I think this is ableism but i have tourettes that get triggered by really weird things sometimes like finger guns. For some reason, whenever someone points a finger gun at me and does a shooting motion it instantly sends me into a full blown tic attack, no matter what, and it will last for hours without fail. Even just pointing a finger gun without the shooting motion will make my tics escalate, i think cus it’s kind of anticipating it but im not really sure. But one of my friends, whenever she wants me to do something, will threaten me with the finger gun, and will point it at me and be like, ‘you better do it’. and its not in a mean way, i know she sees it as a joke, and its not serious, she never does the motion that full on triggers me, but even still she just never seems to understand how anxious it makes me and how much even just pointing at me makes it worse, even though i’ve said multiple times that it’s a really big no, no matter what.
And when I first discovered this trigger, it was because one of my other friends (in the same friend group, they were all there to witness it) did it to me and that’s how we found out and a couple days after that incident, she sent me a video and just told me to watch it, and the video was her doing finger guns to the camera, because she wanted to see if it triggered me through the phone, which it did and i had a tic attack in the middle of the bus, and when she found out she just laughed because it ‘worked’.
and on top of that, whenever i have swearing tics, which are usually aimed at people, she’ll jump in and joke, saying, ‘that wasn’t a tic they really meant that’, which i hate because, yeah i have the ones that are like ‘fuck you’, but i also have one where i tic ‘kill yourself’ and she says that ‘joke’ for those as well. she’ll also say things like ‘i can’t wait for you to get a punching one and start hitting other people’. and she’s the only one who does that kind of thing. All my other friends don’t do that, it’s just her, and ive talked to her so much about not saying or doing those things but she never stops.
but i feel like she doesn’t think she’s doing anything wrong because she also is the one whose always like, ‘hey you okay’ ‘do you need to go to the (school) nurse’, which, i still think is her not taking me seriously because whenever i tell her that im fine and its normal she’ll just refuse to believe me and continue pushing me until i get worked up, which obviously makes my tics worse and i end up going to the nurse anyway so she’s always like ‘i told you so’.
I jsut don’t know if its ableism or not cus i dont think shes discriminating me she just kind of treats it as a joke and as like, amusement for her to enjoy, while also trying to play the hero i guess by being ‘attentive’.
This is ableism.
