How Did You Do in High School?

[Pondering]

Public school is a tough place for people in general, I think. It is also difficult for anyone with AS. So, if you went to public school, how did you fare in high school? What were some of the struggles? Was it what you thought? Did you struggle in a subject but perform well in another?

 

[Nitro]

Highschool was not a problem at all. What was more important to me was learning how politics played out as I did my best to not attend it. I traded my mechanical skills with my teachers for time that I used the way I wanted to when I did attend.I manipulated my own schedule to compensate for not going there on a daily basis. The staff at my school were all a bunch of easy targets that I could play like hand puppets.

 

[DogwoodTree]

I was an excellent student in all subject areas. I had the whole academics thing figured out...I think I used patterns more than most people to determine what the teacher wanted on tests and other assignments and then just did what the pattern indicated should be done.

Academics were my sanctuary. My home life was extremely difficult in the sense that there was constant tension and pressure to please everyone in very unhealthy ways. So to go to school where I could easily get good grades and sit with my thoughts all through classes and not have to manage everyone's emotions...that was a relief.

Socially I was a neutral element. Nobody picked on me much, but nobody liked me much either. It was almost like I didn't exist. I tried to fit in with the band geeks, and did okay, but I was always on the fringe of this fringe group. I never had a close friend and was often left out of group activities, or I'd be casually invited, but no one ever really valued my presence so much as just wanting as big a group as possible for certain events. And then my parents were extremely strict, so I missed a lot of events I could've attended but wasn't allowed to go (even though these were good kids and not into causing trouble).

 

[Beverly]

I was valedictorian of my graduating class, never missed a single day from the first day of first grade, to graduation. (ditched a few half days once after lunch attendance was taken but, never missed morning or after lunch attendance once.)

I fit in with the band geeks pretty well so, it want' too bad socially. Mostly we hung out together and talked about music. Sure there were bullies and, I got bullied but, so did all of the band geeks. Funny thing is, of the seven of us, two are now actors, one film, one Broadway, two are musicians, one rock and one country, one is a dancer with the New York Ballet, and the other two are entertainment industry support people.

 

[karen70]

Always behind, hardly ever finished projects, homework gave me anxiety attacks, couldn't concentrate/easily distracted.

Always someone waiting for me at the school gate or on the way home. Bullying at school, always to blame at home.

Chaos and turmoil. Only subject I loved was English. But reading was always difficult, information not sinking in etc. Re-reading the same paragraph as it seemed to go over my head. Still struggle with reading now but have learnt to concentrate much better.

 

[Progster]

Generally speaking, I did well academically, but not socially. I had a couple of friends, but I was on the fringe and didn't get invited to parties or other such events. I was never a part of the social scene, and all the popular kids looked down on me and didn't speak to me. I used to hang out a lot, because I never felt part of things or included. I resented kids who would say hello just to be polite and then completely ignore me for the rest of the day.

I was rarely absent from school. I did well at all subjects, but I struggled with certain things like algebra, essay writing and interpreting poetry. We were tested in end of year exams, and didn't have to do groupwork, projects or assessments. I was much better at exams than I was at classwork, because in the exam room is was quiet, I had no distractions and I could concentrate. In class I was always slow to finish, and didn't participate in class discussions. I also had a good memory, and could easily remember information I had learnt from my books or notes, or diagrams. I did well in science subjects because of this.

 

[Nao]

When I started high school I made friends with two groups, the geeks and the supposedly cool crowd who were actually a bunch of idiots. I felt like I was at a crossroads and had to choose which group to follow. I chose the idiots! I acted like a complete dick to fit in with the other dicks. I drank, smoked and gave the teachers a hard time. I was very immature but desperately trying to show how grown up and cool I was. Inside I knew I wasn't really like the crowd I was trying to mimic and that I fitted in far better with the geeks (who were all far more interesting and way funnier) but for some strange reason I wanted to keep up with them. It was exhausting trying to keep up the constant act. At the end of school it was like I snapped back to reality and realised the years I'd wasted and the education I'd thrown away. Luckily I was able to go to college and resit all my exams in one year. I also learned to be myself.

 

[Jonathan Lees]

i did very well academically. socially i went through many rough patches from extreme bullying (i had to leave to be home-schooled for a bit to recuperate), to not talking to anyone (almost) at school for a year, to being okay with the really nerdy group but still a bit of a loner/social outcast generally.

 

[Jimbo]

My grades were aweful. All through school I only did enough to squeek by. I could have done better but never could see the point.

I had a lot of friends and had a good time skipping school and partying. It was fun.

 

[David Larson]

I was bullied so severely that it destroyed me. Unfortunately, I didn't realize until 9th grade that all I had to do was threaten to commit suicide every day to get out of it. So I got pulled out in the 9th grade, dropped out when I was 16, got a GED, and started college a month later. College was much better, but I was still damaged. But that's another story.

 

[Nao]

I was bullied so severely that it destroyed me. Unfortunately, I didn't realize until 9th grade that all I had to do was threaten to commit suicide every day to get out of it. So I got pulled out in the 9th grade, dropped out when I was 16, got a GED, and started college a month later. College was much better, but I was still damaged. But that's another story.

I think part of the reason I acted such an idiot was to avoid being bullied and it worked.

My son was bullied terribly at high school. I spent several months battling with the school to sort it out and when they failed to I pulled him out. There was no way I was sending him in every day to be physically and mentally battered.

He now goes to a small independent school that specializes in ASD. It's lovely there, they treat them like adults and encourage independence which definitely seems to diffuse conflict.

 

[NothingToSeeHere]

I was bullied badly throughout secondary and high school, though I did have 2 close friends (we bonded over the fact that we were all social rejects and targeted by the same bullys). Despite this, and missing a lot of school days because I hated it so much and due to social anxiety making it very difficult for me to leave home, I still received top marks in every subject aside for PE (haha what a cliche ;P ) and RE, up until my GCSE year where I developed severe depression. This resulted in my grades dropping from A* to As and Bs, and then at AS level I gave up halfway through the year and dropped out.

Two years later I went to a vocational college to do a National Diploma in Countryside Management (the environment was my special interest at the time) where I made friends, was as happy as someone recovering from depression could be, and went back to receiving top marks.

 

[Flinty]

My experience was quite different because...I didn't really go to a high school. We had 1-to-12 in a single building from the start, and Kindergarten was added when I was in Grade 3 or 4. So, with literally one exception, I had the much of the same classmates in "high school" that I did earlier. As a general rule, I got along better with the girls than with the other boys. The exception was a friend that no one would really mess with because he had a reach advantage on everyone. (Or at least anyone who would bother to mess with him.)

Basically, in "high school", people were divided into three groups. The popular kids made up about two thirds of the school, while the remainder were about evenly divided between the academic overachievers and the underachievers-and-proud-of-it. The dynamic was that the popular kids would leave the overachievers alone because there might be repercussions from the underachievers. Yes, that was an actual dynamic. The overachievers tolerated me and some of the underachievers were my real friends (the rest ignored me). That kept things from getting even worse than they actually were.

Academically, my mind liked to race. It was a fun game to see how much faster I would complete a test than anyone else and still get straight A's (outside gym class); and to see if I could pull off perfect scores in math (which was about 40% of the time).

Of over thirty teachers that I had over 13 years, exactly one thought that I could use some psych help, and for him it could have just been a way to get me out of math class and not get too far ahead of the other students.

There was also the weird odd-even split. Generally, even grades went better than odd grades. I chalk it up to having the better teachers in those years.

 

[flynn_gabriel]

I'm with jumbo on this one..... I barely graduated HS, because of that I didn't see any since in going to college.

 

[Andrew206]

I graduated in the top 10 academically of my high school class. I was really good at math and accounting.

 

[NovaScotia Aspie]

My grades got progressively worse ,I didn't particularly want to be at school . I wasn't bullied but was an outsider with no real social life to speak of .

 

[N64boy96]

I hated most people in school, I was a really shy person. I lived in a world that worshipped status and sports and I was more into being creative than throwing a basketball or lifting weights. I was like the skinniest kid in my class so that made a prime target for bullying amongst the jocks and populars. I basically began to loathe the company I was forced to keep. This kind of made me antisocial so I basically fell more and more into my drawing and writing. Long story short I wasn't a very good student. Now I'm taking my ACT so I can try to pursue music writing and animation

 

[Moviefan2k4]

I only attended high school for a brief time, as a 17-year-old freshman in 1997. I was removed from school by my Mom, due to learning difficulties and bullying. I took my GED in 2000, and went to community college for a year in 2002.

 

[Jeremy]

High school was an absolute horrible experience for me...very lonely...this was before my diagnosis...I spent my lunch everyday walking around the school trying to look like I have some place to go when really I just didn't have any to eat lunch with. Eventually met up with the "wrong" crowd...started skipping school everyday...never really finished but somehow still got my diploma!!!