I would have said a few years ago that any degree of independence would be forever out of his reach. Now a group home in his adulthood isn't out of the question if that's what he wants.
Our biggest obstacle these days isn't communication, it's noise sensitivity. I'm paying more than I would like for an apartment because it's a luxury complex with thick walls, and every window is covered with noise dampening curtains, but he still gets upset if an ambulance drives by. He can barely hear it, but just knowing that it's there sets him off.
We are very careful to avoid triggers, but if he gets enough of them, he will go into a meltdown. You can see his stress levels in his mannerisms and I like to think of it on a 1-10 scale. If he's having a good day, he might go down to a 2. If he's mad because something he wanted got denied, up to 3.5. Loud bird outside our window? Now it's 5 and he's visibly agitated. 7+ and you're likely to see a meltdown.
We have them down to maybe once a month, anywhere from maybe 10 minutes to two hours These days it's usually just screaming, but occasionally he gets violent. When he was younger and we lived with loud family, the violent meltdowns were daily, but they were more easily managed when he wasn't 5-11, 250 pounds.
When he melts down, his pupils get weird, his skin gets warm and his heart rate goes crazy. There's literally nothing he or anyone can do until it runs its course besides try to keep him from hurting himself or breaking anything too expensive. Then when he comes down out of it, he's significantly more relaxed, it's like a pressure release valve.
A lot of older autistics have told me the violent meltdowns often phase out entirely as they exited their teenage years, and whether that's true or not for him will determine a lot of his future.
The nightmare scenario is a public meltdown. I joke that I wish he was "play Minecraft 22 hours a day type of autistic," but he expects to go out in public regularly. Restaurants, movies, sporting events, shopping. If he's not out at least once a day he gets really angry, and I can't control his environment out there the way I can at home.
If he hears a few sirens or loud birds or sees joggers (dont ask me why that's a trigger, my best guess is there's a no running rule at school and he feels like rules should apply everywhere), he might start yelling a lot, which is embarrassing in public but ultimately no one is getting hurt.
But there is one trigger above all, guaranteed to send him immediately to a full level-10 meltdown. Blackout rage, just throwing haymakers at whoever is closest to him (which I make sure is always me), Bobby Knighting furniture, absolutely ape poop. Crying babies. If he can hear a baby cry to any degree through his multiple layers hearing protection, it's instantly go time.
So anytime we are out in public, I'm constantly on the lookout for babies. If we are walking and I see one, we are walking the other way. As we walk up to a restaurant door, I'm looking through the windows and if I see a baby, I'll convince him to go somewhere else. If one comes in after we are already seated, well, *sometimes* I can convince him to pack up and leave but he can be really stubborn and he's not 6 anymore, I can't make him move if he doesn't want to.
So twice in the last two years, a baby came in after we were already seated in a restaurant and started crying. Both times I was able to usher/encourage/shove him to the door and outside while eating punches to the face but nobody else was hurt and no property damage beyond his own tablet and my glasses.
Hopefully we can keep it that way until he grows out of his volatile teenage years. I'm terrified of the day it goes a little more wrong. If he ever starts to attack other people instead of me, I'll have to escalate from herding him out to straight wrestling him to the ground and waiting for police to come help (and God knows calling police to help with an out of control mentally ill person never ends badly). It's never come to that, and hopefully it never will. But I'm not 100% sure it never will.
Or even worse, there was an incident not far from me a few years ago where an autistic, severely disabled adult punched someone at a walmart because the line was taking too long. The person he punched came up blasting his concealed carry, killed the autistic adult and wounded his parents. He was a former police officer and was not charged.
