The truth about my 10 truths is this: I don't believe them. I write them because somewhere in myself, I know that they're true, they're just all but impossible to live out.
Do you want to know the truth about what I believe, or what I live like I believe? Here we go.
1. Autism is a leech. It steals my personality and my humanity.
2. Who I am needs to be changed from the inside out.
3. Autism? It sucks.
4. I will never be accepted as beautiful in this world, and I should stop trying.
5. My value is in my looks and my success at seeming non-autistic.
6. God is distant.
7. People may love me despite my autism, but they will never love me because of it.
8. Sometimes I need help. I need more help than the average person to get through the day. That's not okay. I need to be like everyone else.
9. I can't make a difference in this world when I'm not working. All the matters is whether I'm making money.
10. I shouldn't need support to reach my goals; I should reach them on my own, like everyone else.
As you can see, my positivity is a bit of a farce. Sure, I get flashes of it, but they're gone as quickly as they hit and I'm back to being negative. I'm trying to be positive, though. I thought I would write out what I want to believe, and that maybe that would make it more real for me. I wasn't going to explain the reasoning behind writing my list, but then it would be a little like lying. You would believe that I really felt that way all the time. When I set out to write this blog, I decided that I would be completely honest with Blog World, because my goal is to explain what it is like to live with autism. The truth is that it's not all fun, and sometimes, I want it to go away.
Hi Lydia. For whatever it's worth, here are my 10 truths about why I appreciate you. I hope it's not strange to hear this from a perfect stranger, but I just wanted you to know.
ReplyDelete1. My son is autistic and I don't always know what's going on in his head. Asking you gives me some first hand perspective that makes sense.
2. I am scared about the future for my son. But when I see that you've gone to college, stuck it out through the hard times, and even went back with a letter to try to right a wrong, it gives me hope. I know it's not all been perfect for you, but you keep at it and continue to try to figure out. Your tenacity is extremely admirable and something we could all learn from.
3. You write clearly and from the heart. You definitely have a gift.
4. The things you write about are interesting and engaging, funny and heart wrenching. Your perspective is unique and real.
5. You're trying to find your 'place' in this world. Do you know how many 'typical' people don't even bother?
6. From the comments I have seen posted here in the past, I know you give hope (and help) to a lot of parents out there.
7. You give me an appreciation of cats. (They always kind of scared me and still kind of do.) Need I say more...
8. Believe me, you're making a difference. Making money is important but not everything and certainly not the only gauge of success. Hopefully, you can figure out how to capitalize on all of your talents. There are a lot of 21 year old (and older) 'neurotypicals' out there trying to figure out this same dilemma. I am not trying to make excuses for you, but keep in mind, the economy in the US is not great now....
9. You have a beautiful smile! Keep showing those pearly whites, even if you don't always feel like it. I read somewhere that it releases a happy hormone in the brain (and it causes fewer wrinkles than frowning, by the way, though you're too young for it to matter yet! :)
10. It's hard to have autism (no.3) but autism is not the only thing that defines you (no. 7). There are a million sites out there about autism, but few written by autistic individuals themselves. But that's not the only reason I stop by your blog regularly. You're also a funny, interesting, straightforward and deep person, who writes extremely well about your ups and downs in real time!
Don't be too hard on yourself, Lydia! We all need others, nobody can do anything by themselves! The best thing we can do is to keep trying and be open to learning and it seems to me that you are doing exactly those things.
Bravo, Gimky.
ReplyDeleteLydia, you should change your age in your "about me" section :) you old fart, you.
There, see? I commented instead of just telling you in person. Nevermind that I'm in class...
Lydia NO ONE gets though life with out support and no "typical" person ever achieves thier goals with out support. I applaud Gimky as well and ditto! You're a brave girl and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
ReplyDeleteDon't know who said it but "No Man is an Island". Read and inwardly digest my friend. We ALL need help to do things, I ALWAYS need help to get through the day. Reaching out to people for a hand or to help is what makes the world go round, it's what keeps us all bobbing along through whatever life throws at us.
ReplyDeleteI was talking to a friend last night and we were discussing whether, if someone gave us a magic wand to make the autism go away (she has one daughter with asperger's and I have two with severe autism), would we use it? On balance we came to the conclusion that although we wanted more than anything to enable our girls to achieve their full potential we weren't so sure about using the wand. Autism is a part of our girls and who would they be without it? They would be someone else and neither of us could bare to be without our girls.
Maybe that's selfish, and don't get me wrong, no one wants autism in their lives, but having got it we have to make the most of it.
Autism is such a small part of who you are - an influential part granted but a small part all the same - it's just the tip of the iceberg and like an iceberg the big important bit is under the water. That is who you are.
Gimky- a little strange to hear those kinds of things about myself, but not really a bad kind of strange. Thank you. I'm going to hold onto that and go back and look at it when I need the reminder.
ReplyDeleteI guess you guys are right that no one does it alone. After all, we can't raise ourselves. And even after we're "grown up," we all need help sometimes. I just need help with different things than most people.