Your child is not angry, your child is afraid

The misconception of fear and anger in autistic children

Whenever I hear other people talking about their childhood, I listen to them talking about mostly happy memories, how they played outside in the summer, the visits at their grandparents or the trip to Disneyland.

When people ask me about my childhood, the first thing which comes to my mind is: Fear.

I remember being afraid nearly every day of my life.

Every time I tell people about my fearful childhood, others quickly share their own experience with fear. Their stories usually end with sentences like ‘’ my granny always brought me ice cream when I was afraid’’, or ‘’ mummy came to me and hugged me tied until I felt safe again’’.

My story usually ends with the memory of being punished.

As an autistic child, a lot of things made me feel afraid and overwhelmed. I remember the time when my parents lived in a house 20 minutes away from a train station. As much as I liked to see the trains from my window, I hated the vibrations they caused.

My parents never understood why I would scream and run and jump on the table ( I didn’t even care if we were in the middle of the dinner). Every 20 minutes when the next train approached the station, I was able to feel something which no one else seemed to recognise.

It started with a slide tingly feeling at the sole of my feed. My heart started racing, and my hands became sweaty. I knew I just had seconds to get off the floor.

Within a blink of an eye, the feeling of deep vibrations would crawl up my legs to my knees, making me feel as if the floor would swallow me.

In a panic, I would look around to find anything in the room I could hold on to — everything which would help me not to touch the floor with my feed.

In my hysteria, I became quite creative: I jumped in the middle of the dinner table at a family gathering, landing in the middle of the potato salad.

I climbed up a bookshelf knowing fully well that it would collapse with my weight on, but it was enough time to get me off the floor when the train arrived.

I knew I couldn’t get on the sofa or a chair, as these types of furniture seemed to transport the vibrations even more.

In my desperate attempt to escape these uncomfortable sensory feeling, I tried nearly everything.

Once I got an electric shock when I tried to hold onto an electrical cable on the roof, other days when I knew I don’t have any other choice, my last hope was to jump on other people. I would run and jump straight on their back, holding on to their neck.

I didn’t just ‘’ use’’ family members; I grabbed every person around me: the neighbour, the postman, everyone.

We lived next to a train line where every 22 minutes a train from both sides would arrive. Which meant: every 22 minutes of my childhood, I would freak out: day and night.

When I was 12 years old, I finally found a solution for myself — I decided to sleep in a hammock in the attic. It seemed the only solution for me no to get tormented by these vibrations.

It is needless to say that my parents weren’t happy about my behaviour. My parents never understood why I screamed, why I cried, why I freaked out. All my parents saw was a child who has random tantrums and needs to be punished for this misbehaviour.

What I never understood was that my parents never felt what I was able to feel. My parents never even recognised the vibrations of the trains. For my parents, I was fighting a fight against an invisible enemy.

This wasn’t the only situation where my parents responded with punishment to my anxious, fearful behaviour.

I remember when I was sitting in my favourite spot on a lovely summer day in our garden.

I loved this place between the flowers and the pond, and I could spend hours sitting there watching the fishes.

But suddenly something happened. I felt a shooting pain in my ears, which made me cry. There was a high ringing tone in my ears which seemed to resonate in my head. I pressed my hands against my ears, but nothing seemed to be able to stop the sound.

I run inside the house, crying and full of panic, but the sound didn’t stop. I buried my head underneath the sofa pillows, but again nothing stopped the noise. I started to scream, louder and louder from the top of my lungs. My parents came running towards me. I looked at them and screamed to ‘’ make it stop.’’

But once again, my parents weren’t able to hear what I heard.

The situation escalated over the next view days. I screamed I hit, I bit and in the end, I did run away.

Not far, just down the road and decided from now on I will live in front of the candy shop. Of course, again, my parents weren’t happy about my behaviour.

A view weeks later, my parents found out that our neighbour had installed an ultrasonic device against mice in his garden. Even though it said clearly

‘’ safe around humans’’ and no one else seemed to be able to hear what I heard — I recognised the mice trap loud and clear. I did freak out until the neighbour removed it from his garden. My parents couldn’t imagine for a very long time that I was able to hear things no one else seemed to be able to understand.

When I look back today, my whole childhood was a chain of events like the once above.

The world around me made me afraid. My parents weren’t able to feel what I felt. They weren’t able to hear what I heard, and in the end, my parents always saw a child who has a temper tantrum instead of an overwhelmed child.

I hope that today, more parents of autistic children are aware of our invisible enemies. We see and hear things you will never understand and a lot of times we are unable to express our emotions in a way that they can be understood.

And most of the times, we are not angry, we are afraid.

Photo by Marco Albuquerque on Unsplash

Photo by Marco Albuquerque on Unsplash