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The original was posted on /r/tifu by /u/Cut-Unique on 2026-02-11 21:25:39+00:00.
This happened in the final few weeks of my senior year of high school when I was 19.
For some background, I am diagnosed as autistic, and had an EXTREMELY rough time in school. It was absolute hell, and I used whatever excuses I could to stay home. Slightly sore throat? Stay home. Mild stomachache? Stay home. Arm/leg hurting? Stay home. You get the picture. During my freshman year of high school, I missed so much school that I just narrowly avoided losing credits.
For my sophomore year, I transferred to a small continuation school, which I attended for the remainder of high school. This was where I needed to be. The classes were small, and the teachers were really chill. Most of them allowed us refer to them by their first names as opposed to Mr./Ms. [last name] because they wanted to be seen as mentors as opposed to strict disciplinarians. They mainly wanted to ensure the kids graduated, got help for any substance abuse issues, and stayed out of trouble with the law. That being said, there were plenty of times where the police had to be called if there was a fight or something.
My attendance improved greatly during this time, and by my senior year I was a model student. I was chosen to give the speech at the graduation ceremony. I never got in trouble. I was the quiet, slightly awkward metalhead. I had long hair, a scruffy face, and wore black most of the time. I no doubt looked like the type of guy who would do drugs, but I didn't.
So, one day, in either late May or early June, I woke up with a sore throat. I wasn't sure if I was getting sick or if I would feel better as the day went on. Now, if this happened when I was younger, I definitely would have stayed home, but since I was so close to graduating and being free from the obligation to attend school, I decided to go.
As the day went on, I felt increasingly tired and achy. After finishing my assignment, I asked my teacher's aide (the teacher was out of the room) if I could step outside and get some fresh air. She said "Sure, go ahead." There was a trail near the school where I would occasionally walk and there were benches at regular intervals along the trail. So I decided to walk a little way down the trail to the nearest bench, stay there for maybe five minutes, and then go back to class.
I was so achy that I had to lie down on the bench on my stomach, and ended up falling asleep with my arm dangling down off the bench. About half an hour later, I was woken up by someone tugging on my arm and a guy's voice saying "What's up man? It's the po-pos!" I opened my eyes and saw two cops standing over me, and I was like, oh shit! The cop said "One of the neighbors called us because they thought you had ODed on something, so we wanted to make sure you were okay." I'm pretty sure there was a wet spot on the bench because I was drooling. I explained to them that I was a student at [school's name], and I wasn't feeling well so I decided to take a walk, but I wasn't on any drugs. I was expecting them to not believe me, but they were cool about it. I walked with them back to the school.
Immediately when I walked through the front gate, I saw that there was a huge commotion because there had been a report that a student was found on the trail and had possibly ODed. There was a police car, and I saw that there was another cop talking to the principal, likely asking if the person they found matched the description of one of their students. When they saw that it was me, everybody was like "Oh my god, it's [my name]! He never gets in trouble!" They were of course relieved to know that I was okay, albeit not feeling well. My mom was called, and I went home. I actually was pretty sick, and was out for the rest of the week. Needless to say, I probably should have stayed home that day.
Was my teacher angry? No! He thought it was the most hilarious thing ever. He even joked that since I was selected to give the speech at the graduation, they should have put a picture of me in the back of the police car in the graduation slide show (I actually wasn't driven back to school in a police car since it was a very short walk). My teacher was a really chill dude. My friends and I would periodically visit the class for a few years afterwards until he retired, and every single time we visited, he made me tell the story. That's how funny he thought it was, and after the initial scare wore off, I thought it was funny too. So do my parents.
Things easily could have turned out very differently, but thankfully they didn't.
TL;DR: I was at school and wasn't feeling well, so I asked my teacher's aide if I could step outside and get some fresh air. I went to a hiking trail, fell asleep on a bench, and was woken up by the cops because they thought I had ODed.