General Discussion

First through third grade I could already read so they'd send me out of the classroom to work with the speech therapist. There was also something I remember as the "good posture" class because I was a klutz. In middle and high school I was a skinny, squeaky, highly reactive kid who was the target of every bully that walked down the hallway. I'd also say whatever popped into my head and that would get me beaten, beaten bloody sometimes.

When I was sixteen I'd had enough of high school and quit.

I was good at taking multiple choice exams, however, and that got me into college. The beatings stopped.

It took me nine years to graduate from college and I was "asked" to take time off twice, the implied threat being permanent expulsion. The first time was for fighting with a teaching assistant, among other things. It was a fight about math, and I was right, but I was the undergraduate and had to take the fall, otherwise it was the PhD candidate TA's life that would have been ruined.

During my time in and out of college I suffered periods of homelessness, abusive relationships, and a few instances of extreme violence and other horrors. I have a knife scar on my arm that reminds me not to say whatever pops into my head, especially to an angry person holding a knife. I've been threatened by people holding guns.

I can't "read" people, and people who don't know me can't "read" me.

I always say my mind went a little sideways with adolescence and it took me until I was 25 years old to claw most of it back. When I was twelve years old I knew everything -- except people.

I've been spent time in locked psych wards and been diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder with psychotic features, PTSD, and Autism. I'm certain the depression and PTSD were direct consequences of the autism.

For many years all of this was hidden because I'm a privileged white guy and I'd learned quite brutally how to "mask."

I'm of retirement age now and done with wearing the mask.

It's also possible my ability to mask has completely burned out, just as my knees and hips no longer allow me to run long distances as I used to.

If we lived in communities that accepted people as they are -- "normal," autistic, gay, transgender, bright and not-so-bright, etc. -- life would be better for everyone.