Who I Am
I am an autistic guy with a message. I spent the first half of my life completely trapped in silence. The second – on becoming a free soul. I had to fight to get an education but I succeeded, graduating high school with a diploma and a 3.9 GPA. I am continuing my education in college. I communicate by typing on an iPad or a letter board. My first book, Ido inAutismland is an autism diary, telling the story of my symptoms, education, and journey into communication. My second book, In Two Worlds, is a novel. I hope through my work to help other autistic people find a way out of their silence too.
My Books
My newest book is now available in paperback, on Kindle, and on Smashwords!
My first book is available in paperback, Nook, Kindle, and iBook editions!
Subscribe via Email
My Videos
My NBC Video with Dr. Bruce
Click here to see the article
My Video from the LA TImes
Recent Comments
- How “Autism Warrior Parents” Harm Autistic Kids — THINKING PERSON’S GUIDE TO AUTISM – som2nypost.com on Motor Difficulties in Severe Autism
- admin on Ido in Autismland is now also an audiobook
- Kara on Ido in Autismland is now also an audiobook
- How “Autism Warrior Parents” Harm Autistic Kids on Motor Difficulties in Severe Autism
- Daria on My Books
Archives
- October 2022
- July 2022
- April 2022
- September 2021
- July 2021
- May 2021
- September 2020
- July 2020
- May 2020
- March 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- January 2018
- November 2017
- October 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- July 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- November 2015
- October 2015
- July 2015
- June 2015
- March 2015
- January 2015
- November 2014
- October 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- April 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- October 2013
- August 2013
- June 2013
- May 2013
- April 2013
- March 2013
- February 2013
- January 2013
- December 2012
- November 2012
- October 2012
- September 2012
- August 2012
- July 2012
- June 2012
- May 2012
- April 2012
- March 2012
- February 2012
- January 2012
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
Categories
- "high funnctioning"
- "low functioning"
- "low-functioning" autism
- AAC
- ABA
- abilities
- adolescence
- Adrienne Johnston
- Adrienne Murphy
- adversity
- advocacy
- aide
- aides
- Amazon
- American Psychiatric Association
- American Speech Language Hearing Association
- Anne Frank
- Annie Sullivan
- anxiety
- apllied Behavioral Analysis
- Apple
- apraxia
- Ariane Zurcher
- art
- ASHA
- asperger's
- assistive chat
- assistive technology
- attitude
- audiobook
- augmentative communication
- author
- autism
- autism causes
- autism education
- Autism Experience Challenge
- autism forum
- autism perceptions
- autism research
- autism society
- Autism Speaks
- Autism Spectrum Therapies
- autism symptoms
- autism theories
- autism treatments
- autistic authors
- barriers
- Ben Kuebrich
- bereavement
- Bettelheim
- Between the Lines
- blog
- body responsiveness
- book
- bookLife Award
- books by authors with autism
- brain
- Britain's Got Talent
- California Lutheran University
- camping
- cancer
- capabilities
- career
- Carly Fleischmann
- change
- choices
- civil rights
- classical music
- college
- Communication
- Communication First
- communication with a person with autism
- communicative devices
- community
- cooking
- cooking shows
- coping
- coronavirus
- courage
- CSUN speech
- Deaf Education
- death
- dentist
- depression
- diagnostic criteria
- Diego Pena
- Dillan Barmache
- disability
- disabled athletes
- disabled heroes
- discipline
- Disneyland
- dog training
- dogs
- Down Syndrome
- DSM
- Edlyn Pena PhD.
- education
- Elizabeth Bonker
- emmashopebook
- emotions
- empathy
- environment
- envy
- Erik Weihenmayer
- eugenics
- Evelyn Glennie
- exercise
- Expedition Impossible
- eye tracking
- false hope
- family
- family support
- fate
- fiction
- film review
- fine motor skills
- fitness
- Floortime
- food aversion
- France
- friends
- frustration
- future planning
- Gabrielle Giffords
- genetics
- God
- good and evil
- gratitude
- grief
- happiness
- Hari Srinivasan
- Harry Potter
- health
- Hebrew
- Helen Keller
- heroism
- high school
- hiking
- Holocasut
- hope
- human nature
- human rights
- humor
- Ido in Autismland
- Ido Kedar
- idoinautismland
- IEP
- importance of education
- impulsivity
- in memory
- In the Author's Voice
- In Two Worlds
- independence
- initiation
- inspiration
- institutions
- intelligence
- intelligence testing
- interview
- iPad
- IQ testing
- Ireland
- isolation
- Italian
- Ivar Lovaas
- Jacques Pepin
- japanese
- Jaswal
- keyboards
- language processing
- Larry Bissonette
- le packing
- Leaders Around Me- book
- Lee Ridley
- Lee Romney
- letter board
- letterboard
- letterboards
- loneliness
- Los Angeles Times
- Lost Voice Guy
- luck
- mainstreaming
- Mandy Harvey
- medical
- medication
- memoir
- Memorial Day
- mentoring
- middle school
- mind/body communication
- missing cat
- mosaics
- Moses
- Moses Aaron Cooperative
- motivation
- motor planning
- motvation
- mourning
- muscle development
- My Mission
- Naoki Higashida
- nature
- Nature Journal
- NBC
- neurological instability
- neurology
- neuroplasticity
- news
- Nick Vujicic
- non-verbal
- non-verbal autism
- non-verbal communication
- nonspeaking autism
- nonverbal autism
- Norman Doidge
- NPR
- occupational therapy
- ocean
- Olympics
- optimism
- Oscar Pistorius
- OT
- outbursts
- overwhelming
- parenting Spectrum series
- parents
- Parisa Khosravi
- Passover
- physical fitness
- piano
- poetry
- Point to Freedom
- potential
- presumption of competence
- professionals
- progress
- prompts
- psychotherapy
- public speaking
- Publisher's Weekly
- rant
- Rapid Prompting Method
- rattlesnakes
- religion
- resilence
- resources
- Richard Dawkins
- RPM
- russian
- sadness
- safety
- Samuel Capozzi
- school
- school support
- science
- seasons
- self advocacy
- self control
- Self determination
- self stimulatory behavior
- self-acceptance
- self-help
- self-regulation
- senses
- sensory overload
- sensory overwhelmed
- sensory processing
- sensory system
- sesnory overwhelmed
- shyness
- skeptics
- social behavior
- social interaction
- Soma
- Soma Mukhopadhyay
- Sondra William
- sound sensitivity
- Spanish
- special education
- special needs
- Special-fit
- Spectrum of Opportunity conference
- speech therapy
- spirituality
- spring weather
- squirrels
- Stephen Hawking
- stims
- strategies
- stress
- stuckness
- Sue Finnes
- summer vacation
- support
- Sydney Edmond
- synesthesia
- Tami Barmache
- tantrums
- teachers
- Team Hoyt
- ted talk
- Temple Grandin
- Thanksgiving
- The Brain that Changes Itself
- The King's Speech
- The Reason I Jump
- The Smile Train
- theory of mind
- Tito Mukhopadhyay. nonverbal autism
- Tito Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay
- tolerance
- tornado
- translation
- typers
- typing
- UN
- Uncategorized
- understanding autism
- University of Virginia
- Unlocking Voices
- unmotivated students
- Vaish Sarathy
- voiceAmerica
- Walk Now
- Wall Street Journal
- working out
- world
- World Autism Awareness Day
- Wretches and Jabberers
- Yoram Bonneh
Meta
Monthly Archives: February 2014
A Challenge to Autism Professionals
The theories regarding autism have been based on observation of our odd behaviors. Lists of these behaviors make a diagnosis. I have limited independence in selfcare. I have limited eye contact. I have flat affect often. I can’t express my ideas verbally. I have poor fine motor control. I have impaired initiation. I have impaired gross motor control. I have difficulty controlling intense emotions. I have impulse control challenges and self stimulatory behavior.
Whew. When I write that it sounds pretty bad, but I function adequately in this world. I am now 17 and I am a fulltime high school student in a general education program. I am in Honors Chemistry, Honors US History and Honors English. I am in Algebra 2, Spanish and Animal Sciences. I get straight As. I work out with a trainer 2 or 3 times a week to get fit. I study piano. I hike, cook, and help take care of a horse. I am invited to speak at universities and autism agencies. I am the author of Ido in Autismland, and a blogger as well. I have friends.
I say this, not to brag, but to let you know that people like me, with severe autism, who act weirdly and who can’t speak, are not less human, as Dr. Lovaas suggested, and are not doomed to live lives of rudimentary information and bored isolation.( “You have a person in a physical sense — they have hair, a nose and a mouth — but they are not people in the psychological sense,” the late Ivar Lovaas, a UCLA researcher, said in a 1974 interview with Psychology Today).
I communicate by typing on an iPad with an app that has both word prediction and voice output. I also communicate by using good, old-fashioned letterboard pointing. If I had not been taught to point to letters or to type without tactile support, many people would never have realized that my mind was intact.
My childhood was not easy because I had no means to communicate at all, despite my 40 hours a week of intensive ABA therapy. I pointed to flashcards and I touched my nose, but I had no means to convey that I thought deeply, understood everything, but was locked internally. Meticulously collected data showed my incorrect answers to flashcard drills, but the limitations of theory are in the interpretations.
My mistakes were proof to my instructors of my lack of comprehension or intelligence, so we did the same boring, baby lessons year after boring year. How I dreamed of being able to communicate the truth then to my instructors and my family too, but I had no way to express my ideas. All they gave me was the ability to request foods and basic needs.
Here is what I would have told them if I could have when I was small. My body isn’t under my mind’s complete control. I know the right answer to these thrilling flashcards, unfortunately my hand isn’t fully under my control either. My body is often ignoring my thoughts. I look at my flashcards. You ask me to touch ‘tree,’ for example, and though I can clearly differentiate between tree, house, boy and whatever cards you have arrayed, my hand doesn’t consistently obey me. My mind is screaming, “Don’t touch house!” It goes to house. Your notes say, “Ido is frustrated in session today.” Yes, frustration often occurs when you can’t show your intelligence and neurological forces impede communication between mind and body and experts then conclude that you are not cognitively processing human speech.
In my childhood I feared I would remain stuck forever in this horrible trap, but I was truly fortunate to be freed when I was 7 when my mother realized my mind was intact, and both my parents searched to find a way to help me communicate without tactile support.
Thousands of autistic people like me live life in isolation and loneliness, denied education, condemned to baby talk and high fives, and never able to express a thought. The price of assuming that nonverbal people with autism have impaired thinking is a high one to families and to people who live in solitary confinement within their own bodies. It is high time professionals rethought their theories.