My Early Life

As a toddler and a little boy I was slow to learn and develop. I lagged behind my peers in most things. I know these things because it was stressful for me and I have some memory of it, or at least brief moments cut out of time, like a still photograph in the depths of my mind. Some of these memories are highly unusual and it has taken me decades to realise that most other people do not share similar moments from their past, because the things I remember as great milestones and landmarks in my early years, they took for granted, learning things automatically, without the same effort that I had to put in.

I remember when I was very young doing lots of play on the floor with my mum. I have a vivid and unique memory of the eureka moment that I realised I could talk to people and how wonderfully proud that made me feel. I remember having no friends of my own making. I had my mum and dad, a sister and a brother. We all lived together. This was my world.

When I went to school my mum was the one who made friends at the school gate, so in turn I played with their children when she arranged it. In class and in the playground I was quiet, innocent and lacking any social confidence. I stood on the sidelines or took pleasure in nature. Rejected by my peers I withdrew into my own inner world for the most part.

As time went on I struggled academically, and fell farther and farther behind the other children. Within the boundaries of their understanding my parents knew that I was struggling, but in denial about any tangible reason for this occurrence, they first sought to lay blame upon my primary school and later came to see it as my choice. I was labelled as lazy by teachers who knew no better, as the term Autistic applied only to those with severe learning disabilities, which I did not display.

My parents loved me and wanted to protect me. They tried in their own way to be supportive and to get me the best support available. Unfortunately, the support I required did not yet exist, so this would not prove helpful for me.  (It would be years before the Teaching and Health professionals recognised that Autism was a spectrum and those with the label of 'Higher functioning' were deserving of tailored support to meet their Special Educational Needs).

 Very early on my parents helped me learn the basics of reading and maths, and when I lagged behind in moving forward with the rest of my peers, they sent me to private coaches which initially helped, but I could not retain the knowledge they were showing to me, so it was thought I was not engaging with the process. When I was struggling at a state school my parents thought it was the school's fault and sent me for a few years to a private boys school. They thought that as they had excellent results, they could give me the help I needed.

Those were the days of when disability was stigmatised and not spoken of in Society. There was a lack of understanding around additional needs in the public and the professional world. That was the advice available at the time. So, rather than contemplate such ‘flaws’ in their child and also their own ‘failure’ as parents, they blamed my primary school for my lack of academic progress. My mum did a lot of supporting my learning at home to get me to read and apart from basic maths I could not retain enough to make progress. So instead of entertaining the notion that the problem might lay within me, they sent me to an expensive private school with high credentials, whose students were said to have the best results.

I have a vivid memory of the first day I arrived. I was in the playground and the bell sounded for the start of school. I didn't know where to go, but I saw a group of very young-looking children. They were quiet and non-threatening compared to the other groups of kids. They looked very happy and so, thinking I was in a lower class I joined their line and went to their class.

I was given a badge with my name on it and the teacher let me play with a big sculpture made of plastic cogs. It didn’t occur to me that any of this was strange. It just felt natural and I started to relax and enjoy myself. I now recognise that those children had multiple learning difficulties. I had joined their class by some instinct, because on many levels I connected with them. An hour later a very severe looking elderly teacher came into the class and said I was in the wrong place. She would be my proper class teacher from now on. I would never again be allowed to mix with the group of children that I had identified with.

What my parents had thought would help me to improve academically was sadly a big mistake. Instead I was thrust into an even more difficult environment. The classes were for gifted and advanced children, so I fell even more behind.
The school was in fact aimed at genius level children, who far from struggling, were not challenged enough by a standard level primary education. The result was that for two years of my education I felt as if I was drowning.

My confidence was stripped from me by teachers who had no understanding of why I was failing. I was called ‘A walking disaster’ at parent’s evening by my class teacher. The reason for my failure to learn was portrayed as my choice. According to the school I was ‘lazy’. That label stuck for a long time. With low self-esteem and no support, I made no progress for years of my education. In the end, after two years, I went to see the Head Master myself and told him that I was leaving at the end of the year. He was only mildly surprised by this news and accepted it without any protest, saying it would be “for the best”.

The people who were most surprised were my parents, who he contacted that day. Now that they knew how unhappy I was there, they did remove me and I was allowed to go to a local primary school. The damage to my self-confidence was significant however, and I still found no one with the knowledge to help me learn. Instead, although my results were poor compared to other students, my learning was gradual, everything in slow motion. Knowledge seeped into me slowly, drop by drop over my teenage years.

And so it is a very surreal feeling to be sitting here nearly 40 years later and reading a post on social media by the latest Head teacher of the same school. I quickly track down the school’s website and sit spellbound. It is the same place and yet the complete opposite. The 1950’s generation of teaching staff has long departed. Gone is the arrogant, repressive atmosphere of my memories. The era of corporal punishment used at the drop of a hat and the compulsory learning of latin. The large house that was the centre of the school remains, but those that inhabit it, now do so with joy. For it has become a school for Autistic children up to the age of 19!

It has become everything that I would have benefited from all those years ago. I see images of happiness and progress, and I am so happy for these youngsters.
Everything has come full-circle. Just as I have taken all this time in my development, to catch up to my peers, so too has it taken these years for my old school to evolve. It brings forth a well of poignant emotions.

And now, as I read the words of the Head Teacher, I wear a huge grin of delight. She is talking about the importance of supporting Autistic young people equally, no matter the so called label of 'functioning'. Of leaving no one behind. This message is so important. As I read her words, it seems that trumpets sound. It is so wonderful to see the amazing love and pride that she and her staff have for all of those in their care. It lifts my heart to see how times have changed so much for the better. The proof is right here, before my eyes.