Is someone’s lack of understanding coming from ignorance or are they biased against dyslexic, ADHD, and autistic people?
Being a different thinker or being neurodiverse (if you disclose this or not) you might find yourself on the receiving end of someone’s biases. And then the big question becomes what do I do about what they said or did?
One of the best parts of my job is telling people my job title. It brings up a lot of questions, comments, connections, and feedback.
Recently in a conversation, I could tell that the person was trying to figure out if I had a real job and business or if I was just a wantrepreneur (a wantrepreneur is a person who wants to be an entrepreneur but really never makes any money.) That’s a whole other article for another day. The person asked this question–
“Didn’t you get enough help in school and college that you don’t need help anymore?”
This is where it is really important not to get defensive and to make sure you are looking at the person talking to you and that you review that comment for tone, inclination, body language, micro-expressions… all of the non-verbal cues.
This was one of two things:
- A lack of knowledge OR 2. Bias, hate, bullying, baiting speech
When this happens you need to be able to decide what this feels like to you and how you want to react. I have guessed wrong before, and it didn’t turn out well for me. I have watched others guess wrong and the fall-out can be ugly. All I can say is that you should try to do your best.
Now back to my story.
My back was turned, and I was doing something in the fridge when this was said to me, and the person was walking away from me.
My brain said, “What the hell was that?”
My mouth said, “I had my head in the fridge I missed what you said, and I want to hear that again, wait until I get over by you.”
Once I could see the person, I asked them to share that thought again. They said it again, and I realized that they just didn’t know what they didn’t know and that it might be a chance to give them a little upgrade of facts and NOT drown them in information.
I typically ask a couple more questions to understand how they came to this conclusion.
What I have found is that most often the only time they were even aware that neurodiversity is a thing was in school when one of their classmates was taken to a special reading program, had an aid, or the classmate got in trouble for not sitting still.
Adding a little more context to their facts, an adult had explained to them as a child what was going on and that was the only time they needed to know about it. They are under-educated on the issue, so the question makes total sense from that perspective.
First, I often think how cool would that be to not need to know much about neruodiversities and mental health? That is not my life. Good for them.
Now, coming from this new perspective that they lack knowledge and need to know more I give them a quick easy upgrade of information. If I do it well two things happen.
- I don’t make them feel wrong or bad about not knowing the information. Instead, they feel like they just got smarter.
- They are so curious that they ask more questions. They have a better chance of recalling the information if I get them engaged.
This is my default go-to story.
Do you know anyone with type 1 diabetes, asthma, autism, or allergies?
Usually, someone knows someone with one of those things.
Being neurodiverse is kind of like having type 1 diabetes or any other non-curable lifelong disease/ailment. A person with that ailment will have to do things differently than the average person for their health and wellbeing.
The difference is that the medical community helps train people with most of those ailments on how they need to live their lives to be the most successful while having that disease.
Nothing like that happens for most neurodiverse people and we too are going to need to live our lives a little differently than the average person to be the most successful version of ourselves.
We might need more time to process, we might need more reminders to be on time, we might need to take medication, we might need to learn to manage our anxiety, and we might need to have assistive tools at our job.
Things like sleep, water, and exercise are all important to everyone but for many different thinkers, they are necessities that need to never be slacked on or our ability to function well will dissipate drastically.
It’s not a big deal, once you understand how you tick and what you need to be successful. Then it is pretty easy. That’s what I get to do, help people learn about their different thinking and how they can have a thriving life with it instead of fighting it and not even realizing it.
I shared with this person my go-to story, they had more questions and then realized that they had a niece with dyslexia and they hadn’t asked any questions.
They just figured the school would teach her to read and that would be that. Now they were all curious about what kind of dyslexia she has and what they were doing to support her and if she has any other traits of neurodiversity.
It was a good outcome.
In case you are dealing with option 2, bias, hate, bullying, and baiting comments, which you will be able to figure out quickly if you are looking at the person when they make the comment.
I recommend what I learned from Tracy Arlington, owner of Play It Safe. She shared this on a podcast and it was great.
W.I.N.N.E.R.
Walk away and don’t look back
Ignore the comment and don’t look back
No sassiness – ok, noted, good to know, ok sure
Nice– Say something nice – change the subject
Exit. Don’t engage and don’t fight
Report
She also mentioned your body language. Take a deep breath, smile, and stand up straight with your hands at your side.
If you are an adult different thinker with ADHD, dyslexia, or autism you have had to deal with this many times by now and the next time it happens I hope this little article helps you improve your process. Or maybe you have some ideas to help others that you have learned. I would love to hear them.
Remember unless your life is in immediate danger it is best to just walk away if you are unsure what else to do in the situation and you can’t figure out the other person’s goals and objectives.
Thanks for checking out my article and I hope this helps you a little.
JoyGenea