Masking (I missed that one)

 Like many parents of an autistic child I have read many things, relating to the subject . I have even read about the practice of masking, employed extensively by autistic people, but for some reason I never associated that with my son's behaviour.

Possibly because I was always looking for ways to support him and when he was in my company; well he didn't need to mask. The problem for him was when he was at school, he obviously felt he needed to mask there because of the cruel way teenagers can treat their peers, and given just how cruel they can be, even about the smallest of things ...........

There is a strong argument for providing education for these cruel teenagers about autism and about just being a nice person in the world.

If masking is successful in protecting an autistic person from ridicule and derision then obviously it will be their default setting, until they get to the safety of their own home. The emotional and to a certain extent physical effort needed for masking is I am certain hugely draining .

On reflection it is glaringly apparent that my son was putting on his mask every day he left home to go to school and subsequently to College, now thankfully that he is at university he does not feel the need to mask , in fact diversity is celebrated by him and his peers , he has also met and made friends with other autistic people and he has contacted a local charity, set up to support autistic adults. In addition he has been attending therapy sessions (all to the good ).

 I can't help thinking though that he would be in a much better place in his general happiness if our society could just catch up and get with the programme.

As far as I am concerned, well I can search my soul, all I want, to find the reason I did not recognise he was masking but it does not change the past. 

As to the future though, I hope to one day be able to talk to my son about his experiences at school and other dark times, I suppose parents never really forgive themselves , its just how it is , but I can at least recognise what happened so as to better understand my son in the future.

I mean, just having this light bulb moment has given me a better understanding of my son.

When I think about it

When I think about it , and believe me I do. A lot, probably too much . I think some one with autism does not know what it is like not to have autism, and vice versa someone without autism could not possibly know what it is like to have autism. 

That being said, leads me to no definitive conclusions , but it does help me understand why I don't always know where my son is coming from .

How his thought processes work are a mystery to me, just when I think I am getting a clearer understanding of how his mind works he goes in a different direction , which of course is his prerogative. Sadly though it is where our communication can break down, at this point I usually take a moment to try and settle the confusion in my mind , whilst understanding that the same thing might be happening to him. Since it is me that is trying to understand though, it often appears that he is in no way flustered or confused, he is just waiting for me to catch up.

Now there could be a lot going on in this dynamic; old person-young person; technophobe-tech genius, person who should get out more-person who gets out a lot, and so on.

My best guess, as to how his thought processes work, is to conjecture that he thinks like someone playing three dimensional chess ( see Star Trek ). He can park thoughts on one level, leave that subject and go to another level and carry on a conversation on a completely different subject, then return to the previous level and carry on that conversation without any break in his flow, as to how many levels ,and how many subjects, he can deal with,it is still, and will probably always, remain a mystery to me.

I grew up in a large family, often we would have meals together. Anything from 6 to 12 people would be sat around the table and many conversations would flow on many different subjects, so I have had some training in jumping from one subject to another,my son on the other hand is an only child so I can only conclude he was born with this ability,the fact that his ability to jump from subject to subject,confuses me sometimes, suggests to me,that there is some thing quite deep going on. Primarily because some of the things we are talking about ( at the same time ) are complicated , emotional , and by no means light topics.

If you know what I mean.

Thinking and Planning

             I am not sure how long my son had been thinking and planning,

But in late 2022 he announced that he wanted to go to university.

After leaving school at the beginning of the pandemic he went on to do a college course, he chose the subject whilst still at school,and before, there was any whisper or indication that the whole world and everyone in it, would be subject to a deadly virus, forcing us to live our lives in an extremely restricted way.

Said course was media and broadcasting focusing on working with cameras. He has always enjoyed making short films and is fascinated by films how they are made and so on. This particular course however focused on the theory more than the practical, and as the majority of his course was conducted at home sat at his computer he began to become demotivated. But not one to sit on his laurels he looked around for something else he could do.

He found a course in the north of England for a degree in photography. Which he duly applied for. All of this was done online from application to interview, he was successful and he started his course in September of 2023.

 But more worrying than this in the months leading up to this he seemed to be becoming more animated and excitable, it seems that for many years he had not been happy about being autistic and that for years he had been hiding it as best he could and as his new life was approaching, he was preparing to reinvent himself.

As if somehow this would exorcise the demons of the past, you might think that 'demons' is a strong word but after many conversations with him, I have begun to realise that he was facing some fierce bullying at school just for being different , ( maybe his good looks and his side ways look at the world annoyed the cool kids) I don't know.

Hence his reason to start a new life in another town, perfectly understandable you would say. 

The questions on my mind however were; Is he ready for this ? Is he prepared ? Have I taught him enough? Will he be able to hack it out there in the world.

Well he is half way through his course and passing his grades, making new friends, exploring religion of all things and to my mind he is safe because he is living in student halls and will be for the duration of his course and a little beyond, work and a career seem to be beckoning, as the university have lined him up with some photography work.At present he is surviving on a student loan and a top up from me.

The great thing about student halls is that all your costs are included so the residents only have to worry about one payment per month, quite different from the realer world. 

And therein lies his next big challenge ( In my mind anyway ) Watch this space.

I would venture yesterday

So I guess the question on all our minds is ; Will my autistic child make it in the world ? How can we know? I would say some are more lucky than others some may continue to display autistic behaviour but not enough for it to interfere with day to day living, some may always need support of some kind ,but that might not necessarily  have to come from the parents.

Employers can support their autistic workers, for the benefits can be felt by both parties. Autistic people make great workers , diligent, attention to detail ,and follow instructions to the letter.

Some autistic people are supported by their partners. They prepare them for the working day, in such a way as to mask their autism, some are simply accepted by their colleagues.

But it is not always so straight forward 

At the moment in this country, it would seem like, there are no systems in place to facilitate autistic people into employment,by employers, that is to say employers recognise that autism exists, and that they have an obligation to employ people with autism , but when it comes right down to it. At time of interview 'human resources' are not properly prepared. 

There are Autistic Charities and government departments, set up to support people with autism to get into work. But it seems like they are not working well with employers because if they were more autistic people would be in work and more employers would know how to recognise an autistic applicant and how to interview and support them into working for their company.

My son; and I am sure many like him are very reluctant to reveal their autism diagnosis , although in an interview situation, after a few minutes the interviewer will start to observe behaviour not normally experienced in these kind of meetings. This is where the charities and government should come into play, be it seminars, video calls , legislation. Basically gently bombarding employers with all the information they need to improve the opportunities of our autistic population.

Given that autism is on the increase 1% of the worlds population, more than one in a hundred in the UK.

Something has to be done , I would venture yesterday.

If I was asked

If I was ever asked how I would organise support for learning in secondary schools, which by the way is very unlikely, even though I am a parent of an autistic child. I would do my very best to minimise the feelings of 'being different' that many or all young people with disabilities or learning difficulties feel.

It seems our educators have forgotten what it was like to be a teenager. The crushing embarrassment they feel when out in public , not all teenagers of course but many, and the teenagers with autism feel the clumsiness and awkwardness most keenly. So why then would you want to single them out by creating a so-called HUB.

On first analysis it seems like a good idea to set aside a place where the teenagers with learning difficulties can go, somewhere to relax and find a quiet place away from the hub bub of pupil life, but that by definition is not inclusion, that is segregation any child seen walking in or out of the HUB will immediately be singled out as different. And different is wrong, bad even in the minds of the less enlightened teenagers of our society.

The teenagers most likely to  bully are the ones who feel most insecure, for whatever reason,and there is nothing more empowering to an insecure person than the ability to bully some one so obviously more insecure than themselves.

That last statement does not take a rocket scientist to formulate, in fact it is psychology 101.

So why then would the educators of our precious children want to go out of their way to create a system that basically puts targets on the backs of our most vulnerable young people, at a time in their young lives were you could argue they are in fact at their most vulnerable.

If as I said, I was asked what I would do . I would integrate the hub and all its practises into the whole school structure. I would encourage the mixing of all of our young adults no matter what their individual challenges were. 

I remember seeing signs posted in my sons school ,saying, some people are gay get over it , or words to that effect. But I don't remember coming across a HUB for the gay teenagers in the school ,they were able to go about their lives with out that kind of exposure.

I really feel like my son and others like him should be able to go about their lives without that kind of exposure, who knows what the future brings.

Who needs to know

Even though it is now well over a year since my son left school, rather abruptly because of the coronavirus. He is still traumatised by the bullying he received there.

The victim of bullying will feel weak and insecure, and autistic victims of bullying will feel this 5 or 10 fold more. That being the case, what exactly were they doing at my son's school to address this?

Not much it would appear, even though there was a dedicated department to support learning, and support pupils with learning difficulties they seem to do little if anything to emotionally support the pupils under their watch. 

If inclusion is the goal of modern educators then they seem ill-prepared for the emotional support they should be giving to their charges granted they are on a learning curve but it has been over 15 years now that children like my son have been included in mainstream education.

I am now faced with the challenge of helping him heal from direct attacks on his character, which he feels are solely due to his autism, and convincing him to keep seeking support in all his endeavours because of his autism.

He, however, is convinced that no one should know, at worst new people he will meet will just think him a little odd and to him, that will be a preferred outcome as opposed to explaining he was born on the spectrum.

All well and good you might think, except if he does get employment where his autism is directly challenged he will have to reveal his condition. This might not go well for him if he has previously kept it a secret.

I am certain that in the future he will see that it is no embarrassment to be on the spectrum and that he can be as open about it as anyone with particular personal challenges, but as yet he has not reached this level of maturity. 

Since my last blog my son has started a college course, with my urging, he ticked the box in the application to say he had a learning difficulty after explaining to him that only his educators would know and that they had to know so they could best teach him he reluctantly agreed to tick the box.

Of course, any attempt by the support for learning department to contact him has been ignored.None the less they are aware, and that is a plus.

I also managed to get him a job with my employers, which he earned . He was interviewed they took into account his experience working in a charity shop but sadly without my intervention he might still be applying, attending interviews and ultimately being rejected. 

I am sure though I am not the first and by no means the last parent to help their child in to their first paid employment.

Brave and Proud

 Here we are now many years since this blog started, my son now age 19. He has become a handsome young man, brave and proud, aware of his autism but not allowing it to dictate his life. In fact, he would rather it was never mentioned again.

How that will transpire in his future remains to be seen, but it is a philosophy worth pursuing for now.

The only trouble with this however is that it is not always easy for him to mask the fact he has autism, I can only imagine how difficult it can be for him sometimes. 

He has recently been applying for jobs, and when he is filling in the application, he gets to the bit where they ask him. Would you describe yourself as having a disability? He answers no, he does not want it to be known, he accepts he has autism but he does not want it to be the main part of his character. 

He has managed to secure 5 interviews but is yet to be offered employment. Something at these interviews does not go well for him.

I think because of the stigma surrounding any kind of disability, he is trying to live like he is not autistic, which when all said and done is really quite sad. But when you think of how long it has taken society to accept same-sex relationships, it is not in any way surprising. 

If something about his autism was to influence him positively if in employment his autism was invaluable to his employer, of course, it would change his opinion. That day won't come until he actually gets a job.

 In an effort to make himself more employable I supported him in applying to a local charity shop, they were happy to take him on, he works for free but the difference it made to his demeanour and general well being was palpable.

We now have to apply that to paid employment it seems so close within a whisper of his grasp and as such to me is very frustrating because I know he is more than capable of working in any kind of role. He cant however communicate his competence effectively enough to an interviewee to secure that elusive job.

Watch this space.