Life with Aspergers

In my last post I talked about the dangers of social media. Today I want to talk briefly about a recent event and how it needed to be dealt with. Names are changed to protect people.  The aim of this post is to educate parents and fellow autistics about how this problem started, why it became such a big deal and how to deal with it if and when it does happen to you. Even if you don't read this whole post, at least skip to the end where I give some recommendations for ensuring that this doesn't happen to you. How the Problem Started I received a call about an autistic boy who had an issue on social media. Essentially the crux of the problem was other family members who followed his channel on YouTube were being confronted with videos containing bad language and nudity. This included younger children, so clearly it was a issue.  For the sake of clarity, I'm going to call this autistic young adult "Robbie". Robbie is in his early twenties, he is fairly self-sufficie...

Like many bloggers I have a stash of topics that I keep for later because they're too raw, too "popular" or too difficult to think about at the time. I often look back at these to see if they gel with my experiences of the week. In this case, I looked back over an article about the bullying and savage attack of a boy with Asperger's Syndrome in Melbourne, Australia. This struck a chord with me because this week, I responded to a post from a mother who was talking about moving to a different city because her son was being bullied.  I've talked about bullying quite a bit on this blog before but this time I want to talk about why running from the problem is counter-productive and go over some options for dealing with bullies in their own environment. Why Running is Futile Short term running is fine. If your life actually is in danger, or if you're about to be physically assaulted, then by all means, run away from that current situation. The best pla...

It's a funny old world that we live in and it's full of people that I just don't understand. For the most part, I get along really well with just about everybody but every now and then I encounter "rogue people" who just want to attack me for reason unknown.  It's something I've noticed since I was a kid and I've never felt that I had a very good handle on why this happens. I don't read people terribly well. I'm improving but I've got a long way to go. Recently, it's been suggested that it's something to do with the way I present as emotionally unreactive. I thought I'd use this post to explore this. The Unreactive Child When I was growing up, it was very much the norm for parents to say "boys don't cry" or "boys have to be tough". Of course, I did cry, especially when I injured myself but after an early life of tantrums and meltdowns and I learned to suppress my emotional responses. There...

There's a lot of news about autism and crime these days and I think it's worth some open discussion because the reasons are varied but the blame seems to be quite singular.  I don't believe that the amount of crime among individuals on the autism spectrum is any higher than the crime rate for the general population. In fact, many of the attributes of autism such as a preference for isolation, should contribute to it being lower. Nevertheless, there are criminals on the spectrum and there are some attributes which are common to autism which could make an individual more likely to commit a crime. "Us and THEM" There's no doubt about it, people on the autism spectrum often seem different to the general population. This difference in itself creates some issues; The "Us and them" divide often leads to ostracisation within school, workplaces and social groups with people on the spectrum being clearly in the minority. In schools, it can lead to p...

For many people with autism, getting a job is a pretty difficult prospect in itself but once they have one, the difficulties shift towards keeping the job. Keeping a job when you are on the autism spectrum seems to be a matter of maintaining the delicate balance between being largely invisible and not being too quiet. Hiding in Plain Sight  For many people, the word “autism” conjures up bad images. At one end of the spectrum, people assume that they are hiring a person who will need babysitting rather than someone who will perform their allotted tasks independently. At the other end of the spectrum, people think of the high school shootings or computer hackers and sense danger in employees on the spectrum.  Of course, we've just had “autism acceptance month”, so everyone is fine with it all now right? Wrong. What people say and what they do are very separate things. If it was that easy to conquer fear and discrimination, there would be no reason to discuss racial iss...

I'm often asked, since I moderate comments on this blog (require approval before posting), why I allow comments which are harmful but block some comments which fight back. Surely here, of all places, I should be standing up for people, like myself who are on the autism spectrum? It's a good question and it’s one that I still struggle with constantly but I thought it would be worth posting about because it says a lot about me, about my intentions and how far I will go to ensure that the messages are understood. What does Get Blocked…. First of all, one of my aims in comments is “protection”, so any comments which mention email addresses, surface mail addresses or phone numbers (of individuals) will automatically get blocked. It's simply too dangerous to post these things. I've had people on the spectrum leave comments about loneliness and their hope that someone nearby will connect with them - and then they leave personal contact details. This is downright dangero...

Crystal Puzzle: Growing Up with a Sister with Asperger's by Ashley Nance Crystal Puzzle is a very interesting book which offers a rather different point of view to the usual autism biography story. Normally these books are written by one of three people; the person with Asperger's Syndrome, that person's mother or that person's doctor.  In this case the book has been written from the point of view of the sister (Ashley) of the person with Asperger's Syndrome (Crystal).  What makes this approach so interesting is that both Ashley and Crystal grow up through the course of the book and as they do so, their points of view and opinions change.  Fair Warning Before I start talking about the book, there are two things which I want to point out; Christian Language: There are quite a few instances in the book where Ashley talks very openly about religion and a couple of passages feel like sermons.  Since religion is a very personal thing, some people m...

You could be forgiven for thinking that bullying is “something that happens to kids”. After all, that’s how the media portrays it.  The theory is that if bullying happens to adults, it’s rare, it’s obvious and it’s generally the work of “rednecks” or similar people who lack the education and/or social exposure to be more accepting of others.  In reality, bullying is as common, as pervasive and as destructive amongst adults as it is among kids. The difference is that the vast majority of adult bullying goes undetected - or at least unchallenged by most adult bystanders. We expect our children to report bullying and yet we fail to do it ourselves. In order to really understand bullying, you have to know what it means. Google defines bullying as to; “use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force them to do something”. Bullying is Intentional I think this is a very good definition. It makes it clear that there is an intended result to...

No More Victims Protecting those with Autism from Cyber Bullying, Internet Predators and Scams  by Dr Jed Baker Coming less than a week after a terribly mishandled bullying case which destroyed my five year career in scouting, I guess I had unrealistically high expectations for this book. While it didn't measure up to my expectations, it was nevertheless a useful and practical booklet covering the subject of Internet predators and scams.  There's a mention of autism but really, it's something that can be summed up in one or two sentences. People with autism spend a lot of time online, they are naive and are easily baited. I really wasn't happy with the bullying section of this book. The section didn't start with a definition of bullying but described cyber-bullying thus; " Cyber Bullying is a term typically used to describe emotional victimisation and abuse among school and college aged individuals ".  This is a terrible description which makes i...

I'm finally ready to talk about the Sandy Hook thing but it's not really a thing I'd normally discuss on this blog. You see, I like to stay on topic and keep all of my posts about Autism and Asperger's Syndrome - and Sandy Hook is about neither. Still, I guess there are some things which need to be said. In case you don't know, Sandy Hook is the latest in a number of school shootings in the US. In many ways, it's being considered the "worst" because of the number of victims involved and their young ages.  In truth, whichever shooting affects your own family is always the "worst". There no ranking. All of these "crazy gunmen" incidents are bad. Over here in Australia, where among other things, we have some of the most restrictive gun laws in the world, we're constantly shaking our heads at our US cousins who are ruled by powerful gun lobbies under a constitution which was written more or less to close to a period of war. Get...

Recently I was looking at Music Videos on YouTube when I found some videos by Adele, a singer whom I only recently discovered sings several songs that I like.  I watched the video and happened to glance through the comments. There were a couple of positive and negative ones, after all, not everyone likes the same music.  Then I found the unacceptable; "she's fat", followed by a few cries of dissent then a whole lot more "trolls" repeating the mantra. It's reading comments like this which really makes me despair for the future of the human race.  We think that we're so far evolved from the haters of the 1940s but in truth we're not. We're every bit as judgemental and unaccepting as those we strive to distance ourselves from. It didn't help that shortly afterwards, there was some kind of US political debate about an overweight politician and then our local radio station here in Sydney, Australia started having a discussion about why ...

This is bound to be a controversial post and I'll probably offend at least a few people out there. It's not my intention but it's probably inevitable so before I begin, I want to apologize - it's nothing personal okay. At the same time, I'll admit that I'm not entirely qualified to say what I'll be saying here. My kids can use the toilet though I often say that my boys are stormtroopers - amazing shooters who seem to hit everything except the target. I understand that there are other people out there with far less fortunate circumstances and I'm aware that I haven't walked in their shoes. Like most of you, I'm still learning about autism politics and I make mistakes too. I'm sure I'll be picked up on these in the comments. It's not my intention to sensationalise things or to "close the book on the subject" - simply to tell you what I've learned so far.  I'm sure that it will be as much a learning experience for ...

A friend is doing a talk on Cyberbullying and asked for some suggestions. Unfortunately I'm not the sort of person who can write "just a little" and as it turns out, my response is too long for Facebook. As such, I've decided to "post here and link there". In any case, she may find your own comments/responses to be better than my original statements; So here are the Questions; When does freedom of speech cross over to cyberbullying? What productive strategies have you used when encountering online bullying? Parents/Teachers: Do your school districts have a cyberbullying policy or guidelines which they enforce? Psychologists/Therapists: How serious can this kind of trauma be to individuals enduring online attacks? When does freedom of speech cross over to cyberbullying? For many people, this threshold is reached shortly after the person being attacked starts complaining. For people on the spectrum however, this threshold may be reached quite some t...