By Bird Bouchard
Samuel Andrade-Sangster describes himself as a thoughtful, empathetic, artistic, shy, awkward, clumsy, anxious, sensitive and quiet person.
But if you, like many others, judge him before getting to know him, there’s a lot about him you’ll miss out on.
He has many thoughts in his head – and very rarely can he turn them off. The thoughts are part of a unique set of challenges he has to overcome each and every day.
“I’ve been treated differently my entire life,” he said. “When I was a teenager, I was often called retarded. I felt violated.
At the age of three, Sam was diagnosed with Autism (Pervasive Developmental Disorder – Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS). He was told it refers to a group of disorders characterized by impairment in the development of social interaction, verbal and non-verbal communication, imaginative activity and a limited number of interests and activities that tend to be repetitive.
Now 32 years old, Sam said he hopes to give people an idea of what it’s like to live with autism.
