Some rules I live by

A few weeks ago something happened that, at the time, seemed very much like the sort of bullying and exclusion that I first became familiar with in kindergarten. The person didn't mean it like that, xe just expressed xemself in a clumsy manner, but I didn't know that at the time. However, when it happened, my reaction to it was basically "oh, okay".

Despite the fact that it was a close friend who did it, despite knowing nowadays that the behaviour was ableist, despite xem being one of the very few people I've finally managed to get myself to trust in some small way, despite all those things, my immediate reaction was still "oh, just another friend turned bully, what a shame, but to be expected".

When I realised how I had reacted, I became furious. However, the person I became furious with was me, still reflexively accepting bullying and abusive behaviour as normal and expected, even though I should know better. Even though I now have friends who I'm almost certain won't just turn into bullies one day with no prior warning, the way my former 'friends' used to do in school and later at various workplaces, the fears and impulses created by the past are still there, as potent as ever.

This is largely the result of what's commonly called 'mainstreaming', i.e. I was put in a large building with hundreds of individuals who had an intense, seemingly instinctive dislike of me, and I had to return there day after day, year after year, no matter what they did to me. If I complained to an adult, I was either disbelieved (since my face didn't twitch the right way), or outright suspected of lying (since I tend to giggle or laugh when I'm nervous). My father did believe me, but none of the things he said or did in response to it really made anything better.

I tried solving it myself by staying in the classroom, or sitting in one of the deserted corridors, or going to the school library, but sooner or later an adult would find me and tell me to "go out and play". I tried very hard to explain that I was perfectly happy where I was, but it didn't help. They were sure they knew better, and nothing I said could change their minds.

If I had to choose a single sentence to summarise this entire entry, it would be this; if you're a parent, teacher or wossname, please make sure that your spectrum child has a refuge at school or wherever xe is. A place where xe can feel safe and not be at the mercy of the other children. I know that many fear that their child will miss out on important social skills training, but there are far better places for such things than a schoolyard.

As an example, here are just a few of the things I learned during the training that my teachers didn't want me to miss out on:

• It's perfectly acceptable to call me strange, sick, weird, stupid, too smart, disgusting and many other things. These things mean that they don't want to play with me that day. However, they may want to play with me another day, as long as I don't complain about the things they called me the day before.
• Strangers may beat me up, throw things at me, steal or destroy my possessions or do almost anything else they may feel like doing to me, partly because I'm not good enough at recognising unfamiliar faces to be able to identify them afterwards, and partly because adults tend not to believe what I say anyway.
• Friends are those who tolerate having me around. A friend may at any time go back to being a bully and throw things at me. Any bully may also declare xemself my friend, at which point I must not mention any past treatment, since it will hurt xyr feelings (which is forbidden) or make xem go back to being a bully.
• Don't believe anything that anyone tells me unless I've verified it with at least two independent sources, since it's most likely yet another attempt to either make fun of me or get me into some sort of trouble. Also, if a person asks me to do something, it's most likely intended to cause me harm in some way.
• Spending time by myself is considered very provocative and is a valid reason to attack me, unlike trying to make contact with others, which is considered very provocative and is a valid reason to attack me.
• If I'm sad and crying and something makes me happy, I must not show it right away, since it will make people get angry with me, claim that I wasn't sad in the first place, and was only pretending in order to get attention. Instead, I must pretend that it's a slow, gradual process.
• If I'm allowed into a group, I know I'm only barely being tolerated. Any little mistake I make will be sufficient cause for exclusion. Any of the group's members tiring of me will be sufficient cause for exclusion. Nothing in particular will also be sufficient cause for exclusion.
• Even when I'm allowed to participate, I know that I'm not really considered a part of the group. Just because other people are allowed to say things and decide things doesn't mean I am. If it's a really friendly group, I may be allowed the role of 'cute mascot', but usually I'm merely temporarily tolerated.
• If I'm in pain, I must say "ouch" at the right moments and use a different tone of voice, or no one will believe me when I tell them that a particular injury actully hurts. I also absolutely cannot allow myself to laugh, regardless of how nervous I am about being believed.
• If someone says mean things to me, regardless of how hurtful or false, they can always be excused by saying that "they were only kidding". However, if I ever say anything that anyone interprets as mean, it can never be excused by something as irrelevant as the fact that "I was only kidding".

Evidently I did learn social rules by being forced to spend my breaks in the schoolyard, but I believe that they're not the kind of rules that most parents would want their children to learn. These and many other very defective rules are what I still use by default, even though know intellectually that there's something wrong with them, since they've become so deeply ingrained after being consistently confirmed during the first twenty-five years of my life. They're the result of the systematic bullying, abuse and forceful exclusion that a vast majority of autistic people are forced to endure in the name of 'normalisation' and 'mainstreaming'.

I've only listed a few of the rules I've learned over the years, since I haven't put more than a handful of them into words yet. I'm still finding and putting words to them, one at a time, and asking people I trust whether or not they're correct. Some of them are so weird that I realise myself that they're broken when I actually analyse them, but each and every one of them were once my best effort at trying to make sense of an abusive and intolerant world, and many of them have long since become basic assumptions.

The struggle to get rid of these rules and replace them with saner ones is far from over for me. However, I hope that writing about it will spare someone else from one day having to unlearn the same sort of things.

PS: I'm sorry if this entry shows up as new. It seems I pressed the wrong button.