#stopstigma

Forse quel giorno, avevo 14 anni. Ho pensato al suicidio.

Guardavo oltre la finestra quelli che consideravo il mio gruppo.

Mi avevano escluso.

Mi domandavo come mai non gli piacessi, cosa avessi di diverso da loro.

Non esistere in quel momento era la soluzione.

Non lo feci. Ho sempre avuto una certa forza dentro di me dal farmi desistere a fare un gesto così plateale, così drammatico.

Sentivo, però, che il mio amore verso gli altri non veniva visto perché?

Un intero viaggio di 27 anni fino a che non ho avuto la mia risposta.

I am back, after 4 epic years of my writing silence. My favorite muse beside music, that I have abandoned so many times throughout my life. It has been my hero in the bottom pits of the deepest moments of my life and of my sweet youth. 

My collections of writings: Diaries of a 13yr old, the tumultuous love phases of my youth, my rise from heartbreak after divorce and now the loss of my “unknown” hero. I suffered...we all suffered a tremendous loss of my mother earlier this year. For her friends and people who knew her - she was a gracious woman who kept to herself. Always willing to lend a hand and occasionally sharing a smile. For her family, she was unstoppable - full of determination and ambition unlike no other seen despite her mental ills (the shadow of bipolar.) For her neighbors, a woman who minded her own business but shared a cooked home meal and would offer a set of prayers for you or your loved ones in this busy world where no one stops a second to be in the present moment. For my brother, she was a confidante and her laughter would fill up a room but also alleviate your mind of daily stresses. 

But for her daughter, for me - she was my storm of conflictions. From the time I could look up to her - she was a leader who I feared. She never sat me down to speak “our feelings.” She was just a teacher of actions. She worked as a great American seamstress - waking up by 7am to sew children’s wear until the latest of midnights. She made my hate towards her work become my current love (to work in apparel.) She showed me faith - attending to every part of my religious education. As a young adult, my rebellion for teenage freedom sent me on a different path, moving away. She continued on hers, her independence to take care of herself, as she once did. 

The years taught me with experience as much as I wanted to ran - I came back “home” to my mother. The later years of my adult life, I just took up this role she often hated. I hated it too - but it was also the undefined purpose for a portion of my life. Life smacked me with lessons and gave me transformation (after my heartbreak). I thought the last 7 years were my gift when really it was a gift of time for both of us. My mother, the leader I once feared, became the “unmentioned” best friend I so ever needed and always had but under appreciated. The pandemic, as she quoted, she never thought she would see in her lifetime - soften the world and brought us closer for one year. The last year of her life, she become - not the once feared leader - but my fearless leader. Giving each day of her life sharing her warm home and dinners with me. Like clockwork praying at 3pm for the world, for her loved ones but not for herself. She was my diary - listening to my stressors, my stories and the very few dreams that I still believe I can accomplish one day. Her ever positive non chalant demeanour - showing me to trust more in this very impermanent life. You will be okay, her daily message. 

I thought protecting her for as long as I did - she can survive this too - a pandemic. I lost her and I slowly began to realize she was so much more than a feared leader, my fearless leader but truely my Hero. The stories I heard about her life, that I never knew, made me see that a part of her lives on through me, through us...but I never let her know she was my Hero for all the countless legacies she left behind for us. I just know that my expressive eyes told her the words I left unspoken: that by being her "leader of actions" - she saw her young self: her Hero in me.

i have felt an urge to speak out about my asd diagnosis, and today is the day. it continues to shock me how few opportunities there are for people to learn and speak openly about the autism spectrum. let’s normalize being curious. how much do you actually know about the autism spectrum? open yourself up to new ideas. make room in your life to learn more about others. let’s talk.

asd: autism spectrum disorder asd is not a social disorder. it isn’t connected to any single cause. it is a neurodevelopmental disorder. asd does not have a “look,” or a set list of symptoms. if you consider two people with an asd diagnosis, there is a very high likelihood that they present that same diagnosis in two completely different ways. the efforts to understand the autism spectrum are ongoing, and therefore the definitions of autism continuously change (see: year 2013).

a diagnosis for asd DOES CONSIDER a person’s: degree of language/social difficulties degree of intellectual/physical impairment known medical conditions, exposure to environmental factors associated mental/behavioral/neurological disorders it is not a measure of their worth.

a diagnosis for asd DOES NOT IMPLY a person is: being socially dysfunctional in any obvious way a significantly high or low intelligence level major physical or emotional limitations neglect, abuse, poverty, inferiority it does not change who they are.

receiving an asd diagnosis CAN HELP COMFORT a person who is: struggling to understand social cues and implications generally clumsy and unaware of physical space having isolated interests/rigid plans/ritualistic behavior exhibiting adverse reactions to change it is essential to understand a person’s process as their own.

imagine you’re walking on the road in a small alley. you’re on the left side because you are helping a friend look for their key. someone is walking towards you, and they are walking on their right side. the closer you get, the more overwhelmed you become. and after working every scenario in your head, you give in and you cross the road, only to realize they never looked up once. this is the only way i can think to explain the burden of masking. neurotypical minds seek conformity. neurodivergent minds seek consistency. this makes it incredibly easy for a neurodivergent person to lose whatever feelings of autonomy are left. being in a position of self-perpetuation - where your ability to do task creates an outcome that controls the ability to do task - is masking. the very act of masking uses just as much energy as it receives. there is no carefree moment. you are anticipating bumping into someone, you gauge how close you can get, and you step out of the way before contact. there is no acknowledgement of your efforts. after all, if you were “normal” then you wouldn’t be in the way at all. there is a feeling of indebtedness. no one looks up. consider this: 60 years ago, state asylums were regularly performing lobotomies on the “criminally insane,” usually without anesthesia and almost always without consent. that is fucking terrifying. but you know what is even more terrifying? the fact that this practice stopped only when it was replaced with more convenient options, and is still technically legal. it’s not that america rushed to protect its disenfranchised the from becoming maimed, but rather the federal government rushed to protect its medicaid returns from becoming one-time surgical treatments. although most people would agree that we are far removed from that tragic relationship with psychosurgery. however, for perspective, i want to point out that the first evidence of neurosurgery goes all the way back to the stone age. it took 5,000 years to create not just the science itself, but to create the culture that watched its metamorphosis and anticipated the result. if i spent an hour putting up christmas decorations, how reasonable is it to then expect them to be taken down in 44 seconds, just because i am embarrassed to still have them up? we’re closer to falling backwards into systemic ableism than we are to securing our position away from it. 60 years is not even 1.5%.

one of my friends is a mother to a child with autism. they had their first flight together and her child absolutely lost it security. she was hoping that any of the parents around her would stop and help. completely alone, people shuffled by her, and one even made a comment about her parenting approach. what she wanted to say was that the approach was advised by their developmental specialist. but then she realized that she felt more than alone, but suddenly unsafe and targeted, and she didn’t want to feel victimized further.