When I tell people I might be autistic…

When I tell people I might be autistic, the most reactions are get are one of the following:

Everybody is a little autistic

Yep, like autistics are a little bit neurotypical. I don’t think the people who say this know how offensive this really is. It’s like saying: “every person is a little bit black” to a black person, and not knowing that you said something offensive. It’s people whom are not great at dealing with diversity. I’m not typical, never will be, how hard I try to be normal (and believe me, I try, but I will never be normal, so most of the times, I don’t give a fuck. Sometimes I do. In High profile situations, like a social gathering that my girlfriend thinks that means something, or is important for her).

I couldn’t tell you are autistic, you must be high-functioning then.

Yes, just like my other disability, which is also invisible, and I get also offensive remarks about. When you can’t stand on your legs, because of an accident, and you know it’s going to heal, you won’t say to someone in a wheel chair, I know how it’s to be like you, I have been in a wheelchair like you. Nope, You haven’t been on a wheelchair like that person, just like you won’t have the bowel problems like me, or be a little autistic like me. I also hate when people say about someone when they are being OCD when they just have minor annoyances, like something not being straight. I have annoyances, which can trigger me, but they used to bug me more than now. Now I know that I can go to the store to pick up more of my breakfast, and have some tommorow. It wasn’t like that when I was young.

You can’t be autistic, because you are not like …

Don’t compare two autistics. I have met an autistic person, to whom I said I might be autistic, and he was very understanding. He told me there was a spectrum, and because I was not like him, didn’t mean I wasn’t on the spectrum as well. I have met other people as well, which caused me great doubts, because I have been searching for a very, very long time after what makes me different from most people. I thought I was highly intelligent, but an IQ test knocked that to the ground, although I didn’t think I did that bad, because the test also measures response time. I got the answer right in my mind, but my brain-mouth connection isn’t so fast, because other images keep popping up and distract the brain-mouth connection.

Stand still! Don’t fidget! (any combination of don’t move, don’t fidget, don’t do anything weird)

I had a teacher, whom I still have a grudge toward, which will never, ever go away. She failed my 6th year in high school because she thought I was anti-social, but that isn’t the worst thing she did. She told me to stand still. That’s the worst, because I was nervous during my presentation. I had to present in a group, so I had to remember my words, remember my que, had to face the jury, had to look them in the eyes. Things they told me a hundred times I didn’t do. Then in the middle of the presentation (because I have a tendency to walk around, and rock left to right all the time when I’m talking), she yelled at me (yelled, not said) that I should stand still. I stood still, not in a normal relaxed fashion. I froze in the moment I was in. Obviously, that talk didn’t go well. The next year, I had to do that year over again, and I had the exact opposite of that teacher. A teacher that was very, very understanding, whom wanted me to learn new things and whom helped me hide my stim, but never said anything bad about it. She gave me a table to lean on, which made my stims less obvious, but they were still there, and it was acceptable. I aced my presentation, by not moving standing behind a table and I was very, very relaxed giving that presentation.

 

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