve more than one vehicle. I honestly don’t know how I would react if I encountered a crisis situation because I have never experienced it before. Instead of screaming and panicking, he did his best to rescue the passenger trapped inside the other vehicle. He took the logical approach and solved the problem while helping somebody who was in danger. Fire, severe weather and lockdown drills in school are necessary in schools because they are intended to prepare for the unthinkable. Before I leave you for today, I urge you to look at this video. It contains rare evidence that was found from the shooting at Columbine High School in April 1999. The evidence was put there to help people reconnect with what happened that day.

I hope you enjoyed reading my perceptions of John Elder Robison’s book.

I will review parts 3, 4 and 5 next week!

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Matthew 7 vs 1-5

Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. For with the judgment you make you will be judged and the measure you give will be judged, and the measure you get is the measure you get. Why do you seek the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? Or how can you say to your neighbor, “Let me take the speck out of your eye”, while the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbors eye.

I don’t normally bring discussion about the bible into my blogs, but this perfectly describes the many experiences I have been through with therapists, teachers and other adults who have preached “social skills” to me. I want to start with describing a teacher I had during my sophomore year at the Freeport Area Senior High School. For those of you who know me and/or who are frequent readers of my blog know that I have attended the Lenape Technical School for my junior and senior year. Freeport put me in the learning support classes since I was in the fifth grade. I was in the support room at the high school, and we were handed a scheduling paper for our junior year. My most recent blog post before this one described a math class with this teacher. I saw the optical electronics program at Lenape, and I was so bitter about the whole experience at Freeport that I knew there was only one way to make me feel better about school. I had to get out of there.

The teacher asked me what classes I wanted to take and I said “I don’t know”. She told me “You better decide quickly because if you don’t, you will have to take what we picked for you.” I responded “Then I’ll just go into cyber school if I don’t get accepted into Lenape”. The teacher obnoxiously responded “Derek, the state of Pennsylvania is eliminating cyber school next year. Also, there is now a fee to attend Lenape. Your parents are now required to pay half. You will not be admitted into the school if your parents don’t pay before the end of this school year”. That evening, I brought it up to my parents. My mother told me not to worry, because both of those ignorant statements were not true. Lenape is the comprehensive vocational technical school for Armstrong county. The school district pays the money for students to attend. What baffled me about this situation was how the teacher would try to convince me into believing her even though she knew her statements were false. She always reprimanded me for not interacting “appropriately”, while she bullied me into making the decision to stay at Freeport and be educated to become a janitor. I obviously did not let her bully me into what Freeport wanted me to do, so I went to Lenape and for the most part I feel happier and more fulfilled.

I have described my experiences with traditional “social skills” groups. Wesley Wonder Kids didn’t really work for me because it was mainly focused on teaching kids appropriate ways to interact with people. They used several teaching materials such as role plays and social stories. Before I go into more detail, I know there are many kids who would benefit from this program. I wasn’t very fond of it because it was the same routine every session. At the beginning of the session, each group member was asked to share news stories from their week. They would all talk about their favorite video games, movies, music and activities they participated in throughout the week. When my turn came, I didn’t really know what to share. I hated school, so I didn’t want to talk about that. I am not an avid movie fan. I was and still am a weightlifter, but they already knew that. They were not particularly interested in exercising, so I figured I shouldn’t talk about that. I didn’t do much else besides going to school and going to the gym. I would take my dog on occasional walks and go on errands with my parents on occasions but that was it.

The staff members would put me on the spot and pressure me into sharing something. I remember one sessions somebody asked “what did you have for lunch today?” I reluctantly responded “pizza”. Let’s go back to another post that described a situation during an activity during coffee talk.

Each group member was assigned a date on the calendar, and on that specific date you were supposed to bring a desert type snack and choose a topic the group can easily discuss for fifteen minutes. On one particular day, it was another group member’s turn to choose a topic. When it came time for coffee talk, he didn’t have his topic chosen like he was supposed to. It took him five minutes to finally choose one, and he finally chose “pop culture”. Everybody had their favorite movie, band or television show to talk about and I had absolutely no idea what to say. All of the group members would talk over each other, and the parents could hear them in the lobby next door over the air conditioning vent. Because coffee talk was the last activity of the night, I was only focused on going home and going to bed. Then a voice from one of the staff members rang out “Derek, we haven’t heard from you yet. What do you have to contribute to this discussion?” I responded by saying “I don’t know”. The group members turned around and started pressuring me to say something, similar to most of my peers in school when they would ask me things like “Why Are You So Quiet”? When it finally became time to leave, I muttered in disgust “I hate being put on the spot”. Another staff member heard my remark and said “You have to suck it up, you are going to be put on the spot for the rest of your life”.

I would have been much happier at Wesley Wonder Kids if the staff members would have listened to me and tried to understand how I was personally effected by Asperger’s. A true person with “social skills” will listen to them and do whatever they can to help them get through a problem. I was a very reserved person at Freeport. Wesley told me I should not be judgmental, when made comments towards me regarding how much of a failure I would be if I didn’t make friends “immediately”.

I am going to be graduating from high school in six weeks. I know college is going to be different from high school in many ways, but I still have no idea what it is really going to have in store for me. I am going to try my hardest not to let judgmental people bring me down, because I know I may encounter them. I think the only “therapy” I need is to learn about Electro Optics, a career field with many different job opportunities. Another “therapy” will be to publish a book about my life. I hope I will “shed some more light” about Asperger’s. We need to teach people that every kids with Asperger’s is different, and we should encourage them to use their gifts in order to build on their weaknesses.

I hope you enjoyed reading!

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Dr. Barry Schwartz is an American Psychologist. He is the Dorwin Cartwright professor of social theory and social action at Swathmore College in Pennsylvania. While psychology is a controversial topic in the Autism and Asperger’s communities, he gave a lecture on TED that made some very good points about our loss of wisdom. He opened his lecture with a job description of a hospital janitor. The description basically said you keep the entire building cleaned and maintained. However, he brought up a statement that most people would not think about if they were to apply for that employment position. A job description for a janitor does not cover any  skills regarding how to coöperate with and serve other people. Elaine Hall encountered one of these janitors when she was taking Neal to a gymnastics class for special needs students. She walked into the gym, and saw a guy standing on top of a ladder in the middle of the floor. She thought nothing of it until she saw the man had a drill in his hand. She politely asked him if he could finish the drilling later. Being the thoughtful janitor he was, he responded “I’m almost done”. He immediately turned around and started drilling again. The sound of the drill causes Neal to “go into a convulsion“, as it said in the book. Elaine asks the man to stop drilling once again, and he completely ignores her. As Neal continues to cover his ears and scream, she screams “stop the f***ing drilling!” The man looks, see’s Neal’s meltdown and says “I’m almost done!” Then he continues drilling. She gives up and decides to take Neal home. The man ruined what was going to be an exciting new experience for her son.

Autism is an invisible disorder on the outside. That simply means the child’s physical appearance is normal, but their mannerism can seem to be the complete opposite of normal to people. During “phase two” of the book, Elaine described the day she and Neal took a trip to Maryland to meet his relatives for the first time. One of his cousins gave him matchbox cars, and he went off by himself and started stacking them on top of each other. His cousins were very frustrated because Neal wouldn’t play with them. Instead of playing with them, he would follow them around.  This bothered his one cousin His one cousin Kira commented to his aunt “Mom, I like our other cousin Brandon better!” They had absolutely no idea how to interact with him. This is also true with people like me who have Asperger’s Syndrome. I enjoyed talking about fans, school buses and fire alarms when I was growing up. I have found that children with Asperger’s often like to use their “obsession” as an escape from stress. He really didn’t know how to interact with other children. The fact that he followed his cousins around could have meant that he was at least interested in them.

Traditional therapists did not work for Neal. They didn’t work for me either. Anytime he would flap his hands, the therapist would tell him “quiet hands”! He would hold his hands on his ears instead of sitting still. The therapists were obviously not impressed by that. They would immediately tell him “No Neal, put your hands down!” Most Autistic people cover their ears when they are overwhelmed by loud noises. So, Neal’s brain told him to put his hands over his ears when the therapist would say “quiet hands”. Elaine took a different approach to helping Neal become aware of his hand flapping and spinning in circles. If Neal needed to flap his hands, she would flap hands with him. They would pretend they were birds flying around. There was one situation in the book where Neal was walking down the street, and he liked to look at the shiny hubcaps on the parked cars. She tried to convince him to keep going, but he had a meltdown. Elaine then joined him in staring at the hubcaps. A few seconds past, and they walked on. He never stared at a hubcap again. She helped Neal become aware of his behaviors by entering into his world. As I said, Autistic people use their obsessive behaviors as a way to relieve stress from over-stimulation. Elaine hired theater people to work with Neal and they naturally thought outside the box.

We had a student two summers ago at the Computing Workshop who did this when he was overly stimulated. He had severe non verbal Autism and he also had Down Syndrome. He loved to twirl and shake bead necklaces that people would throw at Marti Gras parties. The mobile therapist he worked with was not very helpful. He, a Behavioral Specialist Consultant (BSC) and a Mobile Therapist (MT) were working one on one. I don’t remember exactly what they were doing, but the student became overwhelmed. He decided to walk over and play with his beads. The therapist quickly ran over, grabbed the beads and forced him to walk back to his tutor. He obviously was not happy about this, so he started making loud noises and trying to pull away from the therapist. The therapist said “I know you don’t want to do this, but it’s time to work. You have to suck it up”. He obviously had no idea what this meant. So he tried to walk over to the beads again. This kept happening three or four times, until a staff member finally insisted “why don’t we let him take a break and bring him to another room afterwords?” This therapist was just another one of the incompetent people we have working with children who have special needs. Instead of helping him, she berated him and treated him like he was bad. Therefore, he rebelled.

Besides writing a memoir about her experiences with Neal, she founded The Miracle Project. She is on the same mission that Mary Hart, the director of Computing Workshop is on. Society is mainly focused on the things Autistics can’t do. Elaine decided to teach the kids singing, dancing and poetry. She and her team wrote a musical and had the kids perform it in front of a live audience. My experiences with traditional social skills groups were not very good. They were only focused on controlling me and correcting me. If you have read my previous posts, they have described my experiences at Wesley Wonder Kids to a tea. Instead of connecting with me, they focused on teaching me appropriate social skills and reprimanding me every time I demonstrated them inappropriately. They wanted to “normalize” me. Before people say anything, I am aware that all children and teenagers need some structure. They have to know things like when it is appropriate to joke around and when it is time to be serious. They have to learn the differences between close friends, friends, acquaintances and strangers. However, we do not need “professionals” who will reprimand them because of their unusual behaviors.

I viewed the film “Autism: The Musical” which documents the Miracle Project from the first class to performance night. I don’t want to give to much of the film away, but I did enjoy watching the kids progress as the film went on. The group member that stood out to me was Wyatt. He did not enjoy being in the special education program at school, but he felt like he couldn’t relate to the students in the mainstream classrooms. He was the object of bullying and harassment in school, but the material taught to him in the special education program was very low-level. During my sophomore year at Freeport, I was put in a math class with the life skills students. There were many elementary level things we did in that class. We learned how to read a clock and tell time, count coins and of all things READ A TV GUIDE. This class was a total insult to my intelligence. I could care less because most clocks are digital, we have calculators to aide us with money, and most TV guides are digital. I can turn on my cable box, and find out what time a show will come on with a few clicks of a button. Wyatt seemed to be high functioning, but his peers and teachers in school thought he was hopeless.

While I know that Autism and Asperger’s are different in many ways, I could see myself in the book “Now I See The Moon” and the film “Autism: The Musical”. The world needs more organizations like Computing Workshop and The Miracle Project, and less social skills groups that focus on normalizing. I am through with hating myself because I am not normal, although I do experience negative emotions from time to time. However, I try my best not to let them interfere with becoming a successful person. This is why I highly recommend people to watch this book and movie. I hope you enjoyed reading my review!

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Stereotypes are the reason people don’t give us Aspies the respect and understanding we deserve. I am going to cover some of the most common misconceptions about Asperger’s Syndrome.

1.) “Teenagers with Asperger’s Syndrome prefer to be alone”

There is a movie out that I haven’t had the opportunity to see yet, but it’s called “If You Could Say It In Words”. I recently viewed an Autism Talk TV interview with Alex plank (founder of Wrong Planet) Nicholas Gray (director), Alvin Keith (actor) and Marin Ireland (actress). The movie is a love story about two undiagnosed Aspies. Alex made a comment during this interview that completely explains why Asperger’s is not understood. He explained that in many movies about people with Asperger’s, they look up a list of symptoms and only talk about how to portray them to show they have Asperger’s. They developed the relationships between the two characters instead of only focusing on the symptoms.

People can’t get the idea that we Aspies want social interaction with people just as much as anyone else does. We want friends who are understanding, loyal and trustworthy of us. I recently viewed a film named “Billy The Kid”, a documentary about Billy, a teenage boy with Asperger’s. The only thing this documentary really focused on was the fact that he has trouble interacting with people. It didn’t focus on the positive sides of Asperger’s Syndrome. There was one scene at the beginning of the documentary that showed Billy waking to the school cafeteria, constantly scanning the hallway for trouble. He was scared somebody might try to harass him. This scene brought back my memories of being a student at the Freeport Area Senior High School. I desperately wanted friends, but people were too rude and judgmental to even let me sit at their lunch table. Everybody had their own clique of friends, and they had no room for anyone new. I couldn’t bare to watch the rest of the documentary because it seemed to me the film directors would drag Billy into social situations. I was fed up with this documentary because it focused on all of the things we Aspies have so much trouble with in life. With that being said, Billy did seem like a very intelligent person. This documentary showed the painful aspects of having Asperger’s Syndrome, as a result I was offended. I am not going to go into detail about the whole film, but there was one scene that made me go back to the bad memories of my high school years. He described how he dated a girl, then she dumped him in front of a bunch of people in school. When I heard about this, I immediately flashed back to my memories of freshman and sophomore year at Freeport. It brought back memories of people setting me up, convincing me into believing they were trying to be my friend, then turning around and behaving in a way that completely humiliated me. Because of this, I would probably give “Billy The Kid” two out of five stars. The film director should have focused on the benefits of having Asperger’s Syndrome instead of the fact that he has trouble connecting with people and dealing with change.

2.) “Children and teens with Asperger’s are rebellious”

We can thank the morning news and society in general for this stereotype. When you get the chance, I encourage you to watch this YouTube video. It’s talks about Indiana State teacher Kristen Woodward who called five year old student Gabriel Ross “pathetic” in class. The student brought a tape recorder into the classroom, and recorded his verbal beating in front of the whole class. Her comments went as follows.

Ten people in this building you have tormented and tortured for 149 days, I’m done! You’ve been ignorant, selfish, self absorbed, the whole thing! I’m done!

The teacher then went as far as addressing the entire class,

He has made every wrong choice possible, and he has had more help to make the right choices and he has chose not to. So, you guys think, is that somebody in class you want to be with?

Class: Nooo.

See, your friends don’t even want to be with you now.

Woodward was suspended with pay. While I don’t know the entire story, it seemed to me the teacher did not communicate with the parents about Gabriel’s ”talking problem” in class. After all, the mother said it kept happening for 149 days. The teacher should have either called or sat down with the parents to talk possible ways to handle the “talking problem”. Instead, she wrote negative comments on his behavior log. Some of them read “talked non stop interrupting the teachers”, “terrible day” and “talked non stop today”.

Since the very first summer I started at the Computing Workshop, I’ve heard many reports from parents about teachers treating their children like this. The coordinator told me about a bad encounter with teachers and administrators at an I.E.P meeting. This student wanted to attend our summer program a few years back, and they had to attend the meeting to decide whether or not the school was going to pay for his tuition in the program. The entire meeting, the teachers and administrators at this school kept berating him about how “annoying” he was. They were trying to threaten him and make him feel like he was a “terrible child”. This child obviously didn’t seem like a major trouble maker. Again, the teachers should have communicated with the parents in private if they thought his “annoying” behavior was such a problem.

3.) “Children and teenagers with Asperger’s are violent”.

This is another one of the stereotypes that we can thank the media and Hollywood for. Do you remember the kid in my TV production class who told me I looked “just like a serial killer”. This was due to the fact that I didn’t talk to anybody. I ignored him after he made this comment because he was purposely trying to get an angry reaction from me. I remember John Elder Robison’s book “Look Me In The Eye”, the very first chapter described how people would say the same things to him. People threatened him with the military and jail. they often called him a “sociopath” and a “psychopath” One quote from the book said “I’ve read about people like you. They have no expression because they have no feeling. Some of the worst murders in history were sociopaths”.

My sister was a senior when I was a freshman at Freeport. This was the time I worked with that pushy therapist who wanted to “fix” me. She often commented how I would walk around the hallway with a scowl on my face. One of the key characteristics of Autism is awkward facial expressions. My pushy therapist got a kick out of the habit that I couldn’t control. He would imitate my facial expressions and try to get me to laugh about it. As I stated in my last blog “You Need To Laugh More”, he finally gave up on me after year. Hurting somebody was not on my mind, but I was pretty angry because of all the prejudices I received from people. Aspies tend to become aware of their quirks as they grow older. It does not always take somebody demanding them to change in order to fix their habits.

4.) “Teens With Asperger’s Syndrome Can’t Express Empathy”

This is probably the most ridiculous stereotype out of the five I am going to cover today. Scroll back to the quote from John Elder Robison’s book. I have began to realize that kids with Asperger’s Syndrome are far more empathetic than most average high school students. People should not confuse the word empathy with sympathy. If the were to be a death in your friends family, you would feel sorry for them. Therefore, you might send them a card or a gift expressing your sympathy. However, empathy a little bit different. My blogs help me express my empathy towards people on the Autistic Spectrum or people who are different in general because they show they are not alone. I know how it feels to be misconceived and misused.

While I am not a fan of reality TV, I am a fan of the show “World’s Strictest Parents”. The show focuses on changing the lives of rebellious teenagers who’s lives revolve around things like drugs, sex, partying and violence. Two teenagers are sent away to live with another family and experience “strict parenting”. The family has strict rules, but they are used to teach them about responsibilities in life. However, they try their hardest to do it with compassion, love and understanding. This particular clip shows British teenagers Sevda and Andrew. They were sent to San Antonio, Texas. They lived with the Frazee family for a week. Randy is a pastor at a mega church and Rosanne, his wife is a “stay at home” mom. My favorite part of this episode was part four. The second half of the clip showed them going to the local Boys and Girls club. While the group members were hanging out during break, Sevda stayed inside. The classmate Carlton walked over and talked to her. Sevda was drawing on a piece of paper when he walked over. Here is what he said.

Carlton: You like art, you’re very stylish, you have a lot going for you! I wanna ask you something. Do you like to party? A lot?

Sevda: Yes.

Carlton: You wanna know where I just got back from? I just got done five months in jail!

Sevda: Really?

Carlton: Yeah, my mom’s an alcoholic, my dad.. I don’t know where he is. I’ve been in every school in this town because of moving. I’ve been through rough times.

Sevda: I just hate doing this.

Carlton: You don’t want to do this?

Sevda: I just don’t like school.

Carlton: I say you go for it.

Even though Carlton’s advice didn’t encourage Sevda to participate with the group, it was a great example of showing empathy to a person. He calmly walker over and tried to start a conversation with her.  He encouraged her by explaining he has been through similar experiences in his own life. I didn’t understand myself during my freshman and sophomore years at Freeport. Coming to Lenape has helped me become more open about my differences. Since then, I have received many comments from people thanking me. Therefore, we most certainly can express empathy! There are still many things I don’t know about Asperger’s. It just takes time for us to understand ourselves while we try understand other people at the same time.

I used this entry to go the extra mile. I have tried to prove my “favorites” of the many Asperger’s stereotypes wrong.

Whether or not you are an Aspie or just a person who is not understood, I encourage you to comment and write about misconceptions people have about you. Try your best to prove them wrong!

Thank you for reading!

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