Understanding Autism: Insights from 'Curious Incident'

An individual never knows the full background of another until they interaction or create dialogue. Therefore, society, including myself, needs to be less judgemental. “Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time” by Mark Haddon keeps a reader intrigued by the intricate rambles and thoughts of the autistic child named Christopher. Haddon uses his book to make the public understand the struggles and daily life of a child consumed by his own brain. I believe that this book should be read by every junior or senior in high school. High school always has the representation that children and peers get bullied. By understanding the thoughts of Christopher, a reader can know how it feels to try to focus on one item but have your mind take you wondering. This book made me think about the social interaction between special needs students and students that have the ability to live a regular life. A person will either avoid, overload, or ridicule a student with special needs. “I wondered if this was a joke, because I don't understand jokes, and when people tell jokes they don't mean what they

“But after a few seconds they looked like this because they were too many and my brain wasn’t working properly and it frightened my so I closed my eyes again and I counted slowly to 50 without doing the cubes” (169). Christopher was on his way to London and he wasn’t expected to be one who could make this trek alone. However, Christopher made it to his destination and knew when he needed to calm himself. Autistic children can overload due to their many distract thoughts. I connected with Christopher when he had these many thoughts. As a child, I would have one thing on my mind and then I would connect thoughts to it. I would make a “path” because my mother would always ask how I got to a totally random subject. Christopher taught me that overloading is okay and that you just need to take a minute to