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Autism in My Time
by Michael Feldman
At 10 years of age, I was sent to boarding school following a 19-month period in Maudsley Hospital. Back then, in the early 1960's, autism wasn’t so well known or understood as it is now. Besides this, probably little was known about the bowel and digestive disorders that autism can bring. Otherwise I would not have been made to eat after feeling or being sick.
Back then, the hospital staff knew that I often felt sick. It never occurred to them to administer an anti sickness tablet first thing and before breakfast. Following the Maudsley, I then went to a residential school in Buckinghamshire.
At that school, there was much discipline. Anyone caught misbehaving either lost marks, was hit by staff, or put on report where, depending on the nature of the offence, we had our pocket money docked.
One example, I was punished by my housefather who ran a tuck shop. One day, I came clomping down the stairs alongside the shop itself. Having heard me, he closed his tuck shop. I, of course didn’t think anything more until he came walking after me down the corridor in an irrational manner. Next thing I knew he had belted me around the ear so hard that I had literally fallen to the floor. Nowadays, this sort of behaviour is never accepted.
Because of my autism, I lacked the social skills, for example, to get a girlfriend. Back then, when I was 15, I wanted desperately to have a girlfriend. When I lived in Hackney, I became attracted to someone in the grocer’s nearby. Not knowing how to approach the situation, I used to do silly things to try to form some kind of friendship together. For example, I used to stare at her and wait outside the shop . I gave her a friendly smile when she came out to continue the rest of her shopping. Of course, had the police been involved, they would have taken me in and given me a good hiding. Then, perhaps I would have been confined to an institution. Again, autism back then, wasn’t so understood as it is now.
Besides the social skills, there was the employment issue. On leaving school, my father put me into the tailoring trade. It was a mistake because I could never keep up with those learning alongside me. Eventually I was asked to leave. After another attempt to learn this trade elsewhere, then a couple of odd jobs, I secured an apprenticeship as a painter and decorator. The guy that I was eventually to be with, never understood autism. He kept ‘putting me down’ whenever I wasn’t doing the job right. He used to say, ‘Why do I keep rucking you’ and ‘You don’t think.’ Once or twice I stuck up for myself. Still it was no good and over time, had to ‘fend for myself’ and learn the rest of the painting trade on my own.
In the latter years of being a painter and decorator, there were fellow painters of mine being promoted above me. I was also under a foreman who was rather bossy and thought much of himself. Still all of that changed when I had an accident and hurt my back. So I had to leave on medical grounds and start again doing office work instead.
While the past hasn’t been that brilliant, I now feel while writing about my experience, that things have got better for me. In particular, since joining DANDA in June 2006. If I don’t go to places where people aren’t so kind and sympathetic for example, then I feel that I cannot go far wrong.
by Michael Feldman
At 10 years of age, I was sent to boarding school following a 19-month period in Maudsley Hospital. Back then, in the early 1960's, autism wasn’t so well known or understood as it is now. Besides this, probably little was known about the bowel and digestive disorders that autism can bring. Otherwise I would not have been made to eat after feeling or being sick.
Back then, the hospital staff knew that I often felt sick. It never occurred to them to administer an anti sickness tablet first thing and before breakfast. Following the Maudsley, I then went to a residential school in Buckinghamshire.
At that school, there was much discipline. Anyone caught misbehaving either lost marks, was hit by staff, or put on report where, depending on the nature of the offence, we had our pocket money docked.
One example, I was punished by my housefather who ran a tuck shop. One day, I came clomping down the stairs alongside the shop itself. Having heard me, he closed his tuck shop. I, of course didn’t think anything more until he came walking after me down the corridor in an irrational manner. Next thing I knew he had belted me around the ear so hard that I had literally fallen to the floor. Nowadays, this sort of behaviour is never accepted.
Because of my autism, I lacked the social skills, for example, to get a girlfriend. Back then, when I was 15, I wanted desperately to have a girlfriend. When I lived in Hackney, I became attracted to someone in the grocer’s nearby. Not knowing how to approach the situation, I used to do silly things to try to form some kind of friendship together. For example, I used to stare at her and wait outside the shop . I gave her a friendly smile when she came out to continue the rest of her shopping. Of course, had the police been involved, they would have taken me in and given me a good hiding. Then, perhaps I would have been confined to an institution. Again, autism back then, wasn’t so understood as it is now.
Besides the social skills, there was the employment issue. On leaving school, my father put me into the tailoring trade. It was a mistake because I could never keep up with those learning alongside me. Eventually I was asked to leave. After another attempt to learn this trade elsewhere, then a couple of odd jobs, I secured an apprenticeship as a painter and decorator. The guy that I was eventually to be with, never understood autism. He kept ‘putting me down’ whenever I wasn’t doing the job right. He used to say, ‘Why do I keep rucking you’ and ‘You don’t think.’ Once or twice I stuck up for myself. Still it was no good and over time, had to ‘fend for myself’ and learn the rest of the painting trade on my own.
In the latter years of being a painter and decorator, there were fellow painters of mine being promoted above me. I was also under a foreman who was rather bossy and thought much of himself. Still all of that changed when I had an accident and hurt my back. So I had to leave on medical grounds and start again doing office work instead.
While the past hasn’t been that brilliant, I now feel while writing about my experience, that things have got better for me. In particular, since joining DANDA in June 2006. If I don’t go to places where people aren’t so kind and sympathetic for example, then I feel that I cannot go far wrong.
