Before this, I tried several ordinary things, gluten&casein free diet etc. but nothing really worked until this. It made a HUGE difference. Life used to be so hard, my diaries were filled with somewhat bizarre thoughts because I had so much trouble understanding myself and others and making out what I actually felt so I could express it in words. Before I had to do a lot of “offline-processing” (out of social situations) to make at least some progress. I could go on and on… It didn’t change everything. I don’t work, for example because ATM I’m still too depressed for that. But my sense of self is much clearer and that has given me more self-respect. Living independently also isn’t so much of a burden anymore. You said in the documentary that watching TV makes you happy and you don’t want to give that up. I can relate to that but deeper inside you there is a want and not just a want but a need, to go beyond that, to be free of the TV. And not free as in financially independent necessarily, although that is a big thing too, but first of all, to become less dependent of attachments.

IT’s very cheap, under $100. But it is experimental. I have a few extra devices so if you’d like one, you could just send it back if it doesn’t work for you (I know of only one other AS-person who has tried it, with success though) and get a refund. I do live in Finland though, and the shipping charges are $13 one-way and you’d have to get a local 110V/12V transformer for it.

If others are interested, you may also contact me. ericwheelman@gmail.com

If you’re not interested in this for any reason, check out “rTMS Asperger’s” in google. You’ll come up with some interesting anecdotal experience as well for that method.

For those who are offended because of my suggestion of changing brain chemistry this way, I’m not sure what to say. I know there are philosophical and ethical aspects to consider. But… personally I think that while these kind of inventions should not be used to justify a homogenous society or fix the effects of bad parenting, they should be available for those who’d like to use them.

If I were a parent of a baby AS child, and knowing how positive the effects were on me, I might be tempted to use it on him/her. Simply because I would very much question the necessity of his/her suffering to come because of endless misunderstandings and lack of empathy from peers and folks outside family. Maybe one should wait until the child can talk sufficiently to voice his/her thoughts about the effects. But anyway, life with AS is going to be a challenge anyway – I would like to ask, does it have to be a very difficult struggle?

email me ericwheelman at gmail dot com

I have been a teacher for fifteen years. In those years I have been a magnet for children with different learning styles because I know that, what is most important to being a true educator, is to BE with the children, as Who they are. You cannot teach someone unless you acknowledge, accept and understand them, thereby enabling them to be present in the room.

I have taught kids with ADD, ADHD, Asperger’s, autism, dyslexia, severe depression, selective mutism, and more. Last year out of 19 kids, they gave me 17 with learning differences, with no aides to help. Other teachers told me I had to just let some kids “go”, not to worry about them, but there is no one who comes to me that I will not connect to in order to understand how they function best and who they are.

I have taken a year’s leave of absence this year to study all of these learning styles and have come up with an astounding, affirming, paradigm-changing understanding of what is going on. These are not “abnormalities” that we are seeing but rather the evolution of the human consciousness through a re-embrace of the right brain, the place of empathy, inspirations of genius, the love of music, movement, drama, insight into human personal growth, technical and/or hands-on giftedness, and connection, indeed, “to the wind”.

I have written an article that I would very much like to send to you. In it, I address the giftedness of many different types of individuals who have been wrongly categorizing as with “abnormalities”. Instead of abnormalilties, these individuals have an orientation toward a new “normal” …toward compassion, profound understandings, and behaviors that can save us all from the left-brain, linear thought-driven systems and invasive world that we have created.

Peggy Magilen email:pmagilen@mac.com

Government lawyers also help develop programs, draft and interpret laws and legislation, establish enforcement procedures, and argue civil and criminal cases on behalf of the government.

I really am sorry to be posting this blog on your site Nicky but in Jan I ordered online and paid for 2 copies of your movie that I wanted to give as gifts to my sister whose son has autism and my best friend whose son has Asbergers. I have never received the copies of the film and have tried twice to send emails to the email addresses I could find to ask why I have not received my copies.
If you could help me with this I would really appreciate it.

thanks
Anne

I loved the film! I have told everyone at school about it but now it isn’t being shown anymore in Boston. It really is a gem- just straightforward and charming.

Having worked with students who have Asperger’s and other ’spectrum disorders’, I found your brother to be very funny. In my experience, most of these guys actually get to be LESS eccentric as they get older, as long as they stay employed and are pushed. In fact, my best friend’s brother who was a holy terror as a child, has been working in the aerospace field for more than 10 years now and he really seems almost typical.

I hope that we get to see the film again here!

Emily Prince

coincidentally i too am working on a sound/photo portraits series “BoundaryLINES” and “Madness & God” that might resonate with you (see below or JamesKusel.com)

i spend a lot of time with people who have been hospitalized for having both the gift and curse of thinking and seeing things differently – and i like to say are “too sensitive and often too smart for their own good” they see things maybe we who are so called more well adjusted wish we could see and at other times glad we don’t see them – they desperately want to belong and at the same time are afraid of not belonging and wish they could they could blindly go along to get along like many of us in society – we pretend we are sleep walking pretend we are numb and dumb and zombies – but inside we all know the world is not what it appears to be… and yet we all have a little of the wonder like Nick who has glimpses of the unimaginable who see the world with wonder and delight or horror or both but differently. some of us deny we feel and some of us wear our insides on the outside like Nick and there is much we can learn from Nick and people who are different

it also struck me as Nick said he needs the tools to handle life on lifes terms but he doesn’t know where to find them or where is where – he not only doesn’t fit the world but the world doesn’t fit him and he is aware of this too – he too walks the boundaryLINES between his world and reality and what i believe he is silently crying out for is tools, reality checks that many people have learned for better or worse –

in more primary times people like Nick and many others who society in its psycho-phobia lump together under the term mental illness; these were the people you went to, to get insights into life

BoundaryLINE is a series of ongoing conversation (work in progress) with my dear friend James Kusel who has what some have diagnosed as bi-polar and he calls himself a bi-polar bear because he swims in the winter and says “he was brought up by the mental health system” has developed his own reality check tools that might resonate with some – you can hear james and i in conversation talking at JamesKusel.com – food for thought

geo@JamesKusel.com

————————- my response on the pbs website

bravo – wonderful, sensitive touching film that resonated with the wonder of people who see and experience life differently then the society at large – in primary times people like Nick were seen as having special gifts, insights into life and the humanity – we discard these gifts because they don’t fit our norm and yet these people are the dreamers the artist who see life differently not for what it is but for what it could be – we can learn much from Nick – but one thing i think worth thinking about is maybe Nick is an artist a dreamer, somebody who has a special gift to climb metaphors and trees and sing about the wonder of things – i think we need to appreciate people like Nick for who they are and not romanticize or demonize them but enjoy them – we can learn much from Nick – like the wind we all come from – keep dreaming and fighting for your dreams Nick even if it just feeling the wave of calm and quiet and the possibilities in watching Mr. Rogers Neighborhood – sanity and normality is over rated – geo (at) JamesKusel.com