Navneet Kulkarni Hi, my name is Navneet Kulkarni. I am a 16-year-old nonverbal boy on the autism spectrum. My mother's name is Neha Kulkarni and my father's name is Raghavendra Kulkarni. I'm from Solapur district, India.
I was diagnosed with autism when I was two and a half years old. I was very hyper, with sleeping issues and behaviors like head banging and biting. At the time, there was not much awareness of autism where I lived, so I went to my grandparents' place in Bangalore for treatment. It was there that I was diagnosed with autism.
After a few months we came back to Solapur, armed with home programs provided by therapists in Bangalore. My mother started implementing therapies at home because there was no therapy center where we lived. My mother homeschooled me and taught life skills to me. My mother spent a lot of time on my speech development, but I was unable to speak so she tried AAC methods for communication.
I communicate with my parents through typing and sometimes through gestures. I'm very happy with the way I am. My parents have accepted me the way I am; I feel very lucky to have such parents who are always supportive.
I’m very passionate about writing. I write many poems, moral stories, and many life quotes. I want to continue with writing as my career.
Being special means not normal but very unique. I think and feel things differently, but it doesn't mean I'm disabled. I'm a boy with different abilities. Through my writing I want to spread awareness of autism.
Meet nonverbal teenager Navneet, who is on the autism spectrum, and gain insider insight into a life with sensory processing differences. My sensory system is very different: different in seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling. It is also different in terms of my sense of touch, sense of motion, sense of body movement, and sense of thinking
