On tonight's episode of Parenthood (of which one of the characters is an Aspergian child), his parents had to go through a tough decision of whether or not to pull him out of his special ed school and put him in a normal school which would be more academically challenging. Initially, his father was in favor of normalizing him, while his mother felt he would do better socially in his special ed school. Ultimatley, after consulting with his former 1:1 (who had to quit because she slept with the Aspergian child's uncle, but that's another story in itself), they decided to send him to a normal school.
This episode really hit home with me, because I was in a very similar situation when I was 17, having to decide whether to continue at VGW and graduate with a diploma or transfer to a normal school for my senior year. I ultimately chose the latter, and it proved to be the worst decision of my life. While I did fine academically and behaviorally at Uni (in fact better than I had at VGW), the social anxiety ultimately became too much for me to handle and I had to leave after the first semester, although I did get my diploma a semester early which was a plus. The whole experience was so off-putting that it set me back for nearly a year. Now, I am at least doing something to move forward in life (I'm taking an extended education course at Cal State LA on how to give people an EKG) but I do not know where that will lead. It's at least a step in the right direction, but I still have a long way to go. On the episode itself, I don't mean to take one position or the other, but I do wish to offer my personal input and let parents know that there are two sides to every coin. However, it pretty much depends on the child, as no two autistic people are exactly alike. Some may do well in a normal school, while others would probably do better in a special ed setting.
Opening Day is just around the corner. Go Dodgers!
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4 comments:
I just wanna say (my opinion only obviously) that this is your first good post, it was a very good post and for that I commend you. I hope that your future posts are similar to this one.
And there's another thing I would like to commend you for. Because I'm sure you've seen Attorney At Lol's new blog on you, and I'm impressed by the fact that you have not retaliated. That is really the only way to defeat attacks like those, a simple solution but not an always an easy one.
To be clear, I'm not knocking anybody or Attorney At Lol for doing this, I'm just complimenting you for the improvement in your tactics and conduct.
Suddenly, it seems you are displaying evidence of maturity, and it'd be unfair for me not to recognize it, which is why I'm saying this. I may not be balanced, because (despite the fact that you watch Fox) anybody who claims to be balanced is a liar because balance is impossible due to human nature. However, I do make a diligent effort to be fair, and while there's some things you need to work on even with this post, you deserve my compliments and I hope you continue in this direction. It's the makers who change society, not the fixers. http://ramblingkvetch.blogspot.com/2011/03/makers-fixers.html (a post co-written by me and my friend ben duchan) Please, please read it, I know you are leery when people send you links but this is something that I think may help send you in a better direction, also you'll like the part where I criticise Bill Maher for some of his antics, whom I've recently been disillusioned from.
Anyways I think this comment has suffered from enough lacking in brevity so I'm gonna peace out.
It's not my blog, it's my best friend's blog. That particular post we wrote together because it was based on a philosophical discussion we had while joy-riding at 3 AM one night.
Oh and you're right it was Village Idiot's Convention, not Attorney At Lol, although they're working together on it.
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