Neurodiversity thread - for all MNetters who are neurodiverse - ASD, ADHD, Dyspraxia and more.

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Welcome one and all to the new thread. A safe haven for MNetters who identify as neurodiverse, diagnosis or not, and those waiting for assessment. Links available in recent threads. Newbies welcome. We just ask that you introduce yourself

I interrupt my tutors at college all the time; I can't help it but they tolerate me being a smart arse because I'm clearly SEN a genius 😂

My philosophy lecturer was impressed at me on Monday because I got through a lesson without wearing headphones :) 😂 (oh dear)

I never had a statement at school but blatantly should've. I spent nearly as much time outside the classroom as in it, between being sent out for misbehaviour and being allowed to sit outside with less tedious work.

It's so much better now that I can indulge my weaknesses a bit - not enough to be a nuisance to anyone or get away with things, but just enough so I can cope. As a kid I guess I just didn't know why I was not coping. Ten years in a system you can't cope with is fucking traumatising.

In fact, if anyone would find it useful, I'm happy to present myself to people as an example of what happens when you take an autistic kid with top-centile academics and bottom-centile CWTSQ (coping with this shit quotient) and treat them like they're a badly-behaved child who really should know better.

ARGH

Not that the education system would give a shit if you presented hundreds of them.

Fucking special fucking needs.

I think the only SEN provision I ever got was in the last year of senior school, where I had to spend half my time in the "STAR Unit" (where we had special board games to play! and inappropriately-pitched books!) and the other half in normal lessons. Somehow, I dropped Media Studies and History - how and when did that happen? I don't know It just stopped happening for some reason? And I ended up being put through for Foundation Science and didn't find out until I got into the exam room But I didn't have to do PE, so there's that

Sorry Polter, just resentful and bitter It pisses me off.

People make assumptions about me. My history teacher is suddenly very different towards me now I've submitted an assignment. Like, when I was just annoying, she tolerated me, but now I've shown I'm not just a big bundle of SEN, it's different… why does academic ability have any bearing on how you treat people? I mean she was perfectly pleasant before, but why are people ALWAYS FUCKING SURPRISED that I can write a decent fucking essay?

What I mean is, I'm assumed not-very-capable unless and until proved otherwise. Why?!

And presumably people who don't happen to perform well on the kinds of tasks that schools put a lot of value on continue to be treated like that

Not badly, as such, but just with an assumption that "special educational needs" is the most important and salient point to note when dealing with that person.

Very probably Polter. I don't know which is worse: very obviously struggling, in a way which gets lots of attention, mostly negative, or struggling in a way that nobody notices at all, all on your own, with nobody even trying to help.

rat I got labelled an "angry troubled teen"
I got put into anger management. They didn't think that me screaming, crying and throwing chairs at people could be a sign of something else going on.
The education system is fucked. No diagnosis then you get labelled bad or angry or lazy or all of the above.
Diagnosis and you only get seen for the SEN, and not what you can achieve and who you are as a person. People don't seem able to look past the diagnosis

I wish I could be as strident advocating for myself as I am advocating for truth and justice

This a thousand times Polter. I can't count the times people have asked me why I care so much about some injustice. But I couldn't stand up for myself to save my life, probably quite literally.

Exactly HRF

Anger management. And presumably they never thought to investigate exactly why you were "angry".

I was clearly… not quite normal, right from the beginning. My mum has said that she thought to herself, "this is going to be a long, long 11 years" when I came out of school on my first day and told her that I didn't like school, so I didn't think I'd be going again.

I got very well acquainted with the Naughty Mat in infant school (big, big prickly doormat just inside the school entrance, where you had to sit when you'd been naughty and be seen to have been naughty by everyone walking past - sometimes you'd have to answer a member of staff who asked you why you were there ).

My mum said I was always the most hard work of all her children. I had to stick to very specific routines and if it was disrupted in any way then all hell broke loose.
I actually quite liked primary school. My mum said I started nursery, found a quiet kid and latched onto her. And it stayed that way through primary she was happy to let me talk about me and my interests and she wasn't loud and boisterous so she didn't overload me. When I got to high school things spiralled out of control.

I used to try and surreptitiously sit next to the mat, because the prickles were bloody torture, but that wasn't allowed.

Did I read somewhere that was a common profile for autistic girls - coping up to a certain point and then falling apart somewhere around the time they start secondary?

Yes HRF I agree. Schools are about suiting the children who fit the system, fuck those who don't, they don't matter

I was talking to someone today about this, and the fact that schooling today is pushing more and more people into being disengaged with education, and less likely to be able to live fulfilled, productive lives. What's wrong with the country that they can't connect the dots and see what's going on?

I think I've done too much today, I feel so anxious now, which affects my breathing. I have ear plugs in and I'm chewing a chewy thing. I'd go to bed but I've got to pick dd up a bit later. Thankfully the boys are in calm mode tonight, for a change, which is very welcome, although the lack of adrenaline due to being relaxed might be contributing to me feeling like shit.

I don't think my parents got an easy job with either of us - apparently my brother used to rip up the books

I've read that Rat.
I was very compliant and managed throughout school (with lots of private crying), but I'm sure if I didn't have my twin there it would have been much worse. She protected me from a lot of bullying.
I do look back and can't believe how good and dull I was though. I feel a bit jealous of ds1 and 2 for refusing to do things and kicking off when pushed, I kept it all inside.