you know what fucks me up a little?

iamthestrangerinmoscow:

breaks-out-the-high-g-note:

Doctor who was one of my biggest special interests right, still is, but I stopped. I don’t remember all the stuff I knew about doctor who before. Like yeah I can recite the doctors in ascending order and if you describe an episode to me I will probably be able to tell you the name of it, but a lot of stuff is gone, and it doesn’t feel the same. And that’s because I talked too much about it and had to be punished. Doctor who makes me really fucking happy and I wanted to share it with my parents because I love them, and they would get angry with me for knowing too much about it. They said it was an “unhealthy obsession” and they took my cards away, all my monster invasion and alien files cards, and my sonic screwdrivers and my tardis (which I bought with my own money). They would use them against me, for leverage. These things were like my sense of self and they were being used as a bargaining chip. They weeded out my special interests based on what was more productive; Nature could stay. But this one was just too much of an inconvenience.

Now I’m older and I know I shouldn’t talk about the things I love too much with my parents. They’ll get angry. And now I’m allowed all my stuff back, since I’m not annoying them about it anymore. I have my sonic screwdrivers, tardis, annuals, everything. But it doesn’t really feel the same… And it’s fucking shit.

That’s so fucked up I’m so sorry about it 😦 I feel this on a personal level because Doctor Who is my special interest and I can’t imagine how awful that must feel. My parents were never very happy with me being obsessed with it, but they never did anything as nasty as that.

And I also have an amazing grandmother who always supported me and because she knows DW makes me very happy she encouraged it since day one, like she always does with my special interests. She bought me so many DW books and other merch and she always defended me. And she watches every single episode so that we can discuss it together and every time we talk she asks “anything new in the Doctor Who world?” and I love that so much.

There are many stories out there of special interests being “beaten” out of autistic people, metaphorically or literally. I really hope you will recover from that and find something that will make you happy again.

There are many stories out there of special interests being “beaten” out of autistic people, metaphorically or literally.

This just sings to me in so many ways. It’s hard not to feel awful when you read about another generation dealing with this kind of treatment. You wonder how things haven’t changed.

In the 80s, my parents treated me much the same over my ‘specialised interests’ like Doctor Who. They made fun of me for it (and they watched when they were younger!). The damage this kind of mockery (by parents, by other authority figures) is so disfiguring. Most of them don’t care, either. They’ll never apologise.

I’m grateful for finding community online over the years, hope others can find/have found the same.

thedreamer001:

A longing for silence

A want for stillness

A desire for darkness

In a world full of noise

In a world full of chaos

In a world full of light

Constantly bombarded

Yet sometimes

When it is silent

When it is still

When it is dark

I find, inside myself

Noise

Motion

Light

Of my very own.

sharkphobia:

ok but i totally agree with that. i love seeing so much positivity for stimming now when before there was hardly any, but like…i hope a lot of ppl realize that stimming isn’t just “moving paint and poking slime and glitter” like. a lot of people, myself included, flap, rock, twist hair, chew, yell, make noises, stomp, jump – and u shouldn’t really….put one before the other. if you’re not autistic or don’t stim, u cant support what u think is cute and aestheticy and not support us autistic folk who stim more noticeably and louder u know?

All the above.

As a kid/teen my stimming was an embarrassment for my parents/family. Punishments were common. So many have gone through this. So many people stim, including non-autistic people. It’s not a fetish, it’s not an ‘aesthetic.’ Ignorant opinions on stimming are unnecessary. We don’t need them. No one needs anyone else’s approval to live and be themselves.

iamthestrangerinmoscow:

On November the first, Autistic Speaking day, I decided to write an actually rather long Q&A with things I and other autistic people get asked most often. If you’d like other people to know these things or just agree with me, feel free to reblog!

Q: Autistic person, or person with autism?
A: I prefer “autistic person”, because I don’t feel like autism is something separate from me, my brain and my identity. It’s not an ink splotch on a picture, it’s more like a color filter that covers the entire picture and changes the way it is. Autism is not what I have, it’s who I am. More than that, there is no reason to put the person first since nothing about autism negates being a real person. Which is why most people in the community also prefer “autistic person”.

Q: Is autism a mental illness?
A: No, it’s a developmental disorder. The main difference between those two things is that mental illnesses typically have a start and sometimes a finish – they can be caused by something, and they can be treated and sometimes even cured with therapy and/or medication. Autism doesn’t have a start because people are born autistic and they die autistic. And it can’t be cured or treated, only accommodated.

Another reason why we separate them is because in my opinion mental illnesses cause distress and suffering just by being present, while with autism the distress and suffering mostly come from lack of accommodations, bullying, abuse and neglect. Which is why we are now trying to move away from this classification and call autism a “neurotype” – not a malfunction, just a different type of nervous system.

Q: Is autism a disability?
A: Yes, in the social model of disability. Meaning that the neurotype itself isn’t disabling, but the society and the world is. Autistic people make up about 1-2% of the population, so the vast majority of people in the world are allistic (not autistic). So the world wasn’t built for us. However with enough accommodations, help, understanding and acceptance we can change the world, and then autistic people won’t be disabled anymore.

Q: Should we search for a cure for autism?
A: No, mostly because of scientific reasons. Research shows that autism is more likely to be an anatomical brain difference rather than a biochemical one, meaning that it can’t be fixed or altered after birth or a certain step in prenatal brain development. So the only “cure” we can develop is a prenatal screening test that will allow us to detect it and give parents an option to abort. I stand with the pro choice movement and the right to abortion, however I do thing that we can come up with a better use of money than stopping autistic people from being born in the first place.

And the second reason is that the majority of autistic people don’t want a cure! As I’ve said, autism is an integral part of our neurology and curing us would be akin to killing us and creating a brand new person. Autism comes with problems and challenges but it also has many traits that I love and wouldn’t want to lose. And even for people who do want a cure, a more manageable and realistic goal would be to invest in support and accommodation that would help them with their problems.

Q: What about therapies for autistic people?
A: Sure. There are several reasons why autistic people might require therapy. A lot of us have comorbid anxiety disorders, often due to mistreatment, bullying and abuse, so therapy for anxiety could help some of us. Sensory integration therapy might benefit autistic people by helping them better understand their sensory perception and learning how to deal with negative aspects of sensory processing disorder. Some autistic people choose to attend social skills classes although we have to understand that being a social butterfly isn’t a requirement to be respected and accepted, so no one should be forced to take them. And of course autistic people can have mental illnesses that they might want to get therapy for. However don’t view autism as something that needs to be cured and fixed. So autism isn’t something you need therapy for by default.

Q: What about ABA, applied behavioral analyses?
A: ABA is to autism is what conversion therapy is to being non-straight or non-cisgender. It doesn’t help the autistic person, it just forces them into seeming more neurotypical which on the surface looks like they got better. It is often abusive, it leaves children and adults with higher rates of mental illness including PTSD, and it comes from a basic premise that autistic people are not whole, real people with thoughts, feelings and consciousness. Read more of my thoughts on ABA here: http://iamthestrangerinmoscow.tumblr.com/post/152193710933/hey-i-liked-the-post-you-did-for-parents-of

Q: What kind of autism do you have?
A: Autism! It’s true that we used to have different diagnosis for autism, such as Asperger’s Syndrome, Kanner’s Syndrome, PDD-NOS, childhood autism, atypical autism and so on. However further research and investigation lead the psychiatric field to realize that this separation was unnecessary because the diagnostic criteria for these disorders weren’t different enough. For example the only thing that separated Asperger’s and Kanner’s in DSM-4 was the time of developing verbal speech which said nothing about persons needs and abilities later in life. As a result we now recognize that autism is a spectrum with vastly varying combinations of traits, needs, talents, abilities and problems, but of the same nature. So there’s just one diagnosis (in the DSM-5) – autism spectrum disorder.

Q: Are you high-functioning or low-functioning?
A: I’m a real person with a complex combination of abilities and needs that can’t be put into one of two rigid categories. Depending on how you describe me, I can be labeled as both. If you say that I’m an adult who can’t live on their own, can’t do most basic housework, can’t even speak on the phone, struggles with severe executive dysfunction and anxiety and needs daily assistance, then I sound “low-functioning”. If you say that I’m a student at a university studying their special interest, fully verbal and eloquent speaker, had no developmental delays, can pass as neurotypical most of the time and is considered smart, then I sound “high-functioning”. In reality I’m neither.

Functioning labels don’t really serve their purpose as a descriptor of needs and abilities, rather they simplify them and lead to more discrimination. High-functioning means your needs are neglected and your problems are denied. Low-functioning means your talents and abilities are ignored and you are denied respect and autonomy. Both are really detrimental to us, so most of us really dislike functioning labels. Some other descriptors that might work are “verbal/nonverbal”, “living independently/requires some level of assistance”, “has an intellectual disability/learning disability/a mental illness” and so on. You’ll have to speak about each person individually cause we are all very different.

Q: Should I support Autism Speaks and Light it up blue?
A: No, by all means no. Autism Speaks is a terrible organization that cares more about money than autistic people. They call is a tragedy, a burden, a disease, the reason for divorces, worse than cancer and AIDS combined, a fate worse than death and so on. They use autism as a fear-mongering tactic to earn more money that goes to staff salaries and advertising (with less than 5% going to autistic people and their families!). They support ABA and abusive fake treatments of autism. They refuse to listen to us and basically they speak for us and over us. Boycott Autism Speaks and Light It Up Blue. More info here: http://autisticadvocacy.tumblr.com/post/102634036950/so-why-is-autism-speaks-bad-im-confused

Q: Which autism organization I can support?
A: ASAN – autistic self-advocacy network, and the Autistic Women Network, are the two good organizations I know.

Q: Is the puzzle piece symbol a good symbol for autism?
A: Personally I dislike it because of the association with Autism Speaks. It can be interpreted as “autistic people are missing pieces” which I think is rather dehumanizing. I prefer the neurodiversity symbol, which is the infinity symbol in rainbow colors. If other autistic people wish to use the puzzle piece for themselves, I’m okay with that, but I don’t like it being pushed on others, especially by allistic people.

Q: Are you professionally diagnosed with autism?
A: I am, but no one needs a paper diagnosis to know they are autistic. You can figure it out with research and help from various resources. There are many reasons why someone wouldn’t be able to get a professional diagnosis. Money and accessibility are the biggest barrier, however systematic oppression also plays a role. Autism is under-diagnosed in girls/women and people of color, and many people are denied a diagnosis because they don’t fit the stereotype of an autistic person. Typically an autism specialist is required to give a paper diagnosis and they aren’t always available – and non-specialists make a lot of mistakes.

Also a paper diagnosis might put the person in risk, depending on where they live. In my home country, Russia, a professional psychiatric diagnosis on your official record will mean denial of education, employment, adoption and even a driver’s license, which is why my family had to pay for the diagnosis out of pocket in a private clinic. All these are reasons why I, as well as most good autism organizations, support well-informed autism self-diagnosis.

Q: Where can I learn more about autism?
A: From other autistic people! No-one can be a better expert in autism than an actually autistic person. If you need answers, ask us. Some good resources to start are: YouTube channel “Neurowonderful”, ASAN official site, musingsofanaspie.com , askanautistic.tumblr.com and other autistic people on tumblr. Don’t speak over us, listen to us and accept us.

Nothing about us without us.

Exceptional and thorough. Please read and pass on.

8 Things Autistic People Want You To Know

autisticliving:

autisticliving:

1. Autism is a fundamental part of who we are and how we experience the world and it cannot be separated from who we are as people. Autism is not something which is clearly separated from our identities and our personalities – it’s something which affects every aspect of how we think about, experience and interact with the world around us. Autism isn’t something we have or something we’re suffering from, it’s something we are. For the vast majority of autistic people, autism is a part of our identity which means that despite common belief most of us prefer to be called “autistic” as opposed to “people with autism.”

Do not tell us that we only have value if we can separate our identities and our personalities from autism.

2. The vast majority of autistic people do not want a cure, we want acceptance and accommodations. Do not put your time and money into researching how to cure autism and how to prevent it, put time and money into accommodating and accepting autistic people. We do not wish to become neurotypical, we wish to change society so that we can be accommodated, accepted and included as autistic people. Our goal isn’t to become as close to neurotypical as possible, it is to get the opportunity to live happy, fulfilling lives as autistic people. It is society that needs to chance, not us.

3. We do not support Autism Speaks or their campaign #LightItUpBlue and neither should you. If you want to support autistic people, check out ASAN or Autism Women’s Network instead. If you don’t know why autistic people don’t support Autism Speaks, check out the many resources linked in this post.

4. Functioning labels are at best inaccurate and at worst actively harmful.

Functioning labels (claiming that some autistic people are “high-functioning” while others are “low-functioning”) do more harm than good, not just because they aren’t able to give you an accurate impression of what supports an individual autistic person needs but because they’re mainly used to either silence or invalidate autistic people. Autistic people who speak up about the issues concerning them are labelled “high-functioning” to invalidate what they have to say as being inaccurate and irrelevant for other autistic people and so-called “low-functioning” autistic people are being silenced and spoken over because they are written off as too ‘low-functioning’ to have nuanced, relevant opinions or even communicate at all. Instead of forcing autistic people into one of two boxes, name the specific issues or strengths that you are referring to when you’re calling them low-functioning or high-functioning. Are they non-verbal? Say that instead of calling them low-functioning. Are they able to manage a job? Say that instead of calling them high-functioning.

5. Non-verbal autistic people can and do learn to communicate using other communication forms than verbal speech and they’re all individuals with their own thoughts, feelings, wants and opinions. You do not get to speak on behalf of non-verbal autistic people. You do not get to assume that you know exactly what they think, want and feel, especially not when you have never made any effort to communicate with any of them. Instead of assuming that you know what non-verbal autistic people think and feel, try listening to what they have to say by reading the words of some non-verbal autistic people such as @lysikan or Amy Sequenzia or Emma Zurcher-Long.

6. Applied Behavior Analysis, the most widespread and well-known therapy for autistic children, does more harm than good. The goal of ABA therapy is to train and force autistic people into hiding their autistic traits by all means possible as if passing for neurotypical should be the goal of all autistic people regardless of what consequences it might have for their general well-being and their mental health. If you don’t see why that is a problem, check out this masterpost by @neurowonderful.

7. People diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome are just as autistic as people diagnosed with other variants of Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Aspergers is autism and to emphasize this, aspergers and other variants of autism have been united under a broader diagnosis called “autism spectrum disorder” in the DSM-5, Back when aspergers was a separate diagnosis, the only difference between whether you got diagnosed with aspergers or autism was whether you spoke before you were three years old – something which says approximately nothing about your struggles and abilities later in life. The common misconception that aspergers and autism is two different things is just that – a misconception.

8. If you want to learn more about autism, listen to autistic people – not our parents, our siblings, our therapists our or caregivers. Autistic people are the ones who know the most about being autistic, so if you want to learn about autism we’re the ones you should ask. If you want to learn more about the different aspects of autism, @neurowonderful‘s youtube series “Ask An Autistic” is a good place to start. Here is an index over all the episodes so that you can easily find the topic you want to learn about.

You can also visit @askanautistic where autistic people are ready to answer whatever questions you may have about autism.

Please reblog this post. It’s time tumblr starts listening to autistic people.

I’m asking you to reblog this because I want this to go vital. I don’t just want this to be passed around inside tumblrs autistic community where we already know about and agree with all of the above statements. I want this to end up on the dashes of people who don’t know anything about autism, who haven’t thought twice about autism and autistic people during their time on tumblr – and that can only happen if you help me out.

Great resources here. Important reading/viewing. Please pass this on.

High-Functioning is Not a Compliment — a Poetic Rant

thedreamer001:

You call me high-functioning because I can speak in words, and you say I’m articulate

But that doesn’t account for the times when the words get trapped inside of me, and speaking seems as hard as running a marathon.

You call her low-functioning because her voice is hard to understand

But she has just as much to say as I do; you just have to listen.

You call her low-functioning because you see her rock her body and flap her hands

But you don’t think about the joy this brings her, how satisfying it is to move to the beat of her mind.

You call me high-functioning because you don’t see me playing with my hands under the table

But you don’t know how much I want to rock and flap just like she does, how it makes me feel finally comfortable in my own skin.

You call me high-functioning be cause I can socialize

But you don’t see my constant internal prompting of what to say, the years it took me to get to this point, or the internal agony when I think I’ve made a mistake.

You call her low-functioning because she often repeats the same phrases over and over again

But you don’t see the meaning in these phrases, or the way she uses them to communicate.

You call me high-functioning because I can go to social events

But you don’t see the exhaustion that comes afterward, and the toll that takes over time.

You call her low-functioning because she melts down, yelling and banging her head on the ground

But you don’t see how hard she has been trying all day long to hold together.

You call me high-functioning because you don’t see me cry and scream

But that’s because I’ve internalized, and my meltdowns happen when the world becomes too fast and swirling and nothing makes sense any more.

You call her low-functioning because she loves to talk about one TV show, and hardly ever talks about anything else

But you don’t see how much joy this brings her, and how it has allowed her to connect and make friends.

You call me high-functioning because I can talk about things I’m not interested in

But you don’t see the pure joy of infodumping about my interests, and how painful it is to keep that all inside

You call her low-functioning because you knew right away that she was not the same

You call me high-function because you never would have known anything was different about my if I hadn’t told you

But maybe I’m tired of the sameness.

High-functioning is not a compliment

When all you’re doing

Is comparing me to her.

a non-autistic’s guide to autistic special interests

leepacey:

autistic people like myself have these things called “special interests,” and a special interest can be kind of a hard concept to convey sometimes, so i’m going to try and explain it here to help non-autistic people (aka allistics) better understand

a common stereotype or image of an autistic person i’ve seen portrayed in media is a nonverbal little boy who’s obsessed with trains. the trains part is the special interest: autistic people become obsessed with specific things to the extent it’s all we can think or talk about sometimes. all autistic people are different, so the way that special interests present in autistic people varies greatly depending on the person.

autistic people are commonly emotionally drained by social interactions. what drives us and refuels us and makes us thrive is indulging in our special interest, learning everything we can about them. this could be by infodumping (enthusiastically telling someone everything we know about our special interest, usually as an attempt to connect with them or show them what’s important to us), or pursuing a career in the field of one’s special interest, or watching a new movie if your special interest is an actor or director, or anything like that. we reach out to others by talking about our special interests. for example: if your special interest is an actor, you show a friend a movie with that actor in it.

(note: special interests are a lot like obsessions, and if your special interest is a real person then that, like any person’s obsession, can cross a line at some point – but like with all people, it depends on the person. almost all autistic people respect boundaries, just like almost all allistic people respect boundaries.)

special interests can be anything, but a common trend is mechanical or technical things (like trains, airplanes, watches and watch-making, space, physics, etc), potentially because we love figuring out how things work in a literal sense. we also love fantasy and have big imaginations, so fantasy series like lord of the rings, harry potter, etc are common, as well as stuff like paranormal investigating, aliens, or the occult. we also have a very strong sense of justice, so social justice or human rights tragedies are common. but like i said, special interests can be anything, like architecture (a certain style or time period, or all architecture), animals (anything from one specific animal like a pet, to a certain species, to all animals), food (being obsessed with only eating a certain food for a little while, or food/cooking in general), sports (participating in or watching one specific sport, knowing everything about all sports, or fitness/health in general). anything you can think of, it can be a special interest.

you can also have more than one special interest, though from what i’ve seen there’s usually one dominant special interest that takes up the most time and energy. special interests are generally just a result of the autistic brain interpreting the world and fixating on certain things.

some of my past special interests, for some examples: airplanes, the titanic, ghosts/the science side of paranormal activities (even though i didn’t even believe in it), abrahamic religions, narnia, architecture, lord of the rings, the show fringe, lee pace, richard ayoade, criminal minds, the davinci code, autism, space, cults

i have two current special interests: actor aaron tveit, and making gifs. these intersect really well, because i just make a lot of gifs of aaron. i’ve had my gif-making one for about four years, and aaron for about one year now.

i’ll use aaron tveit as my example for the way special interests work and what having a special interest would entail: i watched one of his movies, les miserables (not even for the first time; i’d seen it before), and afterwards i had a very strong desire to see what else he was in. i watched all of his movies and shows that i could find. i watched and read every interview. i found out he had a concert in new york, and saved up and went. i watched movies and shows just because his former costars are in them, or he mentioned he liked it in an interview. nothing in the world makes me happier than showing a movie aaron’s in to a friend for the first time; aaron and his work are how i connect with others.

(at this point i’d like to say that as an autistic person, justice is more important to me than just about anything, and aaron’s privacy and respecting his personal life and not being a creep are all extremely important to me and i really don’t want to seem like a crazed stalker fan stereotype. people have tweeted some of my gifs at him and even just that level of interaction with him makes me extremely uncomfortable.)

special interests can last anywhere from days to years to a lifetime; it all depends on the person. we don’t really have control over what our special interests are (i once read about an autistic person who was extremely afraid of spiders but then got a spiders special interest). if i’m between special interests and watching a new movie i’m always like

(fun fact: the creator of community, the show that gif is from, is autistic!)

i’ve also seen a lot of autistic people talk about their special interests being linked to their anxiety; we feel empty when we’re between special interests, worry that we’ll never know everything there is to know about it, worry that we’re experiencing our special interests “wrong” (too quickly, too many at once, etc), or become afraid we’ll lose our interest and feel empty again. additionally, indulging in a special interest is commonly a way to help with anxiety.

in conclusion: special interests are very intense interests that fuel autistic people, and are a very key part of ~the autistic experience~. special interests can be anything, can last any amount of time, and more than one special interest can be had at once.

(if you’re reading this and currently don’t consider yourself autistic but this post is ringing a lot of bells, i would highly suggest doing some research into autism. the current statistic is that 1 in 64 people are autistic, but it’s suspected to be even more common than that, and autism is very commonly missed in girls, children of color, poorer children, etc. autism as a whole is very misrepresented and misunderstood in the media and academia, and you could very well be autistic and not know it)

anyone can reblog this (please do), and any autistic people can add on if i’m missing something important!

@gretchenprowell thank you for sharing this.

theconcealedweapon:

Autistic Person: Are you autistic?

Non-Autistic Person: No.

Autistic Person: What kind of non-autistic are you?

Non-Autistic

Person: What do you mean? I never knew that there are different kinds of not being autistic.

Autistic Person: Are you a high functioning non-autistic or a low functioning non-autistic?

Non-Autistic

Person: What? That doesn’t make sense?

Autistic Person: Are you the kind of non-autistic who’s independent, or do you need other people to help you do certain things? Are you the kind of non-autistic who has amazing skills, or do you struggle with certain things?

Non-Autistic Person: I can’t categorize my entire life’s experience into one category. There are some things that I can do on my own, and there are some things that I need help with. There are some things that I’m very skilled at, and there are some things that I struggle with.

Autistic Person: Now you know how we feel when people ask us those questions.

*Nods* *Nods* *Nods* *Nods* *Nods*