The Brain-Heart Disconnect

Having autism gives us a different perspective on things. Call me crazy but, most of our lives are spent listening, not talking, so we are scary good at it: we hear many things about which you all are unaware. Appearances can be deceiving, because often we do not look like we are paying attention. But we are.

I have noticed that believing we are intelligent or not comes out in conversations you are having. All of us are sitting together in the Center downstairs, and we are listening to you.  Having to talk for us makes it all too easy to slip into babying us. You are probably unaware that you are doing it. We hear it though and it hurts because it shows that deep down, you still see us as cognitively impaired. It’s like you know we are not, but you don’t believe it in your heart:  it’s the brain-heart disconnect.

Please everyone:  be aware of what you are saying. And stop thinking of us like we are unable. We can understand - we just can’t control what our physical body is doing.