My big brother & I are both autistic, have a lot of the same sensory & logical triggers for confusion/shutdown, and I grew up being told he needed accomodations and I needed to try harder bc "his problems are cognitive and yours are just emotional" #ActuallyAutistic #AutisticGirl

Being told for 25 years that everything my brother was experiencing was just how his brain works but everything I was experiencing I was making up to cause trouble and I really needed to get myself under control, as you can imagine, made me unbelievably depressed.

And we do this to autistic girls all over the place. We do this to autistic trans kids everywhere.

My depression led to self harm, drug use, ideation, and nearly death.

This image of Autism as a boys problem isn't just false, it's dangerous. It will keep hurting Autistics.

So my brother gets diagnosed autistic and gets accomodations and grace.

I get sent to CBT so I can get a better handle on my mood.

I'm diagnosed depressed and anxious and they don't bother looking into WHY. they just look into how I can stop acting like this.

Now I sound bitter I'm sure, and at my parents I am. Not at my brother, who was not equally, but still also disserviced by autism myths in our house. We fell out for a bit but we're close again now.

How different would it have been if we'd grown up, autistic, together?

How different would our family have been, if instead of "autistic son, emotionally troublesome daughter" my parents had seen us as two autistic kids?

It's heartbreaking to think about. I can't write anymore