My Mission and My Autism

These thoughts have been milling around my brain today and I want to write about them. I have Autism and Attention Deficit Disorder. My A.D.D. doesn’t affect me much because I took myself off Ritalin a year ago. However, my Autism is still affecting and will affect me my whole life. What’s so frustrating is that I don’t know how much it affects me and how much different I am from the norm. I don’t even know what is a normal person. I think that everyone is different in his or her own little ways. Then, why do I stand out from other people?

I’m writing about this because it just got in the way of me going on my mission. Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to go on my mission. I mostly want to go because I want to get the benefits that result on going on a mission. I want to grow closer to Heavenly Father and the Holy Ghost. I want to recognize the difference between my thoughts and the Holy Ghost’s promptings. I want to help to build up the Kingdom of God. Now, because of my Autism I can’t go.

More than a month ago, I saw a counselor that was recommended by my family’s bishop. He asked me many weird questions like, “What does your tears mean?” when I got upset. I thought that the missionary evaluation went very well because I didn’t see any problems with me going on a mission. Last week, the counselor and my family’s bishop recommended to my bishop that I shouldn’t go on my mission. Therefore, last Sunday my bishop said that I can’t go on a full time mission and I can be a ward missionary instead. I cried all day because it was such a major blow. Now, I want to go back and talk to my bishop tomorrow and ask why they recommended me that I shouldn’t go on a mission. My parents have always told me that I can do any thing in the world if I wanted to. Going on a mission is one of those things I want to do.

I know that my bishop can receive revelation from Heavenly Father for me. Did he honestly pray to Heavenly Father that I should go on a mission? If he did and God said no, I wouldn’t question his answer. The way that I see it, is that I can go on a mission, it’s just God doesn’t want to me go when I’m young. If my bishop didn’t and just accepted the advice from the other bishop and counselor, I’m going to question it until I see valid reasons for their decision.

Right now, I’m somewhat leery of the counselor. I know that he evaluated me to see if I can go on my mission or not. However, is an hour enough time to make that decision? I’m leery towards the counselor because of an experience. When I was a senior in high school, I took a standardized test to see how well I was going to do in college by a psychologist. In his evaluation, he said that wouldn’t be able to graduate with a four-year degree because I wasn’t going to do well in college. I think he said that I’m going to be horrible in math because I had him constantly repeat the numbers that I had to repeat back to him. All I remember is that he defiantly miss-evaluated me. Therefore, the person that had me evaluated said that I shouldn’t pursue my pre-vet education and said that I should pursue a degree in accounting or radiology. I proved them wrong because I’m not having any problems in school. In addition, I have taken hard classes like chemistry and calculus. Right now, my GPA is 3.67.

I don’t know if my family’s bishop should have any say because he doesn’t even know me. There is a guy who has Autism who’s around the same age as me in his ward. From what I heard from my family, I know he’s worse that me. Is the bishop basing his recommendation from what he knows from that guy? I hope not because Autistics can be very different from each other.

I’ll never know why Heavenly Father gave me Autism. In the Book of Mormon, in Ether 12: 26-27 God said: “And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them. Behold, I will show unto the Gentiles their weakness, and I will show unto them that faith, hope and charity bringeth unto me—the fountain of all righteousness.” I know Heavenly Father will help me with my weaknesses and make them strong in His own due time. If He helped me in school, He’ll help me with my Autism.

Blue Belt

I was awarded a blue belt last Friday, which means that I'm officially a 6th kyu in my dojo. I don't really consider this a promotion because I was already a 6th kyu in my old dojo. All along I considered myself much better than the green (7th kyu) and blue belts. However, I'm not as good as the purple belts (5th kyu). I thought I was better because I knew more kata than they did. Green belts were just learning Saifa. I already mastered that until Sensei led me through it and taught me all of the little details. However, they know bunkai and spar better than I.

I knew that I was going to test next month. Three weeks ago, I talked to Sensei Jen that I don't know when I'm going to test and probably it won't be for a long time. Sensei overheard and said that I was going to test next month because I need to get moving along. So, I went to the testing for April because I wanted to train in the atmosphere that I'll be testing in next month. I really like testing days because it's like my old dojo. We keep doing techniques repeatedly until Sensei tells us to stop. By the end of testing, I’m tired and sweaty. I’m never like that in a normal class.