Social Advice

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I'm an Aspie. I have already skipped a grade and I am planning on skipping another. If I skip another grade I'll be going into high school next year, but I don't really know what to expect and how I would deal with being so much younger than most of the other kids... Any advice and stories that might help?

I started grade 9 at 12 yrs, 9 months. I had only a vague notion about all the social life, partly because I had to commute from a farm, and partly because I had no interest in sports. I lost interest in the lessons when I mistook a typo for a trick question on the Christmas science exam, and having the only correct answer got me zero. My side reading also informed me of the general uselessness of our lessons. My grades dropped steadily, except where I had an interest. I dropped out at 17, and got my education at the library and on the job. Along the way, I had a few good moments, and even had a nice girlfriend. Even one good teacher might have changed my life, but they were overworked and uninspired.

My advice would be to get supplementary lessons or do extra reading to feed your IQ, but hang out with people of the same emotional age to develop your EQ. I can endure the boredom of social time a lot easier if I have a brain teaser to work on, such as a stuck point in design work. The randomness can sometimes help with a new perspective. I also use simple meditation techniques to stay calm, which has a mysterious but noticeable benefit to my general acceptability.

If necessary, you can use a checklist, to make sure you are asking people about themselves more than talking about yourself, and other common social graces you can find in books of etiquette.

The high school experience has been the subject of numerous movies. While compressed for entertainment purposes one can definitely encounter cruelty, derision, scorn, malice and contempt. However, the overriding and definitive character will be tedium.

As people of this age are experimenting with peer relationships, they often form themselves into various groups. The wealthy and athletes often associate. There are nerds that may or may not have intellectual abilities and interests. There are drug and criminal elements as well as art and drama types.

When I was in high school there were only four of us who worked more than 40 hour weeks as well. This gave us a detached perspective such that we could encounter each group as a sort of neutral observer. It also allowed us to see high school as the sad environment it actually is.

A guy named John Gatto wrote a book called “The Underground History of American Education” in which he makes a number of astute observations. One of which was that schools are institutions like prisons where most of the power is held in the hands of the inmates. If you happen to encounter a social situation run like a prison gang, you may need to find ways to absent yourself as much as possible.

One reason Junior High school was established as a segregated environment was not only the potential problems that can arise resulting from physiological changes during puberty, the mind also changes such that abstract thinking manifests. This change in thinking often manifests at age 13 on the average. It is usually accompanied by an intense self-focus and concern with what others think of you.

There is a Youtube video of an Asperger woman in Texas who had gone through her entire school life and graduate work with no frustrating social encounters only to discover that in the work environment people can be deceptive and mean. School may not be difficult. However, as a general rule, it can be beneficial to be cautious and guarded with people until you get to know them.

This is something you may not have an interest in right now, but many in high school indulge in casual fornication. You may wish to be cautious in this regard as well as many people find themselves in intimate relationships that were entered into with insufficient awareness and can find extraction difficult and painful.

Entering school, prison, the Army, or other mass people processing system can be difficult. It can help to have a clear idea of what your interests and goals are and seek to avoid those things which can entangle or divert you.

As a Christian, I would encourage you to seek out Christian companions. However, I am experienced enough to know that many are self-righteous or just as selfish and worldly as anyone else. Most older people would wish to advise you so that you would be able to avoid the potential problems you may encounter. I think that this is too ambitious. You may wish to adopt an approach to life that is generally cautious so that when problems are encountered, little has been risked.

One thing I wish people had told me when I was in high school is that graduating is important, but grades really aren't as massive a deal as they're made out to be. If you want to go to university afterwards, it's cheaper and far easier to spend your first two years at a community college, where they will accept anyone with a diploma or GED, and don't so much as look at your high school transcript. They only use your ACT or SAT scores to determine whether or not you'll have to take remedial math or English classes before taking the regular ones. Many community colleges have "automatic transfer" schools that you can go to directly without having to "prove" yourself after you've received your associate's degree. That's how I got my bachelor's in psychology, and I never once had to truly "apply" to college in the sense of competing with others to get in.

As for the high school experience itself, teenagers tend to be fickle, socially driven, and very bad at thinking through the consequences of their actions. Your best bet for making friends is to join a club or sport, and mingle with the other members. Don't fall into the trap of drinking or smoking to socialize as it will only cause you trouble in the long run. High school is only four years (maybe less for you) and after graduation, the chances of you ever seeing any of your classmates again, or of staying in long-term touch with your friends, is slim to none. You'll make closer and more permanent friends in college, so don't do anything you don't want to, or know is wrong, just for the sake of pleasing your classmates.

Jumping ahead a couple years as an Aspie can become problematic. One of the factors is bullying. The experience left me with deep invisible scars. So my recommendation is to join groups such as the Drama club and a Media Club. They tend to be groups that include both male and females, different age groups with a wide variety of special talents. For example Drama clubs put on plays. These require individuals that are actors, or live musicians backstage, or the light crew, or the individuals that are artist and compose set design, control sound and a wide variety of other talents. They join together and become a team.

A second recommendations is to pick up a part time job and summer job as the opportunity arises. Developing a career is the tools that you get from education plus the work habits that you develop from actual employment. The two go together. Many Aspies find the transition from academics to employment to be a very difficult transition. Therefore the earlier you can get some experience in the real world, even if it is volunteer work, the easier you will be able to make the transition into a career.

find myself , wanting to wish you absolute best . Found that being focused on studies in dealing with schooling , helped me quite abit. Attempts at ongoing social endeavours , with persons .
Outside of my age group or intellect , often found me , being victimized by persons with more social experience ..A noted ongoing experience, due to some basic language disparities amongst persons thought to be a found friend. Much to my dismay . This has seemed to be a attribute amongst a
average NT type profile persons . But merely my experience. Fortunately not all my encounters
Were with average IQ persons. In high school . Managed a few friends but certainly not of a older grade level. Please be careful . Allow your academic self to shine. Allow that perhaps high school
social intricasies Maynot be a easy thing to endure . But allow yourself to blossom in your own way and space. Did eventually find myself a older by 12 yrs life partner as time went on , Whom was NOT the average NT . With btw a amazing intellect , and considerable capacity for caring and empathy .
R .I .P. Best Wishes

I have no actual experience with this, but I did have a thought.

As an autistic person, you will undoubtedly be familiar with “masking” or “passing” strategies. Even at your age. Some examples of masking are people who wear eye catching t shirts or hats to draw attention away from their face, or to exchange a natural stimming behavior for one that is more socially appropriate (using a fidget spinner instead of spinning yourself).

So I was thinking that if you skipped a second grade, you would be noticeably younger than your classmates. They would not be treating you as an equal- more like a younger sibling or mascot. So any behaviors or mannerisms that might be scrutinized by kids your age would be less noticeable to the older kids.

Just a thought. I would weigh the responses of the experienced posters more heavily than mine.

Avoid social situations at school and focus on your studies and get higher grades and move onto college and work towards high grades for high paying jobs. At College, the pathetic immature high school kids are no longer a problem. Remember you are better than everyone else that does not have Aspergers. The only way to not get bullied at high school is to ignore them or go to library and avoid social situations. I never really desired social situations because I do not like talking to people that are less intelligent than me. The more popular a person is usually means they are less intelligent.

I always believed the bullying, or more in general not understanding the social games and rules of others came from being younger in class. It made me hate being good at anything, or hiding that always.
(and somewhere in there one might exaggerate the parental expectations, it may be a selffulling misunderstanding when you take praise for expectation, and end up a selfloathing perfectionnist)
I wouldn't have that happened to my children, and didn't.
I would say, rather take a year off to focus on something else and learn that, but that's my two cents.