Cubing for the Autistic

Hi Guys, my name is Martyn.
A little about myself, I am 22 years old, I live in Telford UK, I have only recently come out of being homeless, during which I either lost or sold most of my twisty puzzle collection, including a full set of Vcubes, a shengshou collection from 4x4 through 9x9, many 3x3 speedcubes, and also cuboids and shape shifters. They where too bulky to carry and the money they offered was invaluable, I left myself with only 2 3x3s and a 4x4.

During my time homeless, it was brought to my attention that I have a form of Autism called Aspergers Syndrome, as with all Autism it massively affects my quality of life (for want of a better phrase) and I found that solving the cubes I had left, not only helped keep my mind occupied, but helped massively in keeping feelings of sadness and anger in check, these feelings when not addressed can be a huge problem with people suffering Aspergers as the condition results in confusion over feelings and extreme difficulty in processing them. In short, cubing helped me through.

I am now renting my own flat again, and I feel that the 'salvation' I found in cubing should be shared with people similar to me, so I am organising a weekly group to teach and explain the various cubes to people suffering Autism and mainly Aspergers, this group will be a free to join and free to take part.

Therein lies my problem, Having only 3 cubes and a very low income, it is impossible for me to effectively teach a group, and progress onto more difficult puzzles such as higher order, cuboid and shape shifters. So with that I ask for any charitable donation of cubes to my group, cubes you may never use anymore or anything else. In return I will teach the cubes to a group and also encourage them to join the forum to share their experiences.

Any donation big or small will be greatly appreciated.

To the moderators, I apologise if this is in the wrong category, I was unsure where to post it. If it is kindly move this topic to it's correct category and accept my apologies.

Hi Martyn.

Firstly, congrats for getting your life back on track.

Secondly, I have massive respect for what you're doing. If you can provide a little detail about the group then I'd be happy to send a few cubes I've been struggling to sell for the last few months, including a SS 4x4 and a couple of good 3x3s.

A friend's son has Asperger's, and I've been considering giving him one of my old cubes for a while. Unfortunately I don't have the free time to teach him, which only adds to the admiration I have for what you're doing!

Anyway, great to hear your story and I hope all goes well with the group. I'd love to hear a bit more - feel free to PM me.

Good luck to you. My youngest brother has Aspergers. If you share a little more information about yourself, the outline of your plan (where you plan to meet), how you intend to find people for your group (or how you've already found people), anything else you'd like us to know etc, I think people (such as myself) may be more willing to assist you in your endeavor.

Thank you both for your kind words, it's been a struggle but it is on the right track now.

A little about my plan, in the town I live in (Telford) they operate an Autism support group, where all varying degrees of Autistic can attend twice a week, for physical skills and help advice and support. I proposed my idea to the organisers of the group and received very positive feedback, my groups members will be mainly from this group I speak of. The organisers of the support centre told me if I get myself set up with equipment, I can then go on to promote it within the centre and use one of the function rooms in the building to carry out my ideas. This will initially be once a week, with possibility of a second session per week if I have an overflow of members or a significant interest from current members.

I certainly feel my group will be successful, as by far and large people suffering Autism and Aspergers are left to fend for themselves, as there is no medical cure. Although my group sessions won't cure the condition, for me at least it has made it significantly more manageable.

As stated you both know people with Aspergers, I would advise cubing, even if you don't have the time to teach them, all it needs is for you to sit through one solve with then and then forward them onto any solution guide you used and you will captivate them, that worked for me, within 2 months I was a sub 30 average, and now (2 years on) I am a 17 second average, full PLL and 2 look OLL.

Any further information you would like I will be happy to share.

Once again many thanks for your kind words.

Sounds like a great idea! My older brother has Aspergers (he's the one who taught me how to cube) and cubing helped him, so I'm sure it will be an awesome project.

This is awesome what you are doing. I actually have AS myself, I was diagnosed 2 years ago when i was 16. I don't really have anything to contribute since my own cubing funding is tight. However i recommend starting an indiegogo campaign, if you have never heard of it, just google it. The best of luck to you

Hm. Having studied autism for a year I am wary that you should take care not to treat this as a substitute for proper medical support, which can be hugely beneficial for diagnosed cases of autism. Withdrawing further from social contact is unlikely to be a positive thing and I can easily see that happening when people with autism are exposed to cubing. Used in the right way however I think this could certainly be a good idea.

Hypocrism said:

Hm. Having studied autism for a year I am wary that you should take care not to treat this as a substitute for proper medical support, which can be hugely beneficial for diagnosed cases of autism. Withdrawing further from social contact is unlikely to be a positive thing and I can easily see that happening when people with autism are exposed to cubing. Used in the right way however I think this could certainly be a good idea.

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There is no medical treatment for aspergers. What do you mean by proper medical support???

cowabunga said:

There is no medical treatment for aspergers. What do you mean by proper medical support???

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Actually, there are plenty of treatments for autism spectrum disorders. We can now make a very large functional difference in the lives of people with autism with proper psychiatric diagnosis and counselling, to the extent that some might not meet diagnostic criteria any longer in adulthood. That's why I just wanted to emphasise that this idea, while it's great, shouldn't be an alternative to proper medical support, but supplementary.

I'll admit, I have Asperger's. It really hurt me in seventh grade, since I did not cube at all during that year, and it took me a while to find something to obsess over. (Magic + Cards) Then that got boring. When I picked up the cube again I could not put it down... So Cubing has helped me quite a bit down the road.

I too have Asperger's. Had I enough money/cubes, I would have helped you.

I want to help one asperger to another
I have:
7 3x3
2 4x4
1 5x5
and 1 skewb that I am willing to send to you.
PM where you want it sent to.

Wow, this many autistic cubers?

I have a question for all of you. If you could choose to not be autistic, would you? It's a question that I've found interesting. I think I would choose to stay the way I am now, but I know perfectly well that if I wasn't autistic, I wouldn't want to become that way, so this is really just the human fear of change and nothing to do with whether or not I want this or not. Thinking about it with anything approaching objectivity isn't something I am capable of.

IRNjuggle28 said:

I have a question for all of you. If you could choose to not be autistic, would you?

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Simply, No.

Hi everyone my name is Christian and I am also a cuber with Aspergers syndrome.

At the age of 10 my parents got a professional to watch over me to see why I was struggling in different areas. Later on that year my parents told me I had aspergers. I am now 17 and a few weeks a go I decided to do a bit more research into it so I could understand it more. After doing research I then showed some of my friends some of the characteristics of aspergers and asked if I matched some of the characteristics. All of the people I asked said I had many of the characteristics and one of my closest friends read the entire article and said 'yes this is you'.
Now at the age of 17 I don't struggle as much as I did. In school I am exceeding in different areas but still struggling in a few. I am lucky that I go to a smaller school so that I can get more time with my teachers.
In cubing I believe I am doing alright. I am on good track a achieving all of my goals but money has been a problem. I can't seem to get part time work and my parents use the money on more important things e.g school, sport. Its doesn't matter at the moment though because I have all the speed cubes I need at this point of time.
It is great to know that I am not the only autistic speedcuber in this forum.

Wow, with so many Autistic cubers, I wonder if you guys could form some kind of support group? I know my brother has a much easier time communicating online than in person, and I'm guessing it's the same for a lot of you, so maybe a virtual place to discuss struggles not just with cubing, but general things might be a good idea.

DeeDubb said:

Wow, with so many Autistic cubers, I wonder if you guys could form some kind of support group? I know my brother has a much easier time communicating online than in person, and I'm guessing it's the same for a lot of you, so maybe a virtual place to discuss struggles not just with cubing, but general things might be a good idea.

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That, I believe is a great idea.

There should be a poll. Autistic or not...
I'd be interested to see the ratio on here

DeeDubb said:

Wow, with so many Autistic cubers, I wonder if you guys could form some kind of support group? I know my brother has a much easier time communicating online than in person, and I'm guessing it's the same for a lot of you, so maybe a virtual place to discuss struggles not just with cubing, but general things might be a good idea.

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That is a wonderful idea. Anyone up for a Facebook group? That would be pretty easy to do.

Should the group include other mental illnesses as well? My vote would be yes, but if I'm going to try to set up a Facebook group, I'd like to hear what everyone else here wants as well. If someone else knows Facebook better than me, or thinks the group should be somewhere besides Facebook, feel free to offer to set it up, but please don't do it without getting approval from the others here. If we do decide to do this, it should be something that we're all on board with.

BTW, you're completely spot on with being better at communicating in writing than in person. That's definitely true of me, and lots of other autistic peeps.