I Don’t Know Who Needs To Hear This, But

in recognition of World Down Syndrome Day on March 21

more character should have speech impediments &/or stutters. for me. for my specific benefit

Writing A Blind/Visually Impaired Character: Canes, Guide Dogs, O&M

Wow, back in June I decided to take a few months break from blogging to recharge and focus on my mental health. About a month ago I began writing this specific post, slowly and in stages because of how demanding, detailed, and long it is.

I’m not sure when I planned to come back. I have about 200 posts with tags and image description in my drafts folder, waiting to be queued, but I wanted to finish this guide before I fully came back.

Come back with a bang, right?

But this blog, and specifically, my Writing a Blind or Visually Impaired Character  guide, has gotten so much traffic and support that I felt incredibly motivated to come back now.

So I finished the guide, and now here it is. It’s been a year+ in the making. Since the very beginning of this writing advice series about writing blind characters, I’ve promised to write a guide specifically about canes, guide dogs, O&M, and other accessibility measures the blind community relies on. 

In fact, if you look at my master post for this guide (now pinned at the first post on my blog) you’ll find that it was reserved as Part Four, even as other guides and additions were added over the last year.

In this post I’ll be explaining 

What Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is

How one learns O&M

About canes, from different types of canes and their parts, as well as how to use a cane. 

I will be explaining the sensory experiences of using a cane and how to describe it in narrative. 

I will include small mannerisms long-time cane uses might develop. 

At the very end will be a section on guide dogs, but this will be limited to research because I have no personal experience with guide dogs, being a cane user.

Disclaimer: I am an actual visually impaired person who has been using a cane for nearly three years and has been experiencing vision loss symptoms for a few years longer than that. This guide is based on both my experiences and my research. My experiences are not universal however because every blind person has a unique experience with their blindness

Keep reading

what i need narc abuse believers to realize when we say "narc/npd abuse doesn't exist" is that we are not saying:

your abuse wasn't real or valid

pwNPD are never abusive

pwNPD are perfect angels who can do no wrong, ever

you're a liar

you're lying about your abuse

there is a 0% chance your abuser had npd

abuse isn't real

abuse doesn't happen, ever

you're an abuser

you are, without a doubt, not disabled, and also one hundred percent ableist and sanist

we are saying, though:

narc abuse itself, as a concept, does not exist

narcissists do not perpetuate any type of abuse that egotypicals can't

your abuse and trauma wasn't narcissistic abuse but rather emotional or psychological abuse

narc abuse itself, as a concept, has harmed pwNPD and their relationships

narc abuse has ruined any chance of finding actually good resources

narc abuse itself, as a concept, has been used to abuse narcissists

narc abuse itself, as a concept, is named after a mental disorder, which is inherently sanist and ableist

you have ableist and sanist biases that you do need to check, regardless of if you're intentionally or actively trying to harm people or not

Can y'all please stop using words like "delusional", "psychotic", and "narcissistic" as insults. These are terms used to describe mental illness. Mental illness does not make people evil, stop acting like does.

Not a day passes by without me being mad as shit that ableism against demonized mental illnesses is normalised.

We are not criminals. We are not dangerous. We do not owe neurotypicals a complete explanation on why we developed our disorders and why we aren't serial killers that kidnap people.

Fuck hollywood, fuck ableist criminology and fuck saneism.

girls sitting next to me talking about how a peanut allergic kid transferred into one of their schools and all peanut products were banned. They're genuinely hating on this kid so much. One of them compared it to lactose intolerance and how they don't restrict who eats what and I... THERE'S A BIG DIFFERENCE BETWEEN "I DRANK MILK AND SHIT MYSELF" AND "I SMELL A PEANUT AND DIE OF ANAPHYLACTIC SHOCK" they are in fact WILDLY DIFFERENT DISORDERS. One is the inability to digest a sugar and the other is a deathly allergy. This counts as ableism right? Like hating on someone because you have to accommodate their involuntary life issues?

Friendly reminder that I'm against harassment, suicide baiting, doxxing, and everything like that. If you think telling people to kill themselves is acceptable, this blog is not for you, I don't like you and I don't feel safe around you. My suicidal ass sees that, and no matter the reason, I see someone who thinks suicide is a joke, at best, and at worst, someone who enjoys hurting people.

You are never just hurting the 'bad' person that you think has it coming, you're hurting people who might otherwise agree with you, you're hurting people who are suicidal, and you're hurting people who've lost someone to suicide.

So again, if you do this crap, do us both a favor and show yourself the door.

---

Side note: If you're a therapist, psychiatrist, counselor, or otherwise apart of the mental health care system, please don't message me offering to talk, help, or give me resources. The system you work in caused me a lot of trauma and I want absolutely nothing to do with any of it, all messaging me will accomplish is stressing me out and pissing me off.

My Takes

Consider these

People with personality disorders are not inherently abusive. Yeah, even people with NPD and ASPD (why do I have to say that?) There is no such thing a narcissistic abuse. People with ASPD are not serial killers. They are people, stop putting them down for no reason. People with personality disorders are welcome here. All of them.

Armchair diagnosing is bad. I don't care how shit someone is, if you call them a narcissist, a psychopath, a sociopath, a compulsive/pathological liar, or literally any other disorder that they haven't been professionally diagnosed with, you're a dick. You can't know what's going on in their head. You are not their doctor and are not qualified to diagnose them. And it's just a dick move to diagnose Casey Anthony as someone with a heavily-stigmatized symptom THAT I ALSO HAVE HAD

Stop. Tagging. Your. Writing. With. Disability. Tags. The PTSD tag is nearly unusable because everyone tags their fics as PTSD. Stop it. That space is not for you. It's for us.

People with intellectual, developmental, cognitive, whatever disability deserve to be heard.

As do semispeaking and nonspeaking autistics.

Yes, we do need to listen to caretakers, they're how some people communicate. No one is invalid because they're a caretaker, they're invalid when they're an ableist caretaker.

If the autism "cure" were to exist right now, it would mean eugenics. I don't give a shit if you want it, it would mean eugenics. Society is way too anti-autism for us to trust non-autistics with a cure. I won't get into my rant about the concept of a cure unless asked, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that if that cure is created, it will be forced on people, even those who vehemently oppose it, so it can't exist yet without putting people in danger.

Autism Speaks is shit. So is National Autistic Society. So is the Autism Society. ASAN is on thin fucking ice.

Stop tagging political posts with NPD, ASPD, compulsive liar, or no empathy. You're being ableist and armchair diagnosing. And putting that shit on our feeds.

ABA is bad. Yes, always. All of it. I lost a friend to ABA and I will not budge on this. All pro-ABA people will be blocked, I do not give a shit.

I do not care about syscourse. I am not a system and am not qualified to have an opinion on it.

If you point out typos, grammar mistakes, or whatever when the other person hasn't explicitly said it's okay, stop. You're being ableist.

Stop using TBI as an insult. Yes, I was dropped on my head (okay, I fell, but still,) as a baby. Fuck you too.

This is a safe place for systems and I'm firmly anti-Split.

Autistic and intellectually disabled people are allowed to transition, be queer, get tattoos, drink, have sex, whatever, should they so want.

Mental age is bullshit. He doesn't have the mind of a two-year-old, he has the mind of an adult with IDD.

The posts of disabled people are not an excuse for you to trauma-dump. I don't care what your ex did, that person with NPD wasn't talking about them and it's a dick move to bring that up on their unrelated post.

People should not have to work to live. No one. Ever. Period.

Healthcare should be free

Caretakers need to stop killing their disabled charges

Autism Mommies (TM) are shitty people.

Don't even get me started on Fathering Autism (bitch, you aren't fathering autism, you're fathering ABBY)

Disabled people deserve dignity and privacy. All of them. Yes, even those ones. We're still people. You don't need to know how we go to the toilet.

Fiction does not determine morality and sending people anon hate telling them to kill themselves is a shitty thing.

Telling people to kill themselves in general is a shitty thing. What are you gonna do if they actually do it and you get arrested for manslaughter?

Trans kids deserve to transition, intersex kids deserve to not be mutilated and forced onto HRT when they can't or don't consent, children can and will be queer

Actual sex education needs to be standard

Label policing LGBT+ identities is bad

Devotees and "transableds" are not allowed here

Children and disabled people deserve to exist in public, even if you don't like us

Stop. Saying. Retard. Stop using autistic as an insult. Stop it and go to hell.

I'm pro-choice and I know you don't actually care about fetuses with Down Syndrome, you're just trying to guilt me.

I will reblog with more takes as they occur to me

And, most importantly, listen to ALL disabled voices. All of them. Every single one. We stand together or we don't stand a chance.

seeing supposedly 'neurodivergent friendly' creators (who are usually Autistic/ADHD) stigmatize NPD, ASPD, and any PD under the sun makes me so angry. like they think 'neurodivergent' means 'Autism and ADHD' when the creator of the term meant for it to be a term for anyone with a different neurotype INCLUDING PDs, schizophrenia, psychosis, and all the disorders people love to treat horribly. i've had people tell me that the term was originally intended for AuDHD only so people are just using that definition but... definitions change. i thought autistic people knew that. i thought we were familiar with this. but not when it comes to demonized disorders... ok.

(p.s. it's really easy to just say Autistic, ADHD instead of 'neurodivergent' when you're only catering to Autistic and ADHD individuals)