Living with Autism
By Jay Timms ; This is a letter that has been written by a friend of mine named Chelsea Kouwenhoven. She is a 16 year old girl who has been diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome, which is a high functioning form of Autism. I hope you will read it and get into the mind of a child with Autism. It made my day reading this.
Hi my name is Chelsea, I am 16 years old. I am in grade nine but I’m almost done grade nine. I have something called autism spectrum disorder, which a lot of the time makes it harder for me to understand things. A lot of people don’t understand autism and I wish did because then they would know autistic people are very cool to be around. Just because I went to the doctors and got the label autism doesn’t mean I’m not like everyone else.
Living with this isn’t easy or fun. My life may sometimes look like a party because I have music playing in my head all the time but it really isn’t a party. Some of the hardest things I find with living with autism is that I don’t really know how to show my feelings. All my life I have had a really hard time with people because some people don’t understand me. If you really knew me you would know I am a really nice person and I love animals, I care about others, I love helping people and I think everyone should be treated equally. People need to understand that some of the things I do I don’t mean to do and if I could stop I would stop. Sometimes it may seem like I don’t care about people but I do care about other people. I also a lot of the times don’t understand what people are saying. All through my life I have had a hard time making friends. Sometimes I feel like I am stuck in my body and I can’t get out to show people who I really am.
Something that is hard to hear from a doctor is “I don’t know what to do. She’s too hard for me”. How can a doctor say that to someone?? I get no answer because no one knows. When I am told I can’t do something I just try harder and I do it. When I was in grade 4 I was told I wouldn’t be able to do the same work as the class, but guess what? I am in grade 9 and I am doing all the same work as the class. I am a straight “A” student and people still think I am dumb but I am not dumb and I love school.
I don’t think it’s fair the people look at me and think I’m bad or different because I may need a little more help with things like understanding something’s. And I am doing good at it to. I live in a small town called Chilliwack so there is not very many doctors out here to help me, the only way I got to see a doctor that can help me is being rushed in to the Vancouver Children’s hospitals ER, now if you ask me that’s not right you should not have to do that to see a doctor. For me having to go through that it was hard.
Most people will just get tired and go to sleep but for me I don’t get tired and fall asleep because I always have way to much on my mind. It is so much harder to live with autism because people just don’t understand it and I have a hard time talking to people, it is very hard to focus if your mind is going 100m per hour all the time.
Do I ever wish I wasn’t born with autism?? Well the answer is yes, from time to time I do wish that because then my everyday life would be easier. There is no cure for autism but people with autism can be taught things just like everyone else. I am really no different than anyone else even though I have autism. I have friends, family, good grades and I even have a boyfriend. I may have autism but I’m not going to let it hold me back from anything. Once people get to know me and forget about the autism they will know how nice I really am. If people knew more about autism they would not exclude people with autism as much.
People with autism are not animals we are real people and we have feelings to just like everyone else in this world. We should not be treated bad or looked at weird by anyone, when people do that it hurts and its really not needed. Autistic people are cool, funny, awesome and amazing if you are mean to them or ignore them you are really missing out. We are great people don’t forget that and we didn’t choose to be born like this God did and He loves us and knows we are strong and can handle the challenge He has given to us.
Living with Autism
Being made fun of because you have autism is not a good feeling, it’s not my fault that I was born with autism. But God only chooses families that are strong and He knows who can deal with something like autism and oh boy was He right my family is very strong and they want what is the best for me. I did not choose this life for me but God did and God knows what people can handle and I guess He thinks I can handle autism. I would not wish autism upon anyone but to the people that have autism just stay strong you can do it and your not the only one out there with autism.
Jay Timms BMT, MA, CCC
Author, Presenter, Wellness Consultant
Relationship and Family Counsellor
Trivita Affiliate #13442869
604-816-9405 – 1-888-901-9454
