When I was a few years old,
I was playing in front of a mirror in an old apartment
and I had no idea that my entire life would be changed forever.
My mother took me away from the mirror
and I began kicking and screaming.
This would be normal I suppose for any young children.
However, when my mother set me down,
that's when everything changed.
I had forgotten how to talk,
how to properly convey my emotions and thoughts.
It was as if a part of me was trapped in the mirror
and couldn't get out.
My parents soon took me to a diagnostician
and they told my parents that I had quickly developed a case of autism
known as PDS-NOS.
Even now, I couldn't tell you what that means.
As for my parents,
it meant all their dreams of the perfect little girl
were gone.
Soon, I was taken to a multitude of speech therapists,
behavioral therapists, and so forth.
I still felt like
I was still trapped in the mirror
and desperately trying to get out.
Not for my sake,
but the sake of my family.
Soon,
I was enrolled into a special elementary school for children with autism.
This school was a godsend for my parents and for myself.
I was finally able to get out of my mirror prison.
Though I had to leave some parts of me behind,
I didn't care.
I was finally free
and through that new found freedom,
I made a lot of friends who were just like me.
It made me so happy to know that I wasn't alone anymore.
I went through elementary and middle school pretty well.
I developed hobbies like singing,
acting, drawing and writing.
I also found my love of Disney, Studio Ghibli,
anime, and video games like Kingdom Hearts.
But when it came time for high school,
my parents didn't know what to do.
They couldn't just put me in public school
- I would have never survived.
So, my parents and several others hired a teacher from my old school
and we made a small home-school group.
This was a more difficult part of my life
because I was a teenager with autism
and my emotions were all over the place,
also having to be with the same group of people
and being the only girl of this group
took its toll on me.
However,
I made it through and graduated.
Now came the biggest challenge I have ever had to face.
Adulthood...
That meant looking for a college,
finding a job,
doing more adult stuff.
Stuff I was very limited at.
This is when my self-confidence began to plummet.
I was enrolled into a college program
for people with disabilities
and...
I was shocked, to say the least.
There were so many young adults there
looking for opportunities to work.
When in reality,
there were and still are very few of them.
It's only by sheer luck and the charity of others
that people like me and so many others are even able to find jobs.
It was also hard to think that my two younger sisters
were coasting through high-school
and already applying to big-name universities.
These facts alone shattered my self-confidence.
I felt alone and trapped again.
Only this was a prison of my making.
I began to feel severely depressed and worthless.
I couldn't tell my parents how I was feeling
because I was afraid they would brush it off
as me lying or looking for attention.
I felt so lost...
I had gotten a small job as a jewelry maker for a while
and I working in class,
but none of it made me feel better.
Also around this time,
my grandmother's health was rapidly deteriorating
after the passing of my grandfather.
All of the stress,
sadness,
self-doubt and hating
was awful for my mental health.
But then...
Little by little...
I found the comfort and reassurance I desperately needed.
At this point,
I was online a lot.
Looking at silly videos to pass the time.
Then I stumbled upon a boy
who would become one of my closest friends.
Let's call him B.
B and I would always talk online
and make up stories about our favorite things.
Soon this lead us to writing about them in a little series.
And that's how we met S.
A super talented artist and a great writer.
The three of us chatted non-stop
and made up all sorts of stories.
We are still friends today.
But
nothing could ever compare to when I met the person
who would break me out of my prison.
Jared.
A sweet redhead boy with beautiful blue eyes,
lean and tall, and one of the sweetest people I know.
He and I met at a summer camp
and the first thing he noticed was my Kingdom Hearts shirt.
From there we talked about the movies we liked,
TV shows, anime, video games.
Surprisingly, we had a lot in common.
We saw each other at two more camps before we exchanged numbers.
After that, we texted non-stop to each other.
Mostly Role Playing and making up fun adventure stories.
Then one fateful day,
Jared asked me out to his winter formal at his school.
I accepted not thinking about it too much.
I bought a new dress,
drove to his school and there he was.
I was half expecting him to be wearing just a nice shirt and jeans, but
he was wearing a nice suit.
We went inside, danced, and talked.
His friends and I talked to him
about a few of the insecurities that I was facing at the time.
He was so comforting and understanding.
Later we went to a couch, set off in a corner
and just sat and talked some more.
He then took my hand and
told me that he really liked me.
Flustered, I tried to think of a response.
I then thought,
"Give him a kiss on the forehead while his eyes are closed!
That will show him that you like him too!"
So I told Jared to close his eyes.
He did.
I leaned over to kiss his forehead.
Unbeknownst to me,
Jared opened his eyes and moved to where we kissed on the lips.
I was completely taken aback.
But,
I didn't pull away.
I kissed back.
And
that's how we became a couple.
We have been together for almost 4 years now
and I am as happy as ever.
I'm more confident in myself
and I have now been able to hold a very good job
at my local VA Hospital.
Would I change the fact that I'm autistic?
No.
Because it's through it
that I have been able to discover myself
in ways myself and many others could never have dreamed of.
I hope that somewhere out there,
this story will inspire and motivate you.