My Story

I was diagnosed with Autism at the age of 8. Before I was diagnosed I seemed to be a fairly typical kid who just loved life, however that all changed when I reached primary school. For the first two years, I mostly sat in class with the occasional bit of pencil sharpening. I couldn’t read until grade 2 and if that wasn’t bad enough I also had no concept of time. This of course meant I was constantly late to school, however instead of my primary school trying to understand the reason I was late they decided to punish me in a way no 21st century student should be.

One day I arrived at school at the usual late time, however this day was different. I was not given a late pass and as far as I know I was not signed into school which meant no one knew I was there. I was asked to sit and wait for the vice principal who than lead me into his office and told me I was not to leave that office for the entire day. I was a prisoner and his office was about the same size as a prison cell, if not smaller. No one was ever told about this incident not even my mother as I was too scared that it would happen again to tell her. This all happened before my diagnosis, however believe it or not things got worse after I was diagnosed.

knew how to ‘fix’ me. I was put into special classes that taught me useless life skills such as how to read a phone book and baking packet mix cakes instead of the typical things someone my age should have been learning.

When I reached secondary school things didn’t get much better, as due to my primary school I was academically behind the rest of my peers. My first semester reports showed that I was two years behind in math alone and that I needed immediate help. I began to doubt that I could ever reach year 12 let alone finish it. That is where my wonderful mother stepped in to help. After school each night throughout year 7 she taught me a total of 3 years’ worth of math just so I could be at the same level as everyone else.

After year 7, thanks to the support of my mother, everything began to improve I was no longer being bullied and I was coping better with the schoolwork, however, I continued to hide my diagnosis for another 3 years afraid of how people would perceive me.

On the 10th of April 2016 I came home disappointed in how my peers were using autism as a way to insult other students and even teachers, so I did what any typical teenager does. I logged onto facebook and began to write a post that would soon change my life and those of the people it reached. In this post I vented my frustration and disappointment of my peers and revealed to the world for the first time that I was on the autism spectrum. After this post I felt relieved, however also somewhat anxious as to how my peers where going to react.

as it turns out I had nothing to fear, everyone treated me the same as before, some had questions of course but it was nothing I couldn’t handle. This was the beginning of my advocacy journey as after this day I kept writing about my experiences as an autistic individual in hopes I could help others on the spectrum be true to themselves. This led me to starting a facebook page which then led to some speaking engagements and; well the rest is history.

This is my story, however I am not alone in my experiences as at the time of you reading this somewhere in the world someone else is on a similar journey but this doesn’t have to be the case.

You can help create a more autism friendly world by sharing this story with others, or even by organising me to come facilitate a workshop in your local community.

Together we can create a world that accepts, includes and embraces human diversity.

Thank You

Bryce Pace

Autism Advocate, Consultant, Speaker