Update

[Teejay]

It's been such a while since I was last on here, you heard about me working in the 'sheltered workshop', surprisingly enough it has improved my social skills and gotten me out of my shell. I am quitting in a week or so to get some help from Commonwealth Rehabilitation Services in finding and keep open employment work. I am very likely going back to TAFE next year studying Accounting.

I managed to move out of my dad and stepmother's home and lived with a roommate with spinal bifida for a month or so, before personality clash and various other things, I decided to move out and found another place with a nice middle-aged guy and his geeky son.

I made some new local friends through going to a youth drama festival, which I enjoyed, and trivia nights my ex-roommate and we did. I am going to likely do Poker or either Dancing classes (I've done a few) or play baseball for an amateur team next year.

I also had a good chance of entering into a relationship with an autie girl (far from being intellectually disabled) who was once working in the same network of businesses I am at the moment (they are part of the same disability services organization), but is now an apprentice chef. Her family are pretty strict and overprotective and banned her from giving out phone numbers to guys, also her mother threaten to issue a restraint order on her ex, I have met if he and her did not break up.

I had go through her mother to get in touch with her. I made some mistakes I did not I was making and eventually I had to break off all contact with the girl (I was limited to phone calls with her by her mother) under the threat to be reported by the police for harassment by her father whom she lives with. I am still getting over that, I feel sometimes if I had not blundered I might have entered a romantic relationshp with a girl, me and her former work supervisor felt would have gotten along like a house on fire.

[Callaway]

Thanks for the update.  It all sounds very good except for the part about the potential girlfriend with the extremely overprotective parents.

[Teejay]

Thanks for the update.  It all sounds very good except for the part about the potential girlfriend with the extremely overprotective parents.

Indeed, that has been getting me down lately. I know wasn't totally all my fault, the parents would have limited the girl, who is 23 and me to just being friends. A workmate who knows the family, reasons the family has decided a boyfriend for her is not 'appropriate' for now.

Another thing getting me down is diffculty I am going to face to find work in this town, even when I get my car in January. I could always go back to university, I am living right next to the campus and study either Accounting, Human Resources Management or Business IT. It would be a huge adjustment from a sheltered workshop to an university campus. On the upside the human company would be a lot better for a guy like me being around intellectually handicapped people is intellectually frustating and I will get to meet lots of girls a lot like the girl I have mentioned (she is an intelligent arty girl, who has been a painter for 6 years)

[Phlexor]

The thing with dating etc is that sometimes you have to count in their family as the whole package and ask yourself if you really want to end up doing that. Sounds like in order for you to make that work you would have had to subvert the parents and encouraged her to be more independent and eventually break away.

You said you made some mistakes, we all do the first few times. The smarter ones learn from this and move on, even though moving on can seem like one of the hardest things in the world (us aspie males can have a real problem with that sometimes).

Anyway, overall things sound like they are going quite well and I hope most of it works out for you. Good luck.

[Teejay]

Anyway I've decided on doing the Diploma of Accounting next year at TAFE and going through a local employment agency for those with disabilities - Access Employment. I also will approach the local continuing education school about taking some English classes  to improve my spelling and handwriting, I use the spellchecker and dictionary as too much of a crutch. Also my handwriting is awful.

My medium to long term goal is to work towards becoming an Assistant Accountant, Bookkeeper, Accounts Receivable/Payable Clerk or Payroll clerk. In the short term I will find any work which I am suitable to do.

Social life wise I will continue with the trivia nights I have started with my ex-roommate Ryan, also Joe and Paul. Also I will ten pin bowl on Monday nights with Dave a workmate of mine, he is not intellectually disabled, used to work as a house painter in Western Australia before he had his lymph glands removed because of skin cancer. Finally either I will do dancing classes or play poker at a local pub.

Since I am not sure when I will get another job (I am losing $100 a week from quitting), I have to spend as less money as possible and have to figure out ways of cooking dinners on a low budget. I have already had breakfast and lunch figured out. Overall I am budgeting to eat well I will need to spend $40-$50 a week on food.

[Pyraxis]

Google food for $1 a day. I stumbled on some blogs recently where people challenged themselves to do that for a month, and they have a lot of menus and tips on how to eat really cheaply.

Here are a couple:
http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com/
http://hungryforamonth.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_hungryforamonth_archive.html

[Peter]

Here are a couple:
http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com/
http://hungryforamonth.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_hungryforamonth_archive.html

For those who care, the total amount I spent on food this week was $27.28. That’s about 93 cents a day, although I still have quite a bit of food left over. I also lost about 18 pounds this month.

To me, this doesn't look like a winning proposition in the long term.  If he'd kept going with the experiment, he'd have found it necessary to increase his food consumption once he'd depleted his fat stores.

[Christopher McCandless]

Google food for $1 a day. I stumbled on some blogs recently where people challenged themselves to do that for a month, and they have a lot of menus and tips on how to eat really cheaply.

Here are a couple:
http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com/
http://hungryforamonth.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_hungryforamonth_archive.html

I am sorely tempted for the fun. Next term I might also brew my own cider - just to see what the cleaners thing

[Teejay]

Thanks for the update.  It all sounds very good except for the part about the potential girlfriend with the extremely overprotective parents.

That is good news on that matter, maybe. I have spoken to her former work supervisor who caught with her and she is doing well in her chef apprenticeship and TAFE study which is part of that. There are things going on her family which caused an overreaction and she will give me a call during Christmas. I sent her a christmas card at her workplace with my new mobile number and a little update on myself inside it. As I said earlier she is an intelligent girl, but her time in supported employment, social groups for the intellectual disabled and maybe her parents have made her act dumber than she actually is. Her former work supervisor has said she will need me, when she will be on her own, she does not know many people in her life.

[Callaway]

That was a good idea to give her an update and your new number in a Christmas card at work.

When is she going to be on her own?

[The_Chosen_One]

Thanks for the update.  It all sounds very good except for the part about the potential girlfriend with the extremely overprotective parents.

That is good news on that matter, maybe. I have spoken to her former work supervisor who caught with her and she is doing well in her chef apprenticeship and TAFE study which is part of that. There are things going on her family which caused an overreaction and she will give me a call during Christmas. I sent her a christmas card at her workplace with my new mobile number and a little update on myself inside it. As I said earlier she is an intelligent girl, but her time in supported employment, social groups for the intellectual disabled and maybe her parents have made her act dumber than she actually is. Her former work supervisor has said she will need me, when she will be on her own, she does not know many people in her life.

Thank goodness you still have a chance. Her parents might be worried she would get with a guy and become pregnant or emotionally hurt but if they can see you want to take things slowly, their fears might gradually fade away.

[Teejay]

That was a good idea to give her an update and your new number in a Christmas card at work.

When is she going to be on her own?

I dunno, her parents are old especially her father. My main regret in this relationship (a friendship counts as a relationship) that I assumed (I did sense it although) she was less intelligent than she actually is, that is due to her acting that way and also due my disbelief that somebody that intelligent would live that kind of life.

[The_Chosen_One]

That was a good idea to give her an update and your new number in a Christmas card at work.

When is she going to be on her own?

I dunno, her parents are old especially her father. My main regret in this relationship (a friendship counts as a relationship) that I assumed (I did sense it although) she was less intelligent than she actually is, that is due to her acting that way and also due my disbelief that somebody that intelligent would live that kind of life.

If you're continually told you're helpless for 18 or so years and scared about the outside world, it's amazing how dependent you can become.

[Pyraxis]

Or how pissed off at authority.

[The_Chosen_One]

Or how pissed off at authority.

Yeah, it can go either way. You either get a person who never leaves home or one who can't leave early enough.