Don't quite know what to think of this.

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My disability lawyer likes to send me things about Autism that she learns or finds out about. I am the only Autistic person that she has ever known so everything she knows about Autism, she has pretty much learned from me. She told me about some genetic testing that she just learned about and I was like, OK. Then she asked if my family had done any genetic testing with me. I told her no, that they are not that interested and frankly neither am I. Then she said that it didn't matter unless I was in a clinical study because I wasn't going to have any babies. I asked her what babies had to do with anything and she said, "You don't have to worry about passing this on to your offspring."

I told her that I was very offended that she would say that to me and that if I had had a child, I would have preferred for that child to be like me. I also told her that I would never want to be an nt and that we don't suffer because we are Autistic, we suffer because nts have created a society and insist on maintaining a society that we can't survive in.

She then BLEW UP and yelled and screamed at me via text for quite some time telling me how dare I offend her so badly by claiming that she had offended me. She made herself into some kind of victim of my cruel and unbelievable evil, vicious behavior because I dared to tell her that I was offended by what she said to me.

Some people feel that they are the only ones who are allowed to be offended. If you suggest that they might cause offense...well you have seen the reaction.

Now that you have seen the reaction, you know what to avoid.

One aspect that may have future consequences is that if you are receiving disability payments, she might not represent your interests if she considers you not "disabled".

Many autistic people have babies who, whether (the babies) are autistic or not do become viable members of society.

Nobody tells me I can’t have babies because I’m autistic!

Autism (or autisms) is not inevitably genetic. Non-autistic people have autistic babies; autistic people have non-autistic babies.

The disability lawyer should know much better! He’s too much into eugenics.

It is in the best interest of the disability lawyer for his/her client to win his/her case. The lawyer will advocate for the client no matter his/her personal beliefs.

I’m fortunate I don’t have to deal with lawyers too much.

All I can think is, wow, there’s somebody who picked the wrong career.

Some people try to divert blame from themselves by blaming anyone who blames them. Sometimes a pause followed by calmly resuming the conversation helps.

But...

Um. She thinks she knows better than you do whether you feel offended?!

^{I think Quantum duck summed it up well.}

Wow, she was totally out of line. You did nothing wrong Skibum.

Oh dear. I hope she is your ex lawyer.

Thats messed up.

I get the impression that she has served you well up to this point, but jeeze...

NTs seem to assume that autism is like diabetes...that everyone who has it wishes they didnt have it. Some do. Some dont.

Also I cant believe that they have that technology yet... to do some test that finds a 'genetic marker' for autism.

Twenty years from now maybe. But not now.

They may never find a specific “genetic marker.”

There is aparently a genetic marker that indicates autism.

All autism is not explained by that genetic marker.

As in: if you have this marker, you will be autistic. If you do not have this marker, you may or may not be autistic.

My coworker had the test for her unborn daughter because her son is autistic. But her son doesn’t have the marker, so I don’t actually think that makes any sense.

That’s what I mean……that there is not ONE SPECIFIC GENETIC MARKER that indicates autism. That there might be different “autisms” with conceivably different “markers,” rather than one disorder known as autism with one marker.

Her behaviour sounds a little autistic lol

I mean telling someone you think it's good to not pass on a genetic variation to offspring, because that's just what you think. Sounds like she wasn't aware that this is a totally inappropriate thing to say.

It's good that you love yourself.

Your lawyer doesn't really understand genetics or autism, or she would know, that simply having a gene variation associated with autism doesn't mean that you're an autist.

In my case genetic testing wasn't necessary. In fact I told them about my gene variations, but they didn't care. I also didn't need a lawyer for that. My psychiatrist was "lawyer" enough. E.g. complaining to them when they didn't classify me as at least 50% severely disabled.

Thank you for all your responses. She actually berated me for quite some time accusing me of all the evil things that she was projecting onto me about herself. Interestingly though, two days later, she apologized and said that she overreacted when she felt offended because her life is so stressful. And she has treated me like this many many times. But this is the first time she actually apologized. And she is not the only person who treats me like this. Many nts do.

It's really interesting how an nt can completely be justified in destroying an Autistic person because she felt offended and overreacted but if an Autistic person has an outburst because an nt has pushed his buttons so severely, it is called a behavioral issue and it has to be pathologized and the Autistic person has to be sent to therapy or has to be reprimanded or punished.

I think you hurt her ego, so she reacted that way. Maybe "having an ego" should be part of DSM-6 (diagnostic manual)

But your response was understandable. A lawyer who deals with disabled people should be more sensitive anyway. She has to learn. And it's often hard to be stoic (more or less unemotional) when dealing with certain types of people.

She blew my head off when I told her that I was trying to teach her my perspective and how I felt about the issue. She told me that I should use the word "explain," not "teach" because nts get offended if and Autistic person says they are teaching them something because teaching implies that the person you are teaching doesn't know anything about what you are talking about. She explained that the word "teach" implies social hierarchy so when I am talking to an nt, I should use the word "explain" instead.

Then I told her that nts use the word "teach" with me all the time. I told her that I have had nts say they would teach me about nts. She has even said that herself many times, that she has to teach me about what nts are like. I also told her that I have had nts say to me that they have to teach Autistics about Autism. When I told her that, she didn't say anything.