Through the Eye's of a Spectrum Living With Autism

Chapter 6: Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire

Boy oh boy, we're walking into the big one in this part of my story, I mean big. I mentioned that my elementary school wasn't all to fun, but I did say that middle school was a lot worse than that. Everyday of my life there was an everlasting nightmare of torture, not just for me, but for other friends of mine who were autistic as well. But I'm jumping too far ahead, because we're still in the near end of my elementary school run.

Well, to start, as I was going into sixth grade, this was a year where nothing really exciting happened to me at all. It was simple routine, go to school, go home, go to bed, repeat.

But during this particular year, I did meet someone who would possible be the most influential and helpful person in my life. Her name was Lori Ray. My dad introduced her to me I would say about a few months into my last year. She told me that not only would she help me develop my autism, my social skills and as well as meet some other kids who had what I had. Your probably wondering why I would need help with social skills, well it's quite simple. I had given up trying to talk to people in general that I would definitely need the assistance.

To give a little foreshadow into the future, Lori gave me little handmade packets that would teach all of the boundaries of my autism when it came to socializing with others. Examples would be like what tone of voice to use in certain situations and how to keep on topic with others, seeing as how I could not hold onto a simple conversation without going off topic.

Because of these little helpful advices, not only did I look over them in private, but I would research a lot more so that I could learn new techniques, and although they would mostly fail, they still helped a tad. So if it wasn't for her, I'm pretty sure I'd be a pretty big mess or worse.

I mean, my social skills pretty much "Sucked!". I mean the only topics I knew what to talk about were T.V, video games and cartoons. Seriously, everyone would talk about what was going on with MTV, singers, and as well as celebrity gossip. Trying to communicate with others and talk about all this stuff was like trying to learn a foreign language.

With elementary school coming to an end, I felt like a humongous weight was lifted right off of my shoulders. What with the teasing, mocking, and constantly being ridiculed by others, I was ready to put all that behind and hope to start something new. Boy was I in for a rude awakening.

I went to Walter Clarke middle school, or as I would like to call it "The School of Eternal Torture", and if you think I'm over exaggerating, then wait till you hear what this school had to offer me.

The kids were pretty much demons sent to bring emotional and physical pain to others all around them. If you would walk a certain, either you were beaten or mocked. If you talked a certain way, you were beaten or mocked. Pretty much anything their would get you bullied, teased, mocked, or if you were lucky out-casted, and trust me being an outcast is considered a blessing in disguise.

And the faculty, being the principles were even worse, well, excluding the main principle and some of the counselors. I would to go to them with some of problems I had and they gave the most dumbest response that has ever been given to a person with a problem, which is "Just ignore them." If I had a dollar for every time I heard that, my kids, my grandkids, and my grandkid's grandkids would be set for life.

And here's a funny bonus, when I had a problem, they gave me that response over and over again no matter what it was. But when I stand up for myself and tell them to back off, those kids would go running to a teacher, counselor, or principle and guess who would get the dumb lecture "If you had a problem, you should come talk to us." that's right, me.

Then they would either give me detention or SAC, which is pretty much full day of school detention where your teachers would send you the work you had to finish.

I thought for sure I would lose my mind there if it had not been for Lori's helpful advice, and the fact she was willing to let me rant about all the problems I had. And if it wasn't for her I would have never met my best friend Gianfranco.

This guy is probably the only good friend I had in middle school, until he introduced me some new people in high school, but that's for another chapter. We shared a lot of the same interest, such as video games, cartoons, but if there was one thing I could say about the dude, he was way better at a lot of things than me.

He was stronger, faster, and way more developed than me. He knew how to communicate with others, he could have certain interest in one thing and then move onto another quickly, where as I would be stuck on something interesting for like months. Lastly, he knew how to stand up for himself, trust me this was guy you did not want angry at me.

I couldn't really fight back then, so I was pretty much a fragile autistic kid in a world where just around every corner somebody could jump out and start to pound on me just cause they would find it entertaining.

And middle school was not a perfect time for my autism, be it that my social skills as I previously said were horrible. I could not keep my mouth shut for the life of me, but it wasn't just because I was trying to improve myself and as well as be dumb so people would think I was funny and cool. Yeah, I know, it was a waste of time trying to impress kids like these, especially how I described them, but I was desperate to make some friends.

The worse part of it all was that, this only increased the bullying tenfold without even noticing about until it became too late. I would repeat cartoon episodes in my head to try and calm my nerves and escape the horrid school, and all the other kids would mock me for that.

These kids would even go so far as to tell me to leave, and go to a "special education school" because they would tell me I was too stupid to be in a regular school. The insults got worse and worse that I actually wished to go back to elementary school.

All I could do was keep my head held high and just try to brave it. But I was in for the longest ride of my life.