seriously though it would be an enormous help if more people understood that autistic brains/bodies (and some other conditions too) very VERY frequently don’t process sensations and emotions in normal ways and INSTEAD replace them with bodily and emotional responses that are total nonsense in an NT context
like i have chronic pain, i have an always-on headache that used to be around a 2-3 on the pain scale and is now a 6-7 most days. but periodically i find that instead of actually feeling a level of pain i can rate, i have a series of puzzling physical sensations like nausea that miraculously get better when i take painkillers and go lie down in the dark. because they were actually pain signals. pain signals that got turned into something else at some point in my body. so i have days where i feel GREAT and pumped to do stuff and then i’m like WHY AM I NOT FUNCTIONING WELL and i go lie down in the dark for a while and it gets better?? because i was actually at an 8 which is Can’t Function levels for me, but 90% of that pain was invisible to me, turned into nausea and manic energy and weird sudden mood shifts instead of “pain”.
I don’t experience normal thirst signals most of the time, either. I get cravings for ice cream and lime popsicles and watermelon instead of being thirsty. I had to learn that “i suddenly desperately want ice cream” is my body’s way of saying “put some water in this bitch”.
I also get nausea instead of hunger signals a lot of the time. nausea is one of my body’s favorite go-to signals to send, in general, so it can mean almost anything. when my stomach turns i have to go through a checklist of possibilities to figure out what i’m actually feeling. this is a big reason i eat a lot of snacks. it’s step number 3 or 4 on my “why do i feel sick” list and happens at least once a day.
and anyway this shit is important for non autistic people to know because we can’t always tell you what we’re experiencing, but also sometimes we can get really upset and overwhelmed with trying to even understand what we’re feeling. doctors especially need to know this. how can i tell you what’s wrong with my body when my body doesn’t know how to use its own language for communicating what’s wrong? when it routinely sends me a mishmash of signals that are totally useless for figuring out the problem? it’s not impossible but it requires an understanding of just how different the place i’m coming from really is. you can’t get anywhere by treating me just like an NT patient.
but most people aren’t even aware that “body signals” are a real tangible thing that can be effected and “go wrong” when your brain and body are built weirdly. literally any process in your body can be broken, that should be obvious, but people are so oblivious to the things their body does automatically that they aren’t aware they exist, and therefore don’t know they can break. it’s really important to make people aware of these functions. there are so many disabilities that happen when a hidden function breaks and it’s impossible for abled people to grasp those disabilities without comprehending that that’s an actual thing their body does for them.
