Health Issues of being a Hopeless Autistic

Since my teenage years, my health resulted in two major issues (since resolved)

  • Severe acne, (due to a large dairy intake), which resulted in migrating away from day to day dairy intake, to the infamous acne medication which can cause massive issues if you accidentally knocked up a woman (which I’m forgetting the name and the FDA program for a moment)
  • A case of an underbite. My mother has kicked herself for not addressing the problem sooner, and this also caused my teeth to be worn because of grinding at night. Regardless, we waited to get a mouth guard till I went on a surgery that moved my upper jaw forward along with a second round of braces. This also rebooted my confidence and gave me a smile that people remember me when I was younger. The underbite (or TMJ) made my face look very different. While the surgery was for substance, not worrying about “jaw clicking”, etc., this was necessary.

Both cases were from my father’s genes/side of the family. I’m not going to finger this on the father I have no idea who the hell he is, and not the diet, that is stereotypical autistic diet, but more of what happened in 2004 to 2008.

I was on some medications I shouldn’t had been on to begin with. The medications caused me more anxiety and paranoia, that I feel had a contributing factor to why I was not developing like my other teenage peers. The fear of messing up, the fear of being targeted for mistakes, the fear of being a creep among remaining in one piece for 7+ hours on weekdays factor in my legitimate case of autistic behaviors had perhaps 80% of the physical damage on both the acne and underbite – again even if it was genetic from my father. 

I’ve made a lot of notes from recollection of those painful years (in some cases the worst years of my younger adult life) to convert that energy from pain to preventable measures. And those doctors are well aware of that.

Where I am going at is despite all the analytical gathering I’ve complied and made conclusions; of if I changed my diet, laid off medications, and alike, that I wouldn’t be where I would become. No, I do believe a very oppressive, and depressive support system, that was “support” in legal name only had a lot to do with my regression. (And no, I’m not talking about just the regression of my first 16 months out of school ether.)  I’m almost as smart, bright or functioning as some of my peers of 10 years ago today. I could’ve had a brighter future if it weren’t for being in a system where people had no business working in.

These treatments were very expensive and luckily my mother’s healthcare plan had me in the system because of my “pre existing conditions” that basically, in my mothers recollection began months after birth.

Estimates of an autistic’s lifespan for services and medical expenses alike will average $2 to 3 million dollars. Do I want to be a million dollar man? No. If you put adequate supports with people who really mean what they are doing, professionals who only care about the students when they are “on the clock” and aren’t just following the robotic SOPs, and poor planning in logistics, etc., maybe some people wouldn’t need to go to Boston and stay a few nights or go into a very complex anti acne treatment. Maybe my teeth wouldn’t be as short as it is.

Of course, my solution to the problem is, love, respect, happiness, and mitigating problems over “curing” but of course showing respect to students would be “unprofessional” as they have to be the control freaks because by law that’s what they get paid to do, destroy your dreams “say no” because “you’ve never heard ‘n’ or ‘o’ too many times” and other BS which needs to be destroyed.

Divided Special Needs “Teams” = Hopeless Autistics

I laugh about how there are IEP “team meetings” because in reality, there apparently is an “I” in the word team.

At least on the special ed level, and least in some areas in the Granite State.

Again in some areas, the culture in the special ed system, is all about silos, firewalls and safety mechanisms to protect each others interest. Unless you have the luxury of having an advocate involved, you’re out of luck.

I really am saddened how the New Hampshire special education and special needs system is all political. Sadly in your child’s live its not like Speaker of the House Tip O’Neil (D, Mass) and President Ronald Reagan (R) where they had differences, but worked in the best interest of the United States. On a very nano level, an IEP team is more divided than a political caucus. What’s more disturbing is the politics are more divisive when the child is in that grey years of 18 to 21.

There is no such thing as unity, unification, a common goal for the individual themselves. It’s political exploitation, manipulation and not enforcing basic IDEA rights and getting away with it only because the family is too ignorant or too poor to take legal action. Perhaps being too scared for recourse by the school systems.

This type of division I am a victim of. I use present tense, because the chars of glass that was broken in the high school years have not been put fully back together.

The system is broken. We need to stop having the professionals think about what they want from the child, and be open to what child or family wants. The disruption to the existing system should’ve began 10 to 15 years ago, but of course, politics stalled this. Now we need to enforce this disruption of service delivery so this nightmare of hopeless autistics can stay as a bad dream instead.

College/University Talk

AS I promised in a post in June, I was going to write and report about how colleges are not always the best fit for people with various disorders, in this case for autism related disorders relevant to the United States.
You are better off flipping burgers at the local McDonalds and work up the ladder to a VP of the company in a few years making more than someone with a 6 year liberal arts study that won’t be applied into a few, if any serious career down the road.
For disabilities: first off, the colleges are protected only under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The Individuals with Disabilities Educational Act  or IDEA only applies to the local school systems for students over the age of 3 and under 21 in 40 out of the 50 states. The IDEA (which mostly is federal funds) can make a student’s education vary lenient. However in the mean and and tough world of adulthood, the colleges are not protected by IDEA.
Their reasoning is: college is not a right or a need. Well the black and white sense, it is right, but in the abstract sense, the government’s agenda over the course of the last century has essentially indoctrinated that its a need to to go to college. Regardless whether its legally or philosophically right, can be debated forever. Providing intense services colleges aren’t required by law to provide such services.  Another issue is college is much like getting a job, you don’t have the right to get that specific job; same with college.
So colleges or universities aren’t not required to change the curricula, they are not required to change the content, they are not required to change the testing times, and also they  can only change things for “reasonable accommodations” so if you aren’t physically disabled, you can’t get a wheelchair, (if that has ever been done at the local school district under IDEA.)
Applying to a college doesn’t mean you will get into that place. It’s all about if you are the right candidate for that degree you are applying for. That goes out of the window in some cases if you have a rich daddy who has a Rolodex card who can sweet talk the school to get you in there, another negatives of “networking.”
So to make it short, getting a K-12  education is required by law, you need 12 year education, and if you have a special need, you need special education to get through those classes, confirming that college is allegedly a choice.
Another annoyance, is how states like Massachusetts that have approved laws to enable illegal aliens (citizens who are from outside this country, that have no Green card, no legal non-citizen paperwork) to get free (yes free) college education. So you can come to the States with no immigration paperwork and theoretically  make up a high school diploma here on a piece of a napkin (if you came from a “third world country”), go to UMASS Boston and ask to take the most expensive degree and not expect a bill from there, meanwhile the working families from New Hampshire, that pays extra because of the out of state tuition are getting screwed! And what about the legal “ailens” the ones who have autism like disorders? They get put well into the bottom of the queue!
Colleges and universities can really push their students to be as independent as possible. They do help students with “time management” skills,”self-advocacy” skills, and assistance for tutors in case the student’s are unable to study on their own. Lots of these things are done because the colleges are simply ignorant in providing “user friendly” (so to speak) programs for special needs, most importantly the developmentally disabled.
Not only that, the mentally ill is the most at risk, worse than people with autism or other developmental disorders. Colleges insist that their students act like adults, and in that case, if some seem to have issues, they expect given they are legal adults, to fend for themselves. There has been several tragedies in the last few years by young people in their early twenties and in these cases – mental illness actually gets caught then and not earlier. The most recent issue was in the Denver area movie theatre shooting, where apparently red flags started to show just weeks before the gunman shot there.
Another issue is colleges (both faculty and students) have traditionally accepted minorities, racial minorities, sexual orientations, various political and philosophical views, as well as people with physical disabilities. Sadly, if you have a conservative view, or you have a mental disorder or developmental disorder, or you are a white folk, colleges have not been accepting to such groups, which is disappointing.
I remember reading the local newspaper and when UNH started a minority group,  they interviewed some black (or could’ve been an Indian)  girl was so scared going into her first class because of the prejudice of her classmates. While I am loosely quoting that article, but what about the autistic groups? There are individuals that I wouldn’t be surprised to know they had similar experiences. From people I have talked to who work for that Institution, they have crafted some programs, but that includes that dirty word known as “self advocacy”
Unfortunately, at the end of the day, the unions, the extreme leftie moonbats are still controlling the college systems, and meanwhile the most vulernable citizens of society, the working class, the ones with special needs are getting screwed by the elitists. The real “adults” are the people that are most vulnerable; meanwhile the normal peers and the union preachers are the ones that whine and bitch about how this country sucks, etc. and not willing to teach students they think are “disruptive” – well maybe we need some DISRUPTION of the same ol’ same ol’! While they preach on change, they are the last groups to adapt to change.

I’ve made the decision to stop looking into the college thing last year and never looked back.