Blaming Abuse on Neurodivergence (Is Ableist)

Content/trigger warning: discussion of abuse throughout, including a specific example of gaslighting, ableist slurs (censored)

A while back, I wrote an entry on how “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse” is not a thing. But to be honest, I have never been satisfied with that entry. I felt as though it did not get my point across. This may be because it was little more than a fleshed-out Twitter thread from back when I tried to do Twitter threads. (It turns out that my brain and conceptualizing complex ideas into 280-character–fragments are not friends.) I have deleted the entry, and am just going to reiterate the points that I feel I did at least a passable job making in that entry here:

• Describing abuse with an adjective that applies to a neurodivergent condition implies that the neurodivergent condition caused the abuser to be abusive
• Emotional abuse is real and traumatic, but it is ableist to refer to emotional abuse perpetrated by an abuser who felt that they had to tear down the victim in order to make themselves feel better as “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse”
  • You can just say “emotional abuse” instead, or “self-serving emotional abuse” if you want to be more specific
• Some (but not all, as far as I have been able to determine) people with NPD consider “n*rc*ss*st” to be a slur when used pejoratively, including when it is used as part of the phrase “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse” (or, oh I don’t know, on a subreddit called “Raised by N*rc*ss*sts”)
• I am extremely upset at other ND people, particularly others with abuse-related PTSD, engaging in the lateral saneism of calling what traumatized them “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse” or saying they have “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse syndrome”

However, what I feel like I did not adequately convey is that no neurodivergent condition causes a person to be abusive. I did mention that, but I feel like I didn’t elaborate on it enough. So I will use this entry to describe Mara’s Theory of Neurodivergent Conditions and Suckitude.

Unfortunately, it seems to be a sad truth that people of all populations are capable of sucking; no matter how many (or how few) marginalized groups a person belongs to, it is still possible for them to be disrespectful, toxic, etc. Anyone can have character flaws that cause them to suck. Sometimes, people who suck are neurodivergent. Since neurodivergence affects who a person is on a fundamental level, a sucky person’s neurodivergence may lead them to suck in a particular way. As such, sucky people who share a particular neurodivergent condition may show patterns in their suckitude. However, they do not suck because they are neurodivergent; they suck because they suck. Neurodivergence simply informs how they suck.

A corollary (is that the right word? I haven’t done advanced math since college) to Mara’s Theory of Neurodivergence and Suckitude is that if a neurodivergent person abuses someone, their neurodivergence may have informed what kind of abusive actions they took, but it did not make them abusive. My abuser, for instance, told me that I could not have depression because she had depression and she would have recognized it. If she hadn’t been depressed, she wouldn’t have said that, but she certainly would have said some other gaslighting bullshit. (In fact, she has, multiple times; my favorite is that I lied to all 20something of the psych professionals I have seen about having depression symptoms because I think being depressed is ~*~cool~*~.)

This is also why armchair diagnosing a sucky person is ableist. (I’ve discussed this before, especially in my entry about why I fucking hate it when people armchair diagnose Tr*mp, but I feel like reiterating it.) I mean, armchair diagnosis is de facto ableist—the primary purpose of a diagnosis is to help the person with the diagnosis understand what is happening with them and address it, and if a diagnosis does not serve that purpose, then fuck that—but armchair diagnosing a sucky person is ableist because it is based on the ableist and untrue idea that neurodivergence causes suckitude.

The tl;dr of this entry is that no neurodivergent condition causes a person to be abusive, which is why using a phrase that indicates that a particular neurodivergent condition (NPD, in the case of “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse”) causes abuse is ableist and wrong.

P.S. No, I’m not sure why I decided to name this entry in the style of an early aughts emo song. I’m not particularly good with titles.

How to Respond to High-Profile Suicides

Content/trigger warning: suicide, saneism

Ugh.

I don’t want to do this.

But I probably should while it’s topical, so here we go: shitty ways to respond to high-profile suicide and why they’re shitty. Oh, wait, one more thing; I have already covered the “coward’s way out” and “but they were rich and famous” crap here, so I’m not going to touch on those again.

• Neurotypicals going “You’re not alone! Here is a link to a suicide hotline.” We know suicide hotlines exist. We also know that a hotline is an emergency measure that is not a substitute for long-term care and support. And my queer Autistic ass is not going to call a hotline when I’ll probably become nonverbal because I fucking can’t do phones and the hotline operator would have no idea how to handle my being queer and might even call it a mental illness. A lot of those hotlines aren’t accessible to Disabled people or LGBTQIAP+ people.
• Neurotypicals encouraging people who are suicidal to “reach out”. In many ways, this is no better than “meditation and juice cleanses will cure your depression”. Depression can be a lying bastard. Many depressed people believe that if they reached out, no one would care or want to listen. Also, what is reaching out going to do if a person’s friends and family aren’t supportive? Maybe they don’t have anyone to reach out to. Maybe the only people they could reach out to would gaslight them about how they have no real problems. (This happened to me in high school.)
• Neurotypicals going “This is proof that even money and fame don’t cure depression!” Well, yeah, I kind of get where you’re coming from, but…you’re neurotypical. Shut up.
• Any other ways that neurotypicals who have never experienced suicidal ideation can act like they know what it’s like to experience it, or acting like they have more authority than actually mentally ill people on the subject. Looking at you, neurotypical psych professionals.
• I hate to say this, but there are people who behave shittily in every group, and unfortunately, I have seen MI people acting like their experiences with depression are the only experiences with depression. This can take the form of “well, I have depression and I haven’t killed myself!”. Don’t get me wrong, that is an accomplishment, and the words of people who have actually been suicidal are the ones that matter the most in this conversation. But depression is a diverse illness. Your depression may not be everybody’s depression.
• Medication-shaming. I can’t fucking believe I actually saw this, but I did. I even saw someone (who is ND!! What the fuck!?) sharing bogus pseudoscience that attempted to prove that antidepressants are of no help to people with suicidal ideation. I know so many people who are still alive thanks to antidepressants. Not to mention that while the pharmaceutical industry is ableist, violent, and capitalist, the fact that many MI people need our meds to function and/or fucking NOT DIE remains unchanged. It’s possible to criticize “Big Pharma” without medication-shaming people who are trying to take care of themselves.
• On the other hand, “this is why you get medication and therapy!” isn’t appropriate either, because medication and therapy aren’t right for everyone. Some people have contraindications to medication. Some people can’t find therapists who are qualified to deal with their issues or who don’t suck. Don’t presume you know what’s right for someone who isn’t you.
• NOT USING TRIGGER WARNINGS. FOR FUCK’S SAKE, PEOPLE. I don’t care if you’re ND or NT; suicide is one of the most potentially triggering subjects out there.

“So, Mara,” you may be asking, “how do I respond to high-profile suicides without sucking?” Well, I’ll tell you.

Be there for your friends and other loved ones. You can’t know which of the people in your life is hurting just by looking at them. Make sure everyone you care about knows that you would support them if they had a mental health issue. Be there when things are good, because otherwise, no one will know to reach out to you when things are bad.

Also, be prepared to say more than “that’s rough, buddy” (unless you’re making an Avatar: The Last Airbender reference). You know your friend; figure out what they want to hear that will help them understand that you care and that they matter to you. It’s also totally fine to ask people what kind of emotional support they need when they’re struggling, or how they prefer to be asked (or not asked) when they need to talk. And don’t panic or freak out when your mentally ill loved one has symptoms, even “scary” ones other than suicidal ideation. Unreality, hypersexuality, dual diagnosis, impulsiveness, the works; don’t be that person who is supportive of a mentally ill friend until they show symptoms.

You don’t have to plaster performative allyship all over your social media feeds. You can share suicide hotlines, but make sure you share ones that are for LGBTQIAP+ people and are as disability accessible as possible. You can also donate to charities that provide those services, such as The Trevor Project.

Okay, I think that’s about all I have for now. This is not an easy subject for me to talk about.

“Scary” Mental Illnesses

Trigger warning: sexual abuse mention, emotional abuse mention, reclaimed slur

On several occasions, especially when trying to hammer home the point that no mental illness makes a person evil, I have referred to “scary” mental illnesses. I feel like I should spell out what I mean by that. On one level, a “scary” mental illness is any mental illness besides anxiety, depression, or an eating disorder. On another level, a “scary” mental illness is a mental illness that includes at least one of the following:

• Unreality or psychosis
• Mania, hypomania, or mixed affective states
• Low or no empathy (cognitive or affective*)
• Dissociation
• Unstable sense of self
• Impulse control problems
• Rigid and “extreme” thought patterns
• A pattern of deviation from cultural/social norms
• Self-talk
• “Abnormal” (too close or too distant) attachment to others
• Unusual body movements
• (Supposed) tendency toward violence
• Hypersexuality

I’m not entirely okay with further discussing mental illness and tendency toward violence, because I truly believe that saneism is so pervasive that it may affect even scientific studies on violent behavior in mentally ill people. (This is coming from someone with a master’s in biomedical sciences who just got her name on her first abstract.) So I won’t be talking about number twelve, partly because I already addressed it as much as I’m comfortable with in my entry on mass shootings and neurotypicalism. But as far as the others, I think you can see where I’m coming from, although I may have forgotten a few “scary” traits/symptoms. I would also like to point out that this list doesn’t only apply to mental illnesses; autism is often considered a “scary” disability due to our rigid thought patterns, deviation from social norms, low empathy (although many of us, myself included, have hyperempathy for affective empathy—which is what neurotypicals usually mean when they say “empathy”—some of us do have low affective empathy and that’s okay), stims, tendency to self-talk, and (completely bullshit) supposed tendency toward violence. If that list wasn’t helpful, here’s another list, this one of “scary” mental illnesses:

• Schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders
• Any personality disorder, especially cluster B (narcissistic, histrionic, borderline, antisocial)
• Bipolar disorder
• Dissociative disorders, especially DID (this is where I flip off M. Night Shyamalan)
• PTSD

Yeah, I put PTSD on there. As a CPTSD sufferer, I have noticed that many neurotypicals don’t seem to understand PTSD triggers and think we may just flip out at any second. And CPTSD shares many “scary” characteristics with borderline, especially the unstable sense of self and odd attachment patterns. I would know; I’m also borderline. Sometimes I have trouble identifying whether the shit my brain is pulling at any particular time is a borderline thing or a CPTSD thing.

You might be asking, “Mara, what’s the point of this?” The point–aside from the idea that mentally ill people are not inherently cruel or abusive, which I’ve mentioned before–is that “scary” ND conditions are treated differently from non-“scary” ND conditions. (I say “ND conditions” here because I am also referring to neurodevelopmental disabilities that aren’t mental illnesses. Remember what I said about autism?) This does not mean that people with “scary” disorders have it worse than ND people without “scary” disorders. But what it does mean is that many so-called allies are willing to support only mentally ill people who don’t have “scary” disorders. I have seen NTs reassuring their friends with depression, anxiety, or an eating disorder that they aren’t like those other mentally ill people. I especially see this when the NTs have just said something crappy about mental illness and the person with depression or anxiety says “you realize I’m mentally ill, right?”. I’ve also seen neurotypicals on Twitter or Tumblr rhapsodize about how mental health is just as important as physical health and then turn around and post in #diagnoseTrump. I see this shit often, okay? And it’s frustrating. Neurotypical allies have to know that they should support all of us neurodivergent people, not just those of us who wouldn’t be villains in terrible horror movies. (I’m still mad about Split. I will probably always be mad about Split.) Either you’re with all of us or you’re with none of us.

It isn’t just terrible horror movies. I watch a lot of Law and Order: SVU. I can identify the season by Olivia Benson’s hairstyle. And it seems like every damn female perpetrator of abuse or violence is borderline. Dr. Huang, SVU’s resident psychiatrist for much of the show’s runtime, even said in one episode (I think it was season nine, episode three, “Impulsive”) that many female teachers who get caught sexually abusing their students are borderline. In the season eighteen episode “Motherly Love”, a woman who was raping two fifteen-year-old boys was described in horrified tones as “having no true sense of self” and “no empathy”. These traits were said to be a result of her borderline and narcissistic personality disorders. (I have no sense of self and garbage cognitive empathy. It doesn’t make me a sexual abuser. Also, the SVU writers seem to hate NPD as much as they hate BPD, and even as a person who doesn’t have NPD, that’s a towering pile of Not Okay.) The woman’s abuse of minors was then said to be a result of her mental illnesses, which led her to have a need to control, manipulate, and hurt vulnerable people. The season five episode “Home” used to be one of my all-time favorites before I accepted my borderline diagnosis; Dr. Huang blames a woman’s emotional abuse of her sons on her BPD.

Unfortunately, much to my chagrin, it isn’t just neurotypical screenwriters who pull this crap. People with non-“scary” ND conditions often exhibit lateral neurotypicalism toward “scary” ND conditions. I once watched in horror as a Facebook acquaintance who is Autistic and has anxiety ranted against “p*****pathic liars” and exhorted her friends to “run from anyone with that personality”. I had to unfollow a friend on Twitter who has suffered from major depression but won’t stop retweeting articles about Trump having NPD or being [saneist word of choice]. And don’t get me started on who I’ve seen posting “autistic screeching” memes. It’s not like I don’t understand the impulse to distance oneself from what society deems dangerous. I’m sure many ND people with non-“scary” illnesses or disabilities take comfort in the fact that they’re not like those other ND people. But this is still a form of bigotry. It is important to confront such biases. Being neurodivergent in one way does not preclude one from being neurotypicalist toward certain other neurodivergent people. I mean, look at me; I used to believe I suffered from “n*rc*ss*st*c abuse syndrome” before I realized that that “syndrome” was really a way to conflate NPD with being an abuser. Fortunately, I was open enough to the idea of supporting all of my ND siblings that I was able to realize I was being laterally neurotypicalist.

So, long story short: If you’re neurotypical, ally yourself with all ND people, not just the seemingly non-threatening of us. And if you’re neurodivergent, you should know better than to not support all your fellow ND folks. No matter who you are, check your assumptions and preconceived notions about people with “scary” neurodivergent conditions, because they’re probably wrong and discriminatory. And for the love of chocolate, stop saying “p*****path” and “s****path”. Cluster B gets enough shit.

Carrie Fisher quote of the day: “I’ve always been quite sane about being insane.” (See, that’s how you use a neurotypicalist slur. Way to reclaim, Carrie.)

 

 

*Affective empathy is the ability to feel what someone else is feeling. Cognitive empathy is the ability to think what someone else is thinking.