Tag: no rebogs please

That mention of not only a fair few autistic/otherwise ND people ending up in certain fields, but that also meaning that other people in those fields may be kinda used to dealing with us, reminded me of one conversation with Mr. C a while back.

Years ago, he was running a game at some con, and an acquaintance’s known-autistic little brother wanted to join. Apparently the adults defaulted to “are you sure that’s OK?!” 😕 Sure, why not.

The kid had some trouble with his voice automatically going louder and louder as he got excited–which, you know, so do I. Over time I have learned to keep a better watch on that (as most people will), but sometimes it still helps if people around me keep that in mind and maybe nudge me if the volume has unintentionally crept up to a bothersome point. Which is exactly the approach Mr. C took! And the game went fine. No big deal.

That apparently surprised the kid’s family. It sounded like gently reminding him that his voice was creeping up was…not necessarily an approach they’d been using 🤔 Which surprised Mr. C. Just from what he said, I felt pretty sorry for kid living with people who did seem to be trying, but just not really getting it. Even at that simple example level. As is unfortunately common, and winds up doing a lot of harm.

Anyway, the punchline to that bit of background story? “Well, I did work with the Swedish Youth Science Federation for years. I mean, dealing with autistic people? That’s just Tuesday!”

I just barely controlled myself from “Dude, you are nowhere near the same universe as NT yourself. No wonder it doesn’t seem particularly unusual to you.”

(Not going into a lot of details, because privacy. But, if he’s not at least a cousin, I would eat my metaphorical hat. I actually started looking into it myself after I moved in with him, and in some ways he reminded me that much of my engineer dad who had recently been diagnosed. Pretty quickly started seeing unexpected commonalities with my own experiences, reading stuff from autistic people. But, trying to understand better what might be making him tick was what got me started there.)

But…he just doesn’t see it that way at all? It’s amazed me for years. As far as he’s concerned, he seems to think he’s as close to NT as pretty much anyone he knows.

And I was struck by the idea that this may really be so. From the perspective of someone whose main social circles from the time he was a kid have largely consisted of other people with the Youth Science Federation, other people who practically lived in the computer labs in college, other people pursuing somewhat unusual special interests the whole while–and then working in IT for his entire adult life to date.

I mean, at the risk of falling into stereotypes? In settings like that, I am highly unlikely to stand out as the most obviously unusual person around. (With enough experience of my own to say this with some confidence.) Never mind him.

And no wonder he hasn’t yet been put off dealing with my weird ass 🙄 “It’s Tuesday!”

Another place where context and frame of reference likely matter quite a bit. I was just prompted to make some more connections there.

I did actually buy a bag of some frozen raw food mix as a bit of a treat for Max one time, because I spotted it on sale and it looked like a combo Mr. Picky should really like.

So, then I promptly plonked the nuggets onto a baking sheet in the oven for a while before giving it to him 😅 He seemed to enjoy those chicken and veggie meatballs quite a bit.

An indication of the level of executive function stupids I’m dealing with today:

I want to make some comfort food for supper, which originally calls for cream of mushroom soup (“our good old southern béchamel” 🙄) in the sauce. Which, these days, means making my own GF creamy sauce. Usually not a problem, besides kinda defeating the purpose of a shortcut ingredient. Not that much of a hassle, for something that tastes better.

(Recipe for assorted cream soup equivalents that work well substituting a GF flour, for anyone who might find it useful.)

If it’s going into another sauce, it’s usually easier just to incorporate those ingredients instead of making the “soup” separately.

This evening, though? Hahaha. Figuring out how best to accomplish that is enough of a holdup that I’m just going ahead and making it in a separate pan to add in like the canned stuff.

Also a decent example of how this crap can snowball and make everything else harder, but hey. At least I do know the words “executive function” and “burnout” now. Still frustrating, but at least I have some reasonable explanation and hopefully a little more patience now

Then, of course, there’s also the thing where I’ve run into way fewer problems dealing with genuine white rednecks back home, than with the pseudo-progressive types motivated to do all that whitetrashwashing and set up convenient scapegoats.

They’re generally raised to act better in public, and face some consequences if they do not. That is more than I can say about some other folks.

clatterbane:

Related to one post from a little while ago, I was reminded of a quote from something I reread recently.

From Every Day Is a Good Day, edited by Wilma Mankiller. With this specific quote coming from her intro to chapter 6:

The women at this gathering speak of love in grand, sweeping terms that embrace the natural world, family, clan, community, and nation. Love is not limited to immediate family or to a romantic partner. It is not doled out in small increments to a socially prescribed person or group of people. It is all encompassing.

LaDonna Harris speaks eloquently about the high value she places on her relationships with others, which she describes as “not letting go of people,” even her adversaries. A Cherokee traditionalist echoes this sentiment and speaks of the need to “live and care for one another in such as a way as to ensure that there will be no reason to let go of others.”…

The larger society’s endless conversation about whether gay and lesbian couples should be accepted and granted rights to marriage, adoption, and other rights was nonexistent among these women. They place a very high premium on respect: respect for oneself, for others, for all living things. It is highly disrespectful to label another human being and define them based primarily on their sexual preferences. These women care more about the human decency and dignity of people, and whether they are a contributing part of the community, than about their adult relationships with others.

(And that would be with some longer term different ideas about what constitutes a valuable contribution to society, yeah.)

I included the longer part before the bit directly discussing labels, mostly for additional context.

But yeah, I have also encountered some people who wanted to assume that a statement like that is exactly the same as the “don’t let yourself be defined by X!” discussed earlier. Very possibly because that invalidating, othering approach is most of what they have encountered up close.

(Very much like the difference between people honestly trying to understand and relate to someone else’s experiences, and the dismissive deliberately not getting it “Oh, everyone does that! And you are making me very uncomfortable by even talking about this, jfc leave it already if you don’t want to totally alienate everyone around you. Weirdo” versions. Not at all the same scenario, but I do get the idea that a lot of people are mostly used to encountering the dismissive kind.)

When, yeah, that “don’t let yourself be defined by X!” behavior is one indication of exactly the types of disrespectful “boxes are more important than actual people” attitude being objected to there.

I mean, similar is part of why I have gotten more and more personally resentful of feeling pressured to choose from a certain assortment of boxes. And a good bit of the reason it’s hard to even try to talk about some of this stuff, even if you do make it very clear that the last thing you want to do is dictate how anyone else needs to be navigating or even relate to any of it. That’s still not what some people will hear.

I can understand why certain approaches do appeal to some other people. Not that it would even matter if I didn’t understand at all, because it’s their lives and experiences to make sense of and manage the best they can! The same approach is not going to make sense for everyone, though. It just won’t. And that doesn’t mean anyone is necessarily wrong.

Plus, pegs. It’s hard to even start talking about some things when you are coming at them from a sufficiently different perspective that you’re not necessarily even talking about what a lot of people would assume based on some surface similarities. More complicated when those things are also heavily enough politicized that pretty much everyone involved has been hurt in some way(s).

Not just thinking about the main subject of that quote here, but that’s definitely one aspect where it’s relevant.

Reminded of this again, with some framework that just doesn’t make much sense to me in the first place.

Hoping that it really will be cooler later today. Especially since I’m out of several important items, and really need to get out shopping on the bus.

My system has been handling the heat about as well as when I was on certain medications before, and it’s been kind of worrying in general. Particularly with being on my own this week. But, just getting out to the closest shops (like, within a few blocks) has taken some recovery. Came close to passing out a few days ago, and I do know what that feels like from experience. I haven’t even wanted to try venturing out farther, carrying along plenty to drink or not. It just hasn’t been safe.

Hoping that will be less of a problem later.

(I’m also pretty sure my partner didn’t realize the level of difficulty when he took off. In case anybody was making undue assumptions about that.)

Unfortunately reminded again of when a friend’s otherwise pretty abusive mother was trying to push her into breast reduction surgery. Her clothes would fit so much better! Etc.

We were maybe 20, and the friend wore a C cup 🤔 But Mom apparently thought it was pressing enough to keep offering to pay for it and everything. The situation made my friend uncomfortable enough that she needed to talk about it, which was how I even knew.

The whole thing was just very very weird, and I really hope Mom didn’t manage to wear her down after we lost touch. (Mostly thanks to her mother, but yeah.)

It’s been a welcome break the past few days, but the temperature is supposed to go back up here and I am really not looking forward to that.

Especially now that I’m handling heat worse again with the diabetes, and without the option of jumping in a cool shower when I do start getting dizzy, etc. No cooler place to go, either.