My Speech in Butuan

My ID as an Advocate of Autism

As requested by Teacher Net of Tiny Steps Butuan and Teacher Nino:

Behaviors and Social Communication skills

My life experience as a person with autism is a lifetime endeavor, behavioral challenges during my lifetime is prevalent. Like being one sided in communication skills. I do not have behavior issues during my childhood because I am following what is told to me. I am a perfectionist in nature, so in my mind I do not want to make mistakes. And when I get mistakes I get frustrated especially in academics. I fairly do well in academics then however my interests in singing, dancing and even playing sports was not discovered then, I really do not welcome criticism warmly as I do today. I was always following my parents, siblings and teachers. My social communication skills in my elementary years was being more of a reserved person. I prefer to be a person who wants to be initiated on conversation. My social engagement skills in unfamiliar situations are not well developed, because I do not have the patience to do so. Due to this I was susceptible to aggression and meltdowns when ignored by friends, depending on the person I will throw a punch or rage to attempt to/throwing tables and chairs when I perceive intrusion to space. Intrusion to space means being provoked, teased, taunted. Negative friends taught me to fight back in elementary. So through these my anger to people grew more, so I start to hate people who do negative things to me. Because of lack of acceptance way back then by my peers they always call me ‘abnormal’ ‘buang’ and ‘pikon’ when I react violently to jokes. How would I not react violently when they are the ones who provoke me through punching me everywhere. Well I had a great endurance because of this experience, my pain threshold is very good that I can tolerate pain for long periods of time. That helped me to the sport I play basketball, despite the fact I want to enroll in mixed marital arts classes. Boxing profession was not up for me because of the concussion and Parkinson Disease that Muhammad Ali and Freddie Roach suffered to repeated blows to the head.

Interests

I do try a lot of sports, swimming, boxing, taekwondo and basketball. I do play dodgeball as well. But what was sustained is basketball. When I was 11 years old I was very passionate about basketball, it become a sport for me for a life time. Basketball is part of me bridging the gap between persons with autism and me. My social skills in dealing with my teammates in game was not easy because I was getting picked on by people due to my special needs and aggressions. My playmates were scared of me and do not want to play with me in the court. Coaches in my high school and different colleges and university were rejecting me and picked me on try-outs. Being persistent on my hobby I practiced but improvements on my individual talents were really not enough to be with a commercial or professional team which is my dream. I fantasized on being an NBA player who was cheered as he shoots or dunks and break record of NBA greats. My basketball idols were Hakeem Olajuwon, Karl Malone, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Tim Duncan. I feel I do play like them when I play not knowingly later on I opted in to be myself as I play and be happy even I do not have the hops of Michael Jordan who can dunk and has a 50 inch vertical where I do have only 36 hahaha at least I can Tap board but now my knees cannot carry my weight hahahaha.   There were tandems that I want to form before in my basketball hobby, which I get frustrated. I was obsessed with the sport and the people who I wanted to attach myself during my puberty years that I have to overcome. As years go by people around the community in Davao learned to adjust on cases like this. By the grace of God this happened amazingly and unexpectedly through the support of loved ones and friends through basketball. It brought love from them doing self-advocacy in it through this successful testimony of God. Running 10 years my relationship grew stronger each day as I know God more by being intimate on him every day. It is His glory that is working on me right now.

Handling Relationships

I experienced a lot of heartaches during my adolescent years. Especially on how I deal with woman, during my elementary years and high school years. I am serious all the time, ultra-focused on a particular love interest. Always expressing words to impress the woman I fell in love with I shower them with words and complements. I realized what was to work on is to be real and have some life skills to handle a love relationship. Most of my relationships fail to work because caring too much not to make mistakes due to my past experiences with two women who brought me to the discipline’s office due to the lack of appropriate social skills in a given situation. These areas consist of privacy, personal space, tone, body language, abstract meanings of words, paralanguage, processing things in the sub-conscious level or the things that we cannot see, emotions, perspectives, ideas and opinions. Traumatize that I cannot handle relationships, I sulked myself on this mindset for so long that I fear of being rejected or in Tagalog mabasted. I hid my relationship to people to avoid being ridiculed and even avoid re assuring the feelings of an opposite sex towards me, because when I do this I get violent aggressions and outburst. After this it will turn into depression and have low self-perception due to remarks of people. Gladly, not all women who enter my life are like this. It is because my focus right now is in Jesus the only hope that I can have despite feelings of loneliness. So filling the gap of that void is my only hope in enjoying my life alone. I realized relationship is all about living two independent lives at the same time building for the future each one of us. Lately I have that woman who is proud of what I am doing and understand the situation as my friend who can be relied upon. I build that friendship through love, compassion and understanding in a simple way as possible.

Social and Communication skills in Adolescent

In my puberty years I have the high need of sense of approval due to my insecurities of being bullied and being a bully as well. I tend to forgive slowly because some of it is attributed to the thought that I need to have a perfect life which is not realistic. I felt neglect and rejections by my classmates during the period. It was because of my fixed loved interest, during those times I was frustrated and having friends during that time was difficult being in the Special Science Class. Emotion regulation is the reason that it was hard for me to move on. Seeking attachment for someone I played and wanting that person as a teammate makes it worse. Before my life in Christ it is a big deal. But today as I was immense by the love of God, I manage this kind of feeling. And Without Him even my best friend will be an obsession and compulsion. I had prayed several hours just to block of any of those feelings and giving out my fears of losing persons who meant a lot in my life. Lately that I realize this because being of an almost same experience recently. This time I learned how to detach in a situation and a person is not an object of your happiness. This made me function independently in my life because it is needed for a person in this world to survive. Even your loved ones are gone the thing remain is you. This pushed my family to support every need that I have so I can manage my frustrations and setbacks. I really hate frustration and setback because I want things to be perfect. That sometimes create a sense of self that I am a king or superior to others. Seeking the need for superiority is the issue sometimes in myself even on this day. Humility is the best defense for this attack, because it tells you how you began your journey as a person with Autism. Some may look at me as Temple Grandin but I look myself as who I am. Being yourself is the key in knowing the real you. I would address this to the parents out there not to compare your child to others and be indifferent to others.

Life in College days socio-communication skills challenges I faced

My issue back the in my college days is the school that once not accepted my condition fueled hatred and anger to the Ateneo community. This happened when my mom decided to transfer me to a bigger school to accommodate me. At that time, when I see people from Ateneo I see them as “not friendly to the autism community.” So then I got fantasies that I want to instill fear upon them just to get their respect. Making myself a king to them. I thought of all of them bowing and worshipping me. This came true when they call me “Idol”. But as I entered and graduated college it proved false. I was even respected by them because of my condition and can display my talents to them.

I really hate to get into trouble but angry to people who did something wrong like drugs, party or sex. This led me to stick on my faith in God to resists these temptations. However, my social skills suffer because of the wrong people around me. You cannot hang out with them without going to lavish parties, bars and sex with other women. It put a scar of inferiority complex because I am autistic, I cannot do these things. I cannot process myself is I am being corrected by my professors because I cannot argue with them. I kept comparing myself to classmates. This led me to question my identity. But knowing God more is key to Identifying yourself. So being In Christ is my identity. It is who we are and what we are. We should thank the Lord for the gift of miracles in life.

Sensory Issues

Before I wanted to be like the leaders of the world out there like Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln, Rodrigo Duterte, the kings and queens of England and other nations. I read histories online and in encyclopedias I am sorry to say this because I have fascinations in political topics, leadership styles, power, position. I am not promoting someone here but, I am more inclined to the program of then Mayor Rodrigo Duterte the Gikan sa Masa para sa Masa which talks about his peace and order and other programs in Davao City that catapulted for him to be the current president of the Republic of the Philippines. This became an inspiration on how a life should be for a person with autism a peaceful and secure life, we want things I order, organized and free from hussle. Sensory issues arise when there is conflict it is difficult for me to cope with that because it triggers aggressions and meltdowns.

Okay this is the difficult part of the journey when someone has an heated argument. But in the current situation like the National Youth Parliament I had attended, I experienced a taste of it. Well, we should just relax take a deep breath and look every situation as a valuable experience.