Misunderstood and Underestimated

Feb. 2022, in his previous school as a 3rd grader, my 9-year old son Yi…

• 😶 could not identify simple sight words
• 😕 could not do addition between 1–10
• 😞 had no social interactions and no friends
• 😔 was assumed to have intellectual disability

May 2023, after joining a new school for a year as a 4th grader:

• 👏🏼 Yi has a blog with 100+ posts, received an A in Language Arts.
• 👍🏽 Yi was moved to 5th grade math class one month after joining the new school. He received an A in 5th grade math and is now learning 6th grade materials.
• 🥰 Yi now has real friends who value and respect him.
• 🥹 He’s considered gifted after testing with a psychologist.

June 2023, Yi’s book, I have a Voice, was published on Amazon.

Does it sound like stories in the movies? It’s real and it’s real for many, many of the non/limited speaking students with autism and severe apraxia (mind body disconnect).

Ever since we discovered the new communication method for Yi in March 2022, it has been quite a transformative journey. I realized so much of what I learned over the years about autism was wrong for people like Yi. Many of the experts were wrong. I was wrong.

Day after day, year after year, people like Yi live in profound trauma. Their intelligence is intact, but their body behaves like a toddler and they are treated as a toddler by many. No one understood them, not even the loved ones…

Next time you meet someone who can’t communicate and seemingly “low functioning”/”severely impacted”, please remember Yi’s story and stories of many many other non/limited speakers who have found their voice.

• 🙊 Just because someone cannot speak, does not mean they have nothing to say or they don’t understand.
• ✅ Assume intelligence since it’s the least harmful assumption.
• 🙋🏽 Everyone craves human connection, even those who stay in the corners during parties.
• 👐🏼 Be open to the many different ways which we communicate.
• 🧡 Suspend your preconceptions of what intelligence looks like and open your heart and mind to the many different and amazing ways that humans show up in this world…

If you know someone who might benefit from Yi’s journey, please share this post, our story in 2022 about how we discovered his voice (Hope I can talk), and Yi’s blog.

Change begins with understanding.