Welcome to My World
1Q) Please introduce yourselves to our readers.
I'm Viraj Bhat, born in 1988. I was born and brought up in Mumbai, and I did my schooling too in Mumbai. I work in SAP Labs, which is a software company, in Bengaluru. I was diagnosed as a person with dyslexia and learning disability and later as a person with autism.
2Q) Please share your hobbies and interests/passions with us.
My interests, hobbies and passions are almost never the same. They change with time. Since my childhood my only consistent hobby has been gaining general knowledge - be it from books, online encyclopedias or from video-sharing sites. In my youth my desire was to learn programming and penetration testing, but this desire didn't materialise as I didn't have the learning capacity, time or resources to do so. At one point of time, I had the intense desire to become a full-time investor because I've always wanted to be self-employed but unfortunately, I'm not financially literate. Unfortunately, since the 2020 Lockdown I have been addicted to social media and that too not in any constructive way. I have always been a music lover.
3Q) How do you cope when you're having a bad day?
I overthink about any incident and about person that made me angry and while I do that I roam around in my house. I sometimes also listen to music.
4Q) What are glimmers in your life? (Glimmers are tiny micro moments of joy - fleeting, everyday moments that elicit a rush of happiness, gratitude, calm, peace, safety, or goodwill)
I feel happy every time I listen to my music playlist. It also relieves me from stress and anxiety even though just for the time I'm listening to it. I feel very happy at the time I get to leave the office and every time weekends arrive.
5Q) When did you realise that you are autistic? If you’re a late diagnosed autistic, please write about life before diagnosis and how it changed once you knew you're autistic.
I found out I'm a person with autism sometime in 2005 or 2006, when I was 17 or 18 years old. Even before the diagnosis I was aware I'm different from other children/people. After finding out my condition, I felt relieved because there was some name to my state of being.
Education and Workplace Experiences
1Q) What are your experiences in school/college and workplace … What challenges do you face?
My experience in schools (both normal school and special school) had been unpleasant. I was required to rote-learn subjects - a learning method I'm not at all okay with. From the behaviour and their teaching methods, it was clear that most (not all) of my teachers lacked professionalism. They also were often overly strict. Under their guidance I never felt like learning in school. It was clear that they worked in the school not with the intention to teach but only for the salary. Most of my schoolmates and classmates weren't any better. In my school days I might have been okay with their association, but looking back now, I realise that intellectually and morally they were backward. (I'm not speaking of their social or economic background. I have no idea about their social or economic background and nor do I care.)
In the special school, where I finished 11th and 12th through NIOS, I came across many students who were intellectually disabled, some of whom were really weird and some even ill-behaved. I don't deny I was one such student. Some teachers showed unprofessional behaviour and didn't know how to behave. The reasons I benefitted from this school were that the teachers gave me personal space and were not so dominating, and that the curriculum was slightly more interesting. And also because in NIOS, if a student fails in a subject, he/she still gets promoted to higher grade while having to re-give the test for that subject.
For 2 years, due to pressure from my mother, I unsuccessfully attempted to complete First Year Bachelor of Arts (FYBA). Her argument was that a person who is just 12th Pass would not get enough salary from any workplace. The teachers from that college were aware of my learning disability and had been supportive of me and wanted me to succeed even when they found out I did not want to attend the examinations, which I didn't attend any way.
My first and very short-lived career was that of a manual worker. Working as one, that too in a slum area, I understood that I wasn't made for that kind of work. The only reason I worked there was that my mother insisted me on doing some work or the other and should never stay idle. Those were some of the worst years of my life. I didn't officially quit that job but took leaves for many days until my principal from the special school, who cared for my career, requested me to work as an unpaid data entry clerk for work experience. I admit I did acquire work experience from this job. As my unofficial employer, the princial noticed that I was very unpunctual and occasionally she expressed her dissatisfaction with that and with my overall work performance.
To get hired by the software company I had to first get trained and assessed by some organisation that trains people with disabilities (in my case, autism). Being trained alongside other autistic candidates I found out that not all autistic people are the same and there are certain characteristics of autistic people that not just neurotypical people but even other autistic people dislike, and that autistic people do not necessarily get along well even amongst themselves.
After getting hired by some department of my company, I found out that the trainer from the training organisation didn't do his/her best at assessing me. I am very good at English language, especially in written form. Instead of approaching the department that requires good language skills, they simply put me in a department that involved slightly critical tasks that I was not prepared to perform. My work performance had been slow but unsteady because I hadn't learnt any programming language. There had been times when I made critical mistakes. Eventually I was asked to leave the team but fortunately I got to stay in the department.
Most of my colleagues and mentors have been very well-behaved with me. The company I work for does not have any office politics, is one thing that I have observed. It is purely meritocratic.
2Q) How do you cope with these challenges?
I didn't face these challenges in any proper way, which is exactly why my school days and most of my working days were spent so miserably. At workplace I was very unpunctual and inefficient. Only after joining the software company did I start behaving more professionally.
3Q) What accommodations ( physical or changes in the mindset of people around you) would help you thrive in this scenario?
Speaking of school years, all students (not just the learning disabled) should be allowed to learn only the subjects they are interested in and the subjects the students feel they will benefit from while earning money. Students should not be forced to attend classes if they feel like doing self-study at home. In fact there should be no minimum attendance for any student in any school or college. It is high time home-schooling got normalised and became mainstream. Governments and parents shouldn't assume that students would score better if they attended school and/or college. Parents should not force their children to attend tuitions or coaching classes. For my failure in my first attempt in 10th Grade board examination I hold the coaching class I studied in partly responsible.
What grade a student should be in should be decided by his/her learning capacity and not age. If their learning capacity is proven to be high enough, then they should be allowed to give board examinations at the earliest and be allowed to get into college/university at the earliest. In the era we're living in, earning money and filling the belly needs to be given higher priority than doing academics.
For organisations that train people for getting hired in MNCs I have a humble request - Please assess the trainees very carefully and make sure they don't end up in the wrong department, working there as misfits.
Sensory Challenges
1Q) Please share your sensory world with us...
It has often happened that I found people speaking on mike, music on loudspeakers or the sound of traffic unbearably loud while other people seemed absolutely fine with it. I have noticed that I am a cold-blooded person. I can perform any physical or mental task easily when the atmosphere is cold and dry. My performance degrades drastically when the atmosphere is warm/hot and/or humid. My workplace is air-conditioned and it has often happened that many of my office neighbours prefer the blinds closed. In such a situation I feel very dull and my work performance decreases as there is no sunlight.
2Q) How does it affect your daily life?
Most of my childhood and youth was spent in Mumbai, which is a city notorious for humidity and high temperature. I suspect it to have worsened my academic performance and my work performance when I used to do manual work there.
3Q) What accommodations ( physical or changes in the mindset of people) around you would help you thrive?
For workplaces in hot and humid regions, air-conditioning is an absolute must if they want people like me to perform well or to remain sane. In air-conditioned workplaces, there should be enough sunlight.
Communication Challenges
1Q) How different is your communication style from the Neurotypicals and how does it affect your daily interactions?
I struggle while communicating orally as I have a stuttering issue. I have a problem phrasing sentences while speaking even though I'm good at all languages that I need to use every day.
I struggle registering spoken words. When my office colleagues give me tasks they give knowledge transfer orally. At least earlier this used to happen and I never found this helpful.
I consider the condition of autism to be a curse for me. Being an autistic person, I'm a very straightforward person and I'm unable to behave tactfully and diplomatically, which also makes me not at all streetwise or worldly wise. I usually smile only when I mean it, which makes it difficult for me to be polite to others when they smile at me and I don't smile back.
2Q) How do you cope with this challenge?
I often ask my colleagues to explain tasks or assignments through email or through online chat. Regarding my offensively straightforward behaviour I haven't made any effort to do away with it.
3Q) What accommodations ( physical or changes in the mindset of people around you would help you thrive?
Colleagues, at least those working with me, should have basic knowledge of autism so they are mentally prepared for, and have enough patience while, dealing or interacting with people like me.
Relationships
1Q) What do you look for in your relationships? ( friends/family/colleagues/partners)
What challenges have you faced in your relationships?
I seek respect and detachment in any relationship. Of course I should offer the same to them.
2Q) How do you cope with these challenges?
I don't make any endeavours to socialise with people as I'm a complete introvert with low Emotional Quotient.
3Q) What accommodations or changes in the mindset of people around you would help you thrive?
They should feel at ease while interacting with me while also being respectful, and not behaving too casually. There should be certain amount of detachment. No matter how noble the intentions are, if someone tries to interfere in my life or tries to dominate me or chastises me, I will lose respect for them. At worse I will end up hating them to death.
Bullying
1Q) Have you faced bullying in school/college/workplace? Please share a few details
Yes, I have experienced bullying. In elementary school days to first half of high school days, some classmates used to gang up against me because I behaved differently and because they know I was defenseless and could be easily dominated.
In my former workplace in Mumbai, most of my co-workers were slum-dwellers. They were short-tempered and disrespectful with me because I was both unpunctual and because I was inefficient at my work. They used to use vulgar language even when not angry, which made me feel like never working there.
2Q) How do you cope with these challenges?
I didn't deal with this in any proper way. However, they only way I could take revenge was to block most of my classmates and schoolmates on social media and never hear from them again. I don't like to associate or even interact with toxic people and people who don't know how to behave.
3Q) What accommodations or changes in the mindset of people around you, would help you thrive?
Basic knowledge of autism is a must both in schools amongst both teachers and students and in workplace amongst both managers and colleagues and co-workers. Misconceptions about autism should be cleared, not just in schools and workplaces but even in housing societies where autistic people live.
Masking
Q) Have you ever had to mask to look neurotypical? Please share your experiences..
I had observed that anywhere I went I used to speak to less and gave very short answers. There have been situations where I tried to behave the way I thought neurotypicals behave. The results were in my opinion socially awkward.
Social life
Q) What challenges have you faced in your social life?
There are some situations where I like interacting with people and there are some where I don't. In some situations I used to speak too much with the intention to amuse people or to make an impression. In some, I spoke too less either out of anxiety or just to draw attention. I used to have difficulty communicating with peers in the housing society I used to play in. They found me "funny" and even inferior both intellectually and in sports, so they used to make fun of me in a disrespectful way.
Comorbidities
1Q) Please write in detail about what comorbidities have you faced?
I believe I have a problem in eye-hand coordination, which made it tough for me to be good at martial arts when I used to attend karate classes. I used to also have an issue with personal hygiene, which gave me a few minor health issues occasionally. I had an issue with my anger, which led to me requiring to take allopathic drugs.
2Q) What accommodations or changes in the mindset of people around you, would help you thrive?
I have zero trust in allopathic drugs. My experience with consuming them has never been pleasant. I feel the medicines that not suppress but rather make the symptoms of autism disappear are illegal in India and many other countries. I don't want to mention those medicines as I don't want to get into any controversy. Not only are their positive sides hidden from general public but also is the research on those medicines kept unfunded or even forbidden.
Towards a better tomorrow
Q) Please share your message to parents of autistic children in how they can create a nurturing environment at home.
The kind of people a person associates with, the media a person listens to, watches or reads and the food a person eats - These 3 things affect the person's psychology and personality over a period of time. And autistic people can be easily influenced, so please decide carefully which of these 3 things your autistic sons and/or daughters get access to.
No matter how noble your intentions are, please never try to dominate them, chastise them or try to interfere in their lives too much. Very likely they will end up losing respect for you. Please be detached to a certain extent.
This interview is a testimony of the power of perseverance and resilience! God bless you dear Viraj, may all your dreams come true!
If you are an adult speaking autistic from India and would like to share your journey and challenges and insights with our readers, please get in touch - parentingautismindia@gmail.com
Let's work together towards building a more neurodiverse friendly society.
DISCLAIMER: The views expressed by the guest in this interview are their own independent opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views of the host and owner of the blog. Readers are advised to exercise their own discretion and seek professional advice where necessary.