welcome to my nest !

alien cow (2026)

happy april fools!

Rules: There are 30 questions corresponding to each day in April. Answer each question in your own separate post. You can answer all or just as many of them as you want. Make sure you tag your responses #30daysofautismacceptance and you can put them in the various autism tags too (#actually autistic, #autistic, #autism etc). Please help spread this around before the start of April! And with that, I hope everyone enjoys the questions and has fun with this year's autism month prompts. (Prompts under the read more button)

i work with unhoused people fleeing domestic violence, and i have a client rn whose driver's license expired in 2024, and she needs a new id to apply for apartments. ok, cool. problem is, she lost all her documents due to the domestic violence

so we call the dmv. dmv needs a birth certificate. like i said, she lost her birth certificate. she needs a new one. her birth certificate is from out of state

we look up how to get a new birth certificate. the birth certificate needs an id to order it. cool cool cool

ok then what about secondary options? well, she needs two secondary sources of identification to order a replacement birth certificate, and she only has one, because for everything else she needs an id. fishing license? need an id. fucking park pass? id. she could have her 18+ child use their birth certificate to vouch for her, except her abuser won't let her talk to her children, so that's a no go

ultimately we land on social security card. this is where we're at in the process rn. ofc she doesn't have her ss card, so we need to order that. social security also requires an id to request a new card, but they'll take a health insurance card with a picture attached (god fucking bless them). she has medicaid but doesn't have a physical copy of the card, so we have to figure out how to get that. then once we do that we have to upload it to the social security website, and if that doesn't work, we have to, god forbid, call the social security office (takes literal hours) and then make an appointment. she doesn't have transportation or cell service, so we would have to figure out a way to coordinate me getting her to the appointment in order to present the document

then we wait 10+ days for the replacement, that has to be mailed to me bc she is unhoused and doesn't have an address

then we need to submit her request for a new birth certificate, which we have to figure out how to pay for, bc it is not free. they're at least a month behind on requests, btw, so we are probably looking at may at the earliest for that to arrive

then we need to take the birth certificate to the dmv

dmv also requires two pieces of mail not from a po box. she doesn't have an address, she is unhoused. she can use the homeless shelter in town, but we will need to mail her stuff there and have her receive it first, and also then the homeless shelter address will now be on her new id, which landlords will recognize and may discriminate against her for

during all of this she is sleeping in a garage. it was negative one degrees this morning. also, forgot to mention, she is terminally ill. some days i legitimately don't know if she lived through the night. every day is a toss up

the absolute soonest she will have an id is probably late may. forget voter registration--most rentals won't let her apply without it. she won't be offered section 8 housing without it. she can't apply for ssdi without it. she is blocked at literally every corner without it, and the absolute soonest she can get it is late may. the dmv literally has her old card on file, and she knows the number by heart, but it doesn't matter. it doesn't count if it's expired, as if she's somehow become someone new

and that's all with the help of someone whose job it is to do this shit. imagine if she didn't have a caseworker. she has a ten year old donated iphone that only works on wifi, she can't even do her own research bc she doesn't have internet half the time. how the hell is she supposed to get anything done on her own?

there many disabilities (n other experiences n identities in general) only one system member have/be when you aka the whole system aka “body” no have [edit: ? idk what this mess of paragraph be but mean to say there many disabilities (n other experiences n identities in general) that only the whole system aka “body” can have n not only individual system members n not others]

your system member can’t be autistic unless whole system body brain everyone be autistic - symptom may present different for various system member but entire system be autistic

would even go on say again yes different system member can have different experiences n needs… but it rly uncomfortable as higher support need person talk to someone who call self HSN n later find out they mean they as system member in system that… not HSN

same with nonverbal - yes can have system members who do not speak but it rly uncomfortable as nonverbal person talk to someone who call self nonverbal too n only later find out they mean they as system member in a verbal system

esp there are high support need systems there are nonverbal systems

your system member not intellectually disabled / have intellectual disability unless whole system be it have it

your system member not “have” facial difference or limb difference unless you bodily have facial or limb difference… having it in headspace not same as living w it external

n to echo my Deaf friends, your system member not be Deaf unless whole system Deaf - can absolutely have system member who not able hear but Deaf be very specific meaning

(in similar vein your system member not “Asian” “Black” etc unless you actually be Asian or Black or etc aka whole system “bodily” etc however wanna call it)

like idk how better way say it (or not want hornet nest explode onto face) but like. some things need be Bodily. there whole meaning n specific experiences n reasons n basis n often culture behind words

well aware some system / members see self as fully separate whole peoples within system n may even complete amnesia every time but still following that logic n term n perspective it be very different from i guess living full time in body minds with that specific thing or systems who live in body minds w that specific thing.

ID: Three AAC symbols with a target, each has a different section of the target highlighted with green while the others are gray. In the first, the outer ring is highlighted, and there is a trailer, a home, and a farm far apart on it. In the second, the middle ring is highlighted, and there are blue, red, and yellow houses clustered together on it. In the third, there are skyscrapers close together. End ID.

I'm sharing it again because a couple days ago I was reading a book on ancient Mesopotamia (I don't have it in front of me right now to name the author but she's pretty great; the title is "Between Two Rivers"), and I learned about this palace they were exploring in the 1920s when archeologists found a room with a bunch of artifacts in it from different time periods, only all on the same layer. Usually, you find older stuff in deeper layers and newer ones closer to the surface. Scholars at the time weren't sure what they were looking at, until they deciphered the script on one of the objects and realized it was a label.

Y'all.

The world's oldest known museum was in this princess's palace, in ancient Mesopotamia.

They had stuff in this room that predated the invention of writing, stuff that would have been ancient even to the folks who first compiled the collection. And they labeled it and kept it and honored their past, because people have not stopped being fundamentally people in thousands and thousands of years.

“I think America should be taken by Denmark instead” No, I think America should be returned to its Indigenous tribes while Denmark returns Greenland to the Kalaallit, the Tunumiit and the Inughuit.

“I think Texas should be taken by Mexico” No, I think Texas should be returned to the Apache.

“I think Florida should be taken by Cuba” No, I think Florida should be returned to the Seminole.

“I think the Blue states should form their own country” No, I think the Blue states should return to the Chinook, the Yakama, the Nimíipuu, the Pomo, the Chumash, the Diné, the Wôbanaki, the Massachuset, the Haudenosaunee, the Pequot, the Lenape tribes, and the Inuit, the Unangax̂ and the Tlingit tribes of Alaska.