To Whom It May Concern;
This is Steven B* and my life has just taken a turn for the worst. As if my life wasn't hard enough. I have several disabilities including Autism, Epilepsy,O.C.D., P.T.S.D. and a anxiety disorder. I guess I have to tell you the whole story.
Ever since I was young I was always the one who stood out.I was intelligent and could do math in my head at four but I couldn't understand simple social situations and I was lucky if I managed to get a friend most of my youth I had "pity friends".I was a promising child talking way less than a year old but everything stopped.I went through a nonverbal stage and I didn't talk for a year.But no doctors saw this as autism they saw it as a hearing issue.I couldn't speak right mixing up words and sounds
(which many of my friends with autism do. I was put on medications at a young age, 7 years old and I'm still on them today.I was always the one with good grades in school, I was brilliant. But never have I been able to talk to new people with either ease or grace but I continued with life.
I would always rock and couldn't sit still. I couldn't look people in the eyes because it caused greater anxiety. I would do things wrong without knowing I was. I would obsess myself with things until I was always thinking about them. I would space out. All these signs of autism but people said I was either bipolar or I was pretending for attention. But I trudged on longer.
Then disaster struck we were in debt part of it my fault because of the substantial prices of the only thing keeping me functioning; my medications. We had no other choices so my dad went into the military. When he left I lost it.I started rocking, crying, not sleeping, and trying to commit suicide at eight.
I slipped into a infantile state and lost everything I had learned in my short eight years of life.My dad left and I had dreams of losing him, watching him being shot all these gruesome things from a young eight year olds mind. I slept in his clothes and with his pillow and I would drag my stuffed animal Puppy which my dad gave me everywhere I went. Even with these things it got worse.I started to lose more and more time.Minutes of lost time went into hours, hours to days then it turned to weeks and finally I was gone.It scares me today thinking of the things I could of done not knowing it.The lives I changed and the people I could of hurt. My doctors continued to refuse to diagnose me saying yet again that I was faking or my mom was the cause. I had had enough and while I do not remember doing it I cut my arm just wanting to die to be with my dad.I was hospitalized for weeks but I didn't get better. My mom finally took me out and we went to be near my dad.
So we went east, first to Kentucky then to Maryland. On the way to the base where my dad was stationed things got worse two times, I remember vaguely, of trying to kill myself. One still hurts me today. Not physically but mentally I broke a light bulb and slit my arm open not feeling a single bit of pain, and the other time was when I tried to O.D. by taking my whole bottle of medication. I got lower and lower but the fight continued. My reasoning for trying to kill myself was a religious reason. I believed my father was dead so I would kill myself bring him back a rise again like Jesus did. I didn't know any better.
We finally got to my dad and things got worse. We were begging for the army to let him go and showed them the damage they caused to me but they wouldn't listen. Then all went black except for little pieces.I was in a room full of people and without thinking I ran for every sharp thing I could find so I would just die, staples, paper cutters, scissors, and more. Then all went black I was then in my Daddy’s arms and sitting in his lap he rocked me while I believe I said his name over and over, then everything was gone.I was in a hotel room I wouldn't go near my Dad because he had his uniform on until he finally changed out of it and I saw my daddy again and I cuddled with him. Then everything faded I was in the hospital flipping out hitting, screaming and kicking. I saw a needle then black. Minutes, Hours, Days, Months, Years, I do not know how long I was gone.My dad got out of the military and took care of me.I went to Kennedy Krieger where they helped me gain control of my thoughts, feelings and actions there I was finally diagnosed with Autism.I got my service dog Max through them and because of Max I held my first conversation with a total stranger.But trouble struck again when the military tried to get my dad back now that I've apparently recovered and more fighting began.But they continued to fight for my dad and I developed a phobia with anyone who wore a military outfit or camo,(Even today I refuse to wear it.)
We came back to the west and settled with family in California. Struggling as always we made it through and I began school again. I was terribly bullied with people literally taking turns bullying me. But whenever I fought back I was the one to be punished. Always the one with detention I had no friends and was alone. The poor kid with no one. But even there days came in patches. People refused to give me the help I needed so I was thrown into normal classes until I ran away to the special Ed room where I was begging them to keep me there. But no one thought that was strange. No of course a normal kid will run away and break down crying after being in a class room for two seconds.They would not recognize my Autism and said it was for attention. My grades were fine but Autism makes the mind ninety percent logic, ten percent social understanding.
One day I basically quit and told them so and I walked away from school and that was the last day of me being there. I was then home schooled but I refused to talk to the lady who came to the house to help me work. We wrote on a paper to tell each other what only needed to be absolutely said. Finally after weeks I got into a school called ANOVA for kids like me who dealt with bullies all their life and finally received the help they needed. My first days were blurs but they helped me out. I finally remember everything that happened in the day. This was what I needed for years but the struggle continued. Because people think good grades mean you're normal. Well guess what, grades mean nothing!Some of the smartest people in the world have social disabilities they can't talk to people but find out incredible things using logic. Look at Einstein he didn't work well with others essentially quit school, mean while he is one of the greatest minds of a time!
So we fought on two fronts on one side people who wanted to mainstream me and on the other side trying to take my dad. When the army finally quit fighting us we moved back to Nevada, but there was nothing harder than saying goodbye to my friends at ANOVA, but a new chapter began.
My junior year of high school was spent in Fernley.I had a one on one aid and I had friends, good grades and good times. I was doing so well but only because of the help from people all my life. Anova is one of the few things that kept me going through my high school career and without them I would have failed.
Then my senior year came. Harder than my first and the year I realized I wasn't ready for college or life in general so we fought again this time for my mental well being and to help me succeed. Some of my Special Olympics friends at Fernleyhigh have stayed until they were twenty one years old. A year was all I needed. One year to help me learn how to do simple things like laundry, getting a job, applications and more even today my friends there know more things socially than I do. I would walk with one and they would say hi to everyone so in a lot of ways they are higher functioning than I am. I struggled through this year trying my best, and the only thing keeping me from leaving and dropping out was my teachers, Mrs. Tamera and people I cared about there. In December my mom fought for me staying an extra year and I made a choice that hurt me I wanted to stay one more year than to graduate with my friends, the class of two thousand thirteen.They wanted people to come to the school to help me but they hurt me instead.
They had a person who they claimed to be an "autism specialist" to come and watch me all day. Terry was her name and she destroyed me. I needed to take a walk with my aid Mrs. Tamara which was what I always do, walking and talking help me to stay calm and not run away but Terry followed us.Mrs. Tamera needed to do something so Terry told me I couldn't walk with Mrs. Tamara ever again, and that's just the start. She began telling me that I should graduate this year and all will be fine. I told her that she didn't know me, and then she said she knew a lot of people like me. I told her not many kids try to kill themselves at eight!She replied to me that I need to get my facts straight! I finally broke down I texted my mom begging her to take me home because I couldn't do it anymore and when my mom finally came I broke down crying in my mom’s arms.Even though I cried and I honestly feel like I can't take much of my life anymore the school won't let me stay. All my hard work, my history to overcome the hoops I jumped through and the mountains I climbed all for nothing. This woman destroyed my safe place. School was my safe place not home but safe. Gone, gone with the wind because of one person.
This "autism specialist" who had no clue about people like me. Because of her I have my night mares back, I've had seizures at school and at home.I loose time daily now because of stress and I haven't been eating. Every moment at school when I hear footsteps or spot someone I don't know my heart stops and I can't deal with it, I am crippled and broken. I have always had a shadow hanging over me from what happened to me in Maryland and what I tried to do. Death, my death was my goal. And being afraid the darkness will take me back to what I was and I may succeed at my previous goals of killing myself. She came and lied so the district didn't have to pay extra money to maintain my stability and as I said people are attracted to every way to get money like rats on a carcass struggling and fighting for the biggest piece.
But as I said my life is a struggle always fighting to keep me sane to keep my family safe. But this one thing may have ruined my life forever and I may never come back this time. So why does it have to be so hard for people to put others before them self?
But it will always be this way and whether I can deal with the stress in the end or will I have a short life, only time will tell whether my life with be sweet or sour, easy or hard, up or down, light or dark but whatever happens my life will never be easy.
From a troubled teen with autism,
Steven B*
Please if you have any way of helping (from legal advice to getting the word out). All help is appreciated. I hate seeing this amazing child going from wanting to help with my children and play with them to hiding when I come over to visit.
*I changed the full last name to just the initial for privacy sake.
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