Published on 12, July, 2020
Looking back over my childhood and considering various experiences within my wider family, I can trace not only what I believe to be the "path of autism" but also a fair amount of poverty, to varying degrees.
Now I'm not suggesting that there's a straightforward link between autism and poverty - certainly I can see many positives to my neurodivergent mind which have enabled me to make a fair living over the years - but the patterns do seem intertwined. I can see lots of issues with anxiety, depression and addiction too but increasingly I suspect these might be related to undiagnosed (and therefore unsupported) autism. The patterns seem to involve difficulties in the workplace (choosing and staying in jobs), education (especially higher education where independence and social factors seems to become increasingly important), accessing healthcare and applying for benefits (a stressful process in itself).
During my teenage years in particular, we went through a lot of poverty and our living conditions were quite poor, to the extent that we didn't dare invite people round and our social isolation became ever worse. Dad did what work he could, but was trapped in a low paying job and neither of my parents had much knowledge of the benefits system (I was quite shocked recently when my now elderly mother said that we probably could have claimed something to help).
And going back a generation, my grandmother's house was something of a disaster. No housework ever done, not much with which to do it, no repairs carried out, not much washing, a LOT of hoarding, alcohol consumption and gambling. It was like that with my uncles too, although they were very intelligent people and obviously quite talented in many ways.
Is this all necessarily to do with autism? Probably not. But I'm suspicious. Especially now that my sons are having major difficulties making their way in the world and a lot of our money seems to go on false starts in education and work. There's some good stuff in there too no doubt, but I'm worried.
Any thoughts?
I've been in relative poverty my entire life.
My family were similarly in poverty and outcasts from the neighborhood and our community.
Some of it is our fault from bad behaviour and decisions. And the company we keep.
My mother was a compulsive gambler, she wasted a fortune on the football pools and later the national lottery.
Then there was the bad company who introduced my parents to hobbies such as stamp collecting, they spent large amounts of money on pointless collections such as first day covers of stamps, whole mint collections of new stamps, etc etc.
Then the coin collecting, again large amount of money gone.
But as children we were short of essentials such as clothes and food.
Now I'm in poverty because the state benefit system is inadequate and I can't find paid work.
The job centre and various employment advisors insist that I'm capable of work. But employers disagree. And I fail job interview after interview and when I do find paid employment, the employer discovers quickly that I'm different and gets rid of me promptly. I've even been kicked off employment training schemes as unemployable.
Yes, the situation with the DWP is dire, I think. I imagine it'd be easy to fall into a pattern of being bounced between employers and the Jobcentre+ as the government's threshold for capability to work is much lower than that of many employers. Likewise many employers' pension schemes take a similar view - "We can't continue to employ you in THIS role but in order to qualify for your pension you must be incapable of taking on ANY role. Unfortunately we have no suitable roles so you need to go to the Jobcentre."
My most embarrassing situation was in 2000 and a Tesco training scheme.
Tesco were opening a new hypermarket and were looking for local staff.
The training scheme was a joint venture between Tesco, the DWP and the city council.
At the end of two weeks we were guaranteed an interview for an actual job.
At that time I was applying for retail jobs, so the job centre sent me on the scheme making it clear that if I left without completing it or if I was kicked out for any reason, then my benefits would be stopped.
At the end of the first week, I was called into the centre's general manager's office and he told me to leave. I refused and asked for his reasons. Throughout the week I was always on time, did everything that was asked and behaved myself. Eventually after much hesitation he gave me a list.
So back to the job centre, where my employment advisor threw her arms in the air and said. " I give up!"
He’s a really great writer and a great photographer ~ I love his writings and his photos. He’s got a great sense of humour. He’s a kind, thoughtful and generous person. He would, in many respects, rather go with the flow as opposed to rocking the boat, in order to keep the peace. And that’s just a few things :)
Rather than focusing on what you can't do, do you mind if I ask what you feel you can do?