Sheila Schoonmaker's Maiden Blog

And what place might that be?

In October of the year 2007, the Open Center for Autism arranged for a two-day Going Places with Asperger’s Conference. I greatly appreciated all those who made it to be as good as it was and that I could be there to benefit from what they had to offer.

Alex Plank can be funny to listen to. Mary and Jerry Newport are also comical Aspies. Click here to see a picture of Katie Miller, Jerry Newport, and Alex Plank posing outside the conference door.

Two months previous to that conference, I attended a three-day Autism Through the Life Span workshop at the Omega Institute. Either it was because this workshop involved a lot more time with speakers talking, or I already knew most of what they were talking about, or both? . . . I didn’t find it as rewarding as the conference in October.

Even though most of what was mentioned at the Going Places With Aspergers was also familiar to me, I did begin to notice something important missing.

Unfortunately workshops and conferences put almost all their focus on success. Naturally their speakers are all successful people. Unless I’m mistaken due to lacking enough information, the strong impression I got was that successful people become so with support from others.

Yes, it’s logical to emphasize the importance of supporting children with Asperger’s and others on the Autism Spectrum. But what happens when no attention is placed upon what happens to Asperger’s Syndrome adults that didn’t receive support? How about those aspies who not only didn’t receive support but were also punished throughout their life for being different? Why would that be important for people to know? Let me first answer that with another question. Why is it that people are not interested in knowing about these adults who have painfully struggled throughout their life; often times to just find reasons to keep existing when they know they’re not appreciated?

Where does this lack of support (putting it mildly) come from and how does it happen?

Usually it can begin with the family members because of them expecting their odd duck to be less of an embarrassment. Not all parents find their child’s way of being to be so unacceptable, especially when the child is still very young. However, that tends to rapidly change in such situations once the child becomes an adolescent who has endured punishment for being different.

Just like Aspergers is a hidden disadvantage, most times the torment an aspie child endures is also hidden. That happens when no one wants to deal with something they know nothing about. The only thing I knew when I was growing up was that most other kids seemed to be treated nicer by their peers than I was. I tried telling my parents, but they would insist that I must be doing something to deserve the mistreatment. Now that my parents are deceased, I’ve finally figured out why they didn’t want to realize something was wrong with their logic. After all, when I was a very young child, people would make remarks to my parents like, “Are you sure that child of yours is real and not a doll? She is so complacent. Wherever you place her, she plays so quietly by herself.” Good sense would dictate that an angelic behaving girl would turn sour for a reason?!?

I’m not only a parent now, but also a grandparent, so now I can see and understand a lot more than I could as a child. It both makes me glad to finally know Asperger’s explains my life-long mysteries, but it also makes me angry — very angry and rightfully so! If it wasn’t for the grace of God, I don’t know how I’d control that anger. But thank God for that long-delayed anger, because without it there wouldn’t be the positive changes that have happened.

On the mild end of lacking support, there were situations that because of consistently being repeated, turned into a curse requiring a miracle for it to become a blessing. For instance, whenever sports were played and teams were needed, that hidden disadvantage got magnified. I was ALWAYS picked last for a team in each and every situation throughout my life. It wasn’t that I lacked skills for playing in any sport. In fact, I excelled in horsemanship — specifically cross-country equestrian jumping. How would I know that when no one would award me with any recognition at such a skill? Easy. It didn’t depend on words or people. The actions said it all. I never fell off or caused the horse I was riding to lose stride or balance and we could handle any obstacles ahead in our path . . . even with my being literally blindfolded (those events were done through chutes channeling blindfolded riders to follow the same course). But in spite of it being obvious that I was the only one who accomplished this with a 100% success rate, I was still picked last when teams were constructed. If that’s not bad enough, one of the captains choosing team members was someone who conned me into believing she was my best friend!

Take another scenario. Imagine being a heterosexual girl in high school and almost every girl seems to have a turn at having a boyfriend to walk, talk, and/or dance with in school but you’re still waiting your turn. One day I thought my turn had come when I found written notes (personally written to me) supposedly from a popular guy expressing interest in me as being his possible girlfriend. Naturally such excitement is going to trigger an eager reaction to respond (hungry people salivate when they smell food cooking). How was I to know there were people who hated me so much that they would gain pleasure to hurt and humiliate me? This particular pathetically malicious girl (pretending to be the popular guy writing to me) didn’t even know me, nor I her (that is until I figured out it was her doing it and I still know who she is, but I won’t mention her name). I walked right into her trap, just like a baited child into a molester’s hands. I doubt the guys were innocent either. They got a good laugh at my expense. I did learn quickly that those who others thought were attractive on the outside, were usually the ugliest people on the inside. And they claim neurotypical kids are the ones who behave socially correct?!? I would never even think to hurt, humiliate, and/or take advantage of another human being that’s innocent for the sake of looking impressive in the eyes of peers! Come on you who call yourself professionalsin the mental health field . . . you honestly believe aspies are the ones who lack empathy?!? What space ship did you fall off of?!?

Those are the ways that peers often support aspies. They make them go places with aspergers. However, those places are too ugly to mention here. Now what about school employees? No need to mention what family members can do to make an aspie feel like crap. How about some of the most influential district workers . . . like guidance counselors? How did my guidance counselor guide me? Well, let’s just say it wasn’t in the direction of college. How’s that for support?!?

What’s the best way then for people to support adults with aspergers who lived without positive guidance so maybe they too can have a turn at feeling they serve a vital purpose in life? For starters, quit ignoring the fact that there are a lot of adult aspies being underutilized because of being left to feel useless due to not being socially acceptable. Just because an aspie has become an adult and maybe has even aged a lot doesn’t mean s/he is not important any more. The attitude these days seems to be, “Don’t waste time giving speeches about how adult aspies became unsuccessful (unemployed and/or dependent upon someone who is employed). Their lives are a waste and those people with their experiences should be ignored.”

Most likely, we (AS) are not the ones who are dumbfounded when a news bulletin breaks out about some student(s) going on a rampage . . . while most NTs are standing around saying, “He seemed so nice. I never would have suspected he was capable of such shocking behavior.” It’s not that AS adults with negative upbringings are boiling cauldrons with a tight lid on getting ripe to explode. Most of us are the nicest people on this planet (usually the most honest too). But if all that gets injected into the media for attention are the negative aspects about high-functioning autism and aspergers, then those who perpetuate such prejudice are also making the world a less safe place to live by spreading ignorance and distorting the truth.

Over the hill dejected aspie adults, what say ye? Are you still as naïve and gullible as you were when you were living your younger half of life? I doubt it, especially judging from what I read some of you saying. Maybe we just need to speak with a louder voice. Let’s put our perseverance to good use for others who may be following our muddy tracks that don’t seem to be taking us anywhere respectable. After all, if we don’t support one another . . . who will? The world needs us — they’re just unaware yet of how much so that is.

Postscript added  on 10.1.9 — I had a video on this post of Alex Plank speaking at the Going Places With Aspergers Conference. It has been deleted from YouTube for unknown reasons.