I have never wanted to be “cured” and I feel it’s very offensive that some parents are advocating for finding a cure. I actually turned off a movie that up until the last ten minutes had been portraying twins with autism in a very positive light and I was enjoying it. But then the mom says about wanting to f8nd a “cure” at a gathering for autism awareness and I instantly got angry and thought, “I spent nearly two hours on what I thought was a positive portrayal of autistic kids who weren’t being viewed by the mom as burdens only for it to turn out to be a movie about want to find a cure?! F THAT NOISE!” And I immediately turned it off.
Now the reason I find it so insulting that pews t a “cure” for autism is simply because I literally have no idea what it’s like to not having autism. Yeah I was undiagnosed for years but the symptoms and signs were always there and no one knew how to read them at the time. Autism makes up a huge part of my identity as a person. There was never a time when I never had it. This isn’t like cancer where you live your life completely cancer free when it suddenly shows up unexpectedly one day. I feel that a “cure” would take away what makes me well me. Why do I have to change for the world just to be considered a valuable part of society and the world? Why can’t it be the world that changes how it sees and accepts autism?