I wouldn't consider social media to be "the real world", personally. There's many things on there that are, for want of a better phrase, very "online".
I can only speak for myself, but I didn't even know of the word until 4 years ago.
I wouldn't consider social media to be "the real world", personally. There's many things on there that are, for want of a better phrase, very "online".
I can only speak for myself, but I didn't even know of the word until 4 years ago.
Being one of the "walking wounded" physically, I don't consider that autism wounds me, I find people assume that because I can stand and walk that I'm OK, sometimes I am, but sometimes I'm not. I use lifts now because my knees are sore, I will sit down when I need too, because my back aches or something.
I would like to change the narrative on mental health, to move away from it being a term of mental illness or distress and towards things that have a positive impact, a preventative strategy, rather than one that treats things when they've gone wrong. I'd also like to see more acknowlegement of the link between meantal and physical health, if you're in contastant pain or something then of course you're going to suffer from mental ill health, it shouldnt' be that people say to you with the wisdom of the truely patronising, 'Do you think you might be depressed?' The only real answer to that is, 'Of course I effing well am, wouldn't you be if every step was painful?'
Over all I think it would help an awful lot if people and society in general were just a bit kinder and understanding to each other, I think that would go a long way towards making people feel less stressed and overwhelmed. It often feels like we have to make a fuss in a world of competing disabilities so as we are heard.
I have never said or implied that it was.
Generally speaking, people live in their own comfortable bubble, without giving even a passing thought to those who are different.
I wouldn't overstate the impact of this, but things have started to improve somewhat - with changes in the law and with some organisations taking their reponsibilities more seriously and taking some steps at least to root out the worst practices, and giving training to staff. Notwithstanding the positive steps I think there's still a widespread lack of understanding of the needs of disabled people and what you need to do to remove barriers. A lot of this is to do with stereotypical ideas of what disability is. Say the word "disabled" and people will tend to have a picture of a person in a wheelchair, imagine they know what their needs are, and assume that everything possible has already been done to accommodate their needs. People tend to think that they've done the disability thing by considering wheelchair users (they've put in ramps), those with hearing impairment (they've installed an induction loop system), those with loss of vision. But that only removes some of the obstacles for some users. The job is never finished because ultimately you need to consider how disabilities affect different individuals. It seems to be hard for that message to penetrate and I don't think a lot of people try.
Ableism isn't restricted to autism though.
Ideally I'd have liked a comprehensive assessment of my ability at intellectual and practical things. From that, ideally help to do better at the things I struggle with. If still struggling then hands on help. It's about striking a good balance between doing too much for a person versus too little for a person.
Unfortunately it wasn't till I was 60, and moving to be near my daughter, that it was recognised I wasn't an awkward so so with a major character defect. That was very much due to my daughter talking to mental health services here in Wiltshire before I moved there. She demolished a lot of long held inaccuracies about me that had been allowed to wrongly be accepted as 'truth's'.
The sooner you get the help needed to do better at something the more effective that help is going to be. It's about providing an adequate level of help and support in an appropriate and timely manner. Help provided to 20 year old will be more effective than help provided to a 60 year old.
As for 'ableism', I have no idea as to what could be legitimately described as 'ableism' . Whilst being more interested in what political parties stand for than the average person; I'm not heavily into the 'politics of autism' (for want of a better phrase).
Yes, this doing everything for someone is terribly toxic. I help usually only if asked, some exceptions st work, but it’s different because I know my colleagues. Otherwise there are some situations when I see that something bad is gonna happen and the person there does not see it, so I react.
I just want people to listen and take me seriously. If they offer help (as opposed to just jumping in with it), then that's different, though it depends on the circumstances.
No I don't and I don't think most people ever stop to consider that trying to help and do everything for someone is unhelpful in itself, or that we don't need people to speak for us, although everybody may need an advocate at times. There are plenty of things a disabled person can do, if given a chance.