In my life, my biggest learning experiences have been how to adjust and take advantage of my condition, which is High Functioning Autism. From a young age, my parents have taught me that Autism, and similar conditions, are nothing to be ashamed of. Thanks to them, I learnt that Autism could bring many benefits to my life, and it did. They did a number of things to help me in life, such as:
- When I was really young, my parents had to use regular visual and kinaesthetic stimuli to teach me the most basic things. For example, to learn the meaning of 'under', my parents constantly took me under the bed and to teach me the meaning of the word 'except', everyone would leave the room except for one person.
- They told me that I had Autism at an early age, instead of hiding the fact and pretending that nothing was there, like other parents.
Like anything in life, Autism has advantages and disadvantages. Below is a list of the advantages and disadvantages that Autism has brought me:
Advantages
- I was able to drop out of certain subjects in secondary school that I didn't find very interesting. These include Religious Education (left in Year 7), History (left in Year 7), Art (left in Year 7) and German (left after Year 8).
- If I was interested in a subject, I would concentrate on it so much it would border on obsessiveness. This enabled me to succeed in that particular subject. However, this could also be disadvantageous, because I might fly off at a tangent.
- I was able to meet great people throughout the years of my life.
Disadvantages
- I had trouble socialising with people.
- I've always had trouble keeping on task. I can be very easily distracted.
- If I wasn't interested in a subject, I didn't see the point in doing it and so it was very difficult for people to convince me to do the work that the subject required.
Apparently, in secondary school I changed the perceptions of special needs in a number of teachers.
Autism has been a major part of my life and it always will be, but I have always thought that Autism has made my life better, not worse.
I feel that we all have idiosyncrasies which can be life enhancing or not. What is interesting is how we deal with them in our lives. You have a very good ethic, in that Autism is not going to hold you back. When I was young I had Encephalitis which meant that I found it very difficult to learn - I couldn't read until I was 10 or 11. I persevered and built in strategies so that I could cope, which is what you have done - so I know that you will succeed - you will just do it in a different way to others, which is great!
ReplyDelete