Autism is a spectrum. Everyone will experience it differently. When a so-called professional invalidates you because you're not their vision of what an autistic person is supposed to be.

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I feel I should give you a backstory on how this all happened. Also, this is to show that ableism is real. Just because you exhibit different traits of a certain condition than someone else. This is going to be about how an ignorant counselor said I wasn't autistic, for a stupid reason may I add.

This is why education is important. Stigma, misinformation, and myths will cause us to struggle.

Most people who are labeled as 'high functioning' will more than likely have their needs ignored because of the misinformation out there. People think high-functioning means you have it easy or whatever. This may have been the cause for this person I will talk about. We need to get rid of these labels. They're giving people the wrong idea.

How this all started

I went through a program that helped disabled people find employment. Or at least I thought this program helped disabled people find jobs. My mom had signed me up, at least she called the place. I mean sign me up with the bit with the lady we will talk about. The mistake we both made was not actually asking questions and assuming. This does not excuse the ignorance of the counselor.

None of us thought to ask beforehand

My mom thought they would send me a referral of some sort. After not hearing or getting anything, she called the place back and they told her I had to meet with someone. My mom has records of my autism, however, she gave most of the records to Social Security when we applied back in 2016. This is why you ALWAYS make copies of your things. This happened in 2017 but I was not blogging at that time or into making autism content. The one thing I should have found odd is when I asked my mom about this place she kept saying she didn't know. Did whoever she called not explain this program? Why didn't she ask questions before booking an appointment?

These are my original impressions of this program

For some reason, my initial impression of this program is that it help you find a job within your abilities. My mom assumed they would help me with my disability case rather than asking. The program wasn't what I expected it to be.

This is where I started to doubt this program

My mom gave the lady the records that we still had. I told her I was autistic and the job settings I needed. She looked at my records and had the audacity to tell me I wasn't autistic because of 'how I talked.' She listened to the stigma rather than the facts. So because of 'how I talk' I'm not autistic to her. This woman had no business telling me what I didn't have. I literally didn't say that much when I walked into her cubical. What the hell does that mean? She also thinks I am not autistic because I have a high IQ. Autism does not affect how smart you are. It affects how you learn. BIG difference. Dyslexic people are smart, their disability just affects how they hear and see things.

It affects your ability to detect social cues and what to do in social situations. Autistic people are bright, however, Nts fall to the stigma thus labeling us as 'retarded.' When I was in school because I didn't know about another kid's interest, he labeled me as stupid right off the bat. An autistic person just needs a different method of learning.

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