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Neurodivergence doesn’t always express itself in the form of perfectly-hewn sentences and logic.
🕑 Added 2024-09-25 11:40:30 +0000 UTCThis week, I got skewered for tripping over a sentence six months ago, or at least that’s what I’ve been told. Over the last four days, I’ve earned the label “The transphobe” because I muddled a few words. Contempt-filled people turned the incident into a fabrication of bigotry. They've insisted that anyone who speaks to me should consider themselves the enemy. I’ve even had friends cut me off. When I tried to create distance from those people, they began coming to my DMs and journal. When I tried to escape by deactivating my Fet account, they came to my email. I’ve been harassed, smeared, and lied about for four days.
I’ve tried apologising. It didn’t work. I tried explaining what I meant. That didn’t work either. I tried swearing off activism. Nothing worked. Many of the attacks have been viciously ableist. They’ve been mocking and judging me for failing to remember an incident in February. They’ve done all this as a demonstration against hatred.
I’ve spent most of my life with active epilepsy. I’ve taken a lot of temporal and occipital lobe damage, so I can’t always remember what the pet with the meows is. I’m somewhat face blind, so when I choose movies, I make sure they don’t have too many characters. I can’t remember their names, let alone tell the difference between their faces. I often lose my ability to spell fifth grade words, and I’ve frequently gotten lost on my way out of the door. I’ve spent a lifetime relying on the kindness of strangers to pick me up off the side of the road or direct me back home. I don’t always use the right words.
My cerebellum is wrecked, too, so I’ve tried to pay with a Woolworths card at Mr Price. No supermarket teller has ever mocked me for my confusion. This does not happen on Fetlife. ‘Round there, if you don’t have an impressive brain and even more impressive language abilities, you will be mocked.
I’m good with words, but as a creative person, I can’t find my way around an equation and have to count out numbers on my fingers.
Neurodivergence doesn’t always express itself in the form of perfectly-hewn sentences and logic. Some of us are only bright on good-health days. Your neurodivergence doesn’t always play out like my neurodivergence. Your brain makes light work of certain things, and mine can manage entirely different things. Autism is not the only form of brain anomaly on the planet, so please don’t mock me for having different brain woes than you.
Even in the neurotypical world, people have different talents. So you can remember things. Excellent, but can you be kind to those who have different abilities than you?
Comments
NO_1
I hope to read you back soon on Fetlife. You are one important piece and presence and you know that. I have no idea what happened, doesn't matter, from all I read from you I am absolutely sure you don't need to explain anything, people will always understand only what they want to understand. There are so many versions of ourselves as the eyes who see us, we aren't responsible for any. A hug! And, take your time ofc, if the time isn't enough, we will follow from here!
sydsfriend
Anyway I came here to repeat what we've been saying since this started. We (as in the vast majority of your followers) have no doubts about you at all. The few who did this to you are trash, and they always will be.
sydsfriend
I never even thought to join Patreon. I figured it was for people with disposable income. So sad I didn't realize there was an option for broke asses like me.
accidental sub
Yes, but it's not so easy to logic your way through self-esteem issues. I'm working on it. Unfortunately, it does take me some time and work, but I'll get there.
Karolina Lewanowicz
You hang in* there. For every 10 haters, there are 1000 friends, allies, and people who feel seen reading your writings. (*I initially wrote "hold on", eh)
Dierdre Vans Evers
Hugs, my sweet -- seems to me that evil creeps out when pure light frightens them. You shine a pure light into the corners of our world and this makes you a target for the dark.
WiseAxe
I’m here. And you’re absolutely right. My own kids even misgender each other in discussion about one another. Or about a partner of one of them. Accidentally. Over time, they have found more grace for me and my wife when we miss something or fail to self-correct in an appropriate (whatever the heck that is) amount of time. 🥰 🫂. Being understood and not receiving grace and compassion for it, along with the reality that you aren’t responsible to make them understand when they don’t seek to do so. Yeah. You’re not a transphobe.
KaarN
And we see who you are. And that’s not a transfobe, not even a tiny bit. Hugs 🫂
KaarN
Pls, don’t stop being here. So glad to see you write. I know how strong it is, but it will subside, it will lose its grip.
