#so I’ll deal and stuff but just. being disabled puts me at a huge disadvantage here

[nope-body]

.

#honestly just so tired of my roommate at this point #it feels like she doesn’t respect me as a person most of the time #she has made so many jokes at my expense and I’m tired of it #she doesn’t understand or try to understand me #she’s not kind or compassionate #she was on her phone while I was throwing up and I had to ask her for help to get her to even look at me #like if throwing up makes you uncomfortable I get it but like come on! #her apologies are never her actually recognizing that she hurt me and that was wrong #just an explanation of why she thought it was fine #and then a little sorry that it hurt you/you felt hurt kind of thing tacked on at the end #tonight it was just ‘sorry. I didn’t think that would upset you.’ #but I like my room and I like living in my dorm and I’m not risking changing rooms and ending up in a dorm without a working elevator #so I’ll deal and stuff but just. being disabled puts me at a huge disadvantage here #and she’s gradually gotten better about disability stuff but that’s because I’ve had to explain things every step of the way #but also like. she payed money to get a second number to prank text me with and sure the mystery was a bit fun but after I had completely #forgotten about the whole thing she went and told a bunch of people about how she duped me for a month and I never found out. #I was right there. she told me first and then explained that to everyone else. and it just. I don’t like being made a fool of in front of a #bunch of people! she could have kept it to herself and let it fade away but no. #I’m just frustrated

[autismus-obscurus]

hello could you help me, i wanna write a story were onw of the characters is autistic i want a little help is there some sites about it

First of all, I’m very glad you turn to the autistic community. I’m sure you’ve seen this written a bunch of times, but just to be sure: please, please stay away from Autism Speaks. They demonize autism (basically saying autistic people ruin their families and would be better off dead). They promote a “cure” (which means aborting children that test positive for autism genes) and abusive “therapy”. A good post about why ABA is bad is HERE.This is a very good post on what to look out for in research.Tbh, I don’t go on other websites as much, so I’ll put some links of stuff that I know. For a general understanding, you can look into the DSM-V criteria (the offical criteria to diagnose autism). This won’t give you much to write a lively character, but with all the resources, it can be overwhelming. You should also definitely check out the organizations run by autistics, such as the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network and the Autistic Women’s Network.Autism is a spectrum. (See here for an explanation on what that means.) No two autistics are the same, and experience the world the same. An important tip I read was “don’t make autism their only defining trait” (it’s the same with race or sexuality, really). It’s tempting, since autism is literally affect how our brain works, but it’s better to do it in subtle ways e.g.

sensory differences (HERE is an example for sensory issues)

executive dysfunction and how to deal with it

overstimulation (also called sensory overload; common, but not universal)

the empathy thing

Eye contact

Voice stuff

“Atypical” Traits 

How do special interests work?

Comorbidities and how the influence our perception of autism

Example: PTSD and Autism

This is a very cute comic that gives an overview over common issues and how to be a good ally.

For inspiration and relatable things, you can definitely check out the #actuallyautistic tag! If you need examples for sensory things: Sensory hell and Sensory heavenIf you look on tumblr, you’ll find tons of examples for stimming. The trick is obviously to write it in a way that doesn’t degrade it (especially happy flapping has become a meme that basically says people who flap are R*tarded or just insane). That goes for all autistic behavior.

Another big topic is ableism. Warning: You will fuck up. We all do. I’m autistic and I still struggle with internalized ableism a lot. That includes automatically thinking autistic behavior looks weird, or not being able to express it, hell I haven’t even told more than four people in real life I’m autistic. Autistic is still used to mean something negative and you don’t shake that easily. Just be critical of your own thinking.Ableism has many facettes, too many for me to line up here. Some include:

Not listening to us: People who talk are “obviously” too high-functioning to speak about autism, people who can’t talk are not assumed to be able to express an opinion.

Everyone has met at least one neurotypical who assumed they knew more about autism than an autistic person.

Medical ableism: Goes both directions. Either autistics are treated as if we could not make decisions, even as adults, or our problems are dismissed, especially other symptoms

Sexism: Women much less likely to receive a diagnosis or to be treated for medical problems both. Resources masterpost on autism in women

An article about lack of diagnosis in autistic women

Abuse: Can range from emotional abuse (e.g. guilt tripping, gaslighting) to physical (e.g. provoking a meltdown / sensory overload on purpose), usually both

Generally just ignoring an autistic person’s boundaries.

“Autistics are only worth something if they have a special talent” (basically Rain Man)-> dehumanization in general, “we’re not human for not having certain traits / abilities”

There’s also this huge debate on self-dx (see this post for example). In many places diagnosis is expensive and can have a lot of disadvantages (e.g. looking for jobs). Self-dx involves a shit ton of research, months and years of it, really. (Just like you are doing now!) My humble opinion: Psychologists fuck up as well, see the ableism section.

Here is a post on how to get diagnosed as an adult. And here is a post on self-dx!Here’s my story of getting diagnosed (maybe less relevant, but take it as a real life example)

Media representation of autistic people is unfortunately complete garbage for the most part:

This post has a lot of notes with people telling what irks them about media representation of disability in general.Here is a post on why The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time )a pretty popular book that we read in school as “education” about autism) is a bad representationA post on ableism in the series “Good Doctor”I couldn’t find a cohesive review of the show “Atypical” and I haven’t seen it myself, nor do I intend to, but if you go in the #atypical tag the autistic community is very clear that it’s bullshit (and also backed by Autism Speaks, so big surprise)Billy from the new power rangers is autistic! And from what I’ve heard he’s actually well-written. (A post about what the writers did right.)

Things to avoid (unless you present it in the context of ableism / being negative):

cure rhethoric

functioning labels / mental age rhetoric (See this post)

The distinction aspergers and autism (I can’t find the post explaining in detail why it’s bullshit but here’s the short version: Aspergers is an outdated concept (in the new DSM-V it doesn’t exist anymore, you’re just autistic) and it has been used to separate the “good” autistics from the “bad” (it’s ableist and a functioning label basically)

Here’s also an explanation on Aspie supremacists

emotionless character

person first language (Here is a post on why PFL is bad)

white little boy with special interest in trains (they do exist, but it’s overdone)

he’s autistic BUT- (insert special ability) Click Here

Here is a post explaining our preference for the autism label above othersHere is another post on writing autistic charactersLastly, I recently found a very good post about the difficulty of calling a character autistic in writing, you can check it out here.

I probably forgot a ton of important things, so if anyone wants to add something, please do so; or shoot me a message, whatever is more comfortable.

#dev answers #actually autistic #info masterpost #writing #asd #autism #this took around two hours to type up but it was fun lol