97 Quotes About Autism

I liked holding David’s hand, though. That part-the snow dampening my face, letting my tears mix without anyone seeing, his fingers snug in mine-that was nice. His hand was heavier than I would have guessed. More solid. Like he could keep me from flying away. Julie Buxbaum

I try to think of other things. David’s hand in mine. That was nice. Innocent, friendly hand-holding. I think of his tape measure. And his haircut. I think about what it might be like to kiss him. Not that I really think of him that way-like a boyfriend or even just some hookup-but still I imagine kissing him would feel good. A true thing. A real thing. I imagine he tastes like honesty. Julie Buxbaum

We match, ” I say, and as soon as the words are out I already know that tomorrow will come and I will remember this moment and wince. We match?? And so, even through this drunken haze, I feel relief when he doesn’t laugh at me. Instead he squeezes me a little tighter, brings me a tiny bit closer so my edges are against his edges, and it’s all warm. Our bodies fit. I secretly sniff him, and get rewarded with his fresh lemony scent . Julie Buxbaum

I am kissing David Drucker. I am kissing David Drucker. I am kissing David Drucker. I Was wrong. I had assumed this would be his first kiss, that it would be fumbling and a bit messy but still fun. No way. Can’t be. This guy knows exactly what he’s doing. How to cradle the back of my head with his hands. How to move in soft and slow, and then pick up the pace, and then slow down again. How to brush my cheeks with even smaller kisses, how to work his way down my jaw, and to soften the worry spot in the center of my brow. How to pause and look into my eyes, really look, so tenderly I feel it all the way down in my stomach. He even traces the small zigzag scar on my eyebrow with his fingertips, like it’s something beautiful. I could kiss him forever. I’m going to kiss him forever. Julie Buxbaum

We don’t talk on the ride home. We don’t have to. I feel warm and giddy and like I have a secret that I want to keep all to myself. David Drucker, who is so many different people all at once: the guy who always sits alone, the guy who talked quantum physics even in my dad’s dental chair, the guy who held my hand in the snow. I kissed David Drucker, the guy I most like to talk to, and it was perfect. Julie Buxbaum

FAVORITE GIRL IN THE WORLD. STILL MY FRIEND? Please meet me on the bleachers after school. Please. And I’m sorry. Sorrier than any person has ever been sorry in the history of sorry people. I’ll put in one last please for good luck. Sorry. Again. Julie Buxbaum

Will you think about the kissing?” he asks, and I laugh again and mimic his shrug. If only he knew how much I think about the kissing. “Will you reconsider hand-holding?” he asks, instead of answering, I move my arm so it’s next to his, so we are lined up, seam to seam. He reaches out his pinky finger and links it around mine and a warm, delicious chill makes its way up my arm. We stay that way for a minute, in a pinky swear, which feels like the smallest of promises. And then I grab his whole hand and link his fingers in mine. A slightly bigger promise. Or maybe a demand: Please be part of my tribe. It’s pretty simple, really. For once, things are not complicated. Right now, right here, it’s just us, together, like this. Palm to palm. The most honest of gestures. One of the ways through. Maybe the best one. Julie Buxbaum

There are many things we don’t understand, and many ways to unlock the brain and maximize function. Don’t ever let anybody tell you it can’t be done. Sally Fryer Dietz

When we look at nature, we receive a sort of permission to be alive in this world, and our entire bodies get recharged. However often we're ignored and pushed away by other people, nature will always give us a good big hug, here inside our hearts. Naoki Higashida

But the Beast was a good person...the Prince looked on the outside the way the Beast was on the inside. Sometimes people couldn't see the inside of the person unless they like the outside of a person. Because they hadn't learned to hear the music yet. Karen Kingsbury

Through the blur, I wondered if I was alone or if other parents felt the same way I did - that everything involving our children was painful in some way. The emotions, whether they were joy, sorrow, love or pride, were so deep and sharp that in the end they left you raw, exposed and yes, in pain. The human heart was not designed to beat outside the human body and yet, each child represented just that - a parent's heart bared, beating forever outside its chest. Debra Ginsberg

Children with disabilities are stronger than we know, they fight the battles that most will never know. Misti Renea Neely

Children with autism are colourful - they are often very beautiful and, like the rainbow, they stand out. Adele Devine

My aim is to sort the jumble of information we throw at these children and present it in such a way that they will have a greater chance of achieving independence and fulfilment. Adele Devine

Can you imagine how your life would be if you couldn't talk? Naoki Higashida

The second main reason [that Christopher finds people confusing] is that people often talk using metaphors. These are examples of metaphors I laughed my socks off. He was the apple of her eye. They had a skeleton in the cupboard. We had a real pig of a day. The dog was stone dead. The word metaphor means carrying something form one place to another, and it comes from the Greek words. .I think it should be called a lie because a pig is not like a day and people do not have skeletons in the cupboards. And when I try and make a picture of the phrase in my head it just confuses me. Mark Haddondon

I believe there is a reason such as autism, severe manic-depression, and schizophrenia remain in our gene pool even though there is much suffering as a result. Temple Grandin

I don't knowwhat I'm feeling. Existing like I'm on auto pilot. I've put my Armour on now. Limiting everything gettingin but also not letting anything out. Tina J. Richardson

I can't speak anymore, I open my mouth but nothing comes out. So many things to say. I wonder if you really want to hear it anyway? Instead, I leave my heavy mind exploding with unfinished thoughts. Tina J. Richardson

Julian had heard stories-whispers really-of other Shadowhunter children who thought or felt differently. Who had trouble focusing. Who claimed letters rearranged themselves on the page when they tried to read them. Who fell prey to dark sadnesses that seemed to have no reason, or fits of energy they couldn't control. Whispers were all there were, though, because the Clave hated to admit that Nephilim like that existed. They were disappeared into the 'dregs' portion of the Academy, trained to stay out of the way of other Shadowhunters. Sent to the far corners of the globe like shameful secrets to be hidden. There were no words to describe Shadowhunters whose minds were shaped differently, no real words to describe differences at all. Because if there were words, Julian thought, there would have to be acknowledgement. And there were things the Clave refused to acknowledge. . Cassandra Clare

I find some things difficult to grasp. I need to be shown or taught a few different ways sometimes before I figure it out Tina J. Richardson

Education is that component which brings in a meaningful relationship between the happenings around us and how our senses experience them. Tito Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay

One small decision can shape an entire life. Sometimes, if you're lucky, the biggest hardship can lead to your greatest blessing. It just takes time to see that God works in mysterious ways. Penelope Ward

If the thought of losing someone doesn't scare the shit out of you, then it's not love Penelope Ward

I guess you were not my friend then, that's okay. I can see my true self, I can see yours, now. I guess that you did not look hard enough at mine. Or you would never have let me go. Tina J. Richardson

I Have a Dream.. someday my son, Zyon and ALL individuals with disabilities will be seen as HUMAN beings. I Have a Dream.. someday the human & civil rights of individuals with disabilities are honored and they are treated as equals. I Have a Dream.. someday ALL parents who have children with disabilities see their child as a blessing and not a burden. I Have a Dream.. someday there will be more jobs and opportunities for individuals with disabilities. I Have a Dream.. someday there will be UNITY "within" the disabled community. I HAVE A DREAM! ! ! . Yvonne Pierre

Old memories are always there. Like they happened yesterday. TinaJ. Richardson

And with a relentlessness that comes from the world's depths, with a persistence that strikes the keys metaphysically, the scales of a piano student keep playing over and over, up and down the physical backbone of my memory. It's the old streets with other people, the same streets that today are different; it's dead people speaking to me through the transparency of their absence; it's remorse for what I did or didn't do; it's the rippling of streams in the night, noises from below in the quiet building. I feel like screaming inside my head. I want to stop, to break, to smash this impossible phonograph record that keeps playing inside me, where it doesn't belong, an intangible torturer. I want my soul, a vehicle taken over by others, to let me off and go on without me. I'm going crazy from having to hear. And in the end it is I — in my odiously impressionable brain, in my thin skin, in my hypersensitive nerves — who am the keys played in scales, O horrible and personal piano of our memory. . Fernando Pessoa

Obsessions are the only things that matter. Patricia Highsmith

We live in truly unbelievable times. Autism is an epidemic in most westerncountries, western governments are nothing more than corrupt corporations, and corporations areroutinely suppressing information regarding the toxicity of many common household items. The resultis that many people are unnecessarily suffering from easily preventable developmental problems, sickness and cancer. Steven Magee

I look at the sky and the dust that separates us from the stars that will be my home. I breathe in the night air, the rotten night air, and I miss, I miss, I miss. Corinne Duyvis

That’s very trusting.” Iris watches Anke search our backpacks.“ We’re saving people’s lives. We thought we could be, ” Anke says. I’m more fixated on her arm in my backpack than on what she’s saying, though. That bag is nearly empty, but it’s mine. She’s messing it up. Her hands might not even be clean. When she does stop, I immediately wish she hadn’t. “Denise, ” she says, “I need to search your bed next.” My gaze flicks to my pillow. “I. I. Could I.”“She doesn’t like people touching her bed.” Iris stands, guarding me.“ You’re touching it, ” Captain Van Zand’s brother says. Iris shoots him a withering look. “I sat at the foot, which is the only place that’s OK for even me to touch, and I’m her sister.” Anke’s sigh sounds closer to a hiss. “Look, we have more rooms to search.” I squirm. No. Not squirm. I’m rocking. Back and forth. “Wait, ” I say.“ You can’t–” Iris goes on.“ Just ’cause she’s too precious to–” the man argues.“ Wait, ” I repeat, softer this time, so soft that I’m not even sure Iris hears it. “Can I, can I just, wait. I can lift the sheets and mattress myself. You can look. Right? Is that good? Right? Is that good? If I lift them?” I force my jaw shut. No one says anything for several moments. I can’t tell if Anke is thinking of a counterargument or if she really is trying to make this work. Her lips tighten. “OK. If you listen to my instructions exactly.”“ You’re indulging her?” Captain Van Zand’s brother says. “She’s just being difficult. Have you ever seen an autistic kid? Trust me, they’re not the kind to take water scooters into the city like she did.”“ Denise, just get it done, ” Anke snaps. I don’t stand until they’re far enough away from the bed, as if they might jump at me and touch the bed themselves regardless. I blink away tears. It’s dumb, I know that– I’m treating Anke’s hands like some kind of nuclear hazard–but this is my space, mine, and too little is left that’s mine as is. I can’t even face Iris. With the way she tried to help, it feels as though I’m betraying her by offering this solution myself. I keep my head low and follow Anke’s orders one-handed. Take off both the satin and regular pillowcases, show her the pillow, shake it (although I tell her she can feel the pillow herself: that’s OK, since the pillowcases will cover it again anyway)–lift the sheets, shake them, lift the mattress long enough for her to shine her light underneath, let her feel the mattress (which is OK, too, since she’s just touching it from the bottom) . .They tell us to stay in our room for another hour. I wash my hands, straighten the sheets, wash my hands again, and wrap the pillow in its cases.“ That was a good solution, ” Iris says.“ Sorry, ” I mutter.“ For what?” Being difficult. Not letting her help me. I keep my eyes on the sheets as I make the bed and let out a small laugh. Corinne Duyvis

She unwinds her scarf, taking so long about it that I wonder if she expects me to respond. “You were following the rules, ” I offer after a minute. It makes her words no more pleasant. Resentment. Was that how she’d looked at me? Then how am I supposed to trust how she looks at me now? My words elicit a thankful smile. “Mostly, though, I knew you could do the job. Did you ever know other autistic people?” I shake my head. I’d heard rumors about one teacher, but never asked him. Mom had encouraged me to find a local support group, but I’d never seen the appeal–or the need. It wouldn’t change anything. I had friends, anyway. Peopleonline, my fellow volunteers at the Way Station. I even got along with Iris’s friends.“ Well, I did, and I feel like a fool for never recognizing your autism. I had autistic colleagues at the university. They were accommodated, and they thrived. One researcher came in earlier than everyone else and would stay the longest. I saw the same strengths in you once I knew to look for them. You’re punctual, you’re precise, you’re trustworthy. When you don’t know something, you either figure it out or you ask, and either way, you get it right. I wanted to give you the same chance my colleagues had, and that other Nassau passengers got. One of the doctors is autistic–did you know?” Els silences an incoming call. “Does that answer your question?. Corinne Duyvis

I mean: if you’re going outside to look for your sister, I get it.” Max goes silent. Maybe Mirjam’s death is hitting him now, maybe his voice will choke–but he goes on. “But if you’re going outside to help your mother .” He gestures helplessly at my injured arm. His fingers stop a centimeter away, hovering in midair. “Don’t risk it. Don’t risk you.”“ She’s my mother.”“ The captain will never let her on if she doesn’t even try. Not when there are so many people who haven’t had thechance to try. People we can use on the ship. People who have been on that waiting list forever.” There are a dozen things I want to say. But she’s mymother–as though that means as much as people pretend it does. She is trying, just in a different way–as though I’m convincing myself. I wasn’t on that waiting list, either. I might not be someone the ship can use, as much as I’m trying to be. Corinne Duyvis

Try to understand how they feel - put yourselves in their place. Imagine you are in a foreign country with no money, possessions or friends. You cannot speak the language; the culture is completely different to your normal environment; isolated and helpless. You would be dependent on someone supporting you. Think of that when you next meet someone who is autistic... Michael Braccia

Don't be sad that I'm autistic. Love me for who I am. All of me. Some things are difficult for me but I'm okay as I am. TinaJ. Richardson

Understanding the intricacies involved in raising someone with a physical or mental challenge for those who have never experienced it is like trying to understand anything foreign; impossible, though definitely worth doing anyway. Lynette Louise

Autism is just the surface. What is inside each of us is what matters, autistic or not. Liz Becker

Then the dreaded words, Your child has autism. These words echo in their heads like a freight train blasting through their hopes and dreams. Dr. Linda Barboa

You have a healthy baby boy! The words ring like church bells in the ears of new parents. Dr. Linda Barboa

A small step forward. .. every. . single. .. day. The sun is coming up and I am wondering, 'What wondrous thing shall I witness today? Liz Becker

I go to all the appointments. All the meetings. I sit with the team of inclusion teachers, occupational therapists, doctors, social workers, remedial teachers, and the cab driver that gets him from appointment to appointment, and I push for everything that can be done for my autistic boy. But I will never have a plan that will fix him. Noah is not something to be fixed. And our life will never be normal. And people always say, oh well what’s normal, there’s no such thing really, and I say – sure there is…there’s a spectrum… and there’s lots and lots of possibilities within that spectrum, and trust me buddy, ducks on the moon ain’t one of them….but ….In this abnormal life, I get to live with a pirate, and a bird fancier, and an ogre, and a hedgehog, and many many superheroes, and aliens and monsters – and an angel. I get to go to infinity and beyond. Kelley Jo Burke

Life-transforming ideas have always come to me through books.” - Bell Hooks Win Quier

Stop assuming I don't have any emotions. My inner thoughts might not be easily seen on my face. I do think and feel. Tina J. Richardson

Is autism a disease? If a woman asked me right now, “but wouldn’t you rather be cured?” I’d reply, “would you like to be cured of being a woman?” Autism, like womanhood, is painful, and difficult, and not made easy by the structure of our society. But it is who we are. There are treatments that can make certain aspects easier, yes. But there is no whole cure because there is no whole disease. Some women take birth control to reduce the effects of PMS or PMDD, to stop their bodies from being so at odds with the world, to make living just a little more easy, a little more comfortable. But it is not for every woman, it does not change the fact that they are a woman, and it does not change the sexism that they face every day, all the problems that result from the fact of society being built to serve people who are not them. I’d like treatments for autistic people to be seen in the same light. Medicine’s priority should be to improve quality of life, not to make a person more palatable to society. Society must be forced to deal with these people because these people will not be easily consigned to oblivion. Irene Wendy Wode

Sometimes there are not the right words for my thoughts. Speech feels like it's not a natural way to communicate. This is when typing the words makes my thoughts come out easier. Tina J. Richardson

I don't have to look at your eyes to listen that's whatmy ears are for. Tina J. Richardson

Conversations sometimes are so hard to follow. People are so confusing with the wrong facialexpressions for their words. Tina J. Richardson

Our visuals must represent the truth and decode the verbal jumble so these children can find the right direction. Adele Devine

The Internet, " [Judy] Singer said, "is a prosthetic device for people who can't socialize without it." For anyone challenged by language and social rules, a communication system that does not operate in real time is a godsend. Andrew Solomon

The world has a fast-growing problematic disability, which forges bonds in families, causes people to communicate in direct and clear ways, cuts down meaningless social interaction, pushes people to the limit with learning about themselves, whilst making them work together to make a better world. It’s called Autism — and I can’t see anything wrong with it, can you? Boy I’m glad I also have this disability! . Patrick Jasper Lee

I could sum up my younger life in one word.- Misunderstanding. Most of my school life was spend in protection mode. Which made any 'benefit' I could get from socializing, useless. TinaJ. Richardson

Teachers should be made aware of visual stress symptoms and the potential difference coloured lights, overlays and lenses could make to a learners perception. Adele Devine

Adapting our own perception, following rather than leading and building bridges are all keys to helping the child with autism learn. Adele Devine

His eyes saved him. What they insisted on seeing and reporting to him took him out of the autism of terror. Unknown

Are we allowing individuals to develop their talents with our current teaching methods? Is there more or maybe less we should be doing? Adele Devine

When teaching children with autism we must be quick to adapt, follow our instinct and go off plan. Adele Devine

Autism is more like retina patterns than measles Naoki Higashida

I'll never get to hear her say, 'I love you, Mommy, ' like other parents take for granted. Kelly Moran

The best way to measure the loss of intellectual sophistication - this "nerdification, " to put it bluntly - is in the growing disappearance of sarcasm, as mechanic minds take insults a bit too literally. Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The closer we come to understanding the challenges of autism, the better we are placed to accommodate and educate without risking removing that individuality we all love. Adele Devine

Autists are the ultimate square pegs, and the problem with pounding a square peg into a round hole is not that the hammering is hard work. It's that you're destroying the peg. Paul Collins

It’s true, though, others won’t understand me. I know that. I’m still an alien in the American Christian subculture. Each evening I retreat from it, and I go straight to the Gospels.It's not out of duty that I read about Jesus; it's a respite. Brant Hansen

What brought you here isn't your fault. We human beings have to live each day to its fullest and do our best in whatever environment we find ourselves in. There's no need to feel any shame just because your "fullest" and "best" look different from those of others. Naoki Higashida

Dreaming is escaping. Daydreaming is a form of self protection. Dissociation is Survival TinaJ. Richardson

I hesitate in everything, often without knowing why. How often I've sought — as my own version of the straight line, seeing it in my mind as the ideal straight line — the longest distance between two points. I've never had a knack for the active life. I've always taken wrong steps that no one else takes; I've always had to make an effort to do what comes naturally to other people. I've always wanted to achieve what others have achieved almost without wanting it. Between me and life there were always sheets of frosted glass that I couldn't tell were there by sight or by touch; I didn't live that life or that dimension. I was the daydream of what I wanted to be, and my dreaming began in my will: my goals were always the first fiction of what I never was. . Fernando Pessoa

I like it that order exists somewhere even if it shatters near me. Elizabeth Moon

Today, with tears in my eyes, I telephoned the mother of one of our children (aged thirteen) who had spoken for the first time since the age of three... Michael Braccia

Why was it considered normal for a girl to live for fashion and makeup, but not car engines or bugs? And what about sports fanatics? My mom had a boyfriend who would flip out if he missed even a minute of a football game. Wouldn't that be what doctors considered autistic behavior? Tara Kelly

When I was very young I thought I was just like everyone else. I think it took me longer than most to realize I was different and even longer to realize that being different was what made me great Tina J. Richardson

But in a home where grief is fresh and patience has long worn thin, making it through another day is often heroic in itself. Melanie Bennett

Children with autism are constantly testing and pursuing truth. They are a bundle of contradictions. They love order and routine, yet often have the most amazingly inventive and creative minds. They may appear to follow rules, but are also the most likely people to come up with a revolutionary new idea. They feel emotion intensly, but often seem to struggle to read facial expressions. Adele Devine

I reached down to feel the soil, and I touched the outreaching roots of the trees that bore horizontally and vertically hundreds of feet through the forest. I stroked the earth with my palm, and I could almost feel that invisible network of capillary roots that sucks moisture and nutrients out of every inch of the soil I was standing on. I breathed in and out. I was part of the forest. I was alive. Ned Hayes

The wind is blowing hard around me, the sound is rising in my chest again, and I feel I can fly. And then the branch has shifted under my feet, the deep furrows of the bark have left my back, and I have no time to spread my arms. I am not flying. I am falling. Ned Hayes

I watched water dripping off the ferns and the needles of the Western Red Cedar next door. I watched it running in runnels down the bark of the Cherry tree, and I looked at the small droplets of misty water that were accumulating on the broad leaves of the Bigleaf Maple.I touched one of the accumulated droplets, and instantly it was gone. Ned Hayes

Many people think trees grow so big from soil and water, but this is not true. Trees get their mass from the air. They gobble up airborne carbon dioxide and perform an act of chemical fission by using the energy from sunshine... Essentially, trees are made of air and sunshine. Ned Hayes

I fall for centuries of life. First sunlight touches this hillside; and buried inside the earth, a seed stirs, turning slowly in the deep soil like a tadpole turning itself in a dank pool. Ned Hayes

A rising tower of wood and needles and branches and great slabs of bark that has grown for hundreds of years. An impossible castle made from air and sunlight, fixed in place by the power of photosynthesis and chlorophyll. Magic. With lights. Ned Hayes

The forest was all around me now... The ground soft and warm with light and growth... I could almost hear the ceaseless excavations of the flowing bloodstream underneath the earth skin of this vast organism. I touched the outreaching roots of the trees... I could feel that nearly invisible network of capillary roots... I breathed in and out. I was part of the forest. I was alive. Ned Hayes

The branches are a storm around me, and I fall into a deep well of green. The needles and limbs rush past. It is a whirling motion of green and brown branches. Ned Hayes

I saw the Eagle Tree for the first time on the third Monday of the month of March, which I guess could be considered auspicious if I believed in magic or superstition or religion... Ned Hayes

This tree was a vast cylinder of wood. It filled the sky. The limbs reached out above me, a great canopy sheltering the rest of the trees, as if they were its children. Ned Hayes

My arms sometimes move on their own in big flapping motions, as if I might take off, and my hands spin like a hummingbird’s wings. Ned Hayes

The trees reach up above me toward the sky, stretching out their great limbs in an intricate pattern that reminds me of the pattern of light... the pattern shifting back and forth as I climb. Ned Hayes

Half the time he seems autistic, the rest of the time he's like a lizard jacked full of lithium and speed. These things do not promote love in most of us. Warren Ellis

Could some of the challenging behaviours that often partner autism begin as experiements on measuring human reactions? Are these children exploring boundaries - seeing what makes the toy squeak or the adult shriek? Adele Devine

We know that children with autism like order, that they are often very visual and that they can be quite literal. They deserve beautiful resources and symbols that make sense. If a picture does not explain visually, it is pointless and the child will stop looking to the pictures for information. Adele Devine

But had Minkowski and Einstein not recognized it long before us, our schizophrenic children would have taught us that space-time is a unity that precedes any separate understanding of either category; just as grasping this unity is a precondition for understanding causality. Bruno Bettelheim