neurodivergent-media

[neurodivergent-media]

Do you maybe know why so many people react so negatively to neurodivergent headcanons of characters in popular media? I’ve been scratching my head over this looking for a satisfying answer.

While this blog is for canon representation - to answer your question: for the most part, I think it's just ableism. Some people don't like to imagine a character they like being neurodivergent, unfortunately.

-Mod Violet

[neurodivergent-media]

Hello, I'm writing a character that is autistic. I'm autistic and white (afab) and my character is black (amab), can I use my own experience with autism as a "draftc for his character? If not, what can I do to make the writing feel correct/original?

(sry if I made any grammar mistakes, I'm not a native speaker)

Hi asker,

Ultimately, autism is both race- and sex- and gender- neutral. Symptoms and traits are not going to vary drastically because of any of the above things.

So yes, you can use your own experience as a basis for your character. What you'd need to pay more attention to is the responses of other people to your character and the culture that they're being raised in.

For example, black disabled people are treated especially heinously by law enforcement, so if you were going to include anything about that, a little black kid might be taught as much as possible by his family to be careful around cops and develop a script and to not stim around them. Masking and not stimming in a case like this isn't a case of hiding your true self, it's about protecting your life and safety. And yet, this doesn't actually have anything to do with this character's autism being any different than a little white boy his age. Just that it is treated differently.

And, like any character of color, the only way to make them isn't just to make them live the same life culturally than a white person and then change the color of their skin. Researching about their culture and including bits of that in their life is important – things like food, values, hairstyles, cultural events, holidays, and such.

I want to add that the assigned genders of your characters don't matter as much as you think they might. I know it's common to refer to 'female/girl autism' on the internet as its own separate beast, but there isn't really a material difference in symptoms and traits. Some traits will be seen differently socially by others, like with race, and people might be treated differently depending on their sex about how they behave, but the behaviors themselves are not divided nicely on a gender line or anything like that. That misconception, really, is just born from misogyny, sexism, and societal expectations, not from autism itself being different.

Hope this helps,

mod sparrow

Hi,

mod Sparrow covered the actual question, so I'll mention the AGAB part.

There is no sexual dimorphism related to hormones, genitals, or chromosomes in autism. The severity of a person's symptoms or how they experience them is unrelated to any kind of sex characteristic, nor to a past decision made on the basis of at-the-time appearance of the person's external genitals, which is what AGAB is.

The "girl/boy autism" is a sexist dichotomy that is completely made up and presents girls as inherently less disabled by their autism. It erases the severely disabled girls and women who do have autism and shows "girl autism" as more manageable and pro-social than "boy autism" which is impossible to control and anti-social. That's nonsense and the same kind of erasure of women as in every other minority.

The only real difference that is based on gender is how it's socially treated by others, just like mod Sparrow mentioned. Men's autistic symptoms are generally considered more acceptable than they would be if they belonged to a woman, even if the symptom is exactly the same. If a man shows autistic tendencies, he can be considered "intriguing and unique", but if a woman did the same, she would be "off-putting and weird".

This, however, obviously isn't based on what the person's AGAB was. A transgender woman's autistic behavior won't be seen the same way a cisgender man's behavior would be. It will in fact put her under more scrutiny than a cis woman would be under, not less. AGAB is a past event that serves no function in this question, nor in most contexts. AGAB doesn't answer for gender, presentation, chromosomes, hormone dominance, organs, functionality of these organs, or anything else other than what someone arbitrarily said about a newborn. Categorizing people based on what gender they were assigned at birth - rather than any present characteristic - is bioessentialism.

I know this is not an answer to the ask, but please question what a past evaluation of the character's genitals would inform here that their actual gender wouldn't.

mod Sasza

[neurodivergent-media]

"Hell Followed With Us tells the story of Benji, a trans teen who escapes a fundamentalist cult that causes an apocalyptic event destroying much of the world’s population...

The novel features not only a transmasculine protagonist but autistic representation, as well, in the character of Nick, the leader of the teens' found family who is “gorgeous, autistic, and a deadly shot," according to the book's publisher."

[neurodivergent-media]

Hi! I'm currently working on writing a book about a character with schizophrenia, but I'm afraid to fall into some sort of "crazy-guy" stereotype.

He starts developing a romance with a close friend of his, but I don't want it to be a "I can fix him" type of deal.

I'm a med student and have researched about it, but I'm afraid that having this knowledge and actually knowing what people with this go through is entirely different.

It's a bit complicated to explain, but the book is between a triller and a slight slice of life.

Howdy!

There is nothing wrong with a person with schizophrenia or any level of psychosis, or even any person with severe mental illness and neurodivergence being in a relationship, even if they are still in recovery or somewhat unstable. That doesn't push into "i can fix him" unless the relationship was initiated because the person wanted to affect their partners health and is doing so by being in a relationship, which is very different. People with any level of disability or disorder can have relationships.

To answer more I'm going to need some more information about how the tropes are being handled.

I also want to add that very few characters with psychosis are given meaningful romantic relationships and that giving a character a relationship where the drama is not focused on the character's schizophrenia or how it impacts their lover would be an amazing thing to see. People with schizophrenia and psychosis in general are often, when portrayed as in relationships, shown as being controlling or abusive and while anyone can be abusive it is more likely for a character in active psychosis to be gaslit or controlled by their partner simply because of how difficult it can be to discern reality at times.

I also want to say be careful about the idea of a main character with schizophrenia being in a thriller. It is absolutely possible to have a character with serious mental illness to be in a thriller or horror story, and as someone with psychosis who loves horror that's not my concern. But there is an overabundance of psychotic characters in thrillers acting as the antagonist, or as villainous, and the plot twist of "the violence was in his head the whole time" is overdone as representation and not as exciting as a psychotic character getting to exist in the story as a fully-fledged protagonist or character.

-Mod Bert

[neurodivergent-media]

if you ever watched house the medical drama TV show, know that dr house mean and rude to everyone and very insensitive.

season 3 episode 4 about a severely autistic nonverbal boy with behavioral issues and no way to functionally communicate

of course have bad aspects. filmed in 2006. have bad ABA elements and bad PECS and drills and doctors not knowing how to handle nonverbal autistic boy w behavioral issues. definitely not down playing that. (and some other bad things in the subplot not related to the boy)

but dr house out of all people. is one that actually figured out how to communicate with him.

in this post i talk about how house’s interaction w the boy demonstrates how to connect with nonverbal nonspeaking autistics (despite the “he won’t understand”), presuming competence, the nuance of autism parents, and functional communication. i use the show to go beyond the plot and talk about wider (level 1 speaking) autism community issues.

so even if you not interested in the TV show House. still hope you can read.

“nobody knew how to speak ‘autistic.’ “

procedure need anesthesia mask thingie. and kid screaming and no one can put mask on him and make him stay, everyone trying to hold him down. house came in made insensitive remarks as always, but modeled to kid what to do. house put the anesthesia mask on him and breathed for bit for kid to see until he stopped screaming, then put it on kid, then put on himself, then on kid who successfully went under anesthesia.

which was so important. meant so much to me. because kid so unfamiliar don’t know what people are doing to him, probably no one explain, may or may not understand what happening. everyone so impatient and don’t know how to get on his level, and so many people restrain him so of course want fight back. but house was only one who considered what the kid needs what he is feeling. house mirrored it showed him what will happen what to do to kid in a way he will understand. he was even gentle. he smiled a little.

yes house used rude monkey metaphor to explain reasoning. but does that to every patient nonverbal autistic or not. so really, for house he didn’t treat the patient any differently.

afterwards. house even critiques dr cameron’s construction of “normal” in a somewhat intersectional, race conscious way. and don’t pity the child at all. resisting the idea of institutionalization.

See, skinny, socially-privileged white people get to draw this neat little circle. Everyone inside the circle is normal. Everyone outside the circle should be beaten, broken and reset, so they can be brought into the circle. Failing that, they should be institutionalized, or worse, pitied.

So, it's wrong to feel sorry for this little boy? Why would you feel sorry for someone who gets to opt out of the inane courteous formalities, which are utterly meaningless, insincere, and therefore, degrading? This kid doesn't have to pretend to be interested in your back pain, or your excretions, or your grandma's itchy place. Can you imagine how liberating it would be to live a life free of all the mind-numbing social niceties? I don't pity this kid.

I envy him.

when the medical team was suspecting that parents slip kid alcohol to calm him down (which turned out to not true), house breaks down why martyr parents becomes martyr parents:

How would you know that? The kid can't talk. Why do you think I took this case? He's not going to give away the ending. They quit their jobs for him. Yes, they are everything you'd want in a parent. Unfortunately, their kid is nothing you'd want. When a baby is born, it's perfect. Little fingers, little toes, plump, perfect, pink, and brimming with unbridled potential. Then it's downhill. Some hills steeper than others. Parents get off on their kids' accomplishments. ...They'll annoy you with trophy rooms and report cards. Hell, they'll even show you a purple cow and tell what a keen eye for color their kid has. But this kid, he doesn't smile, he doesn't hug them, he doesn't laugh. His parents get nothing but the right to brag that their kid picked orange juice out of a lineup. So you figure they slip the kid a mickey so they don't have to deal.

i think show parents in dynamic way too. lots of ableism, for sure. the bad coercive compliance drill kind of ABA tactics, for example.

but fully shows how hard it is to raise a “severely” nonverbal autistic kid with behavioral issues and no functional communication. as much as autistic community like to deny it, it is hard. it is a lot of work. and recognizing and acknowledging that it is a lot of work whether because of inherent autism as a disorder or because lack of societal support, acknowledging this fact alone doesn’t make a parent a martyr parent, an autism parent. i think this is where the (level 1 speaking late diagnosed) autistic community get wrong.

the parents are desperate. they do bad things. they don’t mean to do harm to the kid, they think they’re doing what’s right for their kid. but they still do bad things. and they care for the kid, they celebrate the kid’s achievements, yes sometimes misguided but they want to do good. there is nuance to this. the parents aren’t vile. they aren’t evil evil ableist want to force their kid to be neurotypical against all odds regardless of well-being. most autism parents are more nuanced like this. the level 1 speaking autism community need to listen, too.

and the show ended with. as the family is leaving, the autistic boy voluntarily goes towards dr house. and hands him his video game console (like a switch but not a switch idk), something that is a part of his routine that he melts down when interrupted when grabbed, that he probably very attached to. he gave it to house. and looked at house for a long time.

yes, the eye contact part can be seen as the show over valuing eye contact. but. the bigger impact is the fact that. the show showed the boy connected with house. whether it is thanking him, feel safe with him, we don’t know because the boy have no functional communication. but the boy formed connection with house, and expressed the connection in his own nonverbal way. no “thank you,” no hugs, no conventional way, but the boy’s communication in his own unique nonverbal autistic way. looking at his parents’ reactions, this is incredibly rare, probably even first time, and the parents are crying.

and house was able to diagnose the kid because he actually listened to all forms of communication. he didn’t dismiss the kid’s repeated drawings as meaningless. he didn’t dismiss the PECS image the kid picked in response to his question as meaningless and incompetent even though it was not the image/answer he was initially suspecting. and both things were crucial to the correct diagnosis. if house didn’t listen to them, the kid would have died. house listened to all forms of communication. he assumed competence. he assumed the kid was trying to communicate something, he didn’t chalk the kid’s behaviors as meaningless. despite the “he won’t understand you” “it would work” etc throughout the episode.

but. also want to say. these forms of communication, albeit need to be listened to, is still not functional communication. and functional communication is important and should strive towards for a reason.

another thing the (level 1 speaking) autistic community get wrong is saying nonverbal nonspeaking autistics can communicate same way/as effectively as speaking autistics. that only person to blame is evil evil ableist people not listening to their behaviors. if only they listen!

but more nuanced than that. many many ways to decipher the kid’s repeated drawing, for example. house got it right. he assumed that drawing has connection to the kid’s medical symptoms, and that it is a worm parasite. there can be million other interpretation even if you take kid seriously. i thought it was a ocean wave, for example. thought the kid like waves like beaches like ocean.

if the kid had functional communication—and by functional communication, i don’t mean speech, altho that can be a form of it, i include robust AAC—he could have communicated. in words (spoken/typed/written). what he was experiencing. what he was seeing in his eyes, the swiggly worms he was seeing. and the diagnosis would have arrived sinner. been put through less danger. and if house wasn’t there and another another was there and the doctor didn’t pay attention to the kid and dismissed the kid, the kid would have died because he didn’t have functional communication to tell people what he was experiencing.

it’s not as easy as “just listen!!” and chalking everyone who don’t exactly understand the nonspeaker as ableist.

[neurodivergent-media]

Do you maybe know why so many people react so negatively to neurodivergent headcanons of characters in popular media? I’ve been scratching my head over this looking for a satisfying answer.

While this blog is for canon representation - to answer your question: for the most part, I think it's just ableism. Some people don't like to imagine a character they like being neurodivergent, unfortunately.

-Mod Violet

[neurodivergent-media]

hey there! so i'm writing a character who is extremely skilled in combat, but is also autistic and dyspraxic (like myself), with traits that could make a lot of physically demanding tasks like fighting difficult. the story is set in an ambiguous time period that's very advanced in some ways and not so advanced in others, so do you guys have any ideas for ways i could give her a fighting style or some kind of aid that could accommodate her poor motor skills/coordination/balance, spatial unawareness, etc? thank you!

Hi!

There's a lot of ways to have dyspraxia, I will base my answer on my own experience with it (I have major issues with gait and trunk coordination, and a bit with my hands as well).

I would probably stray away from a lot of martial arts where you have to engage all four limbs at all times. Four is just too much to keep track of (I mean, I struggle with jumping jacks...), I would try to go for something that utilizes a greater distance and doesn't require as much moving around all the time. If her hands have enough control, maybe she could go with bow and arrow or something similar (crossbow, gun, or some other fantasy shooting device)?

For closer distance fighting that doesn't need as much hand control, you could always go the Very Big Sword route - doesn't require much precision because it's Big, good spatial awareness not needed because it's so Long it will probably hit anyway, and you might as well stand while using it rather than doing overcomplicated maneuvers.

I hope that these give you some potential ideas in what direction to go! :-)

I'd love a story about a dyspraxic character doing all that cool stuff! Good luck with your story:)

mod Sasza

[neurodivergent-media]

Why does every story that has a character with Down’s syndrome reduce them to “oh this character has Down’s syndrome, isn’t that sad?” Fuck that! Can I have a gay romcom where someone with Down’s syndrome falls in love with their co-worker? How about a slice of life webcomic where a girl with Down’s syndrome and her buddies start a band? Or a supernatural story about a vampire hunter with Down’s syndrome. I don’t know there’s so much potential you could do but you just make it a sad thing!

[neurodivergent-media]

I have a character with Tourette’s Syndrome that is an engineer. His tics are pretty active on a daily basis, both motor and vocal. I know tics can calm down when a person is focused. My character works really well under pressure, and when he is working with his hands his tics calm down. Is it plausible that this character can safely disarm bombs?

Hello!

It is true that tics can calm down when somebody is focused, even to the point where they disappear completely. I find that this happens most to me when I'm working with my hands but focus in general can calm them.

That said, things like stress and excitement can also make tics worse. You've mentioned that your character thrives under pressure so defusing bombs would have a better shot at calming their tics instead of making them worse.

Something to note is that there are actually people with Tourette's in our world that disarm bombs for a living so it could certainly be a possibility for your character! This article [Link] talks about an explosives ordnance disposal (EOD) officer with Tourette's while this article [Link] goes more into his life.

This is somewhat unrelated but still worth mentioning but there are also surgeons with Tourette's! This Canadian surgeon [Link] has Tourette's. This article [Link] also talks about the same surgeon. Please note that it uses some language and phrasing that I disagree with but it does have some good information on how he deals with his tics while operating that may be helpful for your character!

Cheers,

~ Mod Icarus

Note: Edited to fix a broken link.

[neurodivergent-media]

Stop Making Psychosis A Villainous Trait Challenge

[neurodivergent-media]

I'm writing a story set in the 1800s that has an intellectually disabled character. how would you recommend I get across that they are intellectually disabled given that the respectful terms wouldn't really have existed then?

Hi!

I think that the best idea would be to just show the symptoms of their disability. Show them struggle with tasks (which ones would depend on the severity of their disability), if they are able to do so they could speak differently when compared to other characters - I often forget words when speaking, repeat myself because I didn't understand the answer to a question (or realized that it was the answer), or have to ask someone for a TLDR because I got lost in what they were saying (even if I'm actively paying attention). Sometimes I also have to circle multiple times to a single idea to "get it out" properly because it's hard to conceptualize it all at once. Your character could also get overwhelmed or stressed more easily.

Also, often ID comes with physical symptoms so they could have dyspraxia like me! In case their ID is caused by a syndrome, it could work to describe the facial features that come with it, e.g. I think most readers would be familiar with how a person with Down Syndrome looks like. But the most important part is to show the actual symptoms of the disability!

If you want to name the disability without using slurs, "delayed" or "mentally disabled" or "having a slower thought process" could also work. They wouldn't be my primary choices in most contexts, but for historical fiction it's a bit different. "Handicapped" also started being used in the late 19th century, it's not necessarily a slur but it's still offensive. You could go for something like "fallen behind their peers" if you want.

I think that it would be a good idea to mention in some kind of author's note that your work is a piece of historical fiction and that those terms aren't preferred now (and show those that are, i.e. intellectual disability in most places and general learning disability in the UK). A lot of people don't know this, so it could be genuinely educational!

Thanks for your ask, I hope this helps!

mod Sasza

[neurodivergent-media]

Another crosspost from my Instagram! Happy Autism Acceptance Month! Full titles under the cut

Their Troublesome Crush by Xan West

The Outside by Ada Hoffman

On the Edge of Gone by Corrine Duyvis

This Other World by AC Buchanan

The Spirit Bares its Teeth by Andrew Joseph White

The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester by Maya MacGregor

Junker Seven by Olive J Kelley

Tell Me How it Ends by Quinton Li

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

[neurodivergent-media]

Low support needs autistics complain about the high support autistics in media. They will say that autism never look like that. Or that those are just stereotypes. Some of us fit stereotypes. The autism spectrum is indeed spectrum. So see high support autistics representation not mean that it is bad, or that it need to go away.

[neurodivergent-media]

I think a massive obstacle to plural acceptance is the way the media presents Dissociative Identity Disorder. The first explanation an anti-plural person goes to is that people are just lying about DID because (Like Schizophrenia and other conditions) it is always depicted as something life ruining and intense, like the movie Split. The media doesn't display people with DID just living normally, having average lives and coping just fine. People with DID in media are so often murderers or otherwise distanced from normalcy, and from knowing lots of systems I can say that that just isn't the case.

[neurodivergent-media]

Book Review: The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester by Maya MacGregor

This book was a mixed bag.

Plot Synopsis from Publisher: "In this queer contemporary YA mystery, a nonbinary autistic teen realizes they must not only solve a 30-year-old mystery but also face the demons lurking in their past in order to live a satisfying life."

This review contains spoilers.

The Good

The author is autistic and non-binary, like the main character. OwnVoices is always nice to see.

The main character's dad, Junius, is a beautiful portrayal of Black fatherhood. One of the best fictional parents of an autistic child I've ever seen. He communicates with Sam their way, is always patient and kind, and is determined to get them what they need to feel safe. No Autism Parents™ here.

Sam was adopted at age 7 after bouncing between foster homes and group homes, and the time it takes them to fully adjust to their new life is realistic.

The portrayal of stimming, including self-injurious stimming, is very accurate.

Sam finds friends who like them for them, instead of having to change themself completely to make friends. Good change of pace from a lot of advice for autistic teens.

Autistic shutdown is correctly identified as a type of catatonia, which as far as I know is the first time that's ever happened in a fiction book.

Sam has very obviously learned a lot of social rules the hard way, like many of us do. There are direct references to learning social rules like what to do at a funeral, what specific facial expressions mean, what appropriate student-teacher conversations are, etc.

Sam does the autism/alexithymic thing where you relate to a story very deeply and have to back up and unpack why. That was very relatable.

The Bad

Sam is supposed to have a pretty morbid special interest in kids who died before 19. The portrayal of this was not realistic. Sam has no trouble hiding their interest when they think other people might feel upset by it. There's no mention of the pressure cooker feeling so many of us get when we want so badly to talk about a SpIn and can't. There's no mention of how having a special interest like that is deeply lonely; not only are people afraid of the subject itself, they're usually afraid of you, too. No one they reveal this interest to is at all perturbed.

There's a bizarre hang-up with Reactive Attachment Disorder, of all things. Sam was misdiagnosed with RAD as a very young child, which is a perfectly reasonable diagnosis to make when you have a severely traumatized, socially withdrawn foster child. The text treats this as some kind of cockamamie diagnosis they were only given instead of autism because they're AFAB.

The author seems to think mental illness means "for no reason," and this is reflected in the way characters speak about RAD. At one point Junius says to Sam, "I met you at that group home, and they told me you had reactive attachment disorder. I saw the hungry way you looked around and the frustration I knew all too well, like you were shouting and everyone pretended they couldn't hear you. I figured... maybe you had a reason not to get attached to people." Having a reason not to get attached to people is literally a key piece of RAD. It's a traumagenic disorder. None of what he says contradicts a RAD diagnosis at all, but Sam and Junius both act like it does.

The portrayal of Montana is about two decades out of date and seems to confuse it with Canada in some spots. There's regular mention of having lived in Airdrie, which is in Alberta, in the same sentence as Missoula, Montana. The main character says there was only one out gay kid in their entire high school in Missoula, in ~2021. Missoula has 73,000 people and a pride parade every year. There is no way there would be one out gay kid, in a public high school, in a town that large at this point in time. There were about a dozen out LGBT+ kids in my high school in my much smaller, less progressive town circa 2013. I mention this because it's important to recognize the ways homophobia, transphobia, and ableism have shifted over the years. Pretending there's no change at all does everyone a disservice.

Verdict: I've read much worse, but I also wouldn't reach for this as an example of spectacular autism representation.

[neurodivergent-media]

How to write a character with tourettes (by someone with tourettes)

So here it is:

when writing a tic, don’t write “*tic*” write the actual thing out. such as “My tics acted up, causing me to punch my chest hard” or ““Fuck!” I ticced”

don’t suddenly remember the characters tourettes or use it for dramatic affect. yes, it can cause some dramatic moments in your story, but dont do the “oh fuck i forgot to write in their tourettes for the past ten chapters, hm well maybe i can make them twitch violently during a fight”

also, dont make their tourettes their entire character, were people, not walking disorders.

DO YOUR RESEARCH: 

some basic facts include:

10% of tourettes havers have swearing tics

for it to be tourettes, it has to appear before age 18 or anytime from a traumatic brain injury

there are different types of tic disorders

comorbid disorders are common

TIC ATTACKS: they dont last two seconds and can be very traumatizing. they hurt like hell and tire the person out

Those are some basic things on how to write a character with tourettes/tics, feel free to leave more suggestions in the reblogs

[neurodivergent-media]

SO MY AUTISTIC HC WAS NOT OF NOTHING....