Canopus

It cut no ice with my school who thought I was crazy to have such interests. They were also not part of the school curriculum so they didn't see an advantage in having such bizarre interests. It cut no ice with my parents because I used to fill the house with pieces of machinery and spend an excessive amount ot time fiddling with it. My parents did not want their house to look like a rubbish dump as it would create a bad impression with the neighbours. They were also concerned that I would do no work at school all day, and instead get up to mischief. When I came home I would read books on nuclear reactors.

I have no idea how obsessions start. I have been interested in technical stuff such as machinery and electronics from a very young age (3?) despite my parents taking no interest in anything technical. None of my neighbours or friends parents were involved in anything particularly technical although a few of them worked in factories making plastic components. My interests at the age of 6 included: car engines, telephone exchanges, power stations, dams, space rockets, video recorders, washing machines, central heating systems, lighting, oil rigs, gear mechanisms, X-ray machines, chemicals, volcanoes, door locks, printing presses, plumbing, aircraft black boxes, radio telescopes, fibre optics, computers, water treatment plants, satellites, medical equipment, and photocopiers amongst other things.

Moving is the only choice unless you buy bottled water taken from a spring with a very low fluoride content. Standard water filters remove chlorine but they are incapable of removing fluoride. The only way fluoride can be removed is by expensive complicated methods such as distillation or reverse osmosis. The World Health Organisation supports water fluoridation.

It was the carestaff that were often the worst offenders for child abuse at my school. Very few were qualified in child care and none had any experience or knowledge of SEN even though they were working in a special needs school. Many were formerly in the armed forces. Some of the carestaff were friendly people but others were particularly nasty individuals who got up to disreputable activities including using some kids to bully or use physical force against other kids.

Schools can underestimate the potential of kids. My first secondary school was very dubious about allowing me to attend a residential trip because of my behaviour which could be described as mischievous, unco-operative, and wayward. Also, certain physical activities such as tree climbing and an assault course were seen as possibly unsuitable because of my inept performance in PE lessons. I attended the trip and the teachers were pleasantly surprised with my behaviour and co-operation. The same school also arranged a meeting for my parents because of problems and they asked my parents what I wanted to do in the future. They said that I wanted to work with computers which resulted in a torrent of laughter from the teachers who considered a circus clown to be a more appropriate choice. IT or computing was not a timetabled subject, and many of the staff were unaware of my knowledge of computers including programming.

How do you define tomboy? Do you mean popular boys activities such as Action Man and football, or do you mean taking an interest in things that are normally male dominated such as computers and physics?

So it is possible to a certain extent to implement accelerated learning in a secondary school. I think one of the biggest defects of the education system is that league tables only count GCSEs taken at the end of Y11. If one takes a GCSE early then it doesn't count in the league tables. This is the real reason why schools won't offer GCSEs early.

I am planning a change of career and have come to update my CV. In the past I have been rejected by more than one company because of my lack of involvement in sports and social activities. Companies nowadays seem to take an interest in this side of things regardless of ones academic qualifications or interests relevant to their career. I don't really know how to get around this problem and have been informed that employers are increasingly looking at broad minded all round people who can relate well and interact with others as opposed to Einsteins who are experts in their field. The only major social activity I am involved with is a political organisation and it is very unwise to state any involvement in politics on a CV. Can anyone offer any advice?

Is accelerated learning possible in state schools where one is moved up a year or moved into lessons attended by a higher year? Back in the mid 1980s my parents wanted me moved up a year, but the headmaster told them it was impossible as academic year is determined by age and not ability. At secondary school, my parents enquired about me attending classes in Y9/10/11 for certain subjects including maths and science instead of those for my Y7 tutor group, but the school said that it wasn't possible even though I had demonstrated exceptional ability in Y10 science lessons during my free period in "detention".

A book on technical writing might come in useful. They are primarily aimed at adults who have to do factual writing such as business reports or instruction manuals, rather than at kids, but I find them to be better than most GCSE English books. I had the misfortune to have lousy English teachers when I was at school, and would only really say that I learnt how to write stuff properly after studying books on technical writing. You can find them in most libraries.

Seems like I'm not the only one wanting stuff that is discontinued.

At least the condition is now recognised. It certainly wasn't back in 1988 and no psychology textbooks described anything that came close to AS. The simple existance of the knowledge of AS effectively thwarts any attempt to classify someone with AS as a madman, nutter, retard, schizophrenic, mentally unstable or whatever.

My father spent a lot of time during 1988 scouring hospital and university libraries for any books which described my problems. He had no success whatsoever on finding anything that closely matched AS. There were books on autism but he ruled it out as autism tended to include things like involuntarily throwing stuff at ceilings, being unable to communicate, and having little sense in who they are or what they are really doing. There just didn't seem to be any books which mentioned obsessive interests, poor written work yet high intelligence, bad at socialising, and general clumsiness. Mild schizophrenia appeared to be the closest match, but he was unconvinced I was schizophrenic and hoped I would never be diagnosed as schizophrenic because it could have severe consequences. Therefore, he concluded that the doctors and psychologists were right and that there was nothing psychologically wrong with me. It was all down to bad behaviour. I asked him if he could write a paper for a psychology or medical journal describing me in the hope that someone else knows of somebody with similar conditions. He refused on the grounds that it could bring shame on the family and he could be accused of bad parenting.

The geneticists have no plan to ever create a master race as that would defeat the point of their strategy. It is insurance companies that are driving much of the research into genetics so they can charge higher premiums to customers with "bad" genes for things such as heart conditions or even AS for that matter.

The trouble is, AS specific schools didn't exist 15 or so years ago. I was depressed and fed up at a state secondary school that was failing to provide for my needs, so ended up at a special needs residential school. It was not specifically designed for kids with AS and was a generally unpleasant institution. I suppose in a way someone of my age with AS lost both ways.

Stress. That's what it is. I went through a particularly twitchy phase at secondary school when things were not going right and my parents were panicking over nothing.

I once saw a car go into a carwash with an open rear window. The driver couldn't reach the winder, so he got out and opened the door to close the window. He left the driver's door open and the brushes started up. One of the brushes went inside the open door and ripped the seat. The other brush knocked the driver over and completely covered him in detergent. When he got up he was blasted by the water spray. It was hilarious.

I'm more inclined to say he was a traitor. He signed away Britain's sovereignty by joining the EU and lied to us all by firmly stating that it was only a trading arrangement, and that our sovereignty and the right to determine our own affairs would not be compromised. Reports of Cabinet meetings (which are secret for 30 years) from the early 1970s confirm that Ted Heath and his cabinet ministers fully well knew about the single currency, that Britain was no longer in control of certain things such as agriculture and VAT, and the long term aim of the EU was to create a superstate where national governments will have about as much power as a town council has today.

I know there are laws against libel, but are there any official laws against defamation? The way I look at it is that clamping down on defamation is a form of political correctness aimed at stifling criticism and effectively letting the guilty get away scot free. Libel is when something untrue has been written, but defamation is when something true yet very critical and damning has been written. I support free speech and freedom to criticise even if it causes offence. If whatever is written is true then the person or organisation should suffer the consequences of bad press.

I became statemented at 8 and my statement was circulated amongst various education specialists at my LEA, which resulted in a number of unkind letters being sent to my parents. One of the specialists couldn't believe that an 8 year old boy didn't like football and thought that I must be a very strange person. He also suspected that I was just putting it on simply to be an attention seeker or just downright wayward as I got a thrill out of deliberately being different to my fellow classmates. His solution was for me to join a local team, start playing and enjoy the game whilst making some new friends. Another specialist was concerned at my clumsiness and ineptness at PE lessons, but was particularly moved when he read that I couldn't ride a bike and that my handwriting was a scrawl. His only explanation was that I was disabled and should receive disability treatment. However, my GP had not diagnosed me as disabled and my mother flatly refused to believe I was disabled in any way. Perhaps it might have been better if dyspraxic was used rather than disabled.

I am in my 20s and suspect that I have AS although it never has been officially proven.

I think that school PE is too heavily biased towards team sports. I would rather have had Dynamo Digby off the Grimley's than forced to play football.

The same also applies with PE lessons. I was particularly hurt when my special needs school focused primarily on team sports rather than on physical exercises. They even called PE games rather than PE. I was expecting that because the school was exempt from the National Curriculum, it would tailor lessons to the ability of people, but the headmaster had a great love of team sports so thrusted his interest upon everybody whether they wanted it or not. To add insult to injury my mother would not send a letter to the school exempting me from team sports because she claimed it was good healthy exercise whether I liked it or not.

According to my dad who is a mental nurse, schizophrenia has been used to describe a variety of conditions including AS. The psychiatric profession also tends to take a "rear view mirror" approach to problems by trying to shoehorn an individual into an already recognised condition as opposed to identifying new conditions. This is probably why it took so long for AS to become recognised in Britain.

When I was a kid: Favourite TV programme: Tomorrows World. Favourite cartoon: The Mysterious Cities of Gold. Favourite channel: Only had 4 channels back then, but seemed to spend more time with teletext that watching TV. Worst TV programme: Varied depending what was on. I particularly disliked Coronation Street. Now: Favourite TV programme: The Sky at Night. Favourite cartoon: Still seems to be the Mysterious Cities of Gold. The old stuff is always the best. Favourite channel: Discovery. Worst TV programme: Eastenders.