So here's Chris Rock's own words about his diagnosis, and why he got diagnosed.
Opinionate yourself how you will.
Thread with quotes under this tweet:
1/9
Quick summary - his friend thought he had Aspergers, he has a relative who is diagnosed with Aspergers, and the professional said he is "adjacent" to Aspergers (because of good verbal skills?). He says he has trouble with social cues and that knowing what it is helped a lot.
2/9
"I process things slower. I don't pick up on hints. I have a hard time with social cues. So when we talk, all I pick up are the words. So if you were angry..or into me..I wouldn't pick up on it, you'd have to say it to me. I'd pick up on it a week later."
3/9
How he got diagnosed: "A friend of mine jokingly said I have Aspergers. And I'm like Really? He said I think you might have Aspergers. And it's weird, so I said to myself okay, I'm going to get tested, because I have another relative with Aspergers, right."
4/9
"I got tested and he was like No, you don't have Aspergers but what you have is right next to it. The doctor was like You've been taken advantage of in life. You're a little slow in some instances and your verbal ability and memory are impeccable."
5/9
"So, you know it's like the blind guy that can hear amazingly. I've been overcompensating for it. Having a hard time with subtlty is great when you're on a stage and you're screaming. But a 1-on-1 relationship?"
6/9
"..all of that has all suffered because I have a hard time picking up stuff. But now that I know, I'm a thousand times better because not knowing - I knew something was wrong, but you don't know what it is. So I'm dealing it with therapy,"
7/9
"a little bit of drugs but they're weaning me off. And now I know when I feel a certain way I have to stop and..is this how I feel, or is this my learning disorder acting up? I'm way more calm now. I used to have like a squirrel-like energy..."
8/9
"Now I'm kind of just chilling man. I'm way more relaxed and way less judgmental."
Then he talks about disclosing it on dates with women and that it's been helpful so they are more direct with him.
9/9
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Absolutely no shade to the person who posted this. I appreciate the honesty of this parent (do not try to find the screenshot please!!) -
But I want to talk about this response parents often give me regarding telling their kid they're autistic.
There's a lot to unpack here
1/17
1. There will never be a "right time" to tell your child they're autistic.
2. Something I think a lot of parents really don't understand is that there are a lot of different ways to tell your kid they are autistic in a way they understand.
2/17
I'm not saying as a parent, you have to walk up to them and say "You're autistic" with no context whatsoever. If you have a sense of the language they use and what they understand, work with it.
You can start by saying their brain "works differently" -
For autistic People of Color as well as Indigenous and Biracial people -
If you ever sought an official diagnosis for autism -
1. Were you diagnosed with anything? 2. What were you diagnosed with, if you were? 3. Did you think it was an accurate diagnosis?
For autistic People of Color as well as Indigenous and Biracial people -
4. If you haven't sought an official diagnosis but have wanted to, have there been any specific barriers you faced to getting assessed for autism?
Anonymous autistic person answered through DM:
"1. Yes 2. CPTSD, ADD, GAD, Bipolar 3. I do not think I’m bipolar 4. My psychiatrist laughed at me and said “YOU ARE NOT AUTISTIC”. I tried to explain myself and he just kept laughing."
You know, it's really telling when the only well-known black actor that may/may not be autistic, who thought he might be autistic, was then diagnosed with NVLD by a professional,
and everyone's saying you shouldn't call him autistic.
Something's wrong w/ the diagnostic process.
Like, I get that you shouldn't say someone's autistic if they don't say -they- are autistic,
but also autism official diagnoses has a real f*cking big race problem, regardless of this individual situation.
& I don't know if people like, literally want me to make a new version of the picture collage I made?
Like you don't have to share the picture,
but I'm also not required to immediately delete the tweet or make a new version?
I actually don't understand what people want me to do
This is how twitter works when you have a decent amount of followers:
1. Make a tweet you don't think will get noticed.
2. Tweet gets noticed.
3. Everyone tells you what's wrong with the tweet, in the same way, over and over again, without reading the entire thread.
4. Leave.
I guess my point is that I don't think people understand that when you have a decent following, you don't -choose- which tweets go off.
I'm not saying it's good to spout off incorrect information or say wrong things,
but you don't go "oh this one's going to get 1k likes today!"
I think especially with the autistic community, basically anything that's not completely clear or leaves room for interpretation/discussion/nuance is constantly corrected because people want clarification, or don't think it's 100% accurate. It feels like there's 0 room for error.
I don't know if this was worth making but I felt compelled to make it -
As you can tell, we still have a real-world issue as to who is privileged enough to come out as autistic in the first place & have access to an official diagnosis.
That's especially true for autistic people of color and esp. autistic trans and nonbinary people of color.
Actors from left to right - Chris Rock, Hannah Gadsby, Wentworth Miller, Daryl Hannah, Dan Aykroyd, Anthony Hopkins, Kayla Cromer, Josh Thomas, Lillian Carrier, Domonique Brown, Carsen Warner, and Tal Anderson.