Harmful Things Well-Meaning Professionals Say About Autistic People

As a late-diagnosed autistic person, as well as the parent of two autistic children who have had a variety of assessments, services, etc., I have interfaced with A LOT of professionals over the years. Not only personally, but professionally, as someone who specializes in working exclusively with autistic people.

.

Unfortunately, every single slide is a quote I have heard recently from a professional about an autistic person.

.

Well-meaning professionals believe they are actually offering some type of relief by calling autism “mild” or saying that it doesn’t disable someone in a particular way because the person made eye contact or doesn’t fit their stereotype of what autistic communication is.

.

These professionals believe that autism is something that can be seen with the naked eye, which can then be measured and given a “prognosis” of how hard or impacted a person will be by it.

.

They have no idea how autism is something that, first and foremost, is experienced internally by the autistic individual, and only the autistic individual themselves knows firsthand how autism affects them.

.

Everything that is “visible” about autism is just a sign of what is internally happening for that individual.

.

We don’t need professionals giving us their judgment of how autistic they perceive us to be.

.

We want our needs to be taken seriously and for professionals to realize that none of these statements help us at all.

.

Calling autism mild or “high-functioning” is dismissive of what that person’s actual struggles might be.

.

Autism can look “high-functioning” and yet be debilitating for that person in ways that that particular professional may not be able to see or understand.

.

We need professionals to look beyond the surface and their own biases, to seek to better understand how autistic people can be disabled by autism in a multitude of ways—and that the last thing we need is for our experiences to be judged incorrectly and minimized by the people who are supposed to be helping us.