This guest post is by Eowyn Gesler, a young woman with autism who attends the Western Kentucky University. Van Eowyn is applying for the Spring 2023 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, was released on March 29, 2022, on Amazon here for our community to enjoy featuring the stories of 100 autistic adults.
Ever since I was young, I’ve known that I was different. I didn’t know I was autistic, but I knew that I was kind of thrown into the social aspects of life earlier than was comfortable for me. In kindergarten, for example, I had two friends that I had known early on. I had met them because we were all in the same dance class at our local dance studio. During this time, I remember wanting them to be in the same class as me because then I would at least know someone there. Unfortunately, the both of them were put into another class and I was stuck in a class where I knew nobody. I was and still am very much a shy person. So, the thought of not knowing anybody in my kindergarten class was enough to make me anxious. As the year continued, however, I began to come out of my little turtle shell and get to know my classmates. That year I eventually made two friends other than my friends from dance class.
Eventually, in 6th grade I was still friends with them even though I didn’t do dance anymore. I remember all the anxiety of the first day at a new school. Most people who go to a new school have problems. Their biggest problem is usually finding out where their classes are. Not me. The biggest problem for me was figuring out who I was going to sit with at lunch. I remember following one of my friends and sitting with her and her friends. I sat with them every day at lunch for the rest of the year. They would talk about things at lunch and although I joined in every now and then, I never really felt like they were including me in the discussion. I told my sister who was in high school at the time that I didn’t feel included in the friend group. She told me that maybe I should find new friends.
Every single year since then I have had trouble finding friends and maintaining those relationships. However, last year in English class the most bizarre thing happened to me. I walked to English class on the first day and like everyone else or perhaps unlike everyone else I was nervous. I walk in and start to sit down in a random seat near the front of the class. After a couple of seconds the other kids started walking in and sitting down. This one kid sat down in the seat right behind me and a girl sat in the seat to the right of me. It was weird because we all just like started talking to each other. As the year went on, we became friends. We would talk about school, random things, and anything that came to mind. It was strange though because there was no like talking phase of the friendship. It was like we were strangers and then suddenly we were friends. And by the end of the year I had another class with the one kid who sat behind me and its like suddenly we became best friends. Now, being a senior its been roughly a year since I have had a class with them but they are still my best friends. I eat lunch with one of them every single day and I text the other one almost every day because we do not have any classes together this year. And I think that I have come a long way from just becoming friends with someone just because I knew them from dance class.
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My name is Kerry Magro, a professional speaker and best-selling author who is also on the autism spectrum. I 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 was 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.
