A teenage author has sold over 70,000 copies of his book telling of his struggles with autism and bullying – in an effort to raise awareness of the condition and money for charity.
Charlie Michael Baker, from Leyland in Lancashire, self-published Autism and Me, and sold 14,000 copies in the first week.
He said: “I’d been bullied all throughout school. It started really in my young years in primary school and with singling me out. I’d sit on my own for lunch and when I went to secondary school it just got worse.
“I was being called names, I actually had to delete social media. People wouldn’t be friends with me and I went home and cried every night. I had to literally lock myself into classrooms. I bunked off class because I had things thrown at me and I wouldn’t be allowed to move to the back of the classroom.”
Charlie said he had been surprised by the book’s success.
“I was thinking I’ll sell about five copies to my family and friends, so I said I’m going to donate all the proceeds to charity,” he said. “I posted it on Instagram and a few shares came through and then I put it on the local Facebook page and then it blew up from there.
“The local papers picked it up, then the national papers picked it up and then international papers picked it up and now I’m global.”
In addition to being sold in the UK, Charlie’s book is also sold in Australia, Dubai and America where it is stocked in Walmart and Barnes and Noble. All of the money made from the sales is donated to various charities across the world that help people with autism with daily life.
Following this success, Charlie suddenly started to see his follower count on Instagram rising.
“I used to be able to name every single person that followed me and now I’ve got my own Google page and I get papped which is weird.”
Charlie now has 1.4 million Instagram followers with his online platform, he is continuing to share his story and struggles in an effort to help those who may be able to relate to his experience of autism and bullying.
He was diagnosed with autism at six years old, but did not have a Education, Health and Care (ECH) plan in place at school until he was 15.
Shortly afterwards he was permanently excluded from school because they were not equipped to deal with his autism and could not resolve the bullying he was experiencing.
Charlie said: “I would just take myself away, but I’d lock myself in the toilets, I’d run away, I’d hide on the stairs. It was awful, the school did nothing.
“They just kept punishing me for missing class. Basically they couldn’t deal with it all, I was in there crying every single day, so they said you can’t be here, we can’t deal with it.”
“They had an exclusion room that was literally like a prison. There were tiny square tables with a blackboard in between the tables so you couldn’t talk to people or look at people, you’d just have to sit there and look at the desk and I was in there a lot.”
Charlie moved to Shaftesbury High School, a pupil referral unit, to finish school where he had a far more enjoyable time. He explained the classes were much smaller, sometimes with only five students.
He said: “I loved it there, we didn’t move classrooms either, which I like because I don’t really like changing of scenery because of my autism.
“I mean I was the autistic and gay kid, I was going to get bullied. It was just because I was different, I’d just be the odd one out all the time. I’d do different things to other people and they didn’t like it.”
He explained his autism traits include a fear of becoming ill, and making noises.
“I hate being ill, I’ll sit there and cry, it just scares me and I don’t know why. I make noises as well, out of the blue. I’ll just be sat watching a film and I’ll scream – I haven’t got Tourette’s, that’s just the autism. I have bipolar traits as well because autism and bipolar are sisters, so one minute I can have a smile on my face, next minute I’ll be having a row with you.”
Charlie’s mum Danielle, who works on a mental health ward, said: “Charlie’s always been a character from a young age, so it was a bit surprising to find out he had been going through all of this at school. He never told us, he didn’t tell anyone. When we found out, we were obviously devastated and moved fast to get the right support for Charlie.
“In terms of his autism diagnosis, we spotted the signs quite early on, and we were lucky to get him diagnosed from such a young age, especially now with the extortionately long wait times.”
While Charlie is grateful for his online platform because he has the chance to spread awareness, he was not expecting the bullying he had finally escaped from at school to come back even fiercer in the form of online trolls.
He said: “In my DMs it’s either mums telling me I’m great, I’m fantastic or fake accounts telling me they’re going to kill me in my sleep. Me and my manager reckon from the time I published my book, which was March last year I’ve had at least 100,000 threats against my safety. There’s just too many to block so I just tend to stay off my DMs.
“It’s words on a keyboard, none of them are actually going to do anything. It doesn’t affect me anymore because I’ve had it literally my whole life and it boosts my book. It doesn’t matter if you’re clicking on because you hate me or if you’re clicking on because you love me, if you’re messaging my account, you’re boosting my engagement.”
Despite the horrific abuse, Charlie said he would not change it for the world. “Would I rather not raise all this money for charity and not help people at all? No, I want to raise loads of money and awareness.”
You can buy ‘Autism and Me’ here: Charlie Baker: Autism And Me: Amazon.co.uk: Baker, Charlie Michael: 9798389316577: Books
