#I won’t use an AAC

[nagahissteria]

Tfw you’ve had habits or yours that are actively harmful to your mental health brought to light but those things are safety mechanisms you’ve consciously or unconsciously adopted to hide the fact you aren’t like everybody else and you’re just now processing how much it hurts.

[badolmen]

I can fix him*

*bad writing, underutilized gameplay mechanics, characters with unfulfilled potential, funded by bootlickers

[zebulontheplanet]

I’m gonna say this, and I’m taking a deep breath as I say this because it’s probably going to piss off some people lol.

Unless you’re nonspeaking/nonverbal, then you don’t get it. Yes, even if you’re a part time AAC user. Yes, even if you’re an occasional AAC user. Yes, even if you use AAC the majority of the time but are verbal or demiverbal or semiverbal.

You don’t get it. You don’t get what it’s like to rely completely on a device. On other people. You don’t get the fear, the anxiety, the loneliness, the pain. You don’t get the ableism we face. Or the fact that we can’t experience certain connections.

You don’t get that I can’t say thank you and therefore get weird looks. You don’t get that I can’t say please, or sorry, or anything like that. You won’t get what it’s like to have to make your parent your medical proxy because you can’t make doctors appointments yourself, so therefore they know everything about your medical history. You have no privacy. You don’t get what it’s like.

You don’t get the fear of seeing your devices battery slowly die because you’ve been using it but you still have hours left of class or you are out in public and know you need something to communicate but your device will inevitably die on you.

You don’t get what it’s like to go into the AAC community and see part time users be risen up and supported, then for full time users to be ignored and and told our experiences are so different that they shouldn’t even be talked about in these spaces because it leaves people out.

You don’t get what it’s like to be beyond frustrated with other AAC users because although they’re apart of our community, they’re forcing themselves into our conversations as full time nonverbal/nonspeaking users. You don’t get that frustration. The want to scream.

You don’t get what it’s like to see people push themselves into your community for only their self gain. For their own selfishness. For the sake of saying “I’m an AAC user too!!!! I can say these things!!” When no…I’m not talking about you. I’m not talking about part time AAC users.

I feel like people don’t realize that yes, AAC users are a minority themselves, and a marginalized community, but full time users, they’re a marginalized community and a minority within the very community that they fucking built.

Part time AAC users, occasional AAC users, people who are not nonspeaking/nonverbal, it’s time to start realizing your own privilege within the community. It’s time to start letting us talk too. It’s time to stop forcing your way into our conversations. It’s time to listen to us.

I get increasingly frustrated as the days go on, and I’m tired of being frustrated.

[beatingtheouijaboardallegations]

i love you nonspeakers. i love you nonverbal people.

i love you nonverbal people who prefer to be called nonverbal. i love you nonspeaking people who prefer to be called nonspeaking. i love you nonspeaking nonverbal people who tired of debate about terminology or can’t keep up with it and just want be heard and communication rights respected.

i love you people who not speak ever since birth ( hi! ). i love you people who use to speak but experience regression / catatonia / burnout or with degenerative physical disabilities. i love you nonspeaking nonverbal people with acquired disabilities.

i love you multimodal communicators. i love you people with complex communication needs. i love you apraxic people who are unreliably speaking. i love you minimally verbal people. i love you semiverbal people. i love you speaking people with selective mutism with intermittent speech ( who listen to us and not speak over )

I love you nonspeaking nonverbal autistic people. i love you nonspeaking / nonverbal people with other intellectual & developmental disabilities. i love you nonspeaking / nonverbal people with apraxia / dyspraxia ( full body or apraxia of speech ) . I love you nonspeaking nonverbal people with brain injury with stroke with aphasia with genetic disorders. i love you nonspeaking / nonverbal people with mental health disabilities that affect language ( eg schizophrenia ) .

I love you AAC users. I love you users of text based AAC. I love you users of picture based AAC. I love you users of low tech AAC. I love you people who can’t afford the big expensive robust systems and rely on free apps or low tech for that reason. I love you people who need small grid size. I love you people who need visual accommodations to AAC like high contrast. I love you people who need alternate access like switch , eye gaze , head track , joystick , partner assisted scanning to make AAC accessible. I love you nonspeaking / nonverbal people who use sign languages. I love you picture card users. I love you letter board users. I love you people who need human support to use AAC , people who use methods like FC and RPM and S2C and all the “ discredited ” method that are constant at risk of being take away from you.

I love you nonspeaking nonverbal people who haven’t found a way to communicate with words that works for them yet. i love you people who communicate mostly or entirely with behavior with gesture with pointing with vocal sounds not words. i love you people who only way communicate is what the system calls “challenging behavior.” I love you people who communicate through violent meltdown, who SIB and hurt others , run away unsafely , destroy property etc and who are punish institutionalize incarcerate or other abused oppressed instead of helped find other way to communicate. i love you nonverbal nonspeaking people who won’t ever see this post, who under institution control or informal more subtle control and don’t have access to social media , or who disability make social media hard , or who just don't like / have interest in being on here (was me for a while !)

I love you nonverbal and nonspeaking people who have found a home in the nonverbal / high support need community on here and who feel like experience is represent. i love you nonverbal and nonspeaking people who have found a home in offline AAC / nonspeaking world like CommunicationFirst and the spellling to communicate conferences. I love you nonverbal and nonspeaking people who not find their " home " in the disability / nonverbal nonspeaking community yet , who not see own experience represent anywhere.

i love you nonspeakers of color. i love you nonspeaking nonverbal queer and trans people. i love you physically disabled nonspeaking / nonverbal people. i love you mentally ill / Mad nonspeaking nonverbal people. i love you poor nonspeaking nonverbal people. i love you nonspeaking / nonverbal people not from global north.

i love you nonverbal people. i love you nonspeaking people. we are great and we deserve to be heard.

[spooksforsammy]

Somedays I worry I push the idea that aac is this absolutely amazing thing to use and have, and everyone will benefit from it and it’s super easy. And I pray that’s the not idea pass around, because it’s not true.

Aac can be fun yes, but the harassment, exclusion and struggle from starting and continuing to use aac is hard to deal with. People don’t take you serious, they want verbal communication even if you can’t and they won’t talk to someone that uses a device for a voice.

From personal experience, aac is amazing to have, but it’s hard to start, continue use and understand. And truthfully aac can be just as impaired to use as my verbal speech. I feel like I tell everyone the good and purposely exclude the bad, and I don’t want to anymore. Because it’s wrong to me and so many others.

Aac is hard to use. Some just can’t for whatever reason. Sometimes they don’t have any function language, they don’t understand others exist and can be talked to, they have little interest etc. speech & language impairment go past only verbal speech, they often include of others understand them, they understand others and how they communicate with the world.

Aac takes time. And I mean a lot. It need constant improvement, customization and editing. It can take years to get personalized, and even then, sometimes words are being added in daily or monthly.

It’s frustrating. Thought can’t get out quick enough, conversations change before get words out. Sometimes have thoughts but no idea where words are located (symbol based) or not sure how phrase thoughts. Yes it can help prevent meltdowns, but it can also be the cause of them.

I’ve been off and on aac for a few years (mainly due to not have actual device for it) and sadly aac may never actually work for me. Sometimes it does, other times it’s just as or more frustrating than verbal communication. Sometimes the good outweighs the bad.

But sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it just never works. It’s sometime shown as the one that works when nothing else does, but sometimes aac also don’t work. That’s the sad truth behind aac.

(One experience from one aac use. Also part time not use since childhood experience. It’s different for everyone!! If this related with you, great. If it doesn’t that’s good to.)

[cripplecharacters]

I have a non-verbal character who primarily communicates via sign and often uses AAC as well. I have heard using italics isn’t great because it others the character. I have a question about formatting dialogue, though.

My plan is to use “said” when they are using AAC, for example:

“We’ve got to catch the afternoon ferry,” he said.

And “signed” for when he’s signing:

“Otherwise we won’t get there on time,” they signed.

To differentiate between the two ways he’s communicating. However I wonder if I should just use “said” no matter what, since maybe ���signed” is still othering. And if there’s actually any value to differentiating or if just over complicating.

Hi!

You can use the “said” tag for both. In general, “said” is a good multipurpose tag for any form of communication.

Unless there is a specific reason why it matters that he is signing or using his AAC device, it doesn’t need to come up every single time, once the audience knows what communication methods he uses.

If do you want to clarify what type of communication a character is using, you can use the “signed” tag or say something about their AAC device, as examples. (I am assuming when you say AAC you mean your character uses a high-tech AAC device; sign is also a form of AAC!)

“Signed” isn’t necessarily a word to always avoid, it’s just unnecessary to use repeatedly, especially after establishing that a character does sign.

Mod Rock

[murderscenemotes]

I won’t/can’t eat that nd Unsafe food emotes!

made for aac but can be used anywhere :3

-Azzy 🩵

[meeb-motes]

Do I have any advice for someone wanting to start up an emoji/aac blog? We've been wanting to make one for a while but are hesitant

mhm mhm yes yes we do !!

1.Finds good blog name that has Emojis or AAC or Emotes in it

2.Pick a blog theme !! It can be very vague like Winter or very specific like Eevee pokemon !!

3. Make sure that your blogs colors are easy to see / have good contrast !!

4. Do not use colored text on intro and make sure that your intro is nice and concise ( Name , Pronouns ,Importnat info about you, DNI/DNF, Emoji terms of service, What you will be willing to make / what you won’t be willing to make, Couple of userboxes )

5. Ask for promos !!(if your comfy with that)

6. make sure to have a sort of like system for keeping track of requests !!(wether that be a list on paper or something else)

7. Try and have a specific and consistent color palette for your emojis !! Something that is pleasing to the eyes and has ok contrast !!

8. Do not engage in emojiblr drama (trust us it’s not worth it / very VERY tiresome)

9. Optional but maybe have a tagging system ( for like organization of types of emojis ) <- not required though !!

Hopefully this helps :D?!?

-Vee/☀️

[elasmobranch-enthusiast]

i just wanted to let everyone know about this very simple, free, text to speech aac app. it’s called simple aac.

it’s just text to speech, no buttons or symbols. i know that won’t work for everyone, but hopefully someone finds it useful. i know i appreciate having an aac app on my phone that gives me a reliable way to communicate without having to bring my heavy ipad with me at all times. there’s even a little sentence about trans rights, which i know a lot of us appreciate 🏳️‍⚧️

hope this can help someone!

edit: i don’t know if this is for androids, i use ios

[perplexingluciddreams]

A “brief” overview of my communication journey:

My verbal communication was always limited to echolalia and scripts (by scripts, I mean pieces of different echolalia that I stuck together to create a new phrase, or longer several-sentence delayed echolalia. But I didn’t learn to do this until I was at least 9 years old). I also had very limited control over what my mouth said - I would regularly hear my mouth say something I completely disagreed with, then had to watch in panic and confusion as the people around me reacted as if it was something I actually thought.

I used to request things that I didn't even want. "I want..." statements were banned in my house because they were "rude". “I want never gets!” I had stuck as a script for the longest time, even involuntarily saying it when other children said an “I want…” phrase.

I was given examples of how to request things by my parents. I used "I would like...", "Can I have... please", etc. But this didn't give me a reliable way to ask for what I wanted - I could only ask for things I had a script for. So I was limited to a handful of foods and objects that as I grew older, I had less and less interest in.

Saying "please" and "thank you" was drilled into me so much that I would often say it at the end of other unrelated scripts because it got "stuck" there by my mouth, without my permission. I got laughed at for this a lot.

I would say "yes" when I meant no, I couldn't reject things because I didn't have a script for saying "no". And I had been told to be polite so many times that it was a concrete rule in my mind - breaking a rule was worse than anything else. Saying "no" was rude, according to the adults around me - if another child said "no" to something, they were told off by a teacher or their parent. I didn't understand tone of voice so I thought it was the thing they were saying that was wrong.

As I got older, and became more aware that other people seemed to have more control over their voices and could say what they wanted (my general awareness of people and my surroundings definitely played into my struggles with communication, but I won’t elaborate on that here) I would sometimes sit in my bedroom and attempt to read aloud from a book, or write a sentence and read it aloud. To my confusion and upset, it would come out garbled with sounds mixed up, words missing, sometimes no sound coming out of my mouth at all. I couldn't make intelligible speech with my own words AT ALL.

I managed to teach myself to manually make some sounds, mostly vowel sounds, by moving my tongue around whilst making sounds with my vocal cords. But clearly this was not enough for using spontaneous speech as communication. Not to mention, any time I even considered trying to get my OWN words out (with speech, writing - even drawing pictures, signs), all words and scripts I knew just disappeared from my mind.

The only time I could even slightly get my emotions out was through movement - I used to throw myself backwards onto my bed repeatedly, bang my head with my hand, pull my hair, spin around in circles. I now know these would be called "stimming", but at the time I used it more for expressing myself. I also had other repetitive movements that I did almost constantly without even realising what I was doing, but I considered the expressive movement to be a different thing entirely at the time.

It took me years to get my own words out, and that was only once I managed to break down (spoken AND written, and both connected) language into individual words and learn the meanings, then learn to build it back up again. (And, this could only happen after I’d lost most of my out-of-control scripted speech. AAC with symbols helped me break down language in this way, because each word has a separate button and I was forced to learn to form sentences without an already-there structure to fall back on).

In order to do this, first I must take the long string of noises, and break it down into words. Then I must take those words and process the meaning of them individually. The biggest challenge, and the thing that takes the most time, is building the sentence back up.

Words often change meaning when they're strung together, and this is the part where that meaning tends to disintegrate into nothing, for me.

I have to build an abstract "picture" of what the words mean in my head. With very complex language, or a lot of language at once, this can take me hours, days, or even weeks.

Written language is a lot easier to process - firstly, the "string of noises" part is completely eliminated from the equation. Secondly, I see written words as entire shapes. Shapes, symbols or signs connect much more strongly to their meaning, in my head.

I learned to write by hand before I could type, because writing by hand is just copying the shape of a word. I hadn't yet learned to break down a word into it's individual characters and sequence them in the right order, not to mention finding the letters on the keyboard. My spelling has always been fantastic because of my tactile memory for words - and I say tactile instead of visual, because I don't "see" anything in my head, but the shapes of words are something solid that I feel I can touch, hold, grab on to.

But typing was a completely different thing, because even though I could recognise and read words in a typed print, it took longer for me to understand how to put letters together in the correct order to create words using a keyboard. The motor plan for typing was much more difficult for me to learn, but now I have that skill it's invaluable to me in terms of communication.

It took me a little while longer to realise that a keyboard gave me the opportunity to use my own words from my own mind, rather than whatever my mouth (or brain, when writing - I had different written scripts than verbal scripts, though, usually from books) happened to blurt out without my control.

I learned to read very early, but my understanding of language was actually quite poor - separately I could recognise the definition of one word, but when many words are put together I didn't understand the meaning of that sentence or paragraph.

The feeling of being able to put my own thoughts into written words like this, and read them back, is such a rush of power. I can have a concrete, physical impact on the world now that I can use a keyboard and get all the things in my head out there. It becomes real as soon as it's outside of me.

I remember that "comprehension" (answering questions on a written passage - we learned to answer the questions in a certain way, with a “blueprint”) in school really helped me with the breaking down of sentences and rephrasing them. Even though at the time, it just felt like it added to my out-of-control scripted speech, it gave me a skill that has been incredibly useful to me in the long term.

Getting to this point, where I can express myself fluently and eloquently through written language, took so much time and work, and still takes all my energy to write something as long as this. I am so grateful for the genuine communication I have now. It took many sessions, over months, to write this in its entirety. I wrote it in separate chunks, all trying to express similar things, then fitted them together and altered some sentences to make it flow better. (Of course with lots of editing to fix my grammar and my tendency to repeat the same sentence structure over and over - I still use my “blueprints” while writing, it’s the only way I can form complex long sentences like this one).

In order to communicate a memory or past experience in words, I had to have been actively translating (or attempting to translate) my abstract thoughts into language at the time.

If I wasn't or couldn't do this at the time it was happening, those experiences, thoughts, emotions, etc. are almost impossible to describe in language now.

And translating my brain takes so much energy and effort, and relies on me being able to understand what is happening and what I'm thinking and feeling. I more often than not don't comprehend my own mind - if this is the case, then of course I can't explain it to someone else.

It still takes so much time, effort and energy to get my thoughts out like this, and I’m very proud of the progress I’ve made. Even just learning to use Tumblr and posting on here as regularly as I can manage (plus reading other people’s words about similar experiences, or even very different experiences), has increased my ability to express myself and the vocabulary I’m able to access.

[mutt-mojis]

hey!! you can call me mutt, my pronouns are he/they/it + canine neopronouns, and this is my/our (my headmates and i’s; i’m the main poster here) emoji/coining/userboxes/etc. blog! our system blog is @anonymousys; you can find info on us and our system related but non-art/coining posts there! as a short introduction, our system name is the canidae clade, we’re bodily a minor and jewish, and we love art, music, science, and canines/dogs (our special interest :D)!!

i’m willing to make a wide variety of emojis, userboxes, flags, etc., but here’s stuff i’m especially interested in making and will probably prioritize:

anything dog/coyote/canine related!

anything related to judaism!

stuff related to media we’re interested in (supernatural, cod: black ops cold war, wolfwalkers, batman, x-men)!

therian/alterhuman stuff!!

for emojis/aac symbols: more complex/conceptual requests! we’re very interested in linguistics and the idea of distilling complex thoughts into easily understandable images, so we’ll have a fun time playing around with different ways to represent more conceptual ideas!

some stuff i won’t do:

exclusionist/hateful requests, eg. “[anti-whatever flag] emojis,” “this user hates [insert whatever here],” etc.

nsfw subjects/concepts (all power to ya, but as a minor i’m not comfortable drawing that stuff!)

stuff to know before sending a request:

i am a full-time student and have a very busy life (and get burnt out very frequently), so requests might take a while to get done, sorry!

we’re currently not aware of any major differences between our styles, but we’ll tag/label requests with whoever made them anyways! if you notice differences and have a style preference, feel free to add that in your request :3

we are pro-good faith queer identities/contradictory labels, pro-endogenic systems, anti-radqueer, and anti-transid; we don’t really believe in dnis, but if you are a radqueer, a transid user, a transandrophobia denier, an antisemite, or a tankie and you show up in this blog’s notifications, we’ll probably block you.

for aac users: we’re more than happy to design symbols for aac interfaces, but we do not use an aac ourself! we don’t have the lived experience of using an aac, so please let us know if any designs we make for y’all’s aac requests are overcomplicated/too vague/etc., and we’ll be happy to tweak them for better readability and accessibility!!

our creations are free to use on tumblr, discord, and any other sites with credit (and some kind of indication that we can be found on tumblr if you’re using them off-site)! they’re also free to use for aacs!

[five-thousand-loaves-of-bread]

sometime people be mean to me because wheelchair AAC, sometime people be extra nice to me because wheelchair AAC. and rather people be extra nice to me than be mean “even if” “just” because see me in wheelchair use AAC

(& to be fair when say be extra nice just mean be extra nice smile more explain more help more not oh you won’t understand this so i make important life change decision for you)

& sometimes do need people be extra nice to me because condition that made me use wheelchair AAC

[zombblehh]

Autism rant

Been having more frequent and long lasting speech loss episodes. Been trying to learn get used using AAC. Anyone have tips on how get more comfortable using AAC. Am not used to it, use to hating myself for not being able to talk. But me want get more comfortable not talking cuz feels better when not talk with mouth parts. Feel more comfortable not talking, don’t use as much energy. Talking is convenient yes but sometimes wish I didn’t have to because it take so much out of me. Causing me pain in my neck and jaw when I talk too much and make me drool lot. Mom is very close minded and only accept me being autistic when she in good mood, only boyfriend accepts me all time.

Tumblr and bf is only place I can talk about this, most friends are kind of ableist, trying to drop them for best interest of myself. Been loosing ability to mask more and more and require more support. Haven’t showered brush teeth or change clothes take medicine in like a several days cuz no one reminds me to do it and I need someone to physically remind me or won’t do it. Mom ignores this and says I should just know and that she doesn’t have time to help me with this when she has her own problems which maybe she right but still hurts

[zebulontheplanet]

I think as an AAC user, I get jealous. I get jealous of those who can chose to use it or don’t use it (I have the choice to not use it, but then I just won’t communicate). I use AAC basically full time in public, and use it sorta at home. I prefer mouth words at home but I usually use It throughout the day.

I know this is probably horrible, but I can’t help but feel jealous of those who don’t need it to just get words out. For their mouth to work. It’s hard to be someone that feels like they have a brain and mouth disconnect. To have words that won’t come out so you HAD to get AAC.

I don’t know, I just feel very jealous of those who don’t constantly struggle with words. Who don’t stutter over their words, who are able to get their words out, who aren’t declining in speech. My speech just continues to get worse and it’s hard to go through that. It’s all just hard.

[rawr-systemotes]

Hihi everybody!

Hello, I’m Rawr, you may know me from one of my other three blogs

@rawr-carer, @tf-for-two, or @therealsodapopcurtis

Here is where I will be discussing my experience as a system of quoigenic origins aswell as share my AAC symbols/emotes!!

(quoigenic is a term that is used when somebody is not comfortable stating their system origins or does not know them. I do not owe you further explanation of my system or alters, thank you)

I identify as more ‘plural’ than I would a ‘system’ but both are fine to me :]

I have three alters I know of so far and they rarely front so I will work on their descriptions and sign offs later when I am more energized

feel free to use my emotes/symbols with credit unless used for AAC! (You don’t need credit to use for AAC)

requests: open

Block #RawrAAC if you don’t want to see my emotes on your feed or when you search the AAC tag

IMPORTANT: in the below paragraph is my DNI and while yes it does say anti-endos are not allowed to interact communication is for everyone. I will not be upset at all if you use my emotes as an anti-endo person, you deserve communication as much as everyone else. Personally I just won’t be mutuals with anti-endos <3

DNI: anti-endos, fakeclaimers, anti-agere, anti-petre, proshippers, radqueers or anything else under the radqueer umbrella (honestly for radqueers as long as you don’t talk about being transid on my blog idrc knock yourself out on here <3)

Plain text:

Hihi everybody!

Hello, I’m Rawr, you may know me from one of my other three blogs

@rawr-carer, @tf-for-two, or @therealsodapopcurtis

Here is where I will be discussing my experience as a system of quoigenic origins aswell as share my AAC symbols/emotes!! (quoigenic is a term that is used when somebody is not comfortable stating their system origins or does not know them. I do not owe you further explanation of my system or alters, thank you)

I identify as more ‘plural’ than I would a ‘system’ but both are fine to me :]

I have three alters I know of so far and they rarely front so I will work on their descriptions and sign offs later when I am more energized

feel free to use my emotes/symbols with credit unless used for AAC! (You don’t need credit to use for AAC)

Requests: open

Block #RawrAAC if you don’t want to see my emotes on your feed or when you search the AAC tag IMPORTANT: in the below paragraph is my DNI and while yes it does say anti-endos are not allowed to interact communication is for everyone. I will not be upset at all if you use my emotes as an anti-endo person, you deserve communication as much as everyone else. Personally I just won’t be mutuals with anti-endos <3

DNI: anti-endos, fakeclaimers, radqueers or anything else under the radqueer umbrella, anti-agere, anti-petre, proshippers

[spooksforsammy]

Hate that the thought of using AAC is still in a way frown upon.

No matter how much more is talked about and seen, the general public isn’t aware and open to it.

Like AAC is something only really know if disabled, have family member that disabled, or work with disabled people.

If was to walk up to one of my teachers and talking about AAC, they would look at me like was crazy. Because most likely doesn’t know what it. Or what used for. Or how work. Or why needed.

If was to actually use AAC like need, would be viewed as disrespectful. Which isn’t much because already seen that way to a good amount but…

Being black most definitely plays a role, even if most won’t admit. Black people see more things as disrespectful then probably should, especially if older. The concept isn’t something they really know and they extremely value spoken language. They values correct grammar and using your voice and AAC for me isn’t either of those. It’s not my body voice and I can’t always use correct grammar.

Even if don’t contribute race into why AAC frowned upon. AAC is used by those with disabilities, the public isn’t fully okay with people being disabled. With them needing more help.

So even if race wasn’t problem, using AAC still wouldn’t be okay to them