recently two friends of mine brought up autism in a conversation. one of them knows about my diagnosis and the other one is a nurse and regularly works with autistic children.
They brought up lots of things I disagree with and that kind of hurt me… They said things like “there are severely autistic people and there are others that are pretty chill” “being autistic is fashionable these days” “people use their autism as an excuse for bad behavior” “autistic people should keep their diagnosis for themselves because society is not really ready for that yet”
I tried to argue against it, but I wasn’t really good at that. I also didn’t feel comfortable to say I am autistic. I felt really devastated when I got back home. I texted one of my friends (the one who knows I am autistic) and said the whole conversation made me feel really bad.
Since she is gay I said that I am feeling the same way you would feel if two of your friends talked about homosexuality the way they talked about autism (“being gay is fashion these days” “people use their homosexuality as an excuse for bad behavior”, “gay people should stay in the closet because society is not ready for them”…) She got really angry at me, literally told me to go fuck myself and that I am victimizing myself…
I feel so hurt by this. invalidated. I don’t know… I just wanted to share :I
First off, I’m sorry that this happened to you.
If it were me, I’d drop that " “friend” " (extra quotes added for emphasis) like a boulder off a cliff. People that are actually friends listen & make amends when told their words caused pain & invalidation.
If it were me (I’m not familiar with your life situation outside of this post), I wouldn’t contact her in any way/shape/form, and the only words I would say if she contacted me would be:
“Actions have consequences,” and walk away.
I know that some of what I’ve wrote may come across as harsh & nuclear, but I have no patience for people that do this. Life is too short to keep people like around.
In spite of the negativity & pain being spewed out of our screens, there are plenty of people that do care & empathize.