Autism doesn't just exist in April

I'm autistic, and more often than not when I meet someone...I'm met with the statement, "You don't look autistic!" As if its some sort of compliment or praise I'm supposed to graciously accept. The normal person's knowledge of autism is limited, and often rather stereotyped.

I'm not your rain man, or your good doctor either. We aren't a cookie cutter diagnosis where everyone is exactly the same. Media hasn't helped either, as the limited representation seen is often only white & male. For decades, women (and others assigned female at birth) were overlooked and diagnosed with everything BUT autism. When I was a kid growing up in the late 80's & 90's, autism was a male dominated disorder because even medical professionals believed it so. Girls were diagnosed with things like PMDD if they had reached puberty, Bipolar disorder & Borderline Personality Disorder. They would write paragraphs about all the things you had, but they'd never say it was autism or back then, even Aspergers. You just had severe social anxiety, lacked social cues, had sensory overload, selective musism, etc all on their own, it couldn't be autism!

However, the more we learn about Autism, the more the spectrum itself opens up. Autism is not just a spectrum from person to person, but a spectrum within ourselves as well. Autism isn't linear either, we can have one day that seems like a "good" or "productve" to the allistic standard, and the next day be non-verbal, burned out and reactive. Yet, we'll be held up to the day we were most "normal" forever. In my teens and early 20's, I tried to hold various jobs and nothing ever worked out for every long at all. I would need to be driven to my job, I had issues with public transportation, and driving myself. Though I had a liscence, driving anywhere led to panic attacks so bad I would have to pull off and cry. I could only keep good attendance at a job if someone else was making me go, like my parents or former partner. I masked at my jobs as to not draw attention to myself, but it didn't work, I still was too autistic for some places. I worked for the Ralphs Grocery company for a bit, and one time got called into the bosses office for a meeting. Mrs Martha Brown claimed it bothered her that I didn't look people in the eye when speaking to them, and it looked bad to secret shoppers. I tried to say that what she was saying was ableist becase I am autistic, and her response was that she didn't even know what autism was. I was offered no rebuttal after that and put on the overnight shifts which led to a complete breakdown and me never returning to the store again. I was too autistic for Ralphs, yet my boss didn't even know what autism was and refused to educate herself to any capacity. Even when trying to help her be more aware, she didn't care at all. However, even with this broken mixed up work experience, the fact that I ever went into a job, made disability deny me time and time again. You could work then! Why can't you work now? And even explaining to them the exact details, those few days I could once long ago, outweighed the breakdowns, the masking, the sensory overload and pain I was in on all those days I seemed "Okay enough." Even diagnosed Autistic Level 2, I'm not autistic enough for some, but too autistic for others.

April is Autism Month. I don't call it awareness month anymore because I can give people tons of facts about autism, and regularly supply information via my social media....but I can't make them care and retain that information. I can't make allistic people stop treating me like a circus freak. I NEED acceptance, and even some appreciation. Just because I move my body differently doesn't mean I'm here to be stared at or judged. When I am non-verbal, I don't deserve to be yelled at by strangers for not answering their small talk, or having hands waved in my face as I'm called rude. If don't want to be pointed at or laughed at when I need to hold a small stuffed animal in my hands for comfort. If you want to stare at me? Follow me on social media. Learn a thing or two.