Autistic Basketball Star

I am going to take a moment to talk about a high school basketball player who earned national attention for his performance in a game back in 2006.  Jason McEwain, who was a senior at Greece Athena High School in Rochester New York, scored twenty points in four minutes.  "Swish" went the basket as Jason made a number of clean three pointers, many of which made no contact with the rim.  Jason has high functioning autism.

Jason earned national media attention and has become an inspiration to many who struggle with autism.  Even Former President George W. Bush was enthusiastic to meet the teenage star. "I feel like a celebrity," Jason was quoted in a CBS News article. ¹

^{I remember watching this on a news broadcast during my own senior year of high school.  I can imagine how Jason might have been feeling during those four minutes. It may have been the greatest moment of his life, receiving the gratification from his teammates for his accomplishments.  I give the coach a lot of credit for allowing Jason to play that game.  Not everyone would have done that.}


Interested in watching Jason's performance?  Click on the link below to view the news story as it appeared on CNN.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fw1CcxCUgg


¹ Dakss, Brian. "Autistic Teen's Hoop Dreams Come True." CBS News. March 1, 2010.  August 1, 2011.  
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/23/earlyshow/main1339324.shtml

Mood Ring Reference

I am going to take some time to build from the concept I established last time about having a difficult time discerning between senses and emotion.   In this post, I am going to focus on a particular type of emotion: mood.  There is large armory of words to choose for one's current state: happy, sad, lonely, angry, etc. 

This all may seem obvious to most people, but for myself, it is very difficult for me to choose one of those words and label my current state at a given moment.  It is safe to say that my mind does not work like that.  I do not view a given emotion as a current state, but as an absolute reality.  In other words, my current mood is thought as a definition of who I am.  That might seem ludicrous to some people, but it is what I do as a result of my PDD-NOS.

I recently bought a mood ring from the retail store that I work at for ten dollars. It is a pretty thing to wear, even if the elastic band is a little tight.  I had a girl I work with say something to the effect of: it's pretty, but I don't believe that it can show what mood you are in.  Call me naive, but I place a lot of interest in the color of the cheap mood ring.  I wore it for most of the work day both Saturday and Sunday.  All throughout the day, the orb on the ring was blue.  This indicated that I was calm.

It does seem silly to place a lot of faith is a ring, that has elastic bands which will probably fall apart within two years, but I was fascinated how it gave me a reference point to start identifying my own feelings.  During work, I perform the necessary tasks, my mind is quiet, neither feeling pleasure nor pain, neither worry nor exhilaration.  I realized that I was in fact calm while working.  I was not feeling any particular emotion, just blank and responsive to the situation at hand.

Senses Vs. Emotion

In my mind it can be very difficult to tell the difference between sensations and emotions.  When someone asks me how I feel, I am like Spock from "Star Trek:" I really don't know how to answer.  I can distinguish my emotions if I tell someone how I am feeling and receive their judgment, after which I will think oh yeah and then wonder how I could have missed the signs that are now obvious since they have been pointed out.

I can get really agitated at work sometimes due to the daily stress in a retail environment.  The thing is, I often don't recognize that I am agitated and since everyone is trying to get the job done, there is not really opportunity for me to relate my emotions and figure out what is going on.  It is kind of like feeling trapped within myself, when it is really just an illusion.

Slow Change is the Change that Matters

That point in seventh grade when I was an outpatient at the Fox Center was the most definite turning point in my life.  All the escalation that had been occurring for the last few years suddenly stopped.  Everything from my falling school grades to the association with teachers who didn't take the time to understand me, to the classmates who gave me a hard time, everything came to a complete standstill when I started going back to school late October in 2000.  It was almost as though my life can be divided in half from the events prior to October 2000 to the events following October 2000.

When I say that things came to a complete standstill, I don't mean that things started improving right away.  Two months after starting again at middle school I failed a computer class simply because I did not pay attention in class.  That was the last time I ever failed a class.  Boy scouts was still hard for me because they had not noticed the internal change.  Almost a year later at summer camp, I was told by a scout leader that I was not the same person I was a year ago.  I was much calmer, more reserved, kept and I made a point of keeping whatever ecentricities I had to myself.

At the end of the school year in 2001 when I finished up middle school and prepped to enter high school I made the honor role.  This is a luxury I would enjoy all throughout high school.   To this day, I have only received three "C" equivalent grades in college: Precalculus,Calculus I, and Second Year Spanish.  I my remaining three semesters of college, I plan to continue what started that time when I stood up in front of my fellow classmates and realized I was a different person.  A better person.

My Experience with Medications

When I was twelve years old I was taken out of grade school to adjust my medications around. For four weeks I was an outpatient at the Fox Center in Pontiac Michigan.  It was a controlled environment where different medications could be used to determine exactly what I needed to function in day-to-day life. This was the time when I was officially diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified. 

Prior to this time, I had been taking Ridalin since I was three years old.  I had also taken medicines that, instead of helping me, created psychotic side effects.  My parents would refuse to give me those medications.

It was determined during the four weeks I was out of school that I needed a different combination of medications to work with my ADHD, my chemical imbalance, my autism, and my depression.  So they tried different combination's of medicines to find out which dosage suited my needs in that controlled environment.  I remember sitting in a circle with the other patients discussing what was on our minds (this was their way to determine which patients were feeling suicidal thoughts (there were approximately fifteen of us, ranging from age eleven to age sixteen).  In this particular instance, I was heavily sedated, the doctors having overestimated the the dosage my body required.  I remember feeling incredibly drowsy and was completely unconcerned with the fact that I was drooling on the floor while leaning forward in my lap.

Eventually I was prescribed with Remoron, a form of Mirtazipine, to deal with my depression symptoms; Risperdal, a form of Risperidone, which helped me think more clearly through my autistic mind (Risperidone has been associated with weight gain.  I was fairly skinny before this point and I have been struggling with my weight ever since seventh grade); and I was prescribed the controlled substance Concerta to help me think more clearly through my ADHD.  Concerta is a controlled due to the "high" it produces in those who do not have ADHD.

My medicine has been stable for the past ten years and their are noticeable differences in my clarity of thought if, for instance, I forgot to take my Concerta one morning. I accept the fact that I will probably have this combination of medications for the rest of my life.  I'm okay with this, if that's what it takes for me to be able to do the things I want to do with my life.

"Sensory Friendly" films?

I recently heard the term "sensory friendly films" and its association with autism.  What it means is there are some movies that are easier on the senses than others.  In terms of my own senses, when I was younger, I have found that horror films were overwhelming for me.  At age thirteen, I was left shaking with nightmares for years following after viewing a dark comedy. 

I can watch that same movie now, nearly ten years later, and not get worried at all.  One thing kept me intriguing me with horror and action films and that was curiosity.  I could not help viewing such movies because I wanted to know what happened.  If left a action or horror movie unfinished, my imagination would try to anticipate what the conclusion might be.  More often or not, my imagination would predict much darker outcomes than what actually occurred in the films.

Everyone on the autism spectrum do not find the same films sensory friendly as others do.  I know someone with Aspergers Syndrome who is not bothered by horror at all.  Quite the contrary actually, horror is her autistic interest that she dedicates much time and energy to exposure.

Separation from Reality

A major characteristic in autism that is evident in the people who deal with the condition on a day to day basis is the separation between reality and fantasy in the autistic mind.  You can connect this to a basic marketing principle: the separation between the desired state and actual state, which many marketers try to exploit.  In the mind of someone with autism, the idea state becomes reality, and cannot be easily distinguished from the actual state.

One thing my parents did as I was growing up is that they constantly intruded on my "own little world."  They made me participate in cub scouts, bowling leagues, swimming lessons, and t-ball.  Through these events, I socialized with others my age and participated in group activities.  At that time in my life, I was preoccupied about day dreams consisting of "Star Wars" characters emerging into my reality and taking me to their reality.  I was still able to distinguish these fantasies from my reality, especially after receiving a formal autism diagnosis, and changing my medicines around to work with my other problems I was having at that time.

These days, I am doing alright with my job and school, while keeping my idea reality separate from my actual reality.  When I was younger, I had a number of "Star Wars" toys.  I would use these as characters (I had about fifty of them at one point) in stories that were quite independent from the roles these characters had in the "Star Wars" films.  I started to direct my own little world into these stories acted out by my "Star Wars" characters, until I couldn't really get around the fact that they were made out of plastic and were no longer capable at satisfying my stories.  I was about sixteen then.  At this point, I started to write my stories down.

Six years and a number of rough drafts later, I am using my writing experience in another attempt at making my fantasies into realities by writing the first installment in my fantasy series.  My expectations for my written fiction are high, and I just do not have time or energy to do everything I want to do with my writing, but I hope to have this first fantasy novel finished within five years. Then, my fantasies that have grown with me over the years, can be experienced by others bridging the gap between my desired state and actual state, or my own little world and my life.

Black and White Thinking

One trait I have noticed through my own autism that seems to be true for others on the spectrum as well is that we have a strong tendency to think in black and white.  I am going to clarify what it means to think in black and white through a definition I found on the web:

"Dichotomous thinking is also sometimes called “black or white thinking.” This is when someone is only able to see the extremes of a situation, and is unable to see the “gray areas” or complexities of the situation. For example, a student who engages in dichotomous thinking may believe that if they don't get an "A" in class then they have failed."

I also like to call this an all or nothing mentality.  When I am faced with a problem, I find that only the best case scenario, and the worst case scenario in a given situation.  Think about a parent trying to teach their child with autism that it is safe to approach some people and others should be considered as "strangers."  This is difficult for the child to comprehend if they think in black and white.  To that child, there are only two options: talk to a person or don't talk to a person.  Trying to teach a child with autism about stranger danger goes against their natural tendencies.  In my experience, I have found comfort in the prospect that one kind of action, such as not talking to anybody I don't know already, solved the stranger danger tendency without going against my natural tendencies. 

This is only my experience with a natural all-or-nothing   mentality. Believe me, when I am out in the world trying to live my life, awareness of this tendency does not change the fact that I approach most problems with my black and white thinking.  It's just something that everyone on the autism spectrum needs to work on.

Autism and Certain Food Textures

As I grew up, it became apparent that there were some types of food that I just could not handle eating.  Some of those foods include: any type of potato (excluding crispy and salty french fries), stuffing, certain kinds of bratwurst, mustard, onions, mushrooms, the list goes on.  There are also some types of food that I used to not like when I was younger, but now I eat on a regular basis.  This list includes pizza and lasagna.  I particularly cannot stand the texture and general feel of mashed potatoes.  Just having the vegetable in my mouth creates a retching sensation.  It goes beyond simply not liking the taste.

In some cases with autism, the texture of certain types of food cause a sensory overload, such as my case with the mashed potatoes.  I understand that parents want their kids to eat their vegetables, but understand that when my parents forced me to eat mashed potatoes when I was younger, far from making me appreciate the vegetable, it made me hate them even more and strive to avoid them as soon as it was my choice to do so.

Social Acceptance

The number one thing that someone with autism is looking for is acceptance for who they are, even if they are not completely understood.  I am no exception to this.

I have compiled a group of friends over the years that do just that.  Ever since high school, it has become an unspoken rule to give me the benefit of the doubt when it comes to my words or actions.  I am kind of the outsider of the group, but I can still participate in the games or social activities that I choose.  If I say something that is socially unacceptable, they might look at each other with confused expressions, but then they move on without saying anything.  I might be embarassed, when I realize (after the fact) what had occurred, but overall, I am grateful for being accepted.   I wish that every autistic person could have this opportunity to be accepted in this way.

I also offer a word of caution: it is important for people with autism to recognize their social limitation.  Just because a person with autism is accepted by a particular social group, it does not mean that they can do or say anything they want.  I have lost friends before by not recognizing social cues that indicate I am pushing too hard to be accepted by someone who is just not willing to give me what I ask.  I often day dreamed throughout high school about being the most popular or the guy with the best girlfriend.  When it came to pursuing this vision by asking for too much from friends, it only caused more discomfort and drama than I was willing to deal with.  My advice to people with autism who are looking for acceptance from friends, accept your place within a particular social group, and don't ask for too much from the people who are doing you a favor by allowing you to be a part of their group.

Living with Autism

It is really the unknown that intrigues so many people when it comes to autism.  Here is this condition of alternative behavior that is so multifaceted, so varied to the extent that it has an entire spectrum which tries to encompass this diversified range of behaviors.  When people hear that I have autism, even people who have known me for years, they revise their perception of me based on what they know about autism, and based on what they know about me.  There are some situations where people don't notice that I have autism and I choose not to tell them, due to my own judgment of the situation.

In many cases, some people are actually frightened of autism because it contradicts many things that they believe about people. I am going to use some very crude stereotypes to illustrate this point.  From what I have seen, there are some people who believe that there are two categories to conveniently group those they meet and associate with.  In their eyes, there are people who are smart and people who are dumb.  They revise their behavior around those categories, treating the people in each category accordingly.  It simplifies life a great deal, in their minds.  Keep in mind that this is my interpretation of this kind of rationale.

Now add autism into the mix.  These people with autism cannot be placed into either one of the categories.  People with autism, especially Aspergers, can be very smart in some areas of their lives, and not so smart in other areas.  In other words, they fall into both of these categories.

I don't mean to offend anyone with this post.  I am in the position where I can only imagine how people's minds work, having lived with autism my entire life.  I don't know what it is like to think and feel like most people do.  In a way, I think I have it better, living with my type of autism.  Life is much more vibrant, much more interesting.  As a member of the autism spectrum, I have to find my own path to follow in life, instead of following in someones footsteps.  There are always trials that come up through misunderstandings, it is just a cruel reality. 

The way I see it, this is my life.  I didn't choose it.  I can't change it.  I might as well make the best of it and try to find happiness, like everyone else.

Autistic Routine

One characteristic of different types of autism is the presence of a rigid routine in daily life.  This routine differs between autistic people and is followed reverently.  To an autistic person, a deviation in the routine that they are used to represents a total loss of order in their lives.  This is demonstrated in the film "Rain Man" where breaks in the routine of the autistic man displayed by Dustin Hoffman result in shocking public tantrums.  In the case of Hoffman's character, this routine depended on viewing certain TV shows at certain times, eating breakfast a certain way, things of that nature.

The presence of this routine is calming for a person with autism.  In their mind, the break in routine creates an irrational sense of fear.  This problem has never really affected me the way it affects others with autism.  I am trying to interpret this behavior using the few instances I have had where something unexpected occurred and I had to adapt.

There have been instances where an item that I was searching for, such as a charging cord, was not where I expected it to be.  I would enter my autistic mind and search mindlessly for the object of desire, always passing by the places where I expect it to be while feeling a sense of loss.  This actually did happen earlier this week as I was searching for the charging cord for my Nintendo DS.  The loss of this cord (which was eventually found) meant that I could not follow the routine that I have established in recent weeks and play my video games while watching TV.  I would have to find something else to do with my time, which my autistic mind resisted.  Eventually I calmed down and started occupying my time doing other things, but the autistic mind, when it is set in a routine, is determined to mindlessly follow through with that routine, whatever it is. 

My symptoms are much milder than others who have different forms of autism.  Even so, with the cooperation of friends and family, I don't see any reason why both the autistic individual and their loved ones can't both be satisfied with the lives they lead.

My Autism and My Social Life

I went out with a good friend last night.  We went bowling, got some dinner, wandered around a store, had a good time.  The last time I went out with someone was three weeks previously with the same person.  Because of my autism, my social outings are few and far in between.  I know people who are not on the spectrum socialize whenever they're bored, or out of routine, or because they feel the need to be with people.  I am not the type of person who will call up a friend, "hey, do you want to do something today?"  This type of spontaneous action makes me feel uncomfortable, but that might be the fact that I am an introvert, and not due to my autism.

Sometimes, I meet with a group of friends to play sports.  As of the present date, I have not done this in nearly two months.  I have noticed that in smaller groups of friends I am much more outgoing, and with larger groups of friends I hardly speak at all.  I just find it harder to communicate when I feel that a lot of people are watching me. I prefer to text with a friend rather than call them up.  This adds some distance and freedom to respond to an inquiry when I feel ready, not holding someone one the line while I try to figure out what to say.  It's not like I don't have a social life at all, I just prefer to spend more time alone than with friends.

Inside My Autistic Mind

Since I am high functioning PDD-NOS, I view my mind as having two independent parts.  One part is the split between my rational/emotional mind that handles all my day to day activities from work, school, home life, and to a limited extent, my social life.  The second part is the autistic mind, which is more difficult to relate because I do not think with words through this part of my mind.  To put this another way, my autistic mind is "my own little world."  Repetitive movement, such as pacing, can tap into my autistic mind and at these moments I can enter vivid daydreams.

I have heard that some people think with mental images when they are in their autistic mind, others think in sequences or patterns.  Temple Grandin clarified this concept of autistic thinking in her book "The Way I See It" so I have generated the following ideas from reading that book.  When I am in my autistic mind, I think in sequences of related information. I can memorize sequences, such as music or movie quotes, with relative ease when I am in my autistic mind.  I don't like to claim that I can do this normally because the moment I become aware that it is happening while it is taking place, the process stops. 

Sometimes movie quotes stick in my mind and echo over and over again.  The quotes that stand out the most often relate to what I am feeling at a given moment.  It is much easier to recall facts, or movie lines in my head when I am in my autistic mind.  However, when prompted to communicate, the only thing that comes to mind are those movie lines, which does not help me in a given situation.  A strategy I have developed to push away my autistic mind and function in a work environment, for example, is to ask people to repeat themselves and verify what is often obvious information.  This allows me to network through my autistic mind come to a conclusion, or find a way to solve a customer's inquiry.  I side effect of this is people who don' know me very well assume that I am not as intelligent as I really am, which can't be helped, even if I don't like it.  The people who do know me, such as my parents or my brother, say that I often ask questions that I know the answer to and view that as a source of annoyance.  This also can't be helped.

One assumption that my autistic mind makes is that people and situations can be taken at face value.  In other words, my autistic mind assumes that people actually mean what they say.  This assumption is so deeply ingrained that no amount of self reasoning can convince my autistic mind otherwise.  Based upon this, I really do not understand sarcasm.  I can recognize sarcasm when it is used, but I really don't know what to say in response to a sarcastic statement because my rational/emotional mind is telling me one thing and my autistic mind is telling me something else entirely.  I can even use sarcasm simply because I understand my own intentions well enough.  However, my literal autistic mind is not naturally equipped to handle sarcasm, which doesn't do me any good in situations where sarcasm is used (quite often). 

Sometimes people recognize that I don't have a grasp on sarcasm, and decide to have a little "fun" causing my autistic mind to seize up and lean towards a sensory overload.  I understand that no one likes being messed with, but I take serious offense to such occasions because I will often remember the situation for a very long time afterward, whether I want to or not.  A simple occasions of "fun" when I dealing with my autistic mind can really mess up my entire day if I am at work.  My autistic mind would be confused, trying with all its might to understand a sarcastic statement that cannot be literally understood, leaving me with a sensory overload.  Sometimes I am able to stop this from happening, sometimes I can't.  I honestly don't see any "fun" involved whatsoever.

I hope that awareness of this concept of the autistic mind will make it easier for individuals with autism to function in the workplace by raising awareness of the thought processes involved.

My take on a piece of Autistic Fiction

Right before Christmas last year, I bought a book called "House Rules" by Jodi Picoult.  One of my coworkers had read it and told me that it was about autism, so I was interested in reading it.  This particular author specializes in complex dramas involving legal issues.  The book is about a young man with Aspergers who is accused of murder.  I started reading this book to see how this author portrayed the first person perspective of the boy with autism.  After a few days I put down the book and have not been back to it since.

This book affected me a lot more than I had anticipated it would.  Having read several books by the same author, I had some idea of what to expect from her plot arrangements, so I thought I knew what I was getting myself into.  I was wrong.  Watching this fictional boy with Aspergers get into these situations where he is not understood for what he really is and instead is thought of as a criminal was very depressing to me.  If someone of legal stature is that unwilling to understand that the autism mind works differently, then something along the lines of this book plot could really happen.  I found the thought depressing.  At some point my dad asked me why I was feeling down, and I told him because of this book.  He told me if it makes me feel bad, then stop reading it.  So I did.

To make one thing clear, I am not telling people to avoid this book.  I am saying that the book affected me deeply on a personal level at the time when I first started reading it.  I have enjoyed several other books by this same author.  This writer has a very compelling writing style and is a good storyteller.  I have confidence that I will reach a point in the future when I can read this book and not be affected by it, like I was before.

Autistic Interests

Many people with autism, particularly people with Aspergers Syndrome, sometimes have a single interest that amounts to an obsession in their minds. They funnel their entire being into this interest over a lifetime.  This interest could be anything ranging from Ancient Greek Mythology, to TV shows, even to genres such as fantasy or horror. 

You could not find anyone more knowledgeable about their subject of interest than a person with Aspergers Syndrome. These individuals on the spectrum dedicate their entire lives to understanding their interest.  A problem that loved ones often experience is that this narrow-minded focus is not naturally extended into other essential areas, which could be problematic when it comes to school.  However, in some cases, I have heard of this interest being used as a tool for learning, although I have no personal experience in that area.  My interest was never used to support learning in school.

When I was younger, I was well known for being obsessed with Star Wars.  From age six to fourteen, I would talk about nothing else with the same feverish enthusiasm as I did with Star Wars.  I knew all six movies by heart (and still do) and would often quote them to people, much to their displeasure.  I knew the score from the movies and could play it on my clarinet. 

I have long since grown out of this interest as an obsession. I owned quite a bit a Star Wars merchandise when I was younger, but have given much of it away over the years.  However I am still the proud owner of at least fifty Star Wars books from the expanded universe. I have not yet read them all, but I plan to at some point.  My interests are more varied now than they were then, but Star Wars will always have a place in my life.

More about My Autism

I want to take a moment to explain about the type of autism that I have.  I have been using the term PDD-NOS quite often and I don't think that I have elaborated enough about exactly what type of autism this is.  To start off, I want to say that PDD-NOS is not typical for autism.  No two cases are the same.  This specific diagnosis shows some characteristics of autism, but not enough to be diagnosed as any of the major categories.  It can go undiagnosed, or misdiagnosed for years, like in my case, because of the lack of solid criteria.

I am going to quote some criteria I found that is used for diagnosing PDD-NOS from Autism Speaks:

When might a person receive a diagnosis of PDD-NOS?
That will vary, of course, but in one study, researchers found that those with PDD-NOS could be placed in one of three very different subgroups: ⁽⁴⁾

• A high-functioning group (24%) who resembled people with Asperger syndrome but had transient language delay or mild cognitive impairment (such that they could not receive the Asperger diagnosis which requires no speech or cognitive delay).
• A group (24%) who resembled people with autism but who had a late age of onset, or otherwise did not meet the criteria for autism.
• A group (52%) who were autistic-like, but displayed fewer stereotyped and repetitive behavior.

I would have to say that I am in the first group, or the high functioning group.  I did have a language delay when I was younger.  I was developing normally until age two when I lost my language skills.  I had to start from scratch and did not start speaking again until the following summer.

This delay has affected me ever since then.  I found myself behind in development when compared to other people in my age group, even in my graduating class.  When I graduated from high school, I could not help feeling that there had been a mistake, never mind that I graduated with a 3.83 GPA and as a member of the National Honor Society.  It was like I was a sixteen year old who had graduated from high school early.  For all practical purposes, I was sixteen in terms of development due to the loss of language skills at age two.

I still don't know what caused it and pointing blame is not going to change anything, so I have learned to live with it.  I hope that I can use my perspective to help others to better understand autism.

4. Walker, D.R., Thompson, A., Zwaigenbaum, L, Goldberg, J., Bryson, S.E., Mahoney, W.J., Strawbridge, C.P., & Szatmari, P. (2004). Specifying PDD-NOS: A comparison of PDD-NOS, Asperger syndrome, and autism. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 43(2), 172-80.  Abstract

Autism and Animals

When I was going through my difficult times when I was eleven/twelve years old, I found companionship in my three cats, and particularly, the youngest cat we had just received the month before I started seventh grade.  This little black and white cat was an enormous comfort for me.  He still is at this present day.

With this cat, I found nonjudgmental acceptance and unconditional love that even I couldn't deny, deep within my depression.  A cat (or dog) does not care if you are not like the other kids in class, or if you act differently than people expect.  The dog or cat only wants to give, and receive affection.  I currently have four cats and each one of them holds a special place for me (even the youngest one, who will bite anyone who touches her).

It had been stated through different studies that cats exhibit some autistic characteristics, such as the preference of a rigid routine, a severe dislike of change, and probably more that I have not listed.  I am less interested in the scientific implications, and more interested in enjoying the company of my four furry friends while I have them in my life.

Thinking with Autism

One thing that I have discovered over the years is that people with autism have great difficulty relating the part of the mind that is different than those who don't have autism.  We have trouble explaining the reasoning behind autistic behaviors because it is difficult to put those feelings and reasoning into words.  In my opinion, the reason for this is because people with autism think using those feelings and the meaning of such thoughts bypass the use of language.

I have been searching the web a lot lately, looking for first person accounts about autism, and I found this video that a psychology student used in a college project about autism.  In the video, she was interviewing her younger brother, who has aspergers.  I am going to include a link to this video just in case anyone is interested in viewing it.

http://www.theautismsite.com/clickToGive/aut/article/Aspergers-Syndrome-In-his-Own-Words069

During this video, eleven year old Zach who has aspergers tries to explain why he quotes videos he has seen before as a form of communication.  This is a widely publicized trait of aspergers.  It has been used in books and in the movie "Rain Man."   Zach has great difficulty explaining his mindset behind this trait and instead resorts to the trait and quotes what he has heard about the autism. 

I think that this is because while that action is taking place, Zach, or any autistic child, is in a mindset where there is no reasoning to achieve meaning.  I am finding it difficult myself to explain this mindset and instead find a quote from "Star Trek" coming to mind.  I am going to include this quote and see if any meaning can be derived.  It is highly relevant to what I am trying to say: In "Star Trek, Episode Four, The Voyage Home", Dr. McCoy is trying to gain insight from Spock about his views on death.  Spock answers:  "It would be impossible to discuss the subject without a common frame or reverent."  This seems to be the answer to my question. I think this means that it is impossible to relate an autistic mind to a non-autistic mind without a reverent, or something to compare it to.  That is why video quotes come to mind to not only myself, but others with autism.

Autism and Unusual Musical Talent

There is more emphasis placed on the things that those with autism can't do rather than the unusual talents that they might possess.  I believe that if there is something taken away from the mind, in the case of autism, that there is something else in the mind making up.  It can be thought of as a kind of exchange.  This video is an excellent example of what can happen in such an exchange: it is about  teenager with autism who is a musical genius.

http://www.theautismsite.com/clickToGive/aut/article/Autism-and-Musical-Genius136

I have a similar talent to this, but not to this extreme.  I am able to memorize music or movies after watching them time after time and be able to play them back in my head.  It was very useful when I was in high school marching band as I was able to memorize our music without very much effort and was able to retain that music for years afterward.  I can still play my part from the marching show freshman year of high school when I haven't looked at the music in nearly nine years.  I have no such skills on the piano, as this musical genius can, but I can play the clarinet and, to a limited extent, mimic sounds that I hear.

Accommodations Part Two

A more recent accommodation I received for my PDD-NOS was a program at Oakland University aimed towards helping high functioning autistic students make the transition into college life.  This program was called the Peer Transition Program.  An autistic student was paired with another student who had volunteered to participate in this program.  More likely than not, this student mentor was majoring in psychology and planned on helping autistic people for a living.  This student mentor would encourage the autistic student to become more active in the university with student organizations and campus life.

I was a participant in the Peer Transition program from September 2008 to January 2009.  At this time I was a transfer student from the community college level, so I had already been attending college for two years prior to entering this program.  My mentor encouraged me to join a student organization to become more involved with campus life.  My reason's for joining the program were to see what it might do for me, I didn't really have a specific outcome in mind.  After a few months, I decided to leave the program.  I had decided that I would rather socialize on my own terms because that is what I had been doing since high school, my experiences in this program had helped me to realize that.  My mentor was concerned that perhaps she should have done something different. I told her it wasn't her fault, I had received all the assistance that I was going to get from this program.

This is my own experience with such a program and other autistic college students may react differently.

Accommodations Part One

Over the years since I was diagnosed with PDD-NOS, I have received many accommodations from the school system.  In my next few entries, I am going to talk about some of the accommodations that have helped me to succeed in school.  While many of these "helping hands" have indeed been helpful, others have been a bit of a hindrance.  I speak only for myself on this matter, because other individuals with autism will respond differently to treatments.

One of the accommodations I received was the benefit of a special education classroom.  These special ed classes served a distinct purpose for me as I progressed through middle school and high school.  While in these classrooms, I discovered that I could indeed perform well in academic settings.  I found, however, that I did not need to put forward a lot of effort to succeed in special ed classrooms.  After I steadily progressed back into the mainstream classrooms, I continued to succeed and receive the A's and B's I had received in special ed classrooms.  In special ed classrooms, due to the small class size, I was not as quiet as I had been in mainstream classrooms.  I was more comfortable communicating with classmates and the teachers.

These benefits did come with a hindrance because students in mainstream classes did not look favorably on special ed classrooms, calling them "retard classes."  While my self esteem was improving academically attending these classes, I still felt socially inferior due to the barrier between mainstream classes and special ed classes.  For this reason, I did not disclose to my new high school band friends that I was taking special ed classes.  I still don't know if they would have treated me the same if they had known.  Keep in mind that these are my own experiences and do not reflect this accommodation as a whole.

Oh! You have autism?!

Many people, some of them professionals who work with autistic people on a regular basis, have failed to recognize that I have autism until I either tell them, or in the case of the professional, they referred to my documents which listed the treatments I have received. When some people hear that I do indeed have the condition I have been told, with strong conviction, that there is nothing wrong with me.

I am going to explore a less finite topic into some of my feelings as to how people, even some who are familiar with autism, see the condition. To start off, I think that autistic people give off sort of an "aura," that, however faint it might be, can be perceived by others.  This aura is caused by the whatever neurological irregularities that make up a person's autism.  It may be obvious in those on the more severe side of the spectrum, or it can be much harder to see with more mild forms of the condition.  I am going to take a moment to define the term aura: "The distinctive atmosphere or quality that seems to surround and be generated by a person, thing, or place."

Those with high functioning autism can imitate acceptable social behaviors, but it does not seem completely natural.  Those who don't understand what autism is may not recognize that aura for what it is, even though they can still perceive it.  Someone might think the following about a person with high functioning autism (such as myself): "oh, he seems alright enough, but there is something about him..."

I have been working at my job at a local retail outlet for nearly five years, and all the time customers ask me whether I am new at this job.  I had a man ask me a question about the toy section this morning and before I could really answer he said "you're new here, right?"  This September, I would have been at this store for five years and I have experience in many different areas of the store ranging from cashier, to stocking merchandise, to receiving.  This got me thinking that my own autistic aura is mistaken most frequently for inexperience.  People with little exposure to autism, or even some that do, fail to recognize this aura for what it really is.

When I was diagnosed with autism...

By the time I was first diagnosed with Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified, I was twelve years old and in seventh grade.  My sixth grade year had been so bad that my mom chose not to buy a yearbook for seventh grade, because this time of my life had become a time that we could not look back at without pain.

Autism was not the only thing I was dealing with by the time I reached seventh grade.  My ADHD was slipping out of my control and I was acting out, compulsively, in class. The medication I was taking for my ADHD was not doing what it was prescribed to do, and was instead causing psychotic side effects, to the point where my parents refused to give it to me.  I was also dealing with depression caused by a "chemical imbalance."  During sixth grade, my teachers were not taking the time to understand me, and were instead skating me by, without even telling my parents that there was a problem (my parents were outraged when they discovered this).  To cap it all, I was in middle school where, the fastest way to be cool is to put down someone else. I was a prime target for this from many of my classmates, which did nothing to help my depression.

It got to the point in seventh grade where I was taken out of school for a month to re-adjust my medication and be observed in a controlled environment.  This took place in October of 2000.  By that time, my self-esteem was at an all time low.  When I was told that I would be put in a center with people like myself, I was relieved, most of all to hear that there were indeed other people like myself.  The lack of tolerance from my classmates had really hit me hard.  At some point in that month, I remember driving home from this center and being told, tactfully, by my mom that I did not have what they had originally diagnosed me with at age three.  Instead, I had PDD-NOS.  I did not take in the full extent of that name of the condition, in fact I could not recall it moments after first hearing it deeming it as too complex.  I was more interested in the fact that what I was dealing with did in fact have a title, which meant that I was not the only person who had it.  Now that my downhill spiral had been abruptly halted, I could now turn around and start succeeding again.

Distingushing Autistic Behavior from Personality

Any parent wants to understand their children. For the parents of autistic children, the desire is perhaps greater because they have been told that their child is different and they should not have the same expectations for that autistic child than they would for another child without autism.  That is not easy for any parent to hear.

A question that arises, most especially among highly functioning autistic children (such as those with my condition, Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified), is whether the tantrum this child is having is caused by autism or is it caused by another aspect of their personality (normal behavior)?  In other words, the parent might be asking themselves: should I be more lenient because the child does not mean to do this, or should I be firm and rate this behavior as unacceptable, no matter whether this is the child's fault or not?

This question depends entirely on the child.  I can offer what my parents did for me.  I was not diagnosed with autism until I was twelve, which is older than some children who have been diagnosed with the condition.

Before that time, I was being treated for ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), so my parents were aware that there was something going on with me.  After I was diagnosed with autism, my parents continued to treat me like any other child, while making exceptions according to circumstance.  They made it clear to me that some types of behavior, whatever the cause, was unacceptable, no matter what my intentions were or whether the behavior was my fault.  The latter case was not really an issue because my medication was changed after I was diagnosed with autism, so my compulsive behavior was greatly reduced.

I cannot speak for every child in every situation but what my parents did for me worked.  They treated me for the most part like I was not autistic, so I acted like I wasn't autistic and I still do to an extent.  My autistic behaviors sometimes surface, but I have control over them.  I cannot guarantee that this approach will work for every child, but it is worth considering.

Sensory Overload Part Three

I recently moved to a new position at my retail job.  Instead of working as a cashier, I am now working in the clothing department stocking shelves.  This department is much smaller than the previous department I was working for.  While I had received the change I wanted, it came with challenges of its own.

I am more prone to sensory overload in this new position due to the lack of established routine.  As a cashier, it was easy to predict the work pace from the amount of customers present in the store.  I had a routine that I would stick to loyally and that would get me through the day without too much sensory overload, although it didn't always work.  I would say virtually the same speech to every customer.  "How are you doing today?"  "Did you find everything alright?"  As opportunity presented itself, I might talk about cats if I saw cat food; I might talk to the kids a little.  It was much easier to conceal that I was on the spectrum due to my ability to stick to this routine for extended periods of time.

In my new position, it is different.  I often have to stop what I'm doing to help customers.  There is virtually no way to predict when that might occur, so I have been caught off guard more than once.  To minimize my sensory overload, I might speak quickly, and sometime incoherently to keep the sensations from building up.  Other times, I might speak disjointedly and ask to clarify what might be obvious information to collect my thoughts, and again keep the sensations from building up.

Although it is easier than my position as a cashier in terms of workload, it is still a new experience which takes some getting used to.  To protect myself from sensory overload while being trained, I minimized my responses to mostly one or two word phrases.  This allowed me to absorb large amounts of new information without sensory overload. It is problematic because my new boss is having difficulty gauging exactly what I know about the position, but it can't be helped at this point.  It will get easier as I learn more, and most importantly, establish a routine.

Sensory Overload Part Two

Three years after I was first diagnosed with PDD-NOS, I found myself improving quickly.  I played the clarinet in my high school marching band. I was ranked within the top sixty students of my class in terms of GPA. Admittibly, most of my classes were special education classes at that time.  I had a group of band friends to hang out with at school, although they did not know that I was taking special ed classes, let alone that I had autism.  They accepted me which was more than I had hoped for in the past, and I decided to keep those secrets to myself.

In a high school English class, we had someone come into the classroom, an administrator of some sort.  We were told not to pay any attention to her because she was here to watch the instructor and none of us.  She happened to sit right behind me while we were doing our activity for that day.  Keep in mind that this is a special ed class with only fourteen students in it.  I glanced back at the person, momentarily concerned that she had chose to sit behind me of all people, but I quickly lost interest.  A few weeks later, when my mom picked up the report from school, I realized that the person had in fact been observing me.

I was very interested in what the report contained.  This was part of a high school program to ensure that all special ed students were receiving the help they needed for the reasons they were taking those classes.  Most of the observations were intriguing, but the thing that interested me most was what she, the observer, had said about sensory overload.  She wrote in the report that I have my own ways to prevent sensory overload.  I was curious, not least of which because I was still predisposed to doubt my achievements, since not much time had passed since I was having difficulty. 

It was flattering to be praised for something in that manner, even though I did not fully understand what I had achieved.  Somehow, I had developed measures to ward off the overwhelming sensations that are aroused in a sensory overload, although it does not always work.  I don't even know if I can identify them, because all my defense mechanisms are situational.  I will try to give more specific details to how I deal with sensory overload in my next post.

Sensory Overload: Part One

In my next few posts, I am going to talk about a large issue that affects nearly all the members of the autistic spectrum called sensory overload.

To anyone not familiar with the term, I am going to define it using a description I found online: "Sensory overload (sometimes abbreviated to SO) is a condition where one or more of the senses are strained and it becomes difficult to focus on the task at hand. The term is commonly (but not exclusively) used in the context of autism/autism spectrum disorders."

As a member of the spectrum, this is something that I have dealt with my entire life.  There are many instances when a person has noticed that something is bothering me, and asks me what is wrong.  I normally have to come up with some sort of feeble excuse because: not only am I unable to articulate my intentions very well when my senses are overloaded; but it is way too much to explain, especially if the person has no idea that I have autism.

Lunchtime Observations

On my way to my summer class at Oakland University today, I stopped at a fast food restaurant to get some lunch.  It was fairly crowed with lively chatter and there were a few people in line in front of me.  Almost immediately, I recognized that the young man standing on his own before the cashier had a form of high functioning autism known as aspergers.  

Individuals with aspergers are characterized by higher-than-average intelligence but lack the basic social knowledge that many people take for granted.  This lack of social knowledge was evident in the way this young man spoke and through his body language.   The cashier recognized this and decided to use it to her advantage.  It was clear to me that this young man had entered the restaurant knowing exactly what he wanted to order.  The cashier offered him several desserts, putting social pressure on him to accept. He ended up spending more money than he had intended.

I understand why the cashier did what she did in the name of increasing sales in a poor economy, but this young man really did not stand a chance against the pressure she put on him.  It simply did not occur to him to refuse.  If it did, this impulse to disagree was overridden by the desire to avoid the sensations that arise from social conflict. Perhaps this young man recognized what he should have done once the social pressure had been lifted.  People with high functioning autism such as aspergers are smart enough to know they have social problems.  They just don’t know what to do about it.