What is Autism exactly?

definition from Wikipedia:
"Autism is a brain development disorder characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior."

I can tell you, after my cousin started to live here in my house, this pretty much sums it up for me.

Having him live here for almost two years, Im still very unsure how to help my Parents deal with him knowing he has Autism.

If he does something bad, You can't really just tell him "Don't do it next time". Because his Disorder causes him to have repetitive behavior, which makes him make the same mistake 20 or 30 times until he finally gets it.
And, he doesn't like to have a flexible routine. He has to have a set time on when he wants to do things.
I know that there are plenty of other people who like to follow a schedule. But the thing about him is that he starts to get frustrated when something doesn't happen at the exact time that it was scheduled.

For example: His aunt died a couple months ago and the funeral was on a saturday. He really didn't know his aunt very well so it didn't really affect him all that much. But my mom still wanted him to attend the funeral. She tells him that it is very important for him to go and he has to wake up early in order to drive there. But because my cousin wanted to watch the movie that was going to Air on saturday, he really made a fuss about not wanting to go. We kept telling him "You have to go to your Aunts Funeral to say goodbye." and his reply was "But The movie is supposed to go on at saturday and I thought it was my choice."
So do you get what I mean?

Despite the fact that we know very well that his behavior is often linked back to his disorder, we still get very upset when he argues over and over again on how he doesn't want to go here to visit his sisters, and go there to see his dad get out of jail for the first time in four years.

The point Im trying to make is that Living with someone who has a disorder whether its autism or anything else, is NOT EASY. You can have a cousin who has a disorder and visit him once in a while, but it's completely different when you are actually LIVING with them. At first, when my aunt (his mother) used to yell at him a lot for dumb reasons, I thought "wow she is so mean, How can she do that to her autistic son?" but now, having him live here with me, I sort of understand.
Im not saying it's the RIGHT way to deal with things, but now I can understand her emotions a little better.
Now maybe if his mom actually gave a damn, paid a little more attention to her son, and took him to a psychologist to help him, he would have been ALOT easier to deal with. But when he first came here, he didn't even know how to pick up his plate after he was done eating it and not treating everyone like a maid. (they were pretty rich when he was with his parents and yes they had a maid do EVERYTHING)
So when he sat down to eat he would go "Give me a fork" and "Give me a Drink" and "Give me a napkin" and he would even do the little hand gesture. AND didn't bother to say thank you.
Now it's not his fault that his Mom never corrected his actions, but My mom is handicap as well and had back surgery done on her back, so she can't walk for long periods of time and go back and fourth for things he could do himself. And WE had to teach him how to get his own drink and utensils.

so anyway all Im trying to say is that if you happen to see someone with their autistic kid and being frustrated with them, try not to look down on them. Because it really IS a hard task raising a kid and raising a kid who has autism. Although I still think that there are better ways to deal with autism, I just don't judge them as much.

On a side note: Im not trying to B*tch and say "feel sorry for ME because I live with an autistic person *sob* *sob* " no Im just trying to give people an IDEA about how its LIKE to have someone in your life that has a disorder. Of course, not all autistic children are the same so I guess it really depends on how the child was raised.
And I don't think that my cousin is the worst person ever, I really don't.

Okay so Im a T.A for the school library for 6th period and from time to time the counseling office have me deliver call slip to students in their classes.
I walked into this one class room and I try to enter as quietly as I can so I don't disturb the class but the teacher isn't there. Then some students jump up and start asking who it's for. I was intentionally going to wait for the teacher,but It looked like he was busy so I start reading names.
Then The teacher walks in as soon as I hand out the slips an he motions to me "come here for a second" and I walk back in and he starts throwing a fit about how Im "disrupting the class" and how "my job is to wait for him no matter what" and I try explaining myself but he cuts me off every 4 seconds. And as soon as he's done I say "okay im sorry" then walk away. Some students tried to make an effort to explain to him that they were the ones who asked me, but he just doesn't listen and I didn't bother to try to explain to him that I was planning on waiting for him to come back.
Now I find a couple things wrong with this.

First off, he had a horrible attitude, I know it can be frustrating working with a bunch of freshmen, but honestly, I feel that if you can't handle the teenagers I don't think your in the right line of work.
Next he had the "Im right an your wrong attitude" I tried really hard apologizing to this guy but he just cut me off the whole time.
And another thing is he said "it's your job" I don't even get paid to do this, It isn't even for the library! The counseling office just asks me for favors sometimes.
and he said "your disrupting my class" statistic wise, Half those kids aren't going to graduate high school, Plus this guy was only prolonging the situation.

I dunno, this has never happened to me before. I usually try to stay out of trouble, but somehow it just finds me where ever I go. I don't think I even got yelled at this badly since kindergarden.

anyway did you think that it was right for him to do that? I know I made some mistakes, but do you think that it was worth getting yelled at over in the middle of his class?

do you think there was a better way for him to handle it? like bring me over to the side and talk quietly instead?

The matter of fact is, Im already 18 years old and most people at my school are already 15 and up. Do you feel that sometimes we are being treated more as children then young adults?