My name is Kayla Smith. I am 21 years old. I am a disability rights activist.
My early memories of my diagnosis is I always have to go speech therapist to work on my speech to work on pronounce words and like that and having a case worker who I thought babysitting me but it is not. I guess growing up I know I was different but I did not know at the same time I was autistic. When I was 10 years old, I started to learned about my diagnosis when my mom told me that I have autism when I was two years old and explained my diagnosis is.
Autism is a neurodevelopment disorder or the Autistic community would say "a difference." It affects the person's communication and social skills. Autism affect[s] everyone differently.
Autism did not affect my life what[so]ever [in] school, work, doing activities or relationships. [Right now], I have little difficulties on social interaction. I am not bad at it, but there are some things that I don't understand like jokes, [and I] may not get social cues. It is difficult but I am learning.
My family and friends try to understand me, but there are times they don't get me. It get[s] very frustrating that they may not know what it[‘s] like [for] me being autistic. I do feel alone when no one get[s] me. I do have a supportive family though.
My early memories of my diagnosis is I always have to go speech therapist to work on my speech to work on pronounce words and like that and having a case worker who I thought babysitting me but it is not. I guess growing up I know I was different but I did not know at the same time I was autistic. When I was 10 years old, I started to learned about my diagnosis when my mom told me that I have autism when I was two years old and explained my diagnosis is.
Autism is a neurodevelopment disorder or the Autistic community would say "a difference." It affects the person's communication and social skills. Autism affect[s] everyone differently.
Autism did not affect my life what[so]ever [in] school, work, doing activities or relationships. [Right now], I have little difficulties on social interaction. I am not bad at it, but there are some things that I don't understand like jokes, [and I] may not get social cues. It is difficult but I am learning.
My family and friends try to understand me, but there are times they don't get me. It get[s] very frustrating that they may not know what it[‘s] like [for] me being autistic. I do feel alone when no one get[s] me. I do have a supportive family though.
I want society to accept autistic people and try to understand us. I [wish] society [could] be accessible to autistic people and accept them as they are instead of trying to be somebody we are not. We are living in a world [where you’re] suppose to be this image and we can't be that image all the time. Can we just be ourselves instead of trying to be somebody we are not?
I decided that I want to get involved in activism in November of 2017. I want[ed] to become an activist because I did not like …how the disability community [is] treated and I decided to become an activist. I am new to disability activism. To be honest I never heard of disability issues until I went on Twitter on 2015. I have learned so much [since] then.
Learning about intersectionality is interesting. I do have multiple identities …being [an] Autistic black woman. I learned that I have to deal with the fact that I have three identities and have to deal with … racism, sexism, and ableism for the rest of my life. It is very interesting how my identities overlap... I learned that I have to fight for [all] my identities instead of one. I am whole and not part of.
The challenge in the autistic community [is] being heard. The community want[s] to be heard when it comes down to autism acceptance and representing everyone. Every person in the community want[s] to be accepted as we are. We [as a rule] are not ashamed of who we are, but sadly there are some of us [who are]. I learned that I can't speak for all autistic people. I want everyone to be loved as we are instead of trying to fix us. I hope the Autistic community keep[s] on spreading awareness.
I decided that I want to get involved in activism in November of 2017. I want[ed] to become an activist because I did not like …how the disability community [is] treated and I decided to become an activist. I am new to disability activism. To be honest I never heard of disability issues until I went on Twitter on 2015. I have learned so much [since] then.
Learning about intersectionality is interesting. I do have multiple identities …being [an] Autistic black woman. I learned that I have to deal with the fact that I have three identities and have to deal with … racism, sexism, and ableism for the rest of my life. It is very interesting how my identities overlap... I learned that I have to fight for [all] my identities instead of one. I am whole and not part of.
The challenge in the autistic community [is] being heard. The community want[s] to be heard when it comes down to autism acceptance and representing everyone. Every person in the community want[s] to be accepted as we are. We [as a rule] are not ashamed of who we are, but sadly there are some of us [who are]. I learned that I can't speak for all autistic people. I want everyone to be loved as we are instead of trying to fix us. I hope the Autistic community keep[s] on spreading awareness.
