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Credit | The Autistic Cats
"My child is fine-"
Your child is so lonely and emotionally numb that they cope by living in a dream world to the point where they are terrified of living in reality itself
Warnings for autism and ADHD related ableism discussion
I think there's something really interesting about the different traumas acquired by being autistic or having ADHD in a shitty ableist society.
The two disorders have a significant amount of overlap. Of course they're not the same and each comes with its own challenges that the other may not have but, when compared with other disorders/neurodivergencies, for all intents and purposes they are very similar.
However, society's perception of them is almost the exact opposite, which gives people who have one or the other wildly different kinds of disabled trauma.
Society at large likes to think they know a great deal about each of these disorders, but really knows almost nothing. What it comes down to is this:
Society believes and treats autistic people as if their entire personality, capability levels, and potential to succeed as a human is hinged to their autism, and they don't have a confident outlook on that, so they treat autistic people as if they can't do anything or are stupid. Autistic people have to continuously fight to be seen as something other than their autism (or in addition to it, of course, because I don't mean to say they're trying to escape their autism)
And on the flip side, society believes that ADHD is a myth, an excuse, a made up word for children that won't behave or are undisciplined, or a childhood disorder that 'goes away.' People consistently underestimate the symptoms/traits of ADHD, aren't aware of them, or don't believe them. People with ADHD are constantly told that these symptoms/traits are their own shortcomings rather than part of their ADHD. ADHD people have to continuously fight to be seen as having the disorder that massively affects their lives.
Because of these nearly opposite societal takes on each of these disorders, despite their similarities, autistic people and ADHD people end up, largely, being traumatized in opposite ways.
On the one hand there are autistic people who have any failure blamed on their "inherent inadequacy" due to their autism, taking away their sense of ownership, control, and agency of regular, human mistakes or failures they've experienced. And on the other, you've got people with adhd who have failures that are actually caused by symptoms of their disorder being told that they simply didn't try hard enough or that they clearly don't care or it wouldn't have happened.
(also to clarify, I don't mean to say that autistic people don't also have failures or mistakes caused by symptoms and that ADHD people have some that aren't, just that no matter what caused it, this seems to be the societal response)
In the end, you get commonalities in both groups that are directly caused by these societal traumas. Actually, there are two extremes that happen in both groups for the exact opposite reasons, and, often, these extremes coexist/alternate depending on the company.
The first extreme is refusing to unmask and making yourself very serious. For autistic people this seems to also come frequently with a kind of shyness because they're afraid if they say something that's "wrong" or that shows they missed subtext, they'll give ammunition to those who infantilize them. For those with ADHD this extreme comes with constantly overworking themselves, killing themselves with stress, and minimizing every struggle because they're terrified that if they relax for one second, or validate that something was difficult because of their ADHD, the people who called them lazy are right and they're just making excuses for their shortcomings. They seek desperately to prove to themselves and others that they do try.
The other extreme is leaning heavily into the stereotypes and abusive accusations they've faced their whole lives. For autistic people, this can mean taking on learned helplessness and refusing to try new things because they believe they really can't do it by themselves, ending up with less agency because they rely on help they don't really need but are too scared to forego. For those with ADHD, it can mean developing class clown syndrome and completely giving up on trying because no matter how hard they try, they can never get a result that satisfies society when they're constantly fighting symptoms that hinder their success. Both of these are self fulfilling prophecies that end up pushing them into the hole they felt it was impossible to avoid.
People with both disorders get to flip a coin on which trauma they get more of. Regardless of which one led to more trauma, the results end up looking the same - they're likely to fit into one of the two extremes.
Anyway, I don't really have a solid point to all of this - it's just some observations I've made on how the trauma inflicted on both of these groups is wildly different and yet often yields the same results for opposite reasons.
If anyone has anything to add, I really would love to hear!
小田急電鉄 秦野 東海大学前 小田急ロマンスカーMSE ふじさん3号
富士フィルム X-Pro3 XF56mmF1.2R C-PLフィルター ND16
※色づき始めた山と小田急ロマンスカーMSE/ふじさん3号※
Traditional Landscape - Concrete Pavers
This is an illustration of a medium-sized, conventional front yard outdoor sport court made of concrete pavers.
a while ago i attended this lecture on autism. guy in the audience said he had many of the symptoms that were presented and asked what should he do to get treatment and possibly a diagnosis. instead of answering his question the psychologist went on a tangent about how "the clinic reigns all powerful over guesswork", and how actually it has become a trend amongst little children on the internet to claim that they are autistic for cool points, and that this hurts real autistic people. no she didn't tell him how to get his symptoms looked into, she just made it very clear that to her, aknowledging your own symptoms is bad and evil and hurts the poor real mentally ill people.
an ex-friend of mine, then a psychology major and by now probably a full psychologist, once lectured me on how horrible and bad it was that i told her "i probably have some sort of neurodivergency", and that if i were her patient she would never give me a diagnosis because "you aren't like this now, but i know that if you get a diagnosis you'll use it as an excuse to start treating people badly. that's just how mentally ill people are."
same ex-friend was extremely disgusted when she found out that fans sometimes make neurodivergency headcanons for characters that have the same symptoms as they do, and that authors sometimes write books with neurodivergent protagonists in stories that don't focus on that (ex: she seemed horrified that percy jackson has adhd?)
multiple psychologists i've seen on facebook agree that they should refuse to treat patients that say "i'm here because i have symptoms of a disorder and wonder if i have it", and that a patient should arrive to a psychologist as a blank slate.
school psychologist asked me how i was feeling about my trauma situation and i told him i thought my friends would leave me. instead of addressing the issue he said that that no i didn't, that i was lying, that i had searched "bpd symptoms" online and now i was faking symptoms because i wanted to have bpd, that he shouldn't have told me he suspected i had a personality disorder because now look what was happening. no, i didn't search bpd symptoms online. yes, my friends left me, it was a completely founded belief and not a symptom, let alone a faked symptom.
so the next time you hear someone saying they're "anti self-diagnosis" i want you to understand what they're saying. what they're saying is:
- i don't want people to be aware of their own symptoms
- i don't think my patients should have access to any information that doesn't come from me
- i don't think neurodivergent people should learn how to cope with their symptoms and live "normal" lives
- i think neurodivergent people should be denied a diagnosis because the moment they get one they will become evil and dangerous
- i don't think people who don't look like a stereotype could possibly be neurodivergent, even if they have all the symptoms, so i think they are faking it for attention and should be denied treatment
All of the Batfam are some flavor of neurodivergent and you cannot convince me otherwise
Tim designs speedster proof stim toys for Bart
Bart calls them “timmys stimmies”
me because even as a nd person i get genuinely aggrivated when i cant go out and do stuff
"b-but autistic people typically dont-" shut up. shut the fuck up. let me go to my cute little thrift-stores and funky calm shops around my small town
That time of the year approaches...
it makes me sad to see so many non-ADHD allistic neurodivergent people be shocked when they find out they do in fact "count" as neurodivergent (or even autistic or adhd people who are shocked to find out their other things Count as neurodivergent) bc they have been convinced by online communities that only ADHD and autism (and maybe anxiety) are neurodivergencies
chores (toast out of sight, toast out of mind 😩)
Trust me, it makes sense
adhd culture is realizing that sometimes your work feels so undoable because you’re in a place your brain associated with leisure, aka ur bedroom, so you have to go outside onto the porch in 50F weather to do your shit.
adhd culture is needing to take advantage of every accommodative service you have at your school. it is built with you in mind.
ADHD culture is having a really hard time with applications because every time you finally get through the stress of filling it out on time, you always seem to get rejected.
.
real (me, stimming with my little twisty toy inside of a store) recognizes real (the cashier, who was also nd and offered me water because it was hot outside and they recognize that all of that together can be overstimulating)
; * sits down * * five hours later * ... OHHH THAT'S WHAT I MEANT TO DO !! ... It's luckily not too late to .. To .. Do the thing I need to do. that I 100% remember ..