My name is Cole,
I have an autistic spectrum disorder and I have lost my job after being hospitalized for issues relating to my disability. I was unable to return to work because of the work environment. There were too many people talking and too much noise and flourescent lights and intimidating social situtations every minute of the workday.
I have applied to vocational rehabilitation in my area and have applied for SSI and food stamps and state financial assistance. All of these things are taking so long and my wife and I have sold what valuables we had and have loans on our cars that are due. I know they are "just" things but I feel that my decades of struggle to become a productive person with a life worth living is slipping away.
I can no longer afford to see my counselor, prescriber or physicians and rent was due days ago. I am struggling with memory issues and problems with sequencing activities, this is what lead to my job stress and hospitalization.
I worked as hard as I was able at that job and I let my team down by not coming back to work. Before I left work for the hospital, my performance deteriorated until I was unable to do my job and pretended to my team that I wasn't having a problem.
I have been told that I am smart, and that is why I was able to get that job in tech support for Juniper Networks in the first place. I was proud that I helped my team bring in new products to the Juniper brand by supporting customers in their transition into being Juniper customers.
I might be smart and capable of technical work but functionally I cannot work in most environments where I am expected to be socially adept or even resonably socially capable for any length of time.
I am still greiving my mother's death in 2006 and learning how to be a married person. I am mostly unable to manage money or conceptualize value of work or materials. My wife is having her own issues and I do what I can to comfort her and I made a promise to care for her as best as I can.
I am struggle to keep believing that I might be able to be educated in another technical field besides I.T. where I can work alone or with minimal social interactions at a job where my attention to detail can be an asset.
I don't know what another person can tell me that will help. I have done what I know how to do and am trying to follow through with the actions I have described above but I often just forget what time it is or what day it is and I know it will take me weeks to finish the paperwork and make more appointments.
Mostly I just want to be a good person and a good husband to my wife but I think that because I am not living up to the "rules" of her family and my family that I really am a bad person. Sometimes I just want a new yo-yo.
I am afraid most of every day and I just want to feel good like I did when I was doing better at my job and making enough to take my wife to dinner and a movie. Those days I felt like I was doing the "right" things because everyone was happy.
Thanks for reading this.
-Cole
