Growing up, I always knew I was “different” from everyone else. I learned and thought differently than others. I was the shy one that tried to connect with my peers growing up but was oftentimes bullied for the way that I acted towards them. I had shared the acronym alphabet of diagnoses and took a share of medications since the age of six to find that I had my autism and the right cocktail of medication to make myself manageable.

Since I was diagnosed in 1998 and I lived in a county that did not have a plethora of educated experience on the subject, it was hard to get quantitative support that I needed. I was diagnosed when puberty was raging through me, creating the perfect storm to where I became unmanageable and spent one summer in and out of the psychiatric hospital. I learned how to deceit myself by making a destructive decision to sign myself out of the hospital when it was not best to do so and eventually after a long summer and landing in what would be my last psychiatric hospitalization, my parents and trusted professionals sought placement in a residential facility, even fighting systems to ensure I was placed in the one that was close to home and a good fit for me.

Through all that, things were still not perfect. There was for many years not a lot of education on my level of autism and as such, there were services that were not appropriate, or evidence based for autistic. It was something that my parents thought was good and was pressured upon into making me a better person, yet it caused me some childhood PTSD, while undiagnosed has become a reality.

As I came of age, programming and eventually trade school was sought out. Yet, while the world was not adequate on what autism is today, I made it through things and learned and grown increasingly into the person I was. Eventually autism came increasingly to light as it has today. It has allowed me to be able to learn all the things about being autistic and I continue to learn increasingly every day.

I have forgiven my family that had put me through my past experiences as they only did what was best with the information they had at the time. Eventually, I accepted myself as being autistic and asked for and getting support when I needed to do so. It was also accepting that I am a person that has special needs and a disability and that there is no shame in having the many classifications and comorbidities that I have because of my challenges.

Autism is nothing to be ashamed or afraid of. Despite its challenges, there are many remarkable things about being autistic that can be quite beneficial to one’s daily life and nowadays autistic challenges can be managed in many ways.