 Well, there is, I suppose, an aspect of gaslighting that I think is very, just from my own personal experiences but from, you know, just thinking about it, the aspects of stereotyping and infantilisation. Do you have any experiences with those two or ways of explaining it that might be helpful? Where do I start? Okay, so I get infantilised a lot and it's because, it's often because of my shutdowns and because sometimes it is stereotypes that autistic people aren't really adults, like autistic adults aren't really adults and we're just really like children or, you know, whatever which obviously is not the case and I do get infantilised a lot, especially when I'm, because I'm an ambulatory wheelchair user, so I have a wheelchair, so especially when I'm in my wheelchair. But like recently I went to get a vaccine and there was a nurse who, she infantilised me so much, she was, she made me, she treated me like I was an actual toddler, like she was there like, oh, you're here for your ouchy vaccine, you don't know what vaccine this is, do you? Oh, I'll get, how about I give you a lolly and I'm like, I don't want a lolly. She was like, how about I give you a treat, you can have a sticker book and I was like, oh my god. They did like know that you were autistic before. The thing is, she knew I was autistic but she was treating me perfectly fine until the moment she knew I was autistic. I was like, oh, so, hi, I'm autistic so just, yeah, it tends to be that way. That's why I'm doing this, but while I'm stimming, I can still, it's helping me focus on what you're saying and it's, you know, I just carry on, you know, I can understand what you're saying because I'm stimming, but then it was like a curtain dropped and she was like treating me like a baby all of a sudden. And it was, yeah, a massive example of infantilisation. And I have to say, it's not usually that bad. That's a very worst case scenario sort of thing. Most professionals know a lot better. But these things do happen because there's a very, there's a big misconception of what it means when we are stimming, but it can look childish to some people when we're stimming. Yeah. Like it can look like we're playing. It's really interesting, sort of like the dynamic between how we are when like what people say about us when we're younger, as opposed to what people say about us when we're older, like when we're younger, we're kind of characterised as this like little professor, kind of, you know, interesting child that doesn't seem to be able to communicate with people their own age and prefers to talk to adults and like, so it's sort of this kind of like old soul mentality of what we're like. That was me. When we get older, it's like, it's the opposite. It's like, you know, I think I have been thinking about it a lot. And I think it's a lot to do with, you know, just the fact that we don't necessarily apply ourselves to those social norms at any age, really. And so people always don't necessarily know where to put us. And when we don't fit those particular stereotypes of what adults should be like and what adults should say and what kind of life skills they have, then they kind of will automatically put us into this box of like, oh, they're not proper adult yet, the immature, like, yeah. And that's it. It's like, I'm still a capable, mature adult, even when I'm stimming, I'm still a capable, mature adult, even when I'm non-verbal. Like I can still, I can still make choices. I can still, you know, I'm still an independent adult. These things don't change just because I'm shut down or because I'm autistic. Yeah. Especially if I've been empowered with one-to-one support to be independent. Like I find that interesting too, because it's some people think that being dependent on care and support is like the opposite of independence. And I get that. I understand why, because on the face of it, that's exactly what it sounds like. But the definition of independence is to be outside of or like outside of other people's control so that you can make your own choices. You can have your own freedom to do things. And I think with me in particular, I have 16 out of 100 average life skills. I need like a lot of life, life skills and self-care help and independence from carers and things. And but that care support helps me be independent and make those choices. And I would never be independent without it. Like I could never do anything like this. And I think part of that is that people look at autistic people and they think, oh, they infantilise us. And they're like, well, they need all of this care support. They're not independent adults. Whereas actually, if you empower us properly, we can still be independent. It's just different to how society expects it to be. Yeah. I think that that's that's a really good point. It's and also the idea of independence is very funny anyway, because it's it's always it's never a black and white thing. It's very much like a gray sliding scale kind of thing. Like everyone's dependent on some human for well, actually for quite a lot of things in life. Like the people who make all the furniture and the equipment that you have people who provide water and take out the garbage and, you know, produce food that you can consume and sell to you. Yeah, exactly. And with support, it's pretty much exactly the same thing like someone's providing you a service. In order for you to, you know, get get get through life a little bit easier or be able to, I guess, reach a level where you're able to feel happy and and, you know, fulfilled with your needs and stuff. Yeah. See, I see it like that. I see it as like everyone else is that like a baseline where they can thrive and be independent and disabled people to see people might be here. And we just sort of need that little bit of extra help to get to that baseline. And that's all that care is. It helps us get to the same baseline as everyone else. You know, we can still thrive and be independent and be mature adults. And yeah, I forgot what I was going to say. Trainer for just disappeared. There is an aspect of like that is particularly the stereotyping thing that I feel has been has been the most harmful for me and relationships. Hey, YouTube, hope you have enjoyed this podcast clip so far. If you want to check out the full episode, you can find it here on my YouTube channel under the podcast section. Or you can go to Spotify, Apple, Google to check it out on different podcasting streaming services. If you have enjoyed this video this far, please make sure to like, perhaps drop me a subscribe if you want to see some more content from me and drop a comment down below, even if it's something simple, like an emoji or a or a heart. It really does help satisfy those big YouTube algorithm gods in the sky. Anyway, I'll let you go back to it and particularly stereotyping around competence in social situations and empathy, which, you know, that that's something that I've experienced a lot about, you know, particularly intentional gaslighting about me lacking empathy or me not being able to understand particular social situations or perhaps situations within a friendship or relationship. That seems to be something that's quite coherent with the type of gaslighting that I have experienced in life. And it's weird because, like, you know, you only have to, like, watch some of the content that I produce or the podcast that I make to understand that I'm definitely not lacking. I'm definitely not lacking in empathy. I'm not lacking the ability to understand social contexts and situations. In fact, you know, I'd say that I probably I'm better that better at it than most net neurotypicals that I've gone across. But anyway, it's I feel I feel like that's that's quite a big thing because it's like some people just have an inherent like superiority over us or they just they can't like. Except that we're mature, but we're just mature in a different way and that we do understand things, but we just navigate that in a different way. Yeah. It's and also I feel part of my autism helps me sort of delve deep into the psychological details of like every person I meet. So whatever they do or say, like, I've got this little psychological thing in my brain going, oh, I know why they're saying that. I know why they're doing that. Like I passed my child psychology and VQ for Cambridge University, I started at like seven in the morning and I finished it by like 10 at night, like every module, every exam. Like I passed it, aced it and a lot of it. And the tutor sort of said it was because I it was online, by the way, in a sort of learning environment that suited me. But the tutor said it was because she thought it was my autism that could help me dive dive into that psychological detail and work out. And she said, actually, like, you're more empathetic than maybe some neurotypical people are because you have been taught to sort of fight to understand people because you're always misunderstood and you're always people always claiming that you're misunderstanding them. So and I think that's a big part of it. Like like you, I'm hugely empathetic, like to the point that it hurts, but that empathy can also shut me down. So it can be like I have no empathy. It can feel like it can look like I'm really cold or I'm not responding. But that's because I'm so shut down with the emotional pain of it. Like my entire body will be on fire with like volcanoes. I'll be itchy everywhere. I'll be in pain and it will shut me down. And I don't know how to understand those situations. Yeah, I've been in those. Sorry, I've been in those kind of situations where I've like had people tell me something that's really emotional and, you know, I relate to what you're saying because I like I make like less eye contacts. I kind of look into the distance. I'm really trying to process and understand what someone's saying. Yeah. And some people take that as me not being interested and not being caring, whereas I'm just really trying to understand where they're coming from and what they're experiencing. That's not so. It's like it's partly like a defence mechanism because we've a lot of autistic people would have been told off and sort of shamed and invalidated and unintentionally isolated so often about not being empathetic and not reacting properly in certain social situations where like emotional values are really high. And that can create this trauma defence mode where we're like actively hiding from it because our body already expects to be in trouble and we shut down. And for me, I soon learn like very quickly at a young age that I was the problem that I made that whatever emotional situation was going on, I made it worse. So I would run away and hide in like wherever it was, but I distanced myself from them because I believed and I truly believed this that if I was out the way, that problem would go away. But that just made it worse because they thought I didn't care and I had no empathy and I was just being selfish and that could be further from the truth. And it's a huge stereotype, which again, has a big impact on the whole infertilisation and also it links back into the intention of gaslighting and makes makes relationships quite difficult. It's putting it putting it lightly.