Mike Smith
Active Member
My name is Mike Smith, and I am forty one years old. For the past six years I have tried relentlessly to obtain help in getting tested for Autism, and this past March I was formally diagnosed with both High Functioning Autism, as well as Schizoid Personality Disorder. In addition to my mental health, I also struggle with several physical health problems, including IBS-D. Combined, they do not form Captain Planet, what they have done rather is to create a life filled with heartache, pain, and suffering.
I was molested by an older student in the first grade, and subsequently bullied non stop all the way through high school. At a very early age I learned to fear people, as I was abused by certain family members, as well as enduring daily verbal and physical abuse at school. It caused me to become an introvert, and caused me to hate school. I saw it as a place of pain and suffering, and I hated the people there who mistreated me. The only safety that I knew was at my Great-Grandmother's feet. She raised me, she cared for me, and she's one of the few people in this world who actually cared about me, and loved me.
To this day I still endure emotional abuse from people in my family, and I have no relationship with them at all. I'm not close to anyone except my great-uncle. I have no friends, and often have faced ridicule for how I am. Over the past twenty years I have had over thirty jobs, half of which I was fired from, and the others I quit, all within six months of my being hired. I've only had three jobs that lasted an entire year. I would become extremely depressed from being bullied, and punished for having to use the restroom frequently due to the IBS-D.
Though I have great communications skills, and am a talented writer, I just don't seem to be able to get along with most people. I got married in 2012, and my ex wife was my best friend. I loved her more than anything, but the year and a half that we were together she was deceitful and unfaithful, and eventually left me for another guy. It took me a year to get over that, and thankfully that started me on the journey to getting help. There is no way that I would have ever gotten a diagnosis if I had accepted the replies that I got early on.
I have been denied help so many times that I lost count of them all. It took me six years of begging for help, and going to different agencies and clinics before I found one that would accept me with no insurance, and no money. The Psychologist there is unlike any other that I have met, and met with me several times a month for two hour sessions each time. He thoroughly examined, re examined, and looked at stuff again to ensure that I got the proper diagnosis through the evaluations and testing.
It opened up the door for me to receive disability and insurance, for which I am grateful, because without it, I would have nothing. Moving forward, I have no idea what the future holds for me, only that I'm scared. My number one priority is to have home of my own. In the past six months I was able to buy a car debt free, which has helped me greatly. I used to measure how many miles I would walk, and in 2019 alone I walked almost two thousand miles, and now I don't have to do that. I can drive to the library, grocery store, ext.
I have had to come to terms with my health, and the limitations that it imposes upon me, and what I can and can't do. I think the most difficult thing for me is being alone. I think anyone with my diagnosis has probably felt what I feel at some point, because I know that I am not capable of supporting a wife / family, and that I would be a burden from day one. That would be selfish and unfair to ask or think that a woman would be willing to do that. No, I've found out the hard way that being mentally ill is better walked out alone.
My focus now is just on doing what one doctor told me that I would never do, and that's owning my own home. Disabled or not, there are times when we must learn that taking no for an answer is not acceptable.
I was molested by an older student in the first grade, and subsequently bullied non stop all the way through high school. At a very early age I learned to fear people, as I was abused by certain family members, as well as enduring daily verbal and physical abuse at school. It caused me to become an introvert, and caused me to hate school. I saw it as a place of pain and suffering, and I hated the people there who mistreated me. The only safety that I knew was at my Great-Grandmother's feet. She raised me, she cared for me, and she's one of the few people in this world who actually cared about me, and loved me.
To this day I still endure emotional abuse from people in my family, and I have no relationship with them at all. I'm not close to anyone except my great-uncle. I have no friends, and often have faced ridicule for how I am. Over the past twenty years I have had over thirty jobs, half of which I was fired from, and the others I quit, all within six months of my being hired. I've only had three jobs that lasted an entire year. I would become extremely depressed from being bullied, and punished for having to use the restroom frequently due to the IBS-D.
Though I have great communications skills, and am a talented writer, I just don't seem to be able to get along with most people. I got married in 2012, and my ex wife was my best friend. I loved her more than anything, but the year and a half that we were together she was deceitful and unfaithful, and eventually left me for another guy. It took me a year to get over that, and thankfully that started me on the journey to getting help. There is no way that I would have ever gotten a diagnosis if I had accepted the replies that I got early on.
I have been denied help so many times that I lost count of them all. It took me six years of begging for help, and going to different agencies and clinics before I found one that would accept me with no insurance, and no money. The Psychologist there is unlike any other that I have met, and met with me several times a month for two hour sessions each time. He thoroughly examined, re examined, and looked at stuff again to ensure that I got the proper diagnosis through the evaluations and testing.
It opened up the door for me to receive disability and insurance, for which I am grateful, because without it, I would have nothing. Moving forward, I have no idea what the future holds for me, only that I'm scared. My number one priority is to have home of my own. In the past six months I was able to buy a car debt free, which has helped me greatly. I used to measure how many miles I would walk, and in 2019 alone I walked almost two thousand miles, and now I don't have to do that. I can drive to the library, grocery store, ext.
I have had to come to terms with my health, and the limitations that it imposes upon me, and what I can and can't do. I think the most difficult thing for me is being alone. I think anyone with my diagnosis has probably felt what I feel at some point, because I know that I am not capable of supporting a wife / family, and that I would be a burden from day one. That would be selfish and unfair to ask or think that a woman would be willing to do that. No, I've found out the hard way that being mentally ill is better walked out alone.
My focus now is just on doing what one doctor told me that I would never do, and that's owning my own home. Disabled or not, there are times when we must learn that taking no for an answer is not acceptable.