Asperger's from the Inside Out

"Michael was diagnosed with Asperger’s at thirty nine, when his son was diagnosed at four. Because they knew there were some issues with development, Michael and his wife took their son, Will, to an Asperger’s clinic at New York University which diagnosed him with Asperger’s. And then they turned to Michael and said, ‘Well, Michael, let’s talk about you now.’ Up until that time he was always a very bright young man but he went to a conservative school in Providence, Rhode Island. He was considered to have a significant behaviour disorder. In his own words he was “about to crash and burn” as a teenager and he didn’t know why people saw him that way. He thought he was being blamed and was misunderstood. He ended up transferring to a Charter School (back in those days they were kind of hippy schools). He found that for many of the same reasons he was ostracised in his previous high school, he became a leader and was celebrated in his new high school. He was considered to be unconventional, he was considered to be incredibly creative. Yes, he was on the edge a little bit, but everybody appreciated how intelligent he was. After that, he was a diplomat for an agency related to the United Nations. He worked in Iraq and Bosnia. He is a classical guitarist, he hosts a part-time classical music station in New York City. He is a playwright—he has written five plays. He was a Renaissance man! He got married and had his first child. Then the diagnosis came and it was, in Michael’s words, both ‘a sledgehammer and a revelation.’ His son is now a sophomore at Grinnell College in the United States—he is the star baseball pitcher. Michael believes that the more we understand people with autism and their perspective, the better we can support them. He basically says thank goodness I know what Asperger’s is like because I was able to raise a son with Asperger’s and raise a confident and successful young man with Asperger’s. His book is in part his autobiography, but a large proportion of the book is advice for people with autism and Asperger’s. In it, he talks about topics ranging from how to prepare for an interview for a job, to when you talk about the fact that you have autism and Asperger’s and when you don’t. He’s very focussed on helping people with autism and Asperger’s to succeed in life. He’s one of the many people who say that we put all of this money into early intervention but what about the appropriate support for people once they’re out of school? Another issue not too many people have focussed on in autism, and Michael is a leader in this area, is mental health issues that arise when people with autism are not supported appropriately. When he was based in New York he ran support groups with people on the autism spectrum who had problems with alcoholism, with drug addiction, were chronically depressed or bipolar. All of these additional mental health issues are sometimes a direct consequence of having autism and, in other cases, are called co-morbid conditions. For example, bipolar is a co-morbid condition that unfortunately is not uncommon for people with Asperger’s and more capable people with autism. I picked Asperger’s From the Inside Out because it focusses more on adult issues, is written by a person on the spectrum, and is written by a person who you are going to be hearing a lot more from. He is going to be a leader in the field and just another one of these wonderful engaging people on the spectrum who has been very successful and, like Stephen Shore, has found his mission in life and is very hyper-focussed on that."