been here since 2012, just keep deleting old blogs

This goes for other symptoms as well: although pain can definitely contribute to people’s experiences of these symptoms, fatigue and brain fog are actual migraine symptoms, not just pain symptoms.

We know vaccines painful, and by comparing horses at rest with horses getting vaccinated, we've been able to determine how they express pain visually. By looking at horses with disorders like colic, broken bones, wounds, and so on, we can determine their facial expressions during more severe pain.

At zookeeper school we were drilled through the pain faces of the most common lab animals and livestock. Nowadays I believe this has become a routine lesson in all animal related fields, but the general public still doesn't know that this is a thing that exists.

Here are all the pain face/grimace scales I've been able to find. Please study them if you interact with any of these animals on a regular basis:

Been very frustrated lately by lack of phone call accessibility as someone who lacks speech but needs a lot of resources to stay healthy.

With rise of AI, it's only getting worse and worse.

More places changing their systems to incorporate AI answering machines.

Thing is...

Whenever I hear most people ranting about this change, it's usually about how annoying it is from an abled-person perspective or environmental or ethical impact.

Which are important valid reasons to be upset. I share those sentiments too.

But feel like disability is once again forgotten about within important discussion about change.

AI creates terrible language accessibility issues.

In fact, that's why it so annoying to deal with it.

In the past, if a place didn't have a call center or desk person to answer calls, they use extentions.

That meant you had to press a few numbers to get the right person.

Now with AI, you're expected to have a full conversation with a robot.

Tell them why you're calling, who you need to speak to, verify your info so the humans don't have to later, etc.

These bots can be bad at understanding what able-people are saying, so imagine how they handle these disabled callers:

People who use AAC (speech aids/devices)

People who slur, stutter, have "strange" voice or pronunciation

People with rapid or disorganized speech

People who use poor grammar & who don't speak full words or sentences

People who mix up similar common words

People with "deaf accent"

(i don't know if there is a different preferred term for this. Im sorry if I sound offensive. Please Lmk)

People with non-communicative speech such as vocal tics, echolalia, or babbling

Anyone who uses speech or language in a way that needs a human mind to interpret

Anyone whose voice sounds notably different

Ability to understand what AI is saying can be harder too:

d/Deaf people and other hearing differences

Auditory processing disorder

Receptive language disorder

Developmental disability, especially intellectual and learning disabilities

(AI can't help people who need things explained a certain way. AI unreliable and fails to adapt a lot.)

Anyone who frequently can't make out sounds and/or speech

Anyone who frequently has trouble with meanings in conversation

The problems I often face with AI answering machines (and that I'm sure many other disabled people have faced as well):

AI slightly mishearing me/my device

AI mishearing so badly that it basically makes up a fake conversation

AI not hearing me/my device at all

AI registering tics and stims as answers

AI "explaining" an instruction by repeating the same instruction again word-for-word

AI directing me to the wrong person without trying to confirm what I said

AI sometimes just... hanging up on me right after I speak my first answer...

These are the machines being put in front of

hospitals

doctors offices

mental health centers

pharmacies

transportation and in-home care

health insurance member services

medical supply companies

government resource agencies

non-profit organizations

advocacy groups

justice centers & other legal resources

customer service lines

many other places disabled people often need to access from home

It's another example of some of the most vulnerable being pushed away from the things we need, and we're also being forgotten in these discussions about things that can affect us a lot

Next time someone is ranting about AI job interviewers, please also remember:

the AI pharmacy assistants that make it impossible for someone with a speech disorder to sort out their meds

the AI scheduler that won't allow a D/deaf person to access the right extension of the clinic to set up an appointment

the AI agent that confuses an intellectually disabled person into anger and tears

the AI answerer that hangs up on a mentally ill person seeking help in crisis because they aren't speaking coherently enough

Human beings need to be at the forefront of human resources and issues for disabled people especially. Please remember us. Please fight.