Tag Archives: suicidal

The Horrifying Events that Changed A Young Man’s Life

Posted on January 13, 2015 by | 46 comments

There’s a young man, his name is Reginald.  Everyone calls him Neli.  He was on the high school wrestling team, wore a key on a chain around his neck, liked to hold three playing cards, loved his hoodie, repeated “television and movie lines ” and carried a “string that he runs through his fingers.” He was described as being shy and he liked going to his local library, which was two miles from his home.  But one day none of that mattered.  One day someone saw Neli sitting on the grass outside the library waiting for it to open.  They called the police, reporting a “suspicious male, wearing a hoodie, possibly in possession of a gun.”

Neli is black.

Neli is also Autistic.

All the schools within a few miles of the library “went on lockdown.”  SWAT teams were called in.  That’s at least five schools, though one report said it was eight.  Five schools.  Eight schools.  Lock down.  SWAT team.  All because an anonymous source said they saw someone suspicious sitting outside a library.

Suspicious could mean any number of things.  Maybe it means someone who moves differently, keeps their head down, stares at their feet, doesn’t look you in the eye when you speak to them or doesn’t answer you at all when you ask them a question.  Maybe they rock back and forth as they stand or sit, maybe it means they run a piece of string through their fingers or maybe they twirl it around and around the way my daughter does.

Neli was found, frisked and was unarmed.  This is where the story should have ended.  It is at this point that the situation should have been diffused.  This is where the person who had the ability to calm things down could have, but chose not to.  Maybe a parent, teacher, someone in the community who knew him, who could have vouched for him might have stepped in.  Except the school resource officer who approached Neli and frisked him, did know him or at least had seen him at his high school.  Whatever he knew or didn’t know wasn’t helpful as Neli’s life was about to get much, much worse.  Neli was forced down over the hood of a car and told he was being taken in.

According to one report Neli cried, “I didn’t do anything wrong!” The arresting officer replied, “You don’t have to – Welcome to Stafford County.”  Then he held a gun to Neli’s head and said, “I will blow your head off, nigger.” Neli fought back and in doing so the officer was hurt.

The jury deliberated for three days, found Neli guilty of “assaulting a police officer among other charges” and recommended a sentence of ten and a half years.

Ten and a half years.

The judge disagreed and sentenced Reginald Latson to two years in prison with time served.  Except Reginald had done nothing wrong.  Except that ONE YEAR in prison for seeming “suspicious” to someone is not justice.

“Suspicious” could mean someone who utters lines from a favorite movie or says something that is considered out of context or not relevant to the conversation.  Or maybe suspicious means “not white” and when combined with any of these other things this results in people imagining there’s a weapon as well.  Or maybe not being white is all it takes.  But one thing is certain, being viewed “suspicious” and black and Autistic in today’s world can get you locked up, sentenced by a jury of your peers to ten and a half years, put in solitary confinement for most of your time in prison, and when you’re broken, when you give up the will to live and try to kill yourself, it’s enough reason to put you in a straight jacket, restrain you for hours, hours in a chair, and then slap you with another charge to make sure you never get out of prison.

The Bazelon Center wrote before sentencing last week:

 This counterproductive and inhumane cycle continues with charges Latson is scheduled to face this week stemming from an altercation with a prison guard that occurred when he was being moved to a crisis cell while in psychiatric crisis and suicidal.  There was no serious injury to anyone in this incident other than Latson, who was shot with a Taser and bound for hours in a restraint chair.  Nonetheless, a new felony prosecution was initiated.

As I write this Neli has been sentenced to another six months in prison.  This is beyond unacceptable.  Neli should never have been charged to begin with.  None of this should have happened.  But it did.

A massive number of people have been working hard to gain Neli’s release.  At this moment it could not be easier to do something that could help.  If you only have a moment, sign this petition that my friend Kerima Cevik of the blog Intersected started.

Please.  It literally takes less than 60 seconds to add your signature to this petition.

Grant a pardon to Reginald Cornelius “Neli” Latson

If you have more time, please contact the Governor’s office directly Phone: 804-786-2211; via email by clicking here or on Twitter @GovernorVA and add your voice to thousands of others.

Neli Latson before his arrest

Neli Latson before his arrest

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Posted in anxiety, Autism, autistic

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Peering into the Darkness

Posted on September 5, 2013 by | 23 comments

Sometimes there is such tremendous darkness, it scares me.  Sometimes my instinct is to go deeper into the darkness.  Sometimes my instincts are not helpful.  Sometimes my instincts lead me the wrong way.  Sometimes…

When I was in my thirties I went down into the darkness, so deep I began to wonder if I would ever find my way out.  There was a moment, a moment when I stood at the edge and contemplated the void.  It felt blissful.  The darkness seemed to hold the answers I sought.  The darkness held the promise of calm and peace and quiet from all the noise and pain.  It beckoned to me and I believed, for a moment, I believed it was the answer.

I would like to report that in a single instant I made the decision to step back from the edge, but it wasn’t like that.  It was hard to move away.  It was difficult and painful and there was nothing elegant or easy about it.  Stepping away was more like an agonizing scramble of falling, tumbling backwards and clawing forward, grabbing on to whatever scrap of hope I could find.  Some days felt like a slow, steady, groveling crawl on my hands and knees just to get through the hours that make up a day.  And on those days I believed this would be my life forever and I wondered how I could continue.  It was on those days, when I believed I knew what the future held, those were the days that were the hardest.

There are tricks I learned, little things I learned to do, some are silly perhaps, but I do them anyway.  When things feel like they are too much, I tell myself I can get through the next hour, just one hour without hurting myself or anyone else.  Just for the next hour, I will not do or say anything that will cause harm.  Just for this next hour.  And when that hour passes, I take the next hour, one hour at a time.  I have done this for many years now and funnily enough, this method of taking one small manageable segment of time and being present for whatever it may bring continues to work.  During those early days when all of this was new to me, I even gave myself permission to do whatever it was that I wanted to do, but knew it would hurt me after the hour had passed.  Then the hour would pass and I would see I had gotten through it and I would say, okay, just one more hour.  I can get through one more hour.  And I did one hour at a time, I did.

I learned to make phone calls or text people I trust and know are safe.  I let them in, I asked for help.  Sometimes help meant listening to another person, sometimes it meant they listened to me.   I learned I had choices, even when it felt that I did not.  People had to remind me to do the thing that everything in my being screamed at me not to do – reach out in kindness to another.  Sometimes even when I could not muster up the strength to be kind to myself I could show kindness to another, so I do at least three anonymous acts of kindness. (Using the present tense now.)  The anonymous part is important.  It’s imperative that my actions are not about getting thanks or being appreciated, but are about actively taking actions where I can be the person, even if only for a few minutes, I would like to one day grow up to be.

I look back on those years, so long ago now and no longer recognize that person who contemplated the darkness.  I do not know her.  She is unfamiliar to me and I’m grateful.  Mine is but one experience, there are countless others.  I have no answers.  All I know is that to keep the life I now enjoy, a life I could not imagine myself ever having, a life that, so many years ago, would have seemed too good to be true, I must do certain things on a daily basis to make sure that tomorrow and the next day will not involve being anywhere near the edge where I am tempted to peer down into that pit of darkness and contemplate its depths.

If you or someone you know is struggling, reach out for help.  Tell someone else, let them help and remember you are not alone.

23 Comments

Posted in Addiction, depression, hope

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There is Always Hope, Sometimes It’s Hard To Find

Posted on August 22, 2012 by | 22 comments

Sometimes I feel completely inadequate in the face of our society’s insanity.  Sometimes I wish I weren’t a part of the human race.  Sometimes I feel so much rage at all that’s WRONG with the world, with the mess we’ve made of our planet and each other.  Sometimes I just want to go live in a cave in some part of the world that isn’t inhabited by other people, just me, my husband, my children and a few select others.  I want to build a new world, a new community, a new set of societal rules where minority doesn’t equal less.  Where prejudices weren’t tolerated, where people helped each other without expectations of what they would get in return.  A place where people understood that the reward in helping and being of service to our fellow human beings was in the act of doing and not in the form of monetary gain, gold medals, our names engraved on plaques or statues carved in our likeness.

I spent most of my twenties and half of my thirties in hiding.  I hid inside my eating disorder.  I drank more alcohol than my body could cope with, I smoked cigarettes, I took drugs, I did anything I could NOT to be present.  Even in those moments when I did manage to show up, I wasn’t really present.  Not completely.  Not really.  I was angry and hated how angry I was.  I was depressed and hated how depressed I was.  I couldn’t face any of it, for so many years, I just couldn’t.  Eventually I became suicidal.  I couldn’t stand the feelings any more.  I was filled with so much rage, I turned it inward and thought the answer was to kill myself.  I remember I fantasized about driving to a state where I could buy a gun.  That was how I wanted it all to end.  I would blow my brains out.  I was seeing a therapist and when I admitted this to him he said, “You have to go to a 12 step program.   You have to find people who are struggling with an eating disorder just as you are.”  When I told him all the reasons why this was not a possibility he leaned forward and said, “What have you got to lose?”  I will never forget that.  I will never forget how he looked at me.  I will never forget the feeling I had when he said those words – “What have you got to lose?”

So I went.  And I hated it.  A bunch of obese people, a couple of anorexics and an assortment of others sitting around talking about how they couldn’t stop eating or starving or obsessing.  I was horrified.  How had I ended up here?  Wasn’t I different?  Wasn’t I better than this?  I remember I looked around that circle of people in that dingy room lit with strands of donated christmas lights, despite the fact that it was March, and the signs with various slogans plastered on the wall – “We came for the vanity and stayed for the sanity”  and “One Day At a Time”  and “Progress not perfection” and I thought to myself, I have entered hell.  This is not what I want.  This is not where I want to be.  I am not one of these people.  I am BETTER than them.  I don’t NEED to be here.

But I stayed.  Because really, where else was I going to go?  I knew what lay outside the door of those rooms.  I knew, left to my own devices, I would binge and puke and rage and cry and binge and puke.  I knew the cycle, I’d been doing it for more than twenty years.  So I kept going to the “meetings” and I bought the literature and people gave me little notes with their phone numbers and hearts on them that I’d promptly throw away, but they kept giving me more notes with more little hearts and more phone numbers and eventually, eventually I called one of these people and they took the time to talk to me.  There were the steps, each one mapped out a way of behaving that was different from the way I lived my life, so I began doing them, never once thinking that those “steps” would become a way to live my life more than a decade later.  There was a great deal of talk about taking the next right action, staying in the present, taking things slowly, changing ingrained behaviors and being of service.  There was talk of “god” and again I felt there was no hope for me.  How could there be?  I didn’t believe.

I have never believed in god, I’ve tried, I just don’t, but I do have faith.  I have faith in human being’s ability to do great things if we are shown how.   Some of us need more help than others.  I’m one of them.  I needed a great deal of patience, support and help.  I needed to have my hand held by those who had once been where I was.  I needed others to show me the way.  I needed to hear about their struggles, I needed to know that I wasn’t alone.

When Emma was diagnosed, I had a road map, instructing me, helping me.  All those meetings spent in dingy basements without heat in the winter or air conditioning in the summer had shown me another way.  I knew, if nothing else, I had to keep showing up.  There were days I didn’t want to.  I’ve done a great number of things I wish I could take back.  I’ve made countless mistakes.  But I know, I know with all my being that hiding, that not showing up, isn’t an option.  So I research, I read, I reach out to Autistics, I listen, I ask questions and I try to learn everything I can so that I can better understand and help my daughter.  In helping my daughter, I am helping myself.  I am helping myself become a better human being.  There are mornings when I wake up and think, What the hell am I doing?  I don’t know how to do this.  I don’t know what the right decision is.  Is this the right school?  Is this the best therapy?   Does she understand?  What would she say if she could communicate her thoughts?  What would she tell me?  

Much of the time I don’t know.  What I do know is that the basic principles and actions that got me free from the grip of my eating disorder are the same actions and principles that help me parent both my children.  Be honest.  Find safe people to talk to.  Have the willingness to show up.  Be present.  Reach out to others.  Ask questions.  Listen.  Really listen.  If I’m overwhelmed, acknowledge that.  Take a break.  Sometimes doing nothing is better than doing something.  But the thing that helps me more than anything else (I know I’ve said this so many times) is to be in conversation with Autistics.  When I am feeling sad or confused, or overwhelmed, or have questions, I reach out to my Autistic friends.  And even when they don’t know the answer to my question, they remind me of what’s possible.  They remind me that my neurotypical take on my daughter is often incorrect.  They remind me of all the misinformation out there.  They remind me of what is important.

So for any of you reading this who are despairing, who feel it’s hopeless, that the divide between your child and you is too great, know this:  There are hundreds and hundreds of verbal and nonverbal Autistic adults who are blogging, on Facebook, on Twitter, they are talking, they are asking to be heard, they are asking to be respected, they are asking for the same rights as any other human being, they are asking to be treated as you would want to be treated.  Reach out to them.  Google, read books, read blogs, get on Twitter and Facebook, do the research, ask questions, make comments.  If you’re suicidal or feeling you can no longer cope, get help.  Get support.  There are a great many organizations like 12-step programs that do not cost anything, but rely solely on donations given voluntarily.  Find the people whose voices resonate and then find more.  Because really, what have you got to lose?

2002 – Me with Em and Nic

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Posted in Autism, hope, Parenting

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For Genisa

Posted on May 2, 2012 by | 7 comments

Someone commented on the Huffington Post piece I wrote – (I hesitated printing it here, because I don’t want you to feel “outed” but I also didn’t want to not mention it because you’re reaching out and the Letter to You was in fact to you and anyone else who feels as you do.)

So Genisa, I hope it’s okay to reprint the comment you left on the Huffington Post here in it’s entirety so that others may find you and reach back to you.

Genisa wrote:

“Thank you for the kind words. I didn’t realize anyone can see how you get to a blog by what you type on Google or on the blogs searches. I did type in that phrase a few weeks ago around April 7th. I would feel bad to think I made someone else feel sad by what I was looking for. I was trying to find others that felt the same way or to read something that I could relate to that would help to make me feel like there was hope, beyond the hopelessness I was feeling and still do feel. I feel so alone because of my inability to socialize appropriately, effectively communicate (especially verbally), and how I always say the wrong thing and make everyone angry at me. I’m an adult, I’m a female and I have Aspegers. I’m invisible to much of society.  I love volunteering, but for some reason others don’t want me to help out.  It really hurts to feel rejected by everyone, even within a group that should understand you because they have children on the autism spectrum themselves.  I want so much to see why I am not accepted and to be able to change it, but I can only change so much.  We do have feelings and we do have abilities if people would just see past our difficulties.”

I then responded with a very long reply,  one I now regret having written as I had to submit it in three parts due to HuffPo’s policy of a 250 word limit on comments.  As of this writing they’ve only published the 3rd part, which is a little horrifying as my words will be taken out of context and people may think I am drawing parallels between addiction and eating disorders and autism, which I AM NOT!  I’m not sure where the first two parts went, but if you just read the last part of my reply, it won’t make any sense or if it does, my guess is the wrong conclusions will be drawn, so I’m going to try to respond in full again here.  I didn’t copy my response first before submitting it, so this response will be slightly different.  Please, please refrain from drawing conclusions and judging my response until you’ve read my full reply and even then do keep in mind I am speaking of the feelings which may or may not be shared and not the circumstances.   Here goes…

Genisa!  I am so glad you reached out and commented.  If you haven’t already gone to the Autism Positivity 2012 Flash Blog, do.  Because of those words typed into Google, you galvanized and inspired a group of bloggers to create the Autism Positivity Flash Blog.  I don’t know how many people have contributed at this moment, but I do know as of yesterday morning over 115 people had written a reply to your words.  Those replies are from Autists, Aspies, Parents of Aspergers and Parents of Autists.  Over 115 people, Genisa.  You are NOT alone.  Go to the flash blog read the responses from people, most of them have blogs, go to their blogs and reach out to the ones that speak to you.  Many will respond.  You have found your people!

When I was in my 20’s I was suicidal.  (This is not something I often talk about.) I felt utterly hopeless, I had an eating disorder, was bulimic with anorexic tendencies that I could not contain or control, my life revolved around eating, puking, how much I weighed and where and what I would eat next, all as a way to quell my feelings of self loathing.  To someone who’s never had an eating disorder it must sound completely insane.  And, in many ways it was.  I felt horrible about myself, I hated who I was.  And I assumed everyone else felt the same about me as I did. I was unlovable.  Of that I was sure.  Please know that I am in no way equating my addiction and eating disorder to autism.  I am simply describing the feelings of isolation and sadness that can be common in both.

It took a long time for me to get the help I needed in order to stop.  But once I found people like myself, (and this is where the similarity in our stories lie) I was able to see, finally, that I was NOT alone.  I remember thinking  it couldn’t be true.  But it was.  There were hundreds and hundreds of people, in every city all over the world, some were suffering just as I was, others knew what it was to suffer, but had moved beyond those painful feelings.  That was the first step out of my personal hell and into another way of living.  A way of living where I could look at myself in the mirror and finally, finally like what I saw staring back at me.  Over time, with a great deal of support, I was able to begin behaving in ways that were honest and true to myself.  I was able to slowly stop trying to please all those other people that I felt condemned me, saw me as a failure, as a “bad” person.  And now, (I’m in my 50’s) my life is better than I ever could have imagined.  I have a wonderful husband who knows me and loves me exactly as I am, who loves me even when I’m angry, sad, irritated and feeling grumpy.  I have two beautiful, amazing and unique children, one who is considered neurotypical and one who is autistic.  And I am a very, very happy human being.  But thirty years ago, I was not.

You are beautiful, Genisa.  Let us love you until you can love yourself.  (Someone said that to me early on in my recovery from bulimia – I had no idea what they were talking about and I didn’t believe them, anyway.  But they did no matter what I said or felt they loved me and eventually I was able to too.)  Reach out as you have, again and again, find those you feel comfortable talking to, develop a relationship with them.  You are not alone, Genisa.  You are so not alone.  And you ARE beautiful.  Please reach out to me anytime.  I, like so many others, am here.

For my latest piece in the Huffington Post, click ‘here‘
To contribute to the Autism Positivity Blog click ‘here‘

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Posted in Autism, Autism Positivity, Parenting

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