Autism

Dec 7th, 2006 - Autism

I needed a break from yelling and screaming at children. I decided to substitute at the local mental deficiency center located in a town named after a Greek pagan gosh. A lot of what happens at the place is confidential, so I'll be sure to divulge it on the internet for you.

Again I arrived on time and it was too early. I waited for my aides, yes my aides, I'm their boss for the day since I'm the teacher. They thought otherwise...........

I had absolutely nothing to do the whole day, so I decided to pray, but when I'm in extreme boredom and tiredness it's very hard for me to do so. It also scares people, especially ones who have no concept of praying, to see me staring at the wall for so long.

I had four aides, all women, all 40 or older. One looked like she was 70. She was very tired of her job and seemed somewhat unaware of how old she was. She expressed worry that she had signs of diabetes.

Now, before I go on, I must reveal another personality trait about myself. I tend to think people joke way more than they actually do. Can you guess what happened?

Yes, I thought she was joking. I turned and almost gave a big smile..........uh oh she has a serious look....abort abort. She had no body fat whatsoever and she wasn't even in the age bracket for the risk of diabetes. You get diabetes in your 20-30's most of the time, not 70s.......Just a short medical lesson.

She told the first autistic boy to "Put on your helmet!" The boy did and then he slammed his head into the refrigerator. It shut my mouth. I thought she was just being paranoid.

She then told him to run over and put his jacket away. Then run and get a juice. Then go get something else. This and that. What a witch, steve thought. No, she wasn't a witch. The child had OCD and had to be told to do things quick or he would have a meltdown. (From time to time, even the great boy substitute can judge wrongly.)

There were meltdowns anyway and not the good nuclear power plant kind either. When a child got too upset he would throw a fit. Kick, scream, cry, punch. Every body part that can exhibit an influence on the environment was used.

I had to hold the kid's legs. It was fun. It's funner to see the aides get stressed at what I perceived to be funny.

Enter Second Child
He was my favorite special little guy. He said hi to everyone. He danced and shook his hips in the most ridiculous fashion, with the most serious look on his face. I couldn't even do it if I tried.

I did try, many many times (ask kyle).

One thing that bothered me though was that his hair style was the same as mine. It was even messed up the same way. It made me realize that I had the hair styling ingenuity of a preschool autistic child, and that maybe I should try a little harder. I got over it though.

We had snack time every hour. Food is very important for children. It was so important that if they were given something different for lunch or snack they threw a fit. It's like changing religions. As you know by now, children value food way too much. I didn't think that autistic children did too, but I was wrong.

We had 2 basic religious denominations in the classroom. The peanut butter and jelly fundamentalists and the pizza pentecostals. The children tried to desecrate the other religion's sacraments. They would throw the food on the ground. This did not deter the faithful follower though. You eat a sacred object no matter where it's been. If you happened to switch the food order up accidentally, it scandalized the children, they would forget who they were. It's a miracle the children got along. Oh wait they didn't.

Now..... in between snack time they had games they played. They could either assemble a food jigsaw puzzle or practice with food toys. The toys were provided very generously by McDonald's. They should be renamed to St. McDonald's.

Child 2 loved to cut the bread blocks that were held together by velcro. He made me a sandwich to eat. I pretended to eat it, he would zone out (zone out disorder), then make me another sandwich.

Of course, he would have to say hi again because he forgot where he was. I found it funny the first ten times.

Child 3
He was a lower functioning autistic boy. They had no lesson plans for him. They didn't even try to make him learn anything. He would just grab a stick and stim all day. He stimmed with a stem. Stimming is the repeating of a behavior over and over again for a soothing effect.

It's kind of like moving your leg all class when you sit behind me when it's a test day. You know you did it. You lowered my GPA. The next word I'm going to teach is a tangent.......

I felt sorry for this child and his parents. What do you do with a child like this? I feel they were made solely as a sacrifice to the parents. I hope that is not the path to my salvation. I'm not saying the parents don't love their child, they do, but can you imagine how much harder raising that kind of a child would be?

Now if I'm right, then no good is coming from the child being in a babysitting place at the expense of the government, which is the expense of taxpayers. It's like having a tax funded daycare. Both parents probably can't afford to stay home with the child and probably can't afford a regular daycare. A $2000 TV is much more important anyway, right? Or the car that costs $1500 a month? So people can go "ooooooo nice" at your car. "They have it made". That's the definition of a tangent.

Funny stuff
1) I was walking to the bathroom and an older child was having a wuss attack. He looked 14 and started crying at the top of his lungs. This was loud. I teen you not. About as loud as a car alarm. It sort of sounded like he was laughing, which almost made me laugh, which wouldn't have been good if someone saw me laughing at this poor poor special ed teen. He cried for no less than 2 hours straight.

2) The first child that danced and zoned out, also liked drooling. This isn't funny. He would zone and drool. My mind would scream with "Blahhhh, WIPE IT OFF!" My outwarrd expression, though, was a gentle closing of my lead eye lids. He wiped it on his hand and then reached his hand out to shake mine.

This was a predicament. Do I shake his hand and endure the disgust or do I resist and potentially scar this child for life. But wait....he's autistic, he won't remember, right, so it doesn't matter. Oh nooo....he has higher functioning autism, he might.................I shook his hand.

Subbing for Autistic children is boring and the teachers don't want you there because they get 1 1/2 pay if no substitute shows up. It's fun to talk to adults though, just not middle age women that have been divorced 3 times.