So today was my first day of summer vacation and it was WONDERFUL. I slept till 3PM to start off with which was wonderful. I then got up and took my writings in for the Creative Writing course. I hung out with Lauren for a little bit in the library as well, though I don't know how she is able to get through these exams. If I still had them I'd probably go insane. I then just headed home, cleaned up around the house, and watched television.
My autism details for today are actually instead going to look into the past in one of the writings I submitted. So here it is:
"My life has been full of twists and turns, one that has never taken me the same way twice. I was born as a healthy child but that changed a short time later when I started becoming ill frequently, putting me in and out of the hospital consistently. By the time I was four, I had been in the hospital at least eight times. It was at this same time that I came down with rheumatic fever, a condition that probably changed my life forever.
Following the rheumatic fever, I changed socially. When I was once a socially active chatterbox, I withdrew into my own world, and while I did in some ways keep that bubbly baby boy that I was, I still was different. It wasn’t until I reached the end Grade 3 that my life changed around and returned to how it once was. I made several friends, and it was as though all those who one might consider “popular” had finally deemed me as someone to become friends with.
It was Grade 4 where I truly started reaching my stride and discovering the person I really was. That year they held a talent show for all of us and at the beginning of the year, my new friends and I were planning on performing a dance and singing number to the Backstreet Boys’ “Backstreet’s Back” for the talent show. As the year went on however, more and more of my friends dropped out of doing the performance, until it wound up only me as the remaining member who wanted to perform. I showed my confidence that year and performed on my own in front of the entire school and got a standing ovation both because of the guts I had to perform on my own but also because apparently I actually had the talent to put on a great show.
Just from reading you can probably tell that performing breaks me out of the shell that developed when I was younger. What developed, to be clear, was Asperger’s Syndrome, a form of autism that should have inhibited my social skills. While it did in some ways inhibit my skills at knowing what is and isn’t socially appropriate to talk about, at the same time I still do great at socializing. It’s actually through performing that I have been able to learn how to best present myself and also make friends with people of the same interests. This doesn’t mean that I haven’t had difficulties though when it came to socializing. In high school it was harder to be involved in what I was skilled at and that’s where the hardest part of my life happened.
At the beginning of high school, it wasn’t that difficult to make friends, nor was it difficult for me to continue the friendships I had with the friends I already had. But as the years went by, I started finding certain people abandoning me because as I later found out, I said the wrong things to them, talked to them in the wrong tone without realizing it, and also getting into their personal spaces. It wasn’t until later, when someone decided to make a group of people who “hated” me, that I learned who my true friends were who didn’t judge me for how I acted, and those who just pretended to be my friends. I will admit, it was difficult though for me to find this out, and of course it was an eye-opener. But to tell the truth, I’m glad I found out none the less so I knew who to stay with and who to not listen to.
I think the other problem I’ve constantly had in my life is while I have many friends, and make friends easily, I still feel as though I’m an outcast. I try for many things over and over again, Students Council, the Big Purple Couch, and other things and yet I don’t get them no matter how many times I try. I think the main reason for this is simply because I am not the type of person who wants to party all the time like those who are voting for the people who get the positions. I don’t go out to the party events everyone goes to because that is not who I am. I am a people person, but at the same time I’m a people person when it comes to those of my own interests which is in the arts and performance.
So this is my life in a nutshell and I have to say it’s sometimes more than I can handle, but I still do it because I know that there’s something in store for me in the future. I truly believe that my Asperger’s will help me in the future because I see the world in a different light. I better understand what people with disabilities go through, and while they may not be the same as what I have, but I still understand the astigmatism people experience just because they are different."
Thanks for reading!
Sean
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