Things That Throw Me Off By Jake Dwinell
Dedicated to Mrs. Andrea Kabourek,
A good teacher, writer, supporter, and friend.
This book wouldn’t be possible without you.
Rest in peace.
Are you head injury prone, take things way too literally, are obsessive of random things that don’t usually matter, and forget things very easily to the extent of forgetting why you're climbing a ladder half way up it? Then you know exactly how it feels to be me, myself, and I. My name is Jake Dwinell, and I have many weaknesses, but just as many strengths.
I was born on February 7th 1998 A.D. you know, like you do, when you’re born. Ever since then I have been an autistic child. So far it hasn’t gone away, but I haven’t lost hope. I know
I can overcome this “disability” as other people call it. I like to think of it as an analogy like Thor’s hammer. It can be used as a tool to build or a weapon to destroy; in this case the destruction refers to me. Autism is a type of mental disorder, which makes the mind think differently. Autism is just a perspective that you need to build from. You see and feel the world differently than most others and your reactions are different as well. Sometimes those reactions aren’t considered appropriate, so you have to learn to deal with frustrations and even pain, in an appropriate manner, even when you feel like you just can’t. Autism can look very differently for different people. I see it as a place I can always work from. In my case, and in most people who are on the autism spectrum, I take things way too literally. The hardest part of that issue is that when I learn things I can’t easily generalize them, I have to think of them exactly as I learned them, and can be obsessive about it. For example, in kindergarten I was in a play about different animals.
The boy introducing the animals kept using incorrect grammar. Since I was sitting right next to him I kept leaning into the microphone and correcting him...so it sounded something like this:
Andy would say, “And next is bears.” I would cut him off and say, “ARE bears”. It went on like this for about 15 animals because I couldn’t let go of his kindergarten grammar. This leads me to another Asperger Syndrome complication, which is an inability to often see what is appropriate for the social situation I am in. One time when my mother introduced me to her bosses, I decided to do a headstand because I was uncomfortable. At that same place of work, a co-worker teased me, asking if I took some soda out of the fridge. I didn’t realize he was joking, and thought he meant I had stolen it and ran crying into my mother’s office. Misunderstanding is something that has plagued me ever since I was little. If someone says something that is really a metaphor, I will usually take it literally and be confused or emotional. People don’t realize how often they speak with sarcasm or metaphors. How many times have you said or heard, “Take a seat,” or “having a broken heart,” or “you scared me to death.” My parents had to really learn how to talk to me to avoid confusion and frustration. Before I was diagnosed, I was sitting by the front door and putting my shoes on. When my mother saw they were backwards, she told me they were “on the wrong feet.” I began to cry. When she asked me what was wrong I balled, “THESE ARE THE
ONLY FEET I HAVE!!” Once a nurse called me a string bean, and I giggled thinking she was not very smart. One of my favorites is one time when my mother and brother Conner were talking about music. My brother asked, “Were the Beatles bigger than the Beach Boys?” My mother replied, “Yeah, the Beatles were HUGE.” Of course, I thought she meant physically huge and said, “You mean they were giants?” The literal interpretation of things even meant my toys and stuffed animals had to be named after specific traits they had. A yellow turtle’s name was “Yellow
Yellow” (Just to be sure you understood it, I said it twice.). So among my animals, were Black
Black and Orange Orange, and I have a lizard that I couldn’t name for it’s color for it was rainbow like, but it had the word GANZ on his tag so that’s what I named him. Later I found out that was that name of the company that made him.
I do not learn in the same way as most other people, and I can become obsessed about things that may or may not be useful. I think visually so sometimes, I had to learn with picture books rather than books with just words. I had schedules that were made of pictures instead of words. We had Velcro pictures that went on a schedule on the wall to help me know what I was going to do next. I don’t like change or surprises, so if I could control my time and activities, I would be more comfortable.
I also have trouble staying focused sometimes and that’s because I also have another disorder called Attention Deficit Disorder, or ADD. The thing about ADD is it gives me a very short attention span. I can be on my way to brush my teeth and forget what I was doing as I was walking into the bathroom. I often try to do homework but find myself spacing off over and over again even though I am trying to focus. It’s something I have always had to work on and is probably one of the hardest parts of being me. I tend to lose my focus at about 5 o’clock after school as my medicine starts to lose power. It’s very frustrating and sometimes impossible to get homework done at night.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, or OCD, is another major disorder I have, but it’s not nearly extreme as everything else I’ve talked about but it is kind of important, too. It only has to do with certain things, like my artwork being symmetric. Also, it can take me a little longer to get a dish out of the cupboard, because I have to put the others back into a symmetric pattern or I am uncomfortable. When I am texting and I want to put a certain number of characters in the message, usually 30, I will add exclamation points and question marks sometimes to make longer and fit perfectly. It can annoy my parents when I am organizing the dishes because it can get very loud and often take a long time to finish emptying the dishwasher.
I was thought to be a non-autistic until I was about 18 months old, when I stopped talking and responding to anything, including my name, and had to learn things over again. My mother says looking back, there were signs that I had trouble, but she and my dad thought they were just things that would pass until it got a little more extreme. I couldn’t look people in the eye when I spoke to them because eye contact was so uncomfortable. Going to the grocery store or through the car wash was usually more stimulation than I could handle at the time and would result in stemming and fits that either happened at the time or later when I couldn’t bottle up the energy any more. When I was a toddler, I would rock back and forth and flap my hands when I was frustrated, now I twirl a pencil, or rub my neck if it’s really frustrating. I was diagnosed with
Asperger's, a form of autism, when I was about five. My mother and I both recall one day at school, I went up to a good friend of my mom’s and said, “Did you know I have aspergeritis?” She understood what I meant because she also has a kid on the autism spectrum. I thought it was a disease, hence the -itis part, but I know better now.
In grade school I had many influential supporters that cared about me in lots of ways. My mother recalls my kindergarten teacher, named Mrs. Moss. One time she chased me clear down the street, after I ran outside. I had a habit of running when upset. After the high-speed chase, she got the idea of a rocking chair in the classroom, for stemming purposes. One of my other favorite teachers was Mrs. Bonnie Rosenberger, who I had the honor of having for 4th and 5th grades. She was funny, supportive, and not only took extra time to know me, but tried to have everyone treat me equally. And these are just some of the many people on my side back then.
Middle school was quite a bit harder, but somehow I stuck it out and finished with a lot of effort.
In high school, I have had fewer supporters in quantity, but just as good in quality. Mr.
Elsner is one such example. Like most of my other supporters, he is there to help me to the end and does it with a happy heart, and occasionally some corny jokes. My school life isn’t my only life, however. My family is also action packed with supporters that love and care for me.
My family is just as good as any awesome family. And it’s all thanks to me. That was just a joke; I’m definitely no better than any other one of my family members. They are still on my side through thick and thin. And for how small of a family we are compared to other people’s families we sure have a big amount of love goin’ on. Not only is my family supportive and loving, they are strange in the best possible way. I have one older brother, one younger sister, two parents that are still together, two dogs, and one cat in my household, that is. I will talk about the pets later. But now I will talk about my family. Let’s start with my parents, shall we? My parents’ names are Christine and Dave. They work for the same company but have different jobs. My dad has a talk show on the radio in the morning. He is funny and smart. He is also a great artist and was a graphic artist in television for 18 years. My mom sells advertising and gets to work from home. She is also a great cook. They have always been my biggest supporters and help me recognize when my ASD is getting the best of me. My brother is currently 19 years old. He lives up at a college in Hillsdale, Michigan. We don’t see him much, because of the whole “half way across the country” thing. He is a musician and a darn good speaker. He has always a good advice giver and been a good role model for me. When he was in fifth grade, he wrote a paper about me call “Jacob’s Glasses.” It told about how I saw things differently, like when I told my mom about my friend Tate who is severely disabled. I told her that she and Tate were a lot alike.
When she asked me how, I told her that both she and he wore glasses. So, even though it’s more complicated than it seems, I was showing how I looked for similarities differently than most people. My little sister is an 11 year old in 6th grade and she loves to write and sing. She and I spend a lot of time together and sometimes she’s patient with me and sometimes she’s not. She is really creative and sometimes sits and helps me focus on my homework. For a little sister, I think she does her best.
We have three pets in my household, as I have explained earlier. Two dogs and one cat.
My dog, Lilo, is a six-year-old black lab and she was specifically trained to help me when I am upset. She does her job well. For example, if I am crying the first thing she does is come over and sticks her head near my face and wants me to pet her so I calm down. She does this faithfully and sometimes I don’t even recognize it anymore. If my mom asks her, “Where is
Jake?” she will go find me wherever I am in the house. I wrote a poem describing her this year, appropriately titled, “Puppy Cow.” It is called that because she almost weighs more than I do.
She has a big appetite for food but an even bigger appetite for affection. She loves attention and gives unconditional love. If you ask her if she has a bone she will run around the house until she finds her bone. Here is my poem: Puppy Cow
My dog is my best friend. She is there to help to the end. She is a quite a bit overweight, I wonder if it was something she ate. She is happy to hear when I call her name. even if I call her fatty, it’s the same. My dog is lovable more than any dog I know even if it doesn’t always show. Who else would be man’s best friend, other than this big sweet lab who looks like she could eat a taxi cab. I love her so much that I took a vow, to take care of my little puppy cow. Lilo, my dog, is very unique, I always win at hide and seek. She is mine and I am hers. Her nails almost seem like spurs. Although I seem to treat her weird, no one knows her like me dear. Good night Lilo, sleep for now. have a good night my puppy cow.
Her second best friend, after me, is Coconut, also known as Cokey. Cokey is a golden retriever and cocker spaniel mix that is almost 14 years old. Cokey being the older dog, in a way, showed Lilo the ropes in our house but at the same time Lilo decided to do things her own way.
For example, Cokey likes to run inside impatiently when it’s raining and Lilo will faithfully stop to get her feet wiped at the door. Cokey will scratch at the door when she wants in, but Lilo will give just one bark to let us know she is ready to come in. She will bark again, though, if you don’t pay attention and let her in, in a reasonable amount of time. Those are my animal supporters. The cat doesn’t do anything but sleep and want to sit on my mom’s lap.
As good as my life seems it can really suck sometimes. My medication is one such example. I take a lot of big pills in the morning and night, and the side effects are no fun.
One really difficult thing I experience is my pickiness. Anything from what I eat to what I wear can really cause me problems. Textures and sensory details to things seem to be amplified to me. And when something doesn’t agree with my brain, it can cause me to panic. If more than one of these things happen at the same time, it’s an almost guarantee I will have a rough time.
For example, if I am wearing jeans and at a concert with strobe lights, that is about the worst thing to happen to my sensitive senses. Okay there are worse things, but it’s a good example.
Movie theaters used to bother me a lot because they were so loud and the lights were on and off.
I almost missed my all time favorite movie when I was little because I was afraid to go into the theater. Scientists say that sensory issues with kids on the Autism Spectrum are painful, just like normal kids would feel extreme stress. It’s mentally exhausting - like you just ran a marathon with your brain. Sometimes I don’t know I am in sensory overload until everything goes away or I fall apart completely. When I was little I would run away and try to hide my head and cover my ears.
I also rocked back and forth and flapped my hands for relief. Kind of like when you are trying to shake off pain that really hurts. Even now, I will want to pull my hair or rub my neck real hard, to cause physical pain to override the mental pain. Sensory overload is about half of my daily struggles. The other half is usually dealing with the stress of pressure to get things done like homework when I have a lot to do or I am having trouble concentrating on it because my meds have worn off for the day. Unfortunately, that is usually about 3pm. It makes homework at night difficult at best.
Sometimes I feel like there are no good outlets for me when I am stressed. I have trouble focusing in class and then projects get behind and I am more stressed because I have to get more done than I feel like I can. Talking doesn’t help and nothing seems to help when I am stressed. Sometimes I wish my homework would just go away. It doesn’t though. For example, abracadabra homework go away. See it is still here. Despite years of social skills classes, and coping techniques from doctors and psychiatrists, and anyone else willing to help, I still have yet to find the right outlet to fit my plug. Hopefully, I will find it some day.
I know many different people with autism, and I know for a fact that they all learn much differently, but I know that I can help them, because I know how it feels to be them. The thing about autism is that it always takes different forms but almost always starts from the same roots.
For example, I know OCD kids usually tend to have things organized in certain ways, but how it is organized is up to them. It is also very likely that children with autism also have other disorders like OCD, and ADD, and even ADHD sometimes. I have many friends with all of these things going on in their lives, and I try my best to help them in any way I can. Even though I can try to describe what autism is I can’t exactly tell you what I’m trying to say, or what it means entirely.
There is no one-way to pinpoint it but I hope you’ll understand it better at least. Not too long ago I watched a video of a Ted talk by a guy with autism, and he was extremely good at using analogies to tell what autism really is and what he felt growing up with it.
I remember from my early childhood a song on a movie called, “The Tigger Movie,” which talked about Tigger’s loneliness and his want for family members because he is the only one of his species. Tigger had a very child-like personality, and talked like one too. His passion is bouncing and jumping, which he is very good at, but he has no one to bounce with. Here’s the song: “Mostly I'm happy and I'm bouncy
Because I am the onliest one
(hmm hmm hmm)
But now all at once I feel so lonely
For someone like me
(Someone like me)
Right now I'm sorta feelin' downcy
I'm just about the loneliest one
(hmm hmm hmm hmm)
And deep in my heart
I'm sort of wishin'
For someone like me
(Someone like me)
Somebody with springs and things
Who laughs and sings and jumps everyday
Somebody who's fun, fun, fun
Who loves to trounce and pounce
And bounce the gloomies away
(hoo-hoo)
How I dream there is another
A double or a triple of me
(To keep him company)
But since I'm awake I feel so lonely
Because I know it can't be
(It never can be)
Bein' the I'm the one and onliest Someone...like me
Someone like me”
Although this was made for children mainly, it has a good way to describe what it feels like to be autistic. Some times at my age at least I feel lonely and feel like I would give anything for someone who knows everything about how I feel. I guess everyone feels like that sometimes, but
I don’t know how much of a difference it makes when you’re autistic.
My parents had to teach me how to understand what sarcasm and metaphors are and what they mean. Here are just “a few” examples of ones I didn’t understand.
1. take a seat
2. people “flock” to see it
3. raining cats and dogs
4. I die every time I think about it
5. the classroom is a zoo
6. your room is a pigsty
7. she has a heart of stone
8. apple of my eye
9. run like the wind
10. you are my sunshine
11. my legs are made of rubber
12. he kicked the bucket 13. pardon my French
14. cut him some slack
15. that’s a bunch of bologna
16. I slept like a rock
17. my heart leapt
18. my heart belongs to you
19. get a backbone
20. he’s a couch potato
Not only did these throw me off in the past, they still do today to a lesser extent. For example my dad told me a couple of other ones to write that I didn’t even know about, and had to guess what they meant. Metaphors are a constant struggle in my life, and definitely throw me off but sarcasm is no better at doing it too. Here are some sarcasm phrases:
1. I’m really impressed
2. That was fun
3. Let’s do that again
4. No, I love it
5. Oh thanks
6. sure I do
7. You look great
8. Please tell us more Like I said I really don’t get these right away, if at all. I try my best though.
There are lots of different things that I struggle with to this day that I haven’t even mentioned. I have lots of examples but I’ll only be sharing a couple of them. Here we go:
1. My temper
2. My obsessions
3. My memory
4. My tolerance
5. My focus
I will start explaining by talking about my temper. Some things that make me angry are hard to get over. I can’t seem to let go of certain things but I’m trying to learn how to control it currently. Very often I misunderstand someone’s intentions or think they are making fun of me when they may not be. Again, sarcasm can be a very confusing issue that can cause problems for me. Sometimes, it’s like a storm that starts with just a little rain and can quickly build into something much bigger. Often I didn’t even know it started raining until it’s too late. Sensory overload is a very common trigger that I don’t notice building.
My obsessions are next. Just like with my temper there are some things that are hard to let go of. For example I have been trying to learn how to get rid of junk in my room. Although it’s not going too well I have been trying hard. I know I can try harder, but that’s a thing that most humans deal with, I think. The keeping of things is brought on by fear that I will want or need them again and I might not be able to get a hold of again. When I was younger, I would save every single thing I could, like tiny pieces of yarn or broken pipe cleaners because I thought I could find a use for them. My parents have helped me overcome that to some extent but not all the way, obviously.
I still need to figure out what to do when I can’t remember what I need to remember. It is one of the most frequently happening parts of my life. I still don’t know what to do with this part entirely yet but I have always worked on it and will always try until I figure it out. My poor memory has a lot to do with my difficulty focusing. If I can’t stay focused, my mind drifts off and I forget my purpose or intention at the moment. This can be better some days and feel overwhelming and impossible to overcome other days.
Next I will address tolerance. I have a problem with rules being broken. I don’t like things to be out of order either. So sometimes when someone breaks the rules, like saying a bad word, I get uncomfortable and anxious to say something, or more accurately, correct them. This isn’t something most people like to hear. So, I try very hard to keep it in. I don’t always succeed.
I have been doing better lately. The problem with my anxiety over rules being broken is tied to my difficulty with the unexpected. I have a very low tolerance of things that are not planned and told to me ahead of time. Transitions are my arch nemesis. When I was little we used picture schedules so that I knew what to expect next. That made things easier for me to change, say, from one classroom to the next. I also couldn’t tolerate leaving a project unfinished. If everyone else was done, with a project, I had a very difficult time moving on if mine was incomplete or not perfect in my eyes. Okay, I still struggle with that.
My focus has been addressed already, and is one of my many Kryptonites.
Like I said at the very beginning of this paper, I have lots of weaknesses but just as many strengths, if not more. For example, I have done several things to help the needy, specifically, the elderly and special needs children. I love spending time with both. I find that I know more the longer I stay and interact with them. In grade school, I loved spending time with kids whose needs were greater than mine. I loved it so much that I never stopped. I was rewarded for working hard by getting time to spend with the kids that were in resource all the time. When I was in second or third grade, I liked to spend time with Tate, who cannot speak and has swallowing problems. The first time I met him, he scratched my arm, which was something that the teachers spent a lot of time trying to prevent. That normally would have freaked me out but it didn’t for some reason. I became Tate’s friend and one day I went into resource and he was very unhappy. He couldn’t say why of course, but you could tell. I went up to him and took his arm and started walking around the room with him. The teacher had told me it was his birthday and so I walked with him and sang happy birthday to him. He smiled and laughed and his mother later told me that it was the first time that he had ever interacted with a peer. People like Tate tend to be invisible to most people, but I always picked him out of the hall and told him hello and I think it made him happy. Tate now goes to East and I see him every once in a while. He is learning more and more and has grown very tall. He still doesn’t speak, but I can tell he remembers me. Another friend I made is Travis. He is in a wheelchair and also does not speak and has no way to communicate, much like Tate, but I knew how to make him laugh and he never forgot that. I remember running into him at a store and he saw me and started flapping his arms and was so happy to see me. He is here at East too and I see him when I can. I still have a picture of him up in my room that my special ed teacher at Pyrtle gave to me. I often ask myself why I do this and I always answer “because I know how they feel”. It’s hard to be on the outside without a friend and that’s why I want to be an example of what a friend should do. Everyone has value and deserves a chance at happiness.
I also enjoy spending time with elderly people because I feel like they need help sometimes and not everyone has someone there to help. They always have great stories to tell too and don’t judge people, just enjoy the company. This past summer, I volunteered at the
Waterford, and helped the people in the assisted living community play games, had lunch with them and exercised and just spent time with them. I really enjoyed it and I hope they liked it too.
One of the ladies that took to me right away had an Elvis picture frame signed by an impressionist who played Elvis and someone had stolen it. So, I drew her a new one. Once the residents saw my drawings they all wanted some. So, I drew many things to entertain them like Mickey Mouse,
Goofy and a very strange request of a Pekinese dog named Fred. Soon, every time I came, I had the job of a cartoonist for the elderly. I hope to do it again next summer.
My brother once wrote a paper, while he was in fifth grade, that he called, “Jacob’s
Glasses.” In it, he describes how I look at things with a story about our life: “About a half a year after the hall incident happened, we again got into mom’s van after a long, hard day at school. I was ready to go home and hang out with Jake for a while until we felt like we were ready to do homework. As we got into the car, Mom routinely asked, “How was school?”
And I replied with, “Okay.” It was my normal line after she asked this question, and she always asked.
“How okay is okay?”
“Not good, not bad.”
“So it was decent?”
“Yeah it just wasn’t my perfect day.” I hadn’t had a terrible day that was going to change my life, but nothing extraordinarily good had happened either.
Knowing that she was not going to get much more out of me, she repeated the same question to Jake. He replied with every single detail of his six-hour-and-thirty-eight-minute day.
He talked about helping Tate put his bib on, and getting him onto his bike so he could ride it up and down the school to build up his leg muscles. He also told us about giving some of his old
Barney books to Tate for a donation, which apparently made Tate’s and Jacob’s day.
Now we were almost home. That was when Jake said something completely out of the blue.
“You know how you and Tate are alike, Mom?”
“Uh...no I don’t, Jacob,” she said.
“Tate has glasses too!”
Mom breathed a sigh of relief.
Jacob realizes that everyone is a person, nothing less, even if you are a lot different from them. He doesn’t look at the disabled kids and think, “Man, they are weird,” he sees them as equal and nothing other than his friends. Having Jacob as a little brother is like putting glasses on for the first time, and because I put them on, my vision is much clearer.”
Some people call what I have “Asperger’s” and some call it “High Functioning Autism”.
Autism is a spectrum, so the differences can be hard to understand. Autism and classic autism have many things in common. According to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and
Stroke (NINDS), “children with Asperger Syndrome find it difficult to identify and express their feelings, just like those with HFA. They find it challenging to connect with others, often don't hold eye contact and have trouble reading other people's faces and gestures. Many children with AS flap their hands, a behavior often associated with classic autism; speak without much emotion (or have otherwise unusual speech patterns), need to follow schedules rigidly, and are intensely, even obsessively, interested in one specific subject, so much that they become veritable experts in that field. They also exhibit sensitivities to various stimuli, from sounds to clothing to food items.”
In my case of autism, sometimes writing can be difficult by hand as well as other things that have to do with hand eye coordination. My eyesight can be bad from a distance, so it makes it hard to see the paper too. I often forget to use my glasses, so this can make it very difficult to write and read from a distance. What most people don’t know that fine motor skills and handwriting skills are two different things. It takes a different part of your brain to write than to draw. Handwriting is much more complicated for your brain to put together. The thought process of writing is more tied to memory. For example the brain has to think what letters, what do they look like, which order, what does the word mean, etc. It doesn’t seem to take much thought but it is because the human brain usually works fast enough to make it happen quicker than you realize. My brain is wired differently so I don’t think as fast as most people in that regard, but it doesn’t mean I’m not smart, because I have an I.Q. high enough to have two mentors. In fact, many famous and brilliant people have or are believed to have had some kind of autism spectrum disorder. Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein were two geniuses that were thought to be autistic. They both had traits mainly seen in autistic people today such as obsessions, poor social skills and odd sensory issues. Einstein is said to have hated socks so much he would not ever wear them. According to Wikipedia, we can now create retrospective diagnoses on people in history based on our current knowledge of medicine. For example, people now think Mozart was autistic as well. Wikipedia says Isaac Newton hardly spoke and had few friends. He was often so absorbed in his work that he forgot to eat, demonstrating an obsessive single-mindedness that is commonly associated with Asperger's. If nobody attended his lessons, he reportedly gave lectures to an empty room.
Probably the most famous autistic of our time is Temple Grandin. She created a revolutionary new way to humanely take cattle to slaughter. It changed the livestock industry tremendously. She has a significantly powerful connection with animals and she believes that she thinks much like they do...more so than other people. She thinks by memories and in pictures and says that animals do as well. This helped her to develop a way for cattle to move through corrals at ranches, feedlots and meat plants without unnecessary anxiety which often killed the cattle prematurely and in a less peaceful way. A movie was produced about her life in
2010 that was the first of its kind to accurately portray someone with autism, as far as I’m concerned. Before that, the movie “Rainman” was the only picture that people could associate with autism. “Temple Grandin” was a REALLY accurate film about how autistic people really think and behave. I am a big fan of hers, and have an autographed copy of her movie. If you have never seen it, I would highly recommend it as it is awesome even if you know a lot about autism already. It made my mom cry a lot and made me feel like I wasn’t alone in the world. I felt suddenly understood and a little teary eyed...okay a lot teary eyed. She even had an aunt in the movie much like my aunt Mary who supported her in any way she could and accepted her for who she was.
When I grow up I want to either own an art studio where I sell my artwork or I want to be a cartoonist and make cartoon movies for a living.
I know I’ve talked about a lot of really sad or boring stuff, but this paper is all about hope, whether you noticed it or not. My story is a weird one but I hope you liked it anyway. The fact of the story is that I am not normal, and I never will be, but I have learned to be okay with that. To the readers of this story my life is probably my hardest thing for me to write about, but I did it because I knew I could, and I think if people look back someday at my writing they will be still be interested in the stuff that makes me Jake Dwinell, the stuff that comes with autism, like obsessing, and forgetting, and losing focus. But Autism is not all bad though; it has good things like caring, relating to differently others, and making new paths to get to where you need to go in its own unique way. Life is not always happy, but I believe that life very well can be happy as well as sad, but you can only be happy by knowing how to use to your advantage the things that throw you off.