I'm going to do a list of Fucked Up Things That Happened as a result of ableism growing up. TW for those of you who this affects. This is mainly for NTs who have no idea what happens to #ActuallyAutistic children 1/

1) I couldn't eat a school dinner because the sensory smells and textures were "wrong". It felt like I was eating trash and made me sick. A teacher threatened to hit me with an inflatable hammer until I complied. I said do it I don't care. He made me sit alone for the whole day.

2) I had a meltdown in a hospital when I was 14. I was/am afraid of hospitals due to a bad experience when I was 3. They restrained me and threw me in what was basically a cupboard and locked me in until I calmed down. I had bruises all over my arms from them grabbing me.

3) A psychiatrist accused me of knowingly and intentionally manipulating men to get what I wanted and said I was deliberately seductive. This was because I preferred male friends, a common trait if autistic women. I was again, 14.

4) I was harasses repeatedly by some students in my year group in year 7. When I complained about it, I got told "you make them feel stupid. Next time, even if you know the answer, pretend you don't. And dress like the other girls" this is misogynistic as well lmao

5) That same group of students trapped me under a table and deliberately tried to make me have a meltdown. They didn't know what it was but they'd seen me panic over something before and the sociopathic shits think thats funny? I got blamed for "causing a scene" tho.

6) I can't remember two whole years of my life, from age 12 to 14, because whatever happened was so traumatic, I've blanked it out. Whenever I try to recover it, i just remember it was something that happened at school, it was Very Bad and thats why I was homeschooled

7) A grown adult man, a teacher, described 15 year old me as "astonishingly quick wit and a caustic tongue, colder than ice, no wonder she sits alone"

Which I take as a compliment, but thats not an appropriate way to discuss a teenage student.

8) Whatever happened during those two years was So Bad, that I, who usually fears nothing, was afraid to walk past the school building for over 6 years.

9) Something I do remember though is that group of kids I told you about? They used to tell me every day to kill myself and that I'd be better off dead. Because I was "weird", which we all know is coded anti autistic nonsense.

10) I got detentions and exclusions repeatedly though, for punching them in the face when they said that to me. They never, ever, got punished for saying it.

11) My doctors surgery categorised me as a difficult patient because I said I could feel the vacutainer bottle when they changed the needle. "No one can feel that" well I can. They refused to believe me and refused to let me use the butterfly needle, that I can't feel as much.

12) An orthodontist made my parents take me after hours, because "she scares the other patients with her mannerisms". I wasn't allowed to sit in a fucking waiting room because I was "creepy". What the fuck?!

I could go on but these are just a handful of examples of the shit autistic kids get, ask anyone autistic and they'll have their own handful of experiences that would frankly horrify anyone else. No one even knows this happens to us.

Also worth noting - most of my horrible ableist experiences are school or medical related because i have understanding ND parents. A LOT of autistics also face this shit at home because their parents don't understand and use abusive therapies like ABA.