Weighted blankets are now trendy

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Great, Serpentine; I love to think and visualize, especially if it might have a useful result.

If putting weights inside a quilt or comforter--if the weights shift too much, you could put a few stitches around each one, by hand or machine, before or after stuffing.

If you didn't want to mangle a quilt/comforter, it might work to sew together pillowcases, again before or after filling, by machine or by hand. Sewing by hand is not unpleasant, especially if you use a thimble. Some people like to do essentially the same thing with colored yarn or thread and make a work of art. It's relaxing if there's nothing urgent you need to be doing.

A weighted blanket substitute might not look like much, but it could help you see whether it works for you.

Ashley Fetters’ recent Atlantic essay about the “problem” with weighted blankets as last year’s hot holiday trend felt like a reminder. A reminder that I’ll never be part of the “meditation-app-using, Instagram-shopping masses” Fetters’ piece bemoans, regardless of whether I actually use Instagram or meditation apps. Why? Because to Fetters, I’m “special.” Actually, I’m not just “special.” I have “special needs.” And I am, by her essay’s reckoning, under attack. Because nondisabled people are buying weighted blankets, I am having my “special needs” culturally appropriated.

As an autistic person, did I ask for this defense? No. But I sure got it. Fetters’ piece traces how weighted blankets went from a product primarily crafted for and used by autistic people to their new mass-market life as “blankets that ease anxiety.”

It isn’t unusual for a news outlet to run a piece about autism without the voice of a single autistic person, as is the case with Fetters’ essay. Our parents and even grandparents are sufficient proxies. We can’t speak, or what we have to say is too precious and childlike to matter. Perhaps I could do an amusing card-counting trick or play a tune I’ve only heard once by ear. Thoughts and feelings are the purview of actual people, not “special” people like me.

It isn’t unusual for a news outlet to run a piece about autism without the voice of a single autistic person.
But had Fetters asked, I would have been happy to tell her I am not a “special” person, nor am I angry about the blanket you got for Christmas. Yes, I’m autistic. I have a disability. I have more difficulty doing things most people do not struggle with. That being the case, there are still no “special” people. There is no “special-needs community.” There are disabled people and there are our families. That’s it. And now that weighted blankets and fidget spinners are mainstream, I’m more like everyone else than ever. In many ways, the fight for disability rights is about one fundamental issue: I would like to be regarded as an ordinary person. The mass production and marketing of weighted blankets is a step toward that goal

There is no way to culturally appropriate from disabled people. That’s not to say there isn’t disabled culture. The Deaf community has its own language and institutions. I am on the board of Autspace, a conference entirely by and for autistic people to collaborate on culture building. But the physical objects disabled people use—fidget spinners and cubes, weighted blankets, shower chairs, scooters—are not a culture. In fact, nondisabled people using amenities originally designed for disabled people does nothing but improve our lives. It’s called the “curb-cut effect.” You’ve experienced it: The gentle slope from the curb to the street, usually at a crossing, was originally designed so that people in wheelchairs could cross the street. Now, they are enjoyed by people with baby carriages, small grocery carts, rolling suitcases, and bicycles, along with people in wheelchairs. The fact that curb cuts are useful to so many people means that there are more curb cuts, and those curb cuts are cheaper to install. Wheelchair users don’t have to fight to leave their houses and cross the street.

Now I can get a weighted blanket, in an adult size, on sale at Target for as low as $79.99. It comes in an appealingly neutral gray. The trajectory for weighted blankets is the best of American capitalism: People figured out that a particular product is enjoyable for people outside my small corner of the disabled universe. They figured out a way to make the product cheaper and easier to access. This is an unequivocally good thing. There are hundreds of people sleeping better as a result. Perhaps some of them are also autistic and don’t know it; there are major autism diagnostic gaps along gender and racial lines. Why not sleep better with a blanket you got at the store and not fuss over labels? God bless the curb-cut effect.

If that’s cultural appropriation, please, appropriate away

Maybe we could make one. Attach ankle and wrist weights (how?) to a cheap blanket, stuff them inside a quilt?

Or stuff in big flat hot water bottles, filled? Or big bags of dried peas, rice....

What else is flat, clean, heavy, but not hard or sharp? Packs of filler or printer paper. And--???

I thought Id really like it since I tend to sleep with five different blankets piled on top of me. My friend got a 20lb one for Christmas and loves it. I tried it one day though and I freaked out cause I felt like I was trapped and couldnt move. I essentially could only lay in one position and couldnt easily shift my legs and body around. I didnt like it at all! Id rather have several blankets and pillows (and maybe a cat )