This guest post is by Leah Howard, a young woman on the autism spectrum who was diagnosed with ASD at age 3 and has been accepted into Baptist College of Florida. Leah is applying for the Spring 2022 Making a Difference Autism Scholarship via the nonprofit KFM Making a Difference started by me, Kerry Magro. I was nonverbal till 2.5 and diagnosed with autism at 4 and you can read more about my organization here. Autistics on Autism: Stories You Need to Hear About What Helped Them While Growing Up and Pursuing Their Dreams, our nonprofit’s new book, will be released on March 29, 2022 on Amazon here for our community to enjoy featuring the stories of 100 autistic adults.
When I was younger I thought that the reason that I was emotionally sensitive and had social difficulties was that I was just shy and weird. Once, I was so afraid of dragonflies that it took my parents a very long time to get me in the car. They were everywhere and I was not having it. When I was 15, I was told that I was on the spectrum. My mom said that she found out that I had high-functioning autism when I was nine. I didn’t really believe it at first, but as I researched it a bit, I realized that it explained why I do what I do. High functioning autism means that I am able to live a somewhat independent life but still struggle with the mental disability. Knowing about my autism has helped me to understand why I was so emotional or why it took me four years to even make one good friend.
For example, it is still hard for me to get myself to brush my hair every day. Also, it takes me a while to make friends. When I was a kid I hated showers and getting wet. When it rained after school, after quickly getting out of the car and running into the house, I would tell my mom that I had my shower for the day. She soon realized that I was going to need a bit of help to get used to getting wet. So my mom made up a fun way to get me in the shower. She made a list of a showering routine that I could follow. Every night, after my shower she would see if the list was wet and soupy. If it was that meant that I completed the entire routine. Which made her so proud of me. After a few years, I began to love showering and now take the longest in the bathroom at night because I love the feeling of the water.
Many say that it’s a huge accomplishment to go to college because of my autism. I have always struggled in school, but because I worked very hard and never gave up, I am heading to college this Fall. I never knew how much pride I would feel for myself because I was able to push through and finish school. I have already been accepted into the school that I wanted. Which is the Baptist College of Florida, a small school that is known to help Christian students to become good disciples and use their talents to better serve God. I plan on studying to become a missionary there and graduating with my Bachelors of Art in Missions. Being able to learn how to overcome some of these disabilities and live a somewhat independent life, has helped me to be the best version of myself that I can be.
Follow my journey on Facebook, my Facebook Fan Page, Tiktok, Youtube & Instagram,
My name is Kerry Magro, a professional speaker and best-selling author who is also on the autism spectrum that started the nonprofit KFM Making a Difference in 2011 to help students with autism receive scholarship aid to pursue post-secondary education. Help support me so I can continue to help students with autism go to college by making a tax-deductible donation to our nonprofit here.
Autistics on Autism: Stories You Need to Hear About What Helped Them While Growing Up and Pursuing Their Dreams, will be released on March 29, 2022 on Amazon here for our community to enjoy featuring the stories of 100 autistic adults. 100% of the proceeds from this book will go back to our nonprofit to support initiatives like our autism scholarship program. In addition, this autistic adult’s essay you just read will be featured in a future volume of this book as we plan on making this into a series of books on autistic adults.
