Can you help with advice for young people with Autism?

NAS82808 said:

Do you tell people / boss' that you have autism? How do you say it?

- Have you had any experiences with the emergency services? How was your experience and did you tell them that you have autism?

- Do you use public transport?
- Do you get annoyed when people say "I'm a bit autistic" or "everyone is on the spectrum" etc.
- Do you have repetitive thoughts and how do you deal with them?

- Do you have friends? Do you want friends?

1. Yes, work know all about it and my boss was supportive on the journey to diagnosis.  But the true answer to this question lies with the boss more than the young person.  A well disposed boss will be receptive however they tell them.  An ignorant one won't.  There really is no magic answer to this unless you know the individual.  I just got lucky.  My boss had vast experience teaching kids on the Spectrum and I trusted him in absolute.  Not everyone is so fortunate.  Beyond that, I have no qualms about telling new people I am Autistic, but then I am of an age where I can weather other people's ignorance better.

2. 'Emergency services'...well, it was my problems with medical phobias and communicating with medical staff such that I was struggling to access health care, which brought me to my diagnosis.  My experiences with them were consistently awful, but they mostly thought I was just being difficult.  Now that I know, I am finding it a mixed bag when I tell them. Some still have no understanding, but many have been excellent and adapted to my need.  I have an "I am Autistic" card to show if I am struggling to talk to the receptionist even, and I have a dog tag around my neck in case I have an accident.  There is also a "passport" on the system for me now.  It has helped a very great deal.  I would highly recommend that your young people think about and plan for how to inform emergency services.

3. Transport.  I can't drive because of the perceptual and co-ordination problems due to my Autism. I've had no choice but to use public transport for years.  Yes, the crowds and the noise and all that exhaust me beyond belief and sometimes make me anxious, but I get on with it.  It will be different for all your young people.  Some can push through it, even though it's tiring for them, others can cope a bit better with headphones etc, some won't cope at all and will sharp find themselves in melt down.  If they don't have my kind of co-ordination problems to prevent driving, I'd encourage them to take the test and support them with the transport bit of PiP maybe to get them a means of getting out and about.

4.  I think most of us get irritated by: "everyone's a bit Autistic".... if everyone was, we'd all be living in a world better suited to our needs and we wouldn't have half the barriers to leading an ordinary fulling life that we do.  I try to be patient and educate, personally, rather than get annoyed, of course.  Perhaps, encourage them to see these things as an opportunity to open up other people's thinking and arm them with a few scripts that might politely trot out to correct the perception.

5. Repetitive thought.  Yes, but rarely of the type that are harmful.  Usually, they are about a problem I am trying to crack, say to do with my family history investigations.  When they have been harmful - I have had the suicidal ones and yes, it was dangerous, that will only go on until the problem is cracked.  It was on a loop, but the loop was looking for the missing clue as to whether this was my only option or not. I did come close to concluding it was.  This is a tough one.  CBT focuses on rumination and not doing it.... I see why when there's a dangerous thought, but some Autistic rumination can actually be constant action replay which searches for the detail that is as yet unseen. The irony is this is part of the process that at one and the same time took me close to suicide and CRACKED the puzzle of my own Autism, thereby revealing the true cause of my distress and saving my life.  I think you'd have to pick that apart quite carefully with each individual.  When is the thought cycle just fun, helping with something important and when is it hindering or even dangerously destructive?

6. Friends. Yes and I love them.  I had no idea how to play as a kid and was very badly bullied at school, but as friendship started to depend on shared interest and values, rather than silly games and fitting in with pointless gossip and fashion, I had and have friends.  I always gravitated naturally toward the other unconventional, unfashionable and non-judgemental cookies out there.  Funny, how a couple of them have turned out to be on the Spectrum too.  Birds of a feather and all that...

Hope some of that helps.

Nice to see professionals such as yourself popping into the community btw.  Nice to meet you.

Dawn said:

some Autistic rumination can actually be constant action replay which searches for the detail that is as yet unseen

You explain this really well. I've been trying to put my finger on how to describe this but you have just done it perfectly!

endless variations of the same scenario, looking for the best possible outcome

even if it's a doomsday scenario, or maybe especially then

endless variations of the same scenario, looking for the best possible outcome

even if it's a doomsday scenario, or maybe especially then