Growing up I was behind in reading and writing, I was so behind my elementary school requested for me to be tested for a learning deficiency at Seattle Children’s. We learned I had mild autism and when my school was informed I was enrolled into 1-on-1 sessions during school to improve my reading and writing skills. When my mom found out she had so much love and patience with me, but when my dad found out he forced me to read and practice writing. My dad was always really tough on me, he called it “tough love”. My dad made me stay inside and read for hours at a time, usually we would stop once I started crying.

On a nice fall afternoon my neighborhood friend wanted to play with my sister and I, my dad told my sister she could play but I couldn’t because I needed to read. Clearly upset, I stomp to my dads room and sat down on his bedroom floor by a pile of kids books. My dad was sitting in front of me on his office chair staring at me waiting for me to pick up a book. I picked up one of the ‘Berenstain Bears’ books to read together. I started off okay, my reading was choppy but I was able to read and pronounce every word: there was one word I struggled with and my dad helped me sound it out but after struggling with three more words my dad was getting impatient. He stared at me dead in the eye and said “Look at the word”, after trying to sound out the word again I asked for my dad for more help and, now very angry, my dad said “you’re not looking at the word”. “But I already did and I still don’t know” I replied but my dad just turned on his PlayStation, sat down and started playing Madden and without turning his back to look at me he told me “You’re going to sit there until you actually look at the word”. Everytime he caught looking at the tv or looking off somewhere else he would yell at me and tell me to look at the word, I kept my eyes low after that. After thirty minutes I could hardly sit still, I ask my dad if I can go to the bathroom and he replied “not until you’re done”, at that point I felt full of self-hatred. An hour passes and I was hungry and my dad made himself and my sister dinner while I was still just staring at that one word, my stomach felt like it was eating itself. I got up and ask my dad if I could eat and all he said was “not until you’re done”, on the verge of tears I replied “but I still don’t know what the word is and I’m hungry”, as I finished my sentence tears streamed down my face. My dad saw the tears and screamed “There’s no reason for you to cry, if you could read the book you would be able to eat. You’re not done so go sit down”, I went and sat down and started crying hysterically and my dad stood over me yelling at me saying “Why are you crying? Are you bleeding? Do you have a broken bone?”. I continued staring down at the book, avoiding eye contact with my dad while he yelled. After a few seconds of no response, my dad grabbed my face and said “I’m talking to you”, I quietly replied “no” while shaking, “Then there’s no reason to cry, so stop” my dad yelled back.  I continued to cry after my dad told me to stop. He grabbed a shoe and walked over to me, “do I need to give you a reason to cry”, I replied loudly “no!”. My dad dropped the shoe and said “get up you’re done” and stormed off, I ran to my room and cried. I never wanted to touch a book again.