Paperback: £12.99 / $18.95
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2007, 234mm x 156mm / 9.25in x 6in, 176pp
ISBN: 978-1-84310-846-7, BIC 2: JNSG
Chapter 1
My Own Experiences of Being Bullied
A young boy with Asperger's Syndrome once said to me, "I just don't know why bullying was ever invented." Unfortunately, I don't think this child's inquiry will ever be adequately answered. We are both human and animal, carrying the predatory instincts we share with our animal friends. However, I believe our goal as a species should be to rise above these destructive impulses. As higher-order beings, it is morality that differentiates us from all other creatures that walk the earth.
Morality is a curious word these days. I certainly do not want to sound preachy by using it, but I believe the word is appropriate for our discussion. Since few people are willing to be the moral arbitrators on the subject of bullying, especially with regards to the Asperger population, I am glad to assume the role.
I believe anyone who ignores bullying is immoral. Growing up, I was all too often the victim of such nasty, preventable attacks and I want to do everything in my power to make sure vulnerable populations are protected from bullies.
The impact of bullying
It was a late August day in 2004, the day before my first day as a doctoral student in psychology at the Michigan School for Professional Psychology. I was a wreck. My mind was very much entangled with the past. Entering the building, I was afraid of being teased. I was sure I wouldn't fit in and everyone would notice it. I thought people would laugh at me, make fun of me, or, worse, ignore me. My fears were completely irrational. Why would adult students in a doctoral program, in psychology no less, act like this?
I think back to that day and realize my fears had nothing to do with this group of students who would be my classmates for the next four years. I had never even met them before. It was clear that I was suffering from a Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) response that was triggered in me. This was not a new response for me. I had been having these kinds of PTSD episodes from childhood all the way through adulthood.
I once had a conversation with my grandmother that I found rather illuminating. My Grandma Clara is 88 years old and still remarkably sharp for her age. In talking to her about my role in bullying prevention with schools and agencies, she proceeded to tell me an interesting anecdote from her childhood:
'You know, Nick, this reminds me of something from when I was a schoolgirl. I remember that there was a girl who was constantly picking on me. It became so bad that I finally told the teacher. I'll never forget what the teacher's reply was: "Clara dear, 20 years from now, you won't remember this. Don't make such a big deal about it."'
Clearly, her teacher was wrong. Not only does my grandmother still remember being bullied, she remembers the ignorant statement made by this particular teacher over 75 years ago. Unfortunately, too many teachers would say the same thing today. Being bullied is something that stays with you for life.
When I contemplated writing this book, I knew that it meant I had to take myself to a very sad place. In order for this book to have the maximum effect, I was going to have to tell all. I realized that the reader of this book would not understand my intentions for writing this book unless I disclosed these painful episodes of being bullied. That is part of my personal history. Therefore, this chapter will focus on those traumatic events.
First, I want to discuss incidents of bullying by a teacher or an employer because I believe these acts are the most traumatic type of bullying that exists. My definition of teacher and employer bullying is when persons of authority use their power to engage in a purposeful power struggle where the goal is not to help a person, but rather to demean him or her. In essence, when a person of authority bullies someone, it opens the door to condoning peer bullying.
Several personal instances of this type of bullying painfully come to mind.
Opening the door
I often speak at conferences on the subject of bullying, and the first incident is one I mention at every conference I speak at involving bullying prevention. It took place when I was a second grader at Pembroke Elementary School in Birmingham, Michigan.
The incident began in the Learning Resource Center (LRC) classroom where another girl and I were asked by our teacher to go down the hall to a second-grade classroom and remind a couple of other students who had forgotten to come to the LRC room that day. When we arrived at the room, we could see that the teacher was busy conducting a lesson. The other girl, who I will call Jennifer, suggested that I knock on the door rather than just barging in, so I followed her suggestion. The teacher, who I'll refer to as Mrs. B, waved her hand, signaling for us to come in. Jennifer told me to open the door. I tried turning the door handle but, for some reason, it seemed stuck and wouldn't open. After what seemed like 30 seconds, the teacher saw that we were still standing outside the door. I suppose Jennifer could have simply opened the door and made life easier on me, but she chose not to do so. Mrs. B was growing impatient. She walked over, opened the door, and said sarcastically in front of the whole class, "Didn't I say that you could come in?"
"Yes, you did," I said.
"Well then, what's the problem? I'm closing the door and I want you to open it."
Once again, I tried opening the door without any success. At this point, I could see that other kids in the class were laughing at me.
"Mrs. B, I can't open the door."
"That's absurd. How old are you?"
"Eight years old," I said.
"You are eight years old, in the second grade, and you're telling me that you can't open a door?"
"I can't open this door. It won't open," I said timidly.
"This is ridiculous. Jennifer, I'm going to close the door and I want you to open it," Mrs. B said. By this time, I was completely humiliated, but I was somewhat relieved that she asked Jennifer to open the door. I was convinced that at least I would not be the only one who Mrs. B was going to embarrass. I fully expected that Jennifer would try opening the door and would fail as miserably as I did. Much to my surprise, the strangest thing happened. Jennifer opened the door with ease.
"See!" said Mrs. B. "You saw her open the door. Now, you open this door right now. This instant! You're eight years old. Now start acting like it." At this point, my jaw dropped to the floor. There wasn't something wrong with the door after all. There was something wrong with…me. In that moment, my whole perception of reality was turned upside down.
Once again I tried my best to open the door without any success. I was sweating while the kids were now rolling on the ground laughing. I felt that this horrific moment would never end. As if things weren't bad enough, Mrs. B provided the fatal blow to this humiliating experience.
"Oh my goodness, I cannot believe my eyes! Jennifer, I want you to open this door again." Of course, she did. And, of course, I was wishing that I was invisible.
"Now look, I'm getting tired of this. If you think this is funny, it's not. And if you don't open this door right now, you are going to be in big trouble. Do you want to be suspended from school?"
"No," I said almost in a whisper.
"Then open this door immediately." I tried again and failed. For a third time, Mrs. B asked Jennifer to open the door. And, for a third time, she did. By now, everyone in the class was laughing hysterically, watching what was taking place.
"This is last time I'm going to tell you. Open this door."
I knew that no matter what I did, I wasn't going to open the door. It was locked as far as I was concerned. Jennifer had just found some secret way of opening it and I hated her for it. Realizing that I was going to suffer more humiliation, I ran down the hall all the way to the office. I was inconsolable. The secretary in the office tried to understand what happened to me, but I was emotionally out of control. I was hyperventilating, screaming, and crying.
I was still in the same emotional and physical state when my parents arrived at school. Eventually, I was able to articulate what happened, and they communicated this to the principal so that my "meltdown" made sense to him.
Years later I learned that the reason I couldn't open the door was because it was one of those knobs you had to turn counterclockwise. Being characteristically rigid as a person with Asperger's, I thought doorknobs could only be turned clockwise. When turning the handle clockwise did not work, it never even entered my mind that I needed to turn the knob counterclockwise. I could have been there for a week trying to open that door and I don't think I would have ever considered the possibility of turning the knob in the opposite direction. Jennifer was not smarter than me. Her thought processes were just more flexible.
Why did Mrs. B bully me? Most likely she thought I was challenging her authority. Because she somehow felt threatened by my behavior, her fight-or-flight mechanisms kicked in. Instead of simply trying to understand why I was having trouble opening the door, she made an incorrect assumption about my intention. In her mind, there was no reason an eight-year-old couldn't open a door, and the only reasonable explanation was that I was challenging her authority. The truth of the matter was that my Asperger's was causing me to behave rigidly. Instead of trying to figure out why I was having trouble opening the door, she got angry. All she had to do was show me that the knob had to be turned the other way, and I probably would not remember this incident as an adult some 20 years later.
As a result of Mrs. B's incorrect assumption, she committed the number one cardinal sin as a teacher. She bullied a student. She condoned bullying in front of an entire classroom. What a powerful message she sent to all of the other students who witnessed and perhaps even enjoyed watching this event.
Locked in the bathroom
In the summer of 1994, I received a phone call from a tennis instructor who I hadn't seen in several years. He had read my name in the latest Southeast Michigan Tennis Association (SEMTA) magazine where I was ranked number one in the division for boys age 16. Impressed with how I had risen in the ranks, Ron asked me if I would come and work for him during the summer as a tennis instructor at a nearby prestigious country club in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. I was extremely flattered that he had called me and, without thinking twice, I accepted the job.
During the first week on the job, it seemed, at times, he was talking to me in a condescending way and I wondered if I was imagining things. It seemed as if I was being treated with less respect than my co-workers. I wasn't sure if he was just teasing me or ridiculing me. As the weeks went on, I began to realize that it wasn't my imagination. Ron started calling me the "waddler" because he thought the way I walked was like a duck with a waddle. Not only that, Ron encouraged the children who I was teaching to call me that. So it wasn't unusual for one of the children taking lessons to come up to me and say, "Hi, Waddler." Can you imagine how degrading that was for me?
Things only got worse. One day Ron totally stepped over the line. During one of the tennis lessons, I went to use the restroom facilities located beyond the tennis clubhouse. As I was in the bathroom, little did I know that Ron was scheming to demean me in front of all the children. Ron's plan was to have all the kids hold the door shut so I couldn't get out. I was struggling to open the door while ten children were trying to keep me trapped in the bathroom. To make a long story short, this prank went on for at least three minutes. By the time they finally let me out, I was so angry I left the club that day, went home and cried. Again, I was shaken to the core. It brought back memories of being in second grade when I couldn't open the door.
Besides these negative experiences with teachers, I also suffered needlessly as a result of my fellow classmates' unchecked behavior.
The handcuff incident
In 1987, I was a third grader at Pembroke Elementary School. One day, a classmate, Stewart, invited me to play with him and another boy, Ralph, after school. I was elated. After all, it wasn't every day that I got invited to play with someone. Stewart told me to meet them at a neighborhood park after school.
This park was situated right behind our house. Our backyard was literally on the outer edge of the park. This fact becomes important as it permitted my dad to save me from a dire situation. The park was empty at 3:30p.m. when I arrived. There was no sign of anyone. I wondered if Stewart and Ralph had forgotten about meeting me. I waited five or ten minutes and was about to leave when I saw Stewart and Ralph racing towards me on their bikes. I was once again elated that they hadn't forgotten about me, but the good feelings were short lived. Who would have suspected that these two had a plan that would cause me great humiliation?
Here's what happened: Stewart and Ralph asked me to come over to the swing set. Once there, Stewart said we were going to play a game of "cops and robbers" and that I should put both my arms up against the swing poles. Having no reason to believe that Stewart was trying to trick me, I cooperated. Stewart then proceeded to handcuff both my arms to the swing and, immediately thereafter, he and Ralph took off on their bikes. At first I thought they were going to just leave me there, but they decided to torture me. They began riding their bikes around the block shouting "sucker" every time they rode by the swing set, with me standing there completely helpless. I totally panicked and began shouting for them to come back. The more I screamed, the more they taunted me. The pressure of the handcuffs against my wrists was unbearable and the fact that I couldn't move terrified me. I wondered how long they would keep me there.
For about a half hour, I was in an empty park screaming my head off with no help forthcoming. I was hoping a police officer might drive by and see me. A neighbor. A mailman. Anyone! Most of all, I was hoping my parents would hear me. Eventually my father did. He had just come home from work when he heard me yelling in the park. As soon as he heard my hysterical screams, he rushed outside to see what was going on. Stewart and Ralph saw my dad running towards the park and immediately came to unlock the handcuffs. Stewart arrived at the swing set before my dad so he could purposefully create an explanation to give to my father. He said to me: "You'd better tell him we were playing cops and robbers. You're not a tattletale, are you, Nick?"
"What the hell is going on here?" my dad shouted.
"Nothing much," Stewart said. "We were just playing cops and robbers, weren't we Nick?" I didn't say anything.
"That's not what it looks like to me," my dad said.
"Yeah, we were playing cops and robbers," Ralph reassured my father. Again, I didn't say anything.
"Nick, is that true?" I was silent.
"Nick, I want you to come home right now."
I gladly abided by my dad's wishes. Once home, I told my father exactly what happened. As angry as my dad was about what happened to me, I think he felt worse that my so-called friends weren't my friends at all.
The next day something interesting happened. Stewart and Ralph were playing in the park and they saw me shooting baskets in my backyard. Probably because they knew my dad was angry with them, they came over and acted as if they were still my friends, and to see whether he believed the whole "cops and robbers" story. As soon as my father saw them coming, he came outside as angry as I've ever seen him. I'll never forget his words to Stewart and Ralph.
'Look, you two, if you guys want to be Nick's friend, that's one thing. But from what I saw yesterday, you two did just about the meanest thing I've ever seen done to someone. Stewart, I know your story about "cops and robbers" was a bunch of baloney. I'm not stupid, son. If you think that you can do this to Nick and get away with it, you're wrong. Now you are welcome to be Nick's friend, but you are not welcome to bully or abuse him. Do I make myself clear?'
And then, do you know what Stewart and Ralph did? They immediately got on their bikes and rode away. They never asked me to play with them again, nor did they ever mess with me again.
Rain Man
I remember that I was once deeply hurt by a friend of mine who was a tennis buddy. My friend Jake, along with a friend of Jake's, and I were to room together at Oberlin Tennis Camp for a week. On the way to Oberlin, I remember commenting to Jake about the shape of various telephone poles as we were traveling along the highway. I was convinced that depending on the area code you were in, the shape of the telephone pole would look slightly different. Jake seemed interested in my thoughts, but it probably was just the appearance of interest.
Later on in the week, my friend Jake and his friend began calling me "Rain Man," in reference to Dustin Hoffman's character in the movie, Rain Man. I told them to knock it off but they wouldn't stop. Finally, I asked them why they were calling me that. Jake responded, "Anyone who's interested in telephone poles has got to have something in common with the Rain Man." It was a very hurtful statement. I couldn't understand why my friend was comparing me to someone who was autistic. It wasn't until 2004 that some of these mysterious questions I had been asking myself over the years began to resolve themselves through my Asperger Syndrome diagnosis.
The preacher
Around the time I was in high school, I started developing what I thought was a "comedic routine" known as "the preacher." Essentially, I imitated an evangelical reverend doing "call and response" with his congregation. This routine became so popular that, before I knew it, the whole high school was aware of it. Every day, people would come up to me and ask me to do "the preacher." It became a little tiresome after a while, but I didn't mind the attention. As a matter of fact, I thought that doing the routine would help make me popular. People would see how funny I was, and then they would want to be my friends. What I didn't realize was that these people were laughing at me, not with me.
Sometimes, kids would bully me into doing "the preacher." "C'mon Nick, you haven't done it for two weeks now. It's time." I felt that if I didn't perform, they wouldn't like me. "C'mon, why won't you do it? You're being stubborn. Everyone wants to see you do it! Nick, do it! Right now, or else! Do you want me to beat you up?"
Usually these threats were enough to make me comply. Sometimes, crowds of 20 or more would gather around me once the word spread that I was about to perform. Initially, doing "the preacher" seemed like a great way to make friends but after a while it became a chore. By the time I graduated from high school, I had figured out that doing "the preacher" was not the way to gain popularity as I had hoped.
Being ignored
I think excluding someone is a form of covert bullying. The tennis team I was on in high school excluded me socially. Now in part, this was only natural, since I did not share any of their interests, such as dating, drinking, and partying. But now when I watch my senior high tennis banquet on video, I notice something very interesting. No one spoke to me. At my table, all the kids on my team were talking and joking around, but I was totally excluded from all conversation. I certainly had difficulty socializing with my peers, but no one was willing to help include me in the conversation.
The really amazing thing about all this is that I was the number one singles player on my varsity tennis team for all four years. I was the team captain and had been designated "the most valuable player." I was the only player designated as "All State." Logically, I should have been the most popular kid on the team. I was the equivalent of the star quarterback of a football team. However, I wasn't popular. I don't think I was disliked. I just had nothing in common with my teammates other than our mutual interest in tennis.
Why do I care?
The episodes I have just recounted are just a few examples of my daily reality growing up. There were times when these incidents made me contemplate suicide. Was life really worth living under these circumstances? However, rather than seeking sympathy, I am trying to make an important point: most of these painful episodes could have been prevented. If there is nothing else you take away from this book, it is that bullying prevention is possible, as will be detailed in the chapters on empowerment.
I hope it has become apparent why I am so passionate about bullying prevention and those who are diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Because of how I am hard wired neurologically, I was an incredibly easy target for all parties involved: teachers, employers, and peers. I have been wounded deeply by all that has happened to me. For many years during adolescence, I was afraid to be seen in public. I would never leave my parents' house on weekends for fear that someone from school might see me. I was constantly tormented by the thought of running into someone for fear that person would ridicule me. More importantly, being bullied put me in a serious state of depression for many years. There were several times throughout my adolescence when I wanted to die. The thought of going to school every day and having to face those who would either ignore or make fun of me was often too much to bear.
The reason I have made bullying prevention one of my life's missions is because I do not want to see other children go through the same (or possibly worse) torment I endured when all of it could have been prevented. Though I am a much different person now than I was then, some of the "psychic scars" will be with me for life. These memories are, unfortunately, forever ingrained as a part of who I am.
It has become apparent to me, through the research that I have done and my own personal experiences, that bullying is a life-or-death issue. If we as a worldwide community do not respond to what is happening to our children, some of them will be permanently damaged or even attempt suicide (Field and Marr 2001). I feel fortunate now to be able to speak out on bullying. I have the knowledge and self-awareness to make sense of my past and understand the dangers of bullying. I can now use my life's energies to try to combat and eradicate bullying.
The rest of this book will focus specifically on defining the problem and finding solutions. To fully empower ourselves we need to understand why individuals on the autism spectrum are such easy targets for bullying.
How To Be Yourself in a World That's Different: An Asperger Syndrome Study Guide for Adolescents
Yuko Yoshida M.D.
Translated by Esther Sanders
Understanding Nonverbal Learning Disabilities: A Common-Sense Guide for Parents and Professionals
Maggie Mamen
Friendships: The Aspie Way
Wendy Lawson
Asperger Syndrome and Employment: A Personal Guide to Succeeding at Work
Nick Dubin
With Gail Hawkins
