//cw suicide

Sometimes I feel like I'm checking all the boxes on a buzzfeed quiz: "What mental illness do you have? Pick your favorite Riverdale characters to find out." Like, how is someone this mentally ill™?

"Autistic adults experienced a wide range of life events as traumatic, with over 40% showing probably PTSD within the last month and over 60% reporting probable PTSD at some point in their lifetime. Many of the life events experienced as traumas would not be recognized in some current diagnostic systems, raising concerns that autistic people may not receive the help they need for likely PTSD."

I've been exhibiting symptoms of cPTSD since highschool. It took me 10 years to find that out.

I was raised to incorporate ABA therapy which promotes behavior modification. That means that when we commit an action deemed "not normal,"we are "gently pushed" to replace that behavior with "correct demeanor."

Now, ABA is never applied so charitably. It's abusive and infantilizing. Punishment can be taking away emotional outlets for children incapable of understanding themselves and expressing autonomy in other ways, to physical beatings, damaging stimulation, and forced confinement. It leads to self destructive thought loops and expectations. It is a major contributing factor to autistic suicide rates, one of the leading causes of death for us. And if we don't, our life expectancy is 56.

Going to the grocery store can be a debilitating task for me; one that I used to do every other day. I feel incredibly isolated when I'm capable of looking up from the grocery tile floors because I'm afraid that everyone can see I'm weak and disgusting and deseerve to be killed for the mercy of it.

Mental health services designed by non-autistic people are not made for us nore understand us. Hell, our current understanding of language hurts us. It took a bachelor's worht of linguistic, phenomenological, and psychological studies for me to grasp the basics of how my brain works. How do I reasily inform people to interact with that?

But with all that, I'm getting better and happier every single day that I'm alive. I have to make that choice to survive every day but I'm not alone. Please, listen to autistic adults, not puzzles pieces.

Thank you.