Genius (Denied)

In second grade, I was suddenly taken out of class to an office one day, where a guy from the state university spent all day and most of the next testing me with the full Stanford-Binet, and a lot of other tests I never heard explained. He reported my IQ as 160. The school system responded with a decree that I must be treated exactly like all the other kids, and do exactly the same class work. The special attention I had received in first grade would not be tolerated. And my parents supported this travesty!

I have no idea if any of the tests were related to Asperger's Syndrome (now called "high-functioning autism"), I did not hear of that concept until I was in college. But I was clearly an "Aspie" through public school and life, and have since scored well into the diagnostic range on every test. The school blamed my social isolation entirely on my own unwillingness to "adapt".

The "genius" label confirmed my parents' fear of me. My dad had always treated me as a strange and foreign object he had no idea how to approach on a personal level. But now my mom changed from mystified to terrified. Whenever I expressed any willfulness she called me "Little Hitler" and considered it her moral responsibility to limit my power and crush my spirit.

On the other hand, when it served their needs, they trusted me at seven years old to mow the lawn with the self-propelled power mower, and to walk to church alone and bring back the contributions (dad was financial secretary). And at fourteen they "let" me rewire their house. Only my own desires were unacceptable.