Listening Before You Speak

You don’t have to have opinions in public until you’re ready.

Find­ing the Autis­tic com­mu­ni­ty is an expe­ri­ence like no oth­er, espe­cial­ly for adults who grew up unaware of autism or unaware of peo­ple like them­selves in orga­nized groups. The strong emo­tions of home­com­ing, belong­ing or ner­vous­ness about find­ing a place to belong, pride in a new iden­ti­ty, and joy of a cama­raderie per­haps nev­er before known can be intox­i­cat­ing. The num­ber of peo­ple to meet and amount of infor­ma­tion to absorb seem infi­nite, impos­si­ble. It’s as over­whelm­ing as it would be to stum­ble through a moun­tain pass on a hike and find a lost home­land in the hid­den val­ley below.

Find­ing oth­er Autis­tic peo­ple for the first time is as intense as life expe­ri­ences get, joy­ful but also poten­tial­ly fraught. It’s an event most Autis­tic peo­ple expe­ri­ence, since rel­a­tive­ly few of us grow up with access to the com­mu­ni­ty, but rel­a­tive­ly lit­tle advice exists for nav­i­gat­ing this impor­tant tran­si­tion. One thing per­sons new to the com­mu­ni­ty should know is that they don’t need to join the clam­or of voic­es you hear imme­di­ate­ly. There are actu­al­ly at least a cou­ple of rea­sons that tak­ing some time to get ori­ent­ed before speak­ing out pub­licly may be best for you and the Autis­tic com­mu­ni­ty in the long run.

First, there is the impor­tance of think­ing care­ful­ly before you speak on the inter­net, where every­thing you say will prob­a­bly out­live you. The trick to life in Autis­tic blo­gos­phere is remem­ber­ing that you will con­tin­ue to grow and change as long as you live, but past selves of yours will live on. Rub­bing shoul­ders with your­self cir­ca five years ago is unavoid­able once you have had opin­ions in pub­lic for five years. There is no way to be cer­tain you will always agree with these ghosts.

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Originally published at autisticfuture.com on January 24, 2018.