She replied, “I just want a hug, it won’t hurt her.”

Me: She. Said. No.  

When I first met my stepdaughter, if I asked for a hug, she wouldn’t say no, but she’d go into a protective stance and just wait. She was waiting for me to violate her boundaries. I told her “you don’t have to give me a hug if you don’t want one. You’re allowed to say no”. It took a while, but now she’s happy saying no.

If you’re on meds and drink this bullshit you’re not on your meds today, champ. You may as well have flushed them down the toilet. So kiss goodbye to your blood pressure meds/antidepressants/anything else you’re on and if you’re on the pill I hope you’re ready to be a mom.

Among its other charming traits, activated charcoal can prevent your body from digesting food and absorbing nutrients and oh yeah side effects can include “diarrhea, constipation, vomiting, and blockage of the digestive tract.” (Source)

Activated charcoal is a medication, not a food additive, and should not be taken if you're not sick. It absorbs toxins, as well as other chemicals in your stomach. And by toxins I mean actual toxic stuff when you accidentally poison yourself. Not the mysterious "toxins" you get rid of when you "detox". "Detox" is bullshit. You detox by having a working liver. If you're alive and not currently dying of liver failure, odds are you liver is working and therefore you don't need to detox and eat activated charcoal when you're not having food poisoning.

Literally all autistic people:

the following organizations accept donations via Venmo, PayPal or Cashapp:

Homeless Black Trans Women Fund: supports Black Trans women that live in Atlanta and are sex workers and/or homeless

Trans Justice Funding Project: supports grassroots trans justice groups run by and for trans people, focusing on organizing around racism, economic injustice, transmisogyny, ableism, immigration, and incarceration

Trans(forming): membership-based organization led by trans men, intersex, gender non-conforming people of color, to provide resources and all around transitional support

Black Trans Men Inc.: the first national nonprofit social advocacy organization with a specific focus on empowering Black Transgender men by addressing multi-layered issues of injustice faced at the intersections of racial, sexual orientation, and gender identities

Kween Culture: provides programming towards social and cultural empowerment of transgender women of color

Heaux History Project: a documentary series and archival project exploring Black and Brown erotic labor history and the fight for sex workers’ rights

Tournament Haus Fund: mutual aid fund for protesters and trans/non binary BIPOC in the ballroom scene in Portland/Tacoma/Seattle

Black Excellence Collective Transport for Black NYC LGBTQ+ Protesters: raising funds to provide safe transport for Black LGBTQ+ protesters (NYC)

F2L Relief Fund: provides commissary support (and legal representation & financial assistance) for incarcerated LGBTQ+ and Two-Spirit POC in NY state

Trans Sistas of Color Project Detroit: uplifts, impacts and influences the lives and welfare of transgender women of color in Detroit

Black Trans Protesters Emergency Fund organized by Black Trans Femme in the Arts Collective: supports Black trans protesters with resources like bail and medical care

Black Trans Travel Fund: a mutual aid project developed to provide Black transgender women with the financial resources to self-determine safer alternatives to travel, so they feel less likely to experience verbal harassment or physical harm

Reproductive Justice Access Collective (ReJAC): a New Orleans network that aims to share information, resources, ideas, and human power to create and implement projects in the community that operate within the reproductive justice framework

the following organizations can be donated to individually or all-together via this split donation form that will split your donation amount to equal parts:

Okra Project/Tony McDade and Nina Pop Mental Health Fund: provides Black Trans people with quality mental health & therapy and addresses food security in Black trans communities

For The Gworls: provides assistance to Black trans folks with travel to and from medical facilities, and co-pay assistance for prescriptions and (virtual) office visits ⁣

Third Wave Fund: an activist fund led by and for women of color, intersex, queer, and trans people under 35 years of age to resource the political power, well-being, and self determination of communities of color and low-income communities; rapid response grantmaking, multi-year unrestricted grants, and the Sex Worker Giving Circle

Unique Womens Coalition (Los Angeles, CA): supportive organization for and by transgender people of color, committed to fostering the next generation of black trans leadership through mentorship, scholarship, and community care engagement work

Black Trans Women Inc.: a national nonprofit organization committed to providing the trans-feminine community with programs and resources 

SisTers/Brothers PGH (Pittsburgh, PA): A transgender drop-in space, resource provider and shelter transitioning program

Love Me Unlimited for Life: helps transgender community members reach their goals and fulfill their potential through advocacy and outreach activities

My Sistah’s House Memphis (Memphis, TN): designed to bring about social change within the Trans Community in Memphis by providing a safe meeting space and living spaces for those who are most vulnerable in the LGBTQ+ community

Black LGBTQIA Migrant Project: builds and centers the power of Black LGBTQIA+ migrants through community-building, political education, direct services, and organizing across borders; provides cash assistance to Black LGBTQ+ migrants and first generation people dealing with the impact of COVID-19

Taja’s Coalition at St. James Infirmary (San Francisco/Bay Area): navigating housing, medical services, legal services, and the workplace, as well as regularly training agencies

Marsha P. Johnson Institute: helps employ black trans people, build more strategic campaigns, launch winning initiatives, and interrupt the people who are standing in the way of more being possible in the world for black Trans people

Black & Pink Bail Fund: national prison abolitionist organization dedicated to dismantling the criminal punishment system and the harms caused to LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV/AIDS who are affected by the system 

Black Visions Collective (MN): healing and transformative justice principles and develops Minnesota’s emerging Black leadership, creating the conditions for long term success and transformation

Middle Tennessee Black and Indigenous Support Fund (Middle, TN): a community fund for Black and Indigenous queer and trans folks to foster wealth redistribution in its larger community, direct the funds to Black and Indigenous community members, and build the leadership of Black and Indigenous community members

SNaPCo (Atlanta, GA): a Black, trans-led collaborative to restore an Atlanta where every person has the opportunity to grow and thrive without facing unfair barriers, especially from the criminal legal system

Brave Space Alliance (Chicago, IL): created to fill a gap in the organizing of and services to trans and gender-nonconforming people on the South and West Sides of Chicago

House of GG: a nonprofit, founded trans activist Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, that is raising money to build a permanent home for Transgender people  and be part of a growing network of Southern trans people who are working for social justice

TGI Justice Project: a group of transgender, gender variant and intersex people inside and outside of prisons, jails and detention centers challenging and ending human rights abuses committed against TGI people in California prisons, jails, detention centers

Trans Women of Color Collective: creates revolutionary change by uplifting the narratives, leadership, and lived experience of trans people of color

Youth Breakout (New Orleans, LA): seeks to end the criminalization LGBTQ youth to build a safer and more just New Orleans, organizing with youth ages 13-25 who are directly impacted by the criminal justice system

Translash: a trans-led project uses the power of individual stories to help save trans lives, shifting the cultural understanding of what it means to be transgender, especially during a time of social backlash, to foster inclusion and decrease anti-trans hostility

TRANScending Barriers:  empowers the transgender and gender non-conforming community in Georgia through community organizing with leadership building, advocacy, and direct services

My Sistah’s House: a trans-led nonprofit providing first hand experience and field research to create a one-stop shop for finding doctors, social groups and safe spaces for the trans community, providing emergency shelter, access to sexual health services, and social services

TAKE Birmingham: focuses on discrimination in the workplace, housing advocacy, support for sex workers, providing trans-friendly services, and working to alleviate the many other barriers that TWOC face

Dem Bois: provides charitable economical aid for female to male, FTM, trans-masculine identified person(s) of color ages 21 years old and older for them to obtain chest reconstruction surgery, and or genital reassignment surgery

G.L.I.T.S: approaches the health and rights crises faced by transgender sex workers

Emergency Release Fund (NYC): aims to ensure that no trans person at risk in New York City jails remains in detention before trial; pays cash bails

HEARD: Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of Deaf Communities: supports deaf, hard of hearing, deafblind, deafdisabled, and disabled people at every stage of the criminal legal system process, up to and including during and after incarceration

Black Trans Advocacy Coalition COVID-19 Community Response Grant: works daily to end discrimination and inequities faced in health, employment, housing and education to improve the lived experience of transgender people

Princess Janae Place: provides referrals to housing for chronically homeless LGBTQ adults in the New York Tri-state area, with direct emphasis on Trans/GNC people of color

The Transgender District: aims to stabilize and economically empower the transgender community through ownership of homes, businesses, historic and cultural sites, and safe community spaces

Assata’s Daughters (Chicago, IL): Black woman-led; organizes young Black people in Chicago by providing them with political education, leadership development, mentorship, and revolutionary services

Collective Action for Safe Spaces: A grassroots organization that uses comprehensive, community-based solutions through an intersectional lens to eliminate public gendered harassment and assault in the DC area.

The Knights and Orchids Society (TKO) work for justice and equality through group economics, education, leadership development, and organizing cultural work throughout rural areas in Alabama

The Outlaw Project (Phoenix, AZ): prioritizes the leadership of people of color, transgender women, gender non-binary and migrants for sex worker rights

WeCare TN (Memphis, TN): Supports trans women of color 

Community Ele'te (Richmond, VA): provides safe sex awareness and education, linkage to resources, emergency housing assistance

TAJA’s Coalition (San Francisco, CA): ending violence against Black Trans women and Trans women of color 

Black Trans Task Force: intersectional, multi-generational project of community building, research, and political action addressing the crisis of violence against Black Trans people in the Seattle-Tacoma area

The Transgender District: stabilize and economically empower the transgender community through ownership of homes, businesses, historic and cultural sites, and safe community spaces

Black Trans Media (Brooklyn, NY): #blacktranseverything storytellers, organizers, poets, healers, filmmakers, facilitators that confront racism and transphobia

Garden of Peace, Inc. (Pittsburgh, PA): for black trans & queer youth, elevates and empowers the narratives and lived experiences of black youth and their caretakers, guides revolutionary spaces of healing and truth through art, education, and mentorship

House of Pentacles (Durham, NC): Film Training Program and Production House designed to launch Black trans youth into the film industry and tell stories woven at the intersection of being Black and Trans

Minnesota Transgender Health Coalition (Minneapolis, MN): committed to improving health care access and the quality of health care received by trans and gender non-conforming people through education, resources, and advocacy

RARE Productions (Minneapolis, MN): arts and entertainment media production company for LGBTQ people of color that promotes, produces, and co-creates opportunities and events utilizing innovative artistic methods and strategies

Baltimore Safe Haven (Baltimore, MD): providing opportunities for a higher quality of life for transgender people in Baltimore

Transgender Emergency Fund of Massachusetts: recently helped organize a Trans Resistance Vigil and March through Boston, in place of the Boston Pride Parade that was cancelled due to COVID-19

Semillas: in Puerto Rico, the trans, gender non-conforming and queer communities are facing many obstacles to survival

Sensory overload is really complicated to explain because it’s really different for everyone who experiences it. I think the easiest way to explain it is being in a crowded room at a party.

Some people are fine. They’re contributing to the noise and the movement, and they’re having a great time, having fun at the party. No sensory issues present.

Some people find it boring. They can’t really hear anything anybody’s saying, but it’s not upsetting or especially tiring. They may have no sensory issues, they may have an hyposensitive (under sensitive) sense of hearing, so the loudness really doesn’t matter to them, but they also can’t pick out one voice to listen to.

Some people are okay for a bit, but it builds up. The loudness, the movements, the visual input... it’s okay at first, but over time it becomes very overwhelming. This is where sensory overload comes in. This person may try to find a quiet space to take a break. They may do something to ground themselves or block out the overwhelming input with input they have control over (stimming). They may also lash out or try to escape. They may have a panic attack or meltdown.

Some people just cannot. It’s immediately overwhelming and in most cases like this, if the option to not go or leave immediately is available, it’ll be taken. Otherwise, they’ll often end up like the previous case much sooner.

Except that for people with sensory issues, it doesn’t have to be a crowded room at a party. It can be one thing - background noise, someone speaking, bad textures, the wrong kind of lights, a smell, etc.... and it can vary from day to day.

Again, describing sensory overload is hard because it’s so varied.

Someone experiencing sensory overload may seem confused or disoriented. Their sensory processing is already overwhelmed, they may not be able to properly process the visual input of where they’re going or what they’re looking for.

They may go nonverbal. Again, with their processing already overwhelmed, they may not be able to convert their thoughts into words, or the input of actually speaking would just be too much for them, and their brain just shuts it down.

Those 2 are often sort of a stage before a meltdown or shutdown, or part of the meltdown or shutdown. 

Internally, sensory input tends to become a lot more. Typically when I’m in or near sensory overload, I become much more aware of sensory input I’m already extra sensitive to. 

They may have a meltdown, which comes in many different presentations, and are like Panic Attack Plus. Everybody’s needs during a meltdown will be different - for example, physical contact may help, generally with deep pressure, but it may make things worse. This cannot be determined based on their typical sensory issues either - the rules are different when you’re already overwhelmed.

They also may experience shutdown. Shutdown can happen immediately, or can creep up on you. While meltdowns are sort of exploding, shutdown is more of an implosion. It’s almost like our body shuts off sensory input and output until things are better and things have been processed. Some autistics in shutdown may be completely immobile, completely nonresponsive. Others may still be walking around and seem ‘normal’, but internal symptoms are making it extremely difficult and everything feels forced.