I walk with a long cane

My visual acuity tested at 20/10 the last time I was tested. My field of view surprises many people in how large it is. And I walk with a long cane.

I have never crossed streets by sight. Sure, I was taught to look both ways, but that was rote memorization of a movement they said to do, not anything that gave me information. Listening and hearing where the cars where and how they were moving was always how I knew when it was safe, and I didn't know this wasn't what everyone did.

Touch and sound and knowing my environment. I have grown up overwhelmed by too much and everyone assuming I knew what was going on, while I was working with other senses.

Assumptions say one thing, but I walk with a long cane.

In 2016, I got O&M after a too long of process of trying to manage the process of getting O&M as a sighted person.

And now, not feeling like I need to try so hard to do things in ways that increase pain, overload, confusion, and make it harder for me to actually complete what I'm trying to do, makes such a difference.

Not being just sighted so of course I need to use vision always when there are so many ways that vision doesn't make sense, and so many ways that if I tried to do that things would be dangerous for me, and so many ways that would mean I just can't do anything else because relying on vision costs so many spoons.

Instead being me, and using the tools that make sense at the times they make sense, and having people do sighted guide for me and recognize that is meaningful, and it being okay.

Not needing to try to be someone I'm not. Because I can't be anyone else. But what that means is recognizing how my brain works and supporting that. And as such, I memorize locations, I memorize routes to the point of being able to go miles on my bike (not to mention my feet) by the texture of the sidewalk, I listen, and when it makes sense to, I walk with a long cane.

More thoughts on A Wizard Alone and representation in fiction

I learned I was autistic and A Wizard Alone came out, within months of each other. This was a book I had preordered, a series that was my favorite series. It was something that I knew was going to be devoured and loved, because Young Wizards was my life at the time.

And this was when I found out that I was autistic. When suddenly, there was an autistic character in the latest book of my favorite series. And I read this book repeatedly. Whenever I needed anchoring I read this book. This book did not leave the side of my bed, because there was a character like me in a book that already meant so much to me.

And on the flip side, I could never stop being aware that it was wrong to be like me according to this book. It was good to stop being autistic. It was bad to be autistic. When I wasn't reading this repeatedly and living on the Young Wizards forums, I was living in autistic spaces, repeating amongst voices the word neurodiversity, saying that it wasn't bad to be me, being me, and trying to be loud, while not knowing how to be, as a teenager.

I was living this life where the thing grounding me, was a book that was important to me because it was already my favorite series, and was important to me because it had an autistic character, no matter how much that autistic character didn't look like me or move like me or think like me, no matter how much if the word autism wasn't said I wouldn't relate, because this larger family of autistics was a family I belonged to, and this character was someone who was like me and this mattered.

And I was living this life where this same thing that was grounding me was telling me I was wrong. And where I was going and spending large amounts of my time telling people that acting like this book was wrong, though not naming it by name.

This was what I needed, because what I could find for fiction at this point in time with autistic characters were stories and characters that weren't like me and that said that autistic was bad. Latching on to one of these stories, where a character wasn't like me and it was wrong to be autistic, but it was a world and series that I loved made sense, because there was still autistic. Because I could cognitive dissonance and dissociate away the parts which said, but you're not supposed to be this way. Because I could be, this is important, autistic is important, autistic fantasy is important.

And when the NME came out, this meant no longer was I needing to pretend in order to protect myself. While at this point this was no longer that book that I was holding myself together with, it was a book with that history to me, from a series where I buy every book the moment they're available, and a community which I grew up with.

I didn't need to keep saying "but it's okay, I like this book even though I wouldn't accept this from any other book, because it's important enough to me in other ways", because now it was fixed, now it was okay to be autistic, now this character looked far more like me than the previous edition's had (though still we're very different, because all autistic people are different). Now it was a book I was not afraid of recommending to people, and was instead one I wanted to recommend, because it was not only important, it was important, and had an autistic character like a character who actually felt autistic, not like the label was attached, and it was okay to be autistic.

These changes matter. Representation matters.

But what also matters is that it wasn't as huge of a deal as I would have expected when the NME came out. It mattered a lot because of the importance of YW to me, and because it was fixing a book that was problematic, but while I couldn't find books back when the first edition of A Wizard Alone came out where autistic wasn't wrong, now I can find these. Now I've read many. Now autistic authors writing autistic characters is a thing I can search for and choose to read and I know how to do that. Now fanfic with autistic characters isn't difficult to find. It wasn't as huge a deal because the a change in amount of fiction I can find with autistic characters does exist. And that matters too.

There still needs to be more. And we need more PoC autistic characters, and nonspeaking autistic characters, and in general more autistic characters which don't fit the norm that currently exists in fiction. At this point, I'm not looking to a book that wants to cure me because I feel alone and like I'm the only autistic person in the world and that matters. And others need that level of, not being alone, fiction recognizes they exist, too.

The point was always control

CN: abuse of children in schools, ableism, restraint, seclusion, BCBAs

When BCBAs are concerned meltdowns are "behaviors" to be "handled", and how much distress a child is in doesn't matter, but there are still rules in place. Rules they set up for themselves, but rules. Rules like whoever's the first adult in place for "managing a behavior" is in control of whatever is to be done for that "behavior". They control when restraints happen, and who restrains, and how transporting the child to the tiny room that the child gets put in to finish the meltdown in (because of course that'll help a meltdown). They control the decisions. They're allowed to explicitly hand it off to someone else, with consent of both parties, but otherwise, they have control.

This is a rule, an explicit rule, a rule that everyone is told, and everyone has to agree with, and everyone has to know that this is how it works, because this is apparently the safest thing to do. This means that everyone knows who to turn to, and people don't try to go in opposite directions in how they're managing a situation. There's someone in charge and everyone knows who it is and nobody has to make a decision of who it is ever when a "behavior" is going on, because they're more worried about the "behavior" (I mean not the kid of course).

But I mean, what happens if an autistic person is the first on the scene. What happens when a kid starts melting down, because of an entirely predictable reason to be melting down, because adults have pushed them into a position that is completely unreasonable for a child to be in and they cannot cope, and they're trying and trying and trying to cope, and they can't. What happens then? What happens when they're doing the best they can, and an autistic adult is helping them, because the autistic adult knows them, and is seeing their responses, and is seeing that they're calming down, and making it through, and it's working, and life is getting easier and more organized, because someone is there and helping them in ways that they need right now?

No, despite all these rules, these whoever's on the "scene" of a "behavior" first, if it's an autistic person, that's not allowed. An autistic person isn't allowed to be treated equally. The child isn't allowed to be respected that much. Nobody is allowed to have that much respect, because the BCBA needs the control of choosing who takes care of "behaviors" and how. Respect isn't allowed. You need the ABA, you need the restraints, you need the control, you need the abuse. You need to control the autistic people this way. You need to hurt both of them this way.

So instead, they take this autistic child, who's working through a meltdown, and grab, and restrain, and pull them across a room, and throw them into a tiny little space, for a meltdown that never even met the rules that they had claimed met the requirements of restraint was allowed for. Because control is necessary. Because helping children isn't the point. Because helping children was never the point. Because when children were actually getting helped, that wasn't allowed, that was giving too much power to people they didn't want to have any power.

Restraint, Seclusion, ABA, Abuse, children going through trauma, and living with this for the rest of their lives.

The point was always control.

"too emotional"

CN: suicide, ableism, ABA

I should not live in a world where I have to worry that my students won't be alive every time I go to school, because of how they're treated by their teachers. This world should not exist. This world should not be our world. I should not have to worry that my students that I care about, who play with me, who go out of their way to do things with me and include me, and who make sure that I'm someone who knows that they care about me, won't be there when I wake up, because every other adult in a school, instead of caring about them, only cares about behaviors, and eliminating them, and behavior plans, and doesn't even care how many times they even break their behavior plan because who cares if they hurt the children they have power and they'll show the children they have power. I shouldn't need to be there, listening to the children about their suicide attempts, not knowing how many more exist beyond the ones I know about, but knowing that they exist.

I shouldn't live in a world, where because I've not been at that school for a year and a half now, I don't know whether everyone is still alive. I know nobody will tell me. The students would, but they don't have a way to contact me. Some of them tried to friend me on steam, but somehow that fell through. None of the adults would. The adults didn't tell me whether or not I had a job anymore. They just stopped talking to me. Why would they tell me about students I care about living or dying. They don't care about me. They never hid they didn't care about me. They claim to care about the kids, but they abuse them. It's a common pattern.

I shouldn't have to be reminded and wonder whether people I care about are alive or dead knowing if they're dead it's probably suicide. I shouldn't have to think about teenagers and how many suicide attempts they've made. I shouldn't have to know what they've gone through because of how much people have taught them that they can't be autistic, autistic is wrong, they're wrong, among the piles of lessons taught by people taking over their minds and bodies through ABA. I shouldn't have to know these things.

And if I didn't know them, I couldn't have been there, and I couldn't have helped them through the years I was there. I couldn't have introduced them to neurodiversity and autistic community being a thing. I couldn't have been someone who they learned to trust. I couldn't have made the difference I know I made. And I would still know that this is happening to children. The children just wouldn't have names and faces.

I'm told by people I'm too emotional when saying that what people call therapy is actually abuse. I'm told that being angry will mean people won't listen to me.

I just don't want anyone I care about dying. I just don't want anyone else abused. I just want this to stop now.

How can they not be emotional about this?