#void words

Touch

The thing about consent is, most people only think about it in the context of sex. And, when they’re met with someone who’s crying, they want to help. And any idea about consent goes out the window. They aren’t trying to take advantage of someone, they just want to help. And touching someone’s arm, or giving them a hug, is soothing. Right? Physical touch is always comforting. The thing is, it’s not.

When I’m crying, I’m mid-meltdown, and my brain’s shut down. I’m not really in a place where I can talk, this can be true for a number of autistic individuals even if they’re usually quite verbose. So I can’t tell you, at least not verbally, to stop touching me. I have no way of using words to communicate the fact that, your hand on my arm is painful and stressing me out. Yes, I do mean painful, it hurts. And it is making the situation worse. It is much harder for me to calm down, while you are actively hurting me.

So, please, don’t touch strangers. Good intentions does not translate to consent, you need to ask.

Questions

Often, when confronted with someone who’s very upset, most people’s first instinct is to ask questions. “Are you okay? How can I help? What’s wrong?”, in their concern and eagerness to help, most people ask way too many questions. If I’m upset my brain is already kind of overloaded, and it’s common for an autistic individual to need more time to process questions (or language in general).

Problems with auditory processing are fairly common with autistic individuals. So, imagine this, you’re upset and now someone has decided this is the best time to quiz you on types of birds. But, they don’t give you any time to answer any of your questions, instead they just keep asking new ones. Irritating, isn’t it? Now add on to that, an inability to talk. It’s not that just that they aren’t giving you any time to reply, even if they did you can’t answer. And in this scenario, there’s a chance you don’t know anything about birds.

Sometimes, an autistic individual doesn’t really know why they’re upset. Or if they do, they might need a while to figure out how to explain it.

When you’re trying to help someone who’s upset (I personally think this should really be standard practice and not just when the situation involves autism), focus on asking one question at a time. It is vital, that you wait. Give them time to understand what you’ve said, and then more time to figure out what they want to say, and then more time still to actually reply. Patience.

I also want you to keep in mind, that sometimes the very best thing you can do for someone, is leave them alone.

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