#my disability disables me

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[chronicallydragons]

anyone else ever wish they could lie down harder? Like, I'm already horizontal, but I need more horizontal. I need to be absorbed by the floor. I think that would fix me

[stars-and-branches]

Chronic pain pisses me off cause I'm not even incapacitated for like a cool or badass reason instead my body is throwing the world's biggest temper tantrum because it's raining outside

[sentientsky]

just a friendly reminder that, just because slavery was formally "abolished" in the so-called united states* in 1865, enslavement itself is still ongoing in the form of incarceration, which disproportionately affects Black and Indigenous people

(*i say "so-called" because the US is a settler-colonial construction founded on greed, extraction, and white supremacy) recommended readings/resources:

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

"How the 13th Amendment Kept Slavery Alive: Perspectives From the Prison Where Slavery Never Ended" by Daniele Selby

"So You're Thinking About Becoming an Abolitionist" by Mariame Kaba

"The Case for Prison Abolition: Ruth Wilson Gilmore on COVID-19, Racial Capitalism & Decarceration" from Democracy Now! [VIDEO]

[mochasucculent]

Was looking at refs and since Viktor has two different leg braces I was wondering, do we think he wears them simultaneously?? The refs don't perfectly line up perspective-wise so it's hard to tell but parts of the one he wears during the Hexcore scenes look like they could maybe line up with the brace that he wears over his clothes, but also some parts really don't and look like they'd be super uncomfy. Also HOW does he take these on and off. Experts weigh in

[melxhunter]

I feel like there are a lot of people out there who needs to hear this:

If you dropped out of school because of diagnosed (or undiagnosed) ADHD, Autism, ADD, OCD, Dyslexia, Anxiety, Depression, Bipolar disorder, psychotic disorders, schizophrenia etc… You did not fail. The education system failed you.

[bean-spring]

Hot take and not to be a killjoy or the shipping police but people treating Viktor or Jinx's aroace headcanons as if they were canon is not the revolutionary take people think it is.

Headcanons are always all right but we have to acknowledge that they are somehow damaging when they apply to stereotypes. It might not be the case for everyone but most of the time people unconsciously assume that disability/mental illness=asexuality. These headcanons erase the freedom of attraction from people who are already seen as unable to have sexual/romantic experiences/desires, when it's completely untrue and harmful.

You can headcanon Viktor and Jinx as aroace, but I have seen people changing their minds once Viktor is no longer disabled (s2 with all of his other forms) and Jinx is no longer as mentally ill (alternate universe Powder). And it speaks wonders of how people see these characters.

"I never thought about Jinx being able to feel romantic/sexual attraction until s2!" To believe she's actually only capable of that when she's not "damaged" is incredibly disturbing. Especially since Jinx has always had a bit of a flirty personality too.

"I've always seen Viktor as asexual, I don't know why!" That's fine. You can headcanon him as ace. But I believe there is a reason behind it, most of the time, if for some inexplicable reason the "vibes" of the disabled character are making you think he's ace.

I say all of this being aroaspec myself, by the way. Headcanon all you want but going to people's posts commenting how "it's weird for you that they have romantic/sexual plots when they're clearly aroace" is not a win at all. It's a headcanon, after all, and it should be treated as such, and that's fine. But it also is damaging to spread stereotypes like these.

Of course the disabled character is asexual. Of course the mentally ill character is aromantic. It's not as revolutionary as you might think, tbh.

Fandom is not activism and it's all right to have any headcanons you want BUT some of them are filled with damaging stuff and perhaps we should look into ourselves more before treating these assumptions as something canon.

[balthazarslostlibrary]

Dan Piraro, Bizarro Comics 2006

[mythicalcoolkid]

You don't wish your disability was worse or more visible, you wish your disability was taken seriously. Please stop confusing the two, I guarantee you would not get the support you need JUST by being more severe or more visible. Please listen to visibly disabled people when we tell you it isn't better on our side

[44cowboycryptid44]

I feel like I hear more and more people say that society is the disabling part of being autistic, not the autism itself, which is true to an extent? But I also feel like it overly simplifies it. So, here are some ways in which my autism disables me that are not related to society:

(This is written late at night as my disability is disabling me: please excuse me if I’m actually not using the english language properly)

1. I need a fan to sleep because otherwise I overheat and go into sensory overload (and my pots flares). I can’t stand the noise of the fan, and the very slight light created shifts the room ever so slightly and it’s Different and now I still can’t sleep.

2. I have horrible anxiety from the tism. It makes me (for lack of a better word, please excuse if this is rude to say) hyperactive. I can’t sit still, my brain moves too fast, I can’t hear my thoughts, but I know they’re there and it stresses me out. I feel like there are noises being blared in my head 24/7. I can’t hear them, but I can feel the vibrations and it’s super overwhelming.

3. One of the ways I counteract the above is by rearranging my room. Constantly. The super fast moving part of my brain needs stimulation All The Time or I spiral and start dissociating. I move my bed a lot because of this. But then the bed is in a New Position and it’s Not The Same and I don’t feel safe because of the lack of familiarity. I can’t sleep, and I lay awake for hours feeling panicky and exhausted but also wide awake.

4. Scroll to hide from the anxiety. Dissociate. Zone back in. I’m still scrolling. I desperately want to stop scrolling. I can’t move. I turn off my phone. I can’t move. I lay there.

5. I can’t stand the texture of anything on my lips, so I never use chapstick. My lips dry out and split. Bad Sensory Experience. If I try to use chapstick, I go into sensory overload. If I do nothing, I go into sensory overload.

Obviously, this isn’t life ruining stuff, and some of it is more difficult to live with than other parts. It’s just some ways in which my autism disables me that isn’t related to other people or society. Autism is complex and widely disabling, and I wish we talked about it more! I feel like along with the whole functioning labels problems, we also end up with this stereotype that “low functioning people are disabled and high functioning people have social anxiety”, which (just like functioning labels) is super harmful!

[inkskinned]

i hate to say it because i'm neurodivergent and a chronic-pain-haver but like... sometimes stuff is going to be hard and that's okay.

it's okay if you don't understand something the first few times it's explained to you. it's okay if you have to google every word in a sentence. it's okay if you need to spend a few hours learning the context behind a complicated situation. it's okay if you need to read something, think about it, and then come back to re-read it.

i get it. giving up is easier, and we are all broken down and also broke as hell. nobody has the time, nobody has the fucking energy. that is how they win, though. that is why you feel this way. it is so much easier, and that is why you must resist the impetus to shut down. fight through the desire you've been taught to "tl;dr".

embrace when a book is confusing for you. accept not all media will be transparent and glittery and in the genre you love. question why you need everything to be lily-white and soft. i get it. i also sometimes choose the escapism, the fantasy-romance. there's no shame in that. but every day i still try to make myself think about something, to actually process and challenge myself. it is hard, often, because of my neurodivergence. but i fight that urge, because i think it's fucking important.

especially right now. the more they convince you not to think, the easier it will be to feed you misinformation. the more we accept a message without criticism, the more power they will have over that message. the more you choose convenience, the more they will make propaganda convenient to you.

[the-trans-advice-blog]

I’m not sure who needs to hear this but it’s normal and okay to be DISABLED by your DISABILITY.

Sometimes it is going to stop you from doing things, and that’s okay. Sometimes it’s going to get in your way or make you struggle or cause problems in your life. But that’s okay, that’s why it’s called a disability.

You don’t need to fight yourself or “not let it hold you back” because a lot of times it will, but that’s the point.

[chronicallydragons]

Anyone else with chronic pain ever get really absorbed in a project and dissociate from your body while you're working but then you finish and you come back to your body and you're just like AAAAAAAHHH! WHAT'S WRONG?? oh yeah. The horrors. Never mind

[primrosebitch]

I don't think healthy people realize how for chronically ill people getting a diagnosis isn't sad or even disappointing for us, it's a relief and a vindication. So many people with chronic illnesses take many years to get diagnosed, and are told that 'it's just anxiety/your period/psychological' or that we're exaggerating or that everyone experiences that, so for us getting a diagnosis is being told that we weren't faking it and that this wasn't normal and it's also finally knowing what exactly is going on in our bodies.

I think many healthy people think of it as if it were them being told they have this lifelong debilitating illness, and they would feel awful because they are going from perfectly healthy to disabled, but they don't fully realize that we already have all the symptoms and impacts of said chronic illness and that we are just finally finding out the name, and that knowing what it is means that we have access to more treatments and more knowledge as to what we can to do alleviate our symptoms.

[thoradvice]

you don't have to be glad that it's not worse. that goes for everything. disability, trauma, mental illness, grades, finances, whatever. you're /allowed/ to be upset that things are the way they are. you don't have to be grateful for your situation - bad is bad. somebody else's suffering doesn't make yours less painful. it's okay to be angry

[badolmen]

They don’t even attempt to assassinate US politicians anymore. You notice that? Not since the anthrax scare back for… who was it, Barack? And even that… pathetic. This new generation has no respect for an honest hitman. I’m not sure this new generation has any honest hitman - you see that shit with Boeing? Sloppy, fucking disgraceful - you kill the whistleblowers before they get halfway to a lawsuit. What kind of fucking amateur is doing faked suicides the night before testimony? Goddamn greenhorns. Back in my day someone tried to shoot Ronald Reagan in broad daylight. There used to be bomb threats to Congress. I took out a few union leaders in the utilities sector myself. Today’s generation? Won’t even threaten to throw a punch - not even over on that - what’s it now, ‘X’? They got no guts. None! And they don’t even have poor impulse control to boot! Too much of that - that panopticon anxiety bullshit. “Oh what if I get a called out post???” People used to send the president letters full of bioweapons. In the mail! Today’s generation? Not a chance. All because of woke.