Good manners?

With hindsight I think confidence is really important. Getting a job, getting some job skills and satisfaction in doing something is essential.

The pain for many parents is seeing a young adult get a break, then having it undermined, and having to start again, and maybe over and over and over again...finding a break, building up confidence and self esteem, and getting over the next crisis that comes along, to get back out there.

Because though such circumstances are hard for everyone, and many people are experiencing that in this current recession, people on the spectrum have real impediments in presenting themselves to get work, coping with the social world involved in work (fitting in) and sustaining enough self confidence and self esteem to keep going.

I think office work is a good place to start. It is an environment of routines in which someone on the spectrum can excel. Its just unfortunate that offices seem to be breeding grounds for bullies - so you need to be watchful that growing confidence isn't being sapped by unsympathetic colleagues.

My apologies again to Pink68 as we've stolen a thread, but it is a useful opportunity.

My first job after school was clerk in an insurance company at 18. I had terrible trouble finding work, making an atrocious fool of myself at interviews, and left school with a few basics (then O'Levels) mostly second or third attempt. So my credibility profile was grim, and my social skills for fitting in seriously defective. It is quite scary thinking back. But filing, and organising documents, doing simple calculations for quotes and such like suited me well. It was just bad luck I was in with two spiteful vicious senior clerks who made sport of tearing me to shreds.

Another job I did was operating theatre orderly, which is again routine, and comfortable, and fellow workers in a hospital proved much easier to get on with, so that job helped my confidence.

Unfortunately I spent more time out of work than in work - and being stuck around at home was confidence destroying.

Little acorns grow into oaks - so office work seems to me a good place to start, if the atmosphere is good and there is a chance to get more confident and self assured. Negativity seems to be a widespread symptom of autistic spectrum. Anything that lifts an individual up must make a difference.

Sounds to me like a good beginning. Good luck to him. He may make rocket science yet, and who says rocket scientists have to start with good A Levels and a First in Quantum Physics from Cambridge.

With hindsight I think confidence is really important. Getting a job, getting some job skills and satisfaction in doing something is essential.

The pain for many parents is seeing a young adult get a break, then having it undermined, and having to start again, and maybe over and over and over again...finding a break, building up confidence and self esteem, and getting over the next crisis that comes along, to get back out there.

Because though such circumstances are hard for everyone, and many people are experiencing that in this current recession, people on the spectrum have real impediments in presenting themselves to get work, coping with the social world involved in work (fitting in) and sustaining enough self confidence and self esteem to keep going.

I think office work is a good place to start. It is an environment of routines in which someone on the spectrum can excel. Its just unfortunate that offices seem to be breeding grounds for bullies - so you need to be watchful that growing confidence isn't being sapped by unsympathetic colleagues.

My apologies again to Pink68 as we've stolen a thread, but it is a useful opportunity.

My first job after school was clerk in an insurance company at 18. I had terrible trouble finding work, making an atrocious fool of myself at interviews, and left school with a few basics (then O'Levels) mostly second or third attempt. So my credibility profile was grim, and my social skills for fitting in seriously defective. It is quite scary thinking back. But filing, and organising documents, doing simple calculations for quotes and such like suited me well. It was just bad luck I was in with two spiteful vicious senior clerks who made sport of tearing me to shreds.

Another job I did was operating theatre orderly, which is again routine, and comfortable, and fellow workers in a hospital proved much easier to get on with, so that job helped my confidence.

Unfortunately I spent more time out of work than in work - and being stuck around at home was confidence destroying.

Little acorns grow into oaks - so office work seems to me a good place to start, if the atmosphere is good and there is a chance to get more confident and self assured. Negativity seems to be a widespread symptom of autistic spectrum. Anything that lifts an individual up must make a difference.

Sounds to me like a good beginning. Good luck to him. He may make rocket science yet, and who says rocket scientists have to start with good A Levels and a First in Quantum Physics from Cambridge.