17/09/2023
I'm Autistic.
But whenever I tell people "I'm Autistic", I get the death stare.
Followed by "But you don't look autistic".
It makes me red.
If you are autistic yourself, you will know the exact steam-out-of-your-eyes-and-ears feeling I'm talking about!
Over the last couple of weeks, I met two people with completely opposite understanding of Autism.
The first one gave me the usual "unaware about Autism" reaction - infuriating for me, but it's so common - I tried to ignore it.
The second one was actually a psychologist who
had adverse experiences with an Autistic child,
didn't hate them but understood them, and
even had a nuanced understanding of their experience with their Autistic adult friend
This was pleasantly surprising.
They knew about Autism because it was a part of their learning curriculum.
But if you are like the first person I met, you are not taught about any kind of disability - let alone an invisible disability like Autism - in school.
So I have realized that most people in India don't care about adult autism.
If you have never been friends with an autistic person, how will you know what Autism is and how an autistic friend is different from your regular friends?
At one point, I thought hearing "But you don't look autistic" shouldn't trigger me.
When you realize someone is unaware of something, your natural tendency is to make them aware, to teach them something new.
But if I try to teach everyone I meet who doesn't know what Autism is...?
Can you see how exhausting that sounds?
Having to explain your own identity over and over again to people, several times during the day.
It's like me having to explain what a man is, after adding "Mr." as a prefix to my name.
Can you now see how "But you don't look Autistic" is offensive to someone who is actually autistic?
But then I also think the burden of learning about Autism shouldn't be on everyone else in the society.
I want to have a positive relationship with the people around me.
(More in comments!)
