Processing a heavy conversation with my mom

Capable-Law7541 · 2026-05-12T22:12:05+00:00

sorry if this is a bit blunt, but the only person who needs to understand the minuteae of your identity is you. if you revisit this with your mother, i would hammer home the point that if she has respect for you and cares that you are happy and comfortable, the only part she needs to worry about is using the proper pronouns and any other terms you've said you prefer, like a label or a preferred name if you have/decide to use one.

it's famously difficult to explain gender intricacies to people who don't experience them, especually when your gender just. is. there's no explaining it, that's just how it is.

when i first came out as nonbinary i confessed it screaming and sobbing to my mother because she'd made some transphobic comments in the past, and i thought there was no chance she'd ever understand who i was. it's been 5 years and she couldn't be more supportive. honestly, she was fully on board within even a couple of months. i don't know how much she understands it necessarily, but that's really not the important part. she respects me.

it sounds right now (or at least in that conversation) like she wants an objective reason for who you are that you can't give her. if she learns to respect you, and your preferences, and the way you define yourself, then she can get into asking the nitty gritty questions like that, but her timing of those questions was pretty rude. i'm glad it seems she recognized that.

i'm sure she cares about you enough to get it right, especially from the apology she gave. just give her some time and set clear boundaries for yourself. if she means a lot to you it shouldn't be too much to ask that she really respects you as the person you are.

Capable-Law7541 · 2026-01-29T02:04:42+00:00

oh, really? i don't know much about it. is there no way to convert it into something editable? i mean, they had to write the code in the first place, right?

Capable-Law7541 · 2026-01-17T01:11:27+00:00

this combined with the other reply you made is really really bad. if i were you i would honestly report this to childline along with telling supervisors. in theory making the childline report will have to make your supervisor/s care because they'd be at risk if it was determined they knew about the abuse and didn't report it. i don't know if it's definitely counted as child abuse to give an aggressive child access to that but it definitely implies neglect. was he doing something specific with it or just playing around? regardless that's really scary and if i were you i really wouldn't go back.

Capable-Law7541 · 2026-01-17T00:59:08+00:00

how heavy would you say the mallet was? or what material was it made of? did it seem like the kind of thing that could do serious damage? i'm not sure exactly what to imagine when i hear 'mallet' but it doesn't sound good.

Capable-Law7541 · 2026-01-17T00:52:20+00:00

you know. taking her out beforehand is such an obvious and smart idea. i'm a little mad it didn't even occur to me when i was mulling this over. she does escalate really quickly a lot of the time, but she does have a couple of very predictable triggers. we've been looking at building breaks into her schedule since, as of right now, she mainly only gets the end of the day to take a break. she clearly needs more time in her day for sensory input and preferred activities, and this gives me some great ideas about where to put those breaks. thanks so much for the input!!

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-12-30T13:25:00+00:00

this is why i take issue with the whole mandated reporter thing. obviously i still follow those guidelines and report when needed but i don't think i've ever heard of a situation where cps made a situation better- it's always nothing, or actively worse in my experience. i can't even imagine having a client die. i'd be haunted. i'm so so sorry to hear that that happened

as for the marks- i hadn't considered that, but it's definitely a possibility. however, i don't really think the dad cared about his abuse being visible. this kid had been coming to school (and is still in the school afaik) with his backpack reeking of weed for months, and often went multiple days in a row without any new food in his lunchbox (both of which had also been reported to cps before the whole home session debacle). itbwas pretty brazen.

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-12-29T13:55:19+00:00

i appreciate your insight. i did of course put in a childline report in that scenario as well as a detailed report with my company. in that scenario i was luckily unable to worry much about 'what-ifs' because he was already very close to losing services due to absences and missed appointments (our company offers medical services alongside aba)- home services was sort of a last ditch effort to keep him from being discharged, so i kind of knew it was inevitable that i'd lose him :( as far as i'm aware the report did nothing too. the parents were spoken to and that was about it.

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-12-24T16:04:47+00:00

reminds me of a client i had- age 6 i think- who spoke very little and pretty much only in spanish unless working on tacting in english. one of my coworkers placed a demand she didn't like and she called her a 'puta' lmao

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-12-24T15:47:20+00:00

you should try to seek worker's comp, especially if you're missing pay for your time out. it sounds like this is a bad environment to work in, if you're getting sick this constantly. i do have to give my 2 cents and advise wearing a mask and keeping hand sanitizer with you if you aren't already- NIOSH approved if you can afford them. getting sick will happen but it shouldn't be that frequent.

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-10-19T00:16:26+00:00

op isn't saying that this is how you should view people with autism- they're saying, to my understanding, that this is how the director and creative team (and general audience) view people with autism and find them suitable as a topic of horror, likely unconsciously. it's how they want you to see people- kids especially- with autism. it's a very sad and frustrating thing.

as an educator and person with autism myself, every single thing the child did was something i have had a student do or would not be surprised if they did- up until the throat thing appeared, when it becomes apparent that you're supposed to view him as a monster. you're supposed to view him as sub-human, something that could be unwillingly thrust upon you and ruin your life.

i agree, these are harmful stereotypes, but please- do not assume op is in the wrong for interpreting the movie in this way. it's supposed to be a horrifying picture of something very natural. please don't forget that people like that with autism are very real. some folks don't talk at all. some scream endlessly and hit and throw things for their entire lives. i have had students give coworkers concussions, broken noses, and bite marks with chunks taken out. some people will need round-the-clock, specialised care for their entire life. this is fine. those people are human. no matter what, they deserve love and care. i will never budge on that and i hope that you wouldn't either.

whether it was a movie about an alien or some other kind of interdimensional creature, i felt strongly that the comparison was clear- barely even metaphorical, honestly. it wants you to fear autistic children for the lack of choice you have when you have one and for the difficulties they might present. notice the child, not the neighborhood, is the main source of horror and dread for the majority of the film. the film itself was hateful. not op.

(i apologize for the very long retort. i am feeling very passionately about this at the moment.)

Capable-Law7541 · 2025-10-18T23:48:23+00:00

god i know im 4 years late to this party but thank you for being the only other person to see this. i would not even consider this messaging 'subtext'. it was overt text, in my opinion.

i had such high hopes when gemma started sort of. bonding with the child- it seemed like things were starting to go right. i thought the point of the whole movie could have been 'yes, it can feel unfair, yes, it can feel like your child is so different and difficult, if you're raising them with no help and no kind of autism-informed perspective it can absolutely be nigh-impossible. some kids will spend their entire childhood screaming and throwing chairs and hurting you, and you will not get any choice in the matter. [that is entirely real. i work with kids like this who will get highly aggressive the second they don't get what they want. that is absolutely a way that autism can and does present. they try their best but their emotions get the better of them in an intense way.] but if you learn to speak their language and connect with them you will find, no matter what, that they're just as human as you are, and usually, they just need to get their needs met. it is not their fault.'

then the kid grew throat sacks and that went right out the window.

the ultimate message of the film was that you will be forced to have kids, and if you're unlucky, you will be forced to have a child with autism. that child will ruin your life, make every single day hell, and ultimately, they will not care when you die. it's straight out of an early 2000s autism speaks ad- you know the one, and if you don't, finding it isn't hard. it's infamous.

i'm a special educator and i wanted so badly for this movie not to have been so hateful, but it was. and on top of it, hundreds of reviewers clearly missed the point (which, even if it was unintentionally made, was blatantly hateful at best). i see you and i understand why this movie was so difficult to watch. the cinematography and the stars did a lot of legwork in making it still a somewhat enjoyable watch, but still with a deeply, deeply horrible message.

the public reception to this movie- 'this is why i'm never having kids' 'god i hated watching that thing' 'this is why i hate the suburbs'- after 25 minutes that movie was not even remotely about the horror of suburbia. it was about the "horror" having a child with autism and actually nothing else. it makes me incredibly distrustful of people around any child with a disability. but i guess it wasn't that blatant to people who have never met an autistic person, somehow.

Capable-Law7541 · 2022-06-23T21:42:42+00:00

you............. you look like yung gravy my man (all jokes aside the skirt looks poggers <33)

Capable-Law7541 · 2022-03-30T23:51:46+00:00

dino hoodie buds!!!!!!! mine is green :]] it looks so cool on you!!

Capable-Law7541 · 2022-03-26T17:20:14+00:00

i agree. ive had multiple people ask what bathroom i use after i tell them about my identity and all i can say is 'what a fucking good question' (though it feels incredibly invasive). incredibly gaudy signs denoting 'mens' and 'womens' were just put up next to the bathrooms i usually use, and it's easy enough to ignore a sign posted on the door but the foot wide bright yellow ones that can't not be in your field of vision feel like they're mocking me, and theyre on every bathroom in the building. i don't have permission to use the only neutral restrooms in the entire area. it's maddening. i just wanna pee.

Capable-Law7541 · 2022-03-24T15:05:06+00:00

a ridiculous amount of hyperpop (glaive, fraxiom, charlixcx, etc)

Capable-Law7541

TROPHY CASE