The Autism Society Event and Education Recordings Archive

As an ASD adult, Gyasi views his life through the following double-consciousness:

I graduated cum laude with a BA in English and Psychology and earned an MS in Library and Information Science. I’ve served on the boards of autism organizations, and I’ve shared my experiences with autism at regional and international conferences. I sit on the Bedford Cultural Council; I am an officer of Bedford’s Masonic lodge, and I volunteer at Bedford’s library’s semi-annual book sale. I love to read, and I’m almost finished with a memoir I’m co-writing with my mother entitled “Disabled at Harvard: Working with ASD.” Although I receive long-term disability, I still lead a productive and rewarding life, at least, until the inevitable occurs, and my mother is no longer with me.   

Where then do I reside? How do I eat? How do I shop? My mother and I do these things together. On my own, I become discombobulated in the kitchen or the supermarket, and I don’t drive. Who will pay the bills? I’m hopeless when it comes to math and paperwork. Who can I trust? I’ve been bullied and taken advantage of my whole life. I have acquaintances but no real friends. My close relatives are deceased. With so few services or supports in place for people like me—a verbally high-functioning 40+ autistic adult with severe deficits in executive functioning and spatial skills—where is the ramp for me?   

As the mother of an ASD adult, I view Gyasi’s situation from a different perspective.

While I share our community’s concerns with those on the spectrum transitioning into adulthood and aging out of publicly funded services and supports, I still lament the fact that a significant segment of older ASD adults—those like my son who will never “age out” because they never “aged in,” those who were born before the Americans with Disabilities Act became enforceable law—continue to be ignored.            

I will always cherish the sometimes joyous, sometimes tortuous moments I shared with Gyasi providing “Mommy therapy,” wearing a head scarf to waylay his affectionate,  excruciatingly painful vise-like grip on my hair, or teaching him not to walk like a duck or talk like a robot. And I consider myself lucky that, bereft of precedent, I helped change his prognosis from a mentally retarded individual unable to graduate from sixth grade to a man whose academic achievements pale only in light of his generosity of spirit. I can help but agonize over what’s going to happen to Gyasi when I, too, “age out” and no appropriate programs and supports exist to take my place.