{"id":885,"date":"2007-06-23T08:47:00","date_gmt":"2007-06-23T08:47:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog2\/2007\/06\/my-feelings-are-mine-just-as-your-autism-is-yours\/"},"modified":"2007-06-23T08:47:00","modified_gmt":"2007-06-23T08:47:00","slug":"my-feelings-are-mine-just-as-your-autism-is-yours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/2007\/06\/my-feelings-are-mine-just-as-your-autism-is-yours\/","title":{"rendered":"My Feelings Are Mine, Just As Your Autism is Yours"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am moved to write about some of the outcry over my Dreamchild post on Ballastexistenz<\/a>, and to some degree, on my own blog. There’s a lot being said about how expressing feelings on a blog is actually a form of taking action on those feelings. I can understand that claim. They are afraid that my expression of those feelings will hurt Nat. When I expressed my feelings in Dreamchild, I thought I took great care to show how the bulk of my feelings about my son are positive and that I am taking into account his abilities when I write about him as well as when I deal directly with him.<\/p>\n

What I can’t understand and won’t accept is the sentiment that “therapy culture,” as the comment describes it, is something to dismiss. That if I say that these are my feelings and they just are, they are neither good nor bad, that is something to dismiss as “therapy culture.” In fact, feelings are in a different category from thoughts and actions. Although for some cases, you can work to change your feelings, there are other kinds of feelings that you may not be able to change. Feelings that arise from wishes, from your own flaws, from others’ disturbing behavior, I don’t believe can be changed very often. <\/p>\n

As far as my right to express those feelings, I maintain that I have that right just as much as those Ballastexistenz readers have the right to express their feelings by criticizing what I wrote. I took great care to put my feelings and their expression in a context that stated that I was clearly not happy about having these feelings; that I love and accept my son for exactly who he is; and that I would never hurt him; and that I was sorry for having hurt others by what I had expressed. Nevertheless I believe that my expression of those ugly feelings was very helpful to others who have also experienced similar feelings and then they feel even worse about themselves and their lives. Acknowledging our feelings, even publicly but with care and sensitivity can be helpful in working towards ultimately changing those feelings, or at least understanding how our actions affect others. I am grateful to Ballastexistenz et al. for pointing out how my blogging about my feelings is in fact an action that can hurt. Even though I thought carefully about how I wrote them down, using the references to Nat’s true age destroyed for them the message I was trying to convey. I believe I hurt them, that they are empathizing with Nat. And I thank them for that, and I apologize again for that part of what I did.<\/p>\n

I disagree with Ballastexistenz who says that feelings don’t just come up in a vacuum. I find that feelings are exactly that and more. I don’t dismiss “therapy culture” that fosters that belief; I think that is absolutely the case. <\/p>\n

I find it ironic that Ballastexistenz and some of her readers are basically saying that I should change my feelings, and<\/span> the way I express them, when they take offense at society asking them, as autistics, to change their<\/span> behavior and in some cases, to change how they see the world. I value the perspective the autistics in my life have brought to my world, and I will try in the future to be more respectful of their feelings, especially Nat’s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am moved to write about some of the outcry over my Dreamchild post on Ballastexistenz, and to some degree, on my own blog. There’s a lot being said about how expressing feelings on a blog is actually a form of taking action on those feelings. I can understand that claim. They are afraid that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pSTth-eh","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/susansenator.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}