How to deal with discrimination from society for invisible illnesses?

[meetapple]

I was wondering how any of you might deal with other people treating you negatively for symptoms of an illness that they don't understand. Over time I have amassed a number of negative social reactions like people watching me carefully, saying negative things to another person meant for me to hear, and even starting fireworks. I think I have thought broadcasting which makes me think that people can read my thoughts. Thus, I feel the need to control my thoughts. This causes me to be self conscious which causes others to pay a lot of attention to me. When I can't control my thoughts people treat me in a subhuman manner because they just don't understand why I act differently. This causes a rage but usually goes away after a day or two. But I still am filled with a vast sense of dread regarding going out into public.
My question is how do you stop from internalizing this negative reaction and ignorance? How do you prep yourself for going outside? How do you deal with people thinking you are a douchebag for something that is out of your control?

 

[maakies]

I have similar issues to you, perhaps on a smaller scale. My answer is: you don't deal with people thinking you are an ass. You just kind of accept it and shrug and laugh it off when they react angrily towards you. Give them no reaction, nothing to work with. Grey rock them. It's the best way to get rid of people's attention. Sometimes there will be situations where apologies are necessary and other times not.

As for avoiding internalizing it, it's tough for me to say. Hell I wouldn't be on this forum if I knew how to quit doing that. I prep myself for going outside by doing benzos.

 

[little helpers]

I have very same fears surrounding thought-broadcasting. feeling as if they're judging me down to every thought in my head.

not sure if it helps at all but my go-to is simply telling them to fuck off. like "FUCK OFF". intimidation. I spend more energy on self-preservation than going out my way to educate them for free. that's not my job. "this is my first warning. three strike and you out."

there's no real solutions here, honestly. a "get out of here" works for the immediate situation, but that's also how I lost a lot of friends over the years. well, not that I gotta pick friends out of a trash can in the first place. but when the other person still cares (like they did the worst thing without knowing how much it hurts us), retreating can ultimately result in isolation. so, what I would say is, if they're testing your limits, a "fuck off" serves them well. if they still wants to listen, they can go educate themselves.

there's many ways to say "fuck off". one of my favorites is to meet their eyes and fucking stare back at them. I guess some of this will apply to your situation, but never perfectly, of course.

 

[TheBestUsernameEver]

To reassure you, there is no such thing as "thought broadcasting". People cannot read your thoughts.

What people can read is your facial expressions and body language.

 

[little helpers]

To reassure you, there is no such thing as "thought broadcasting". People cannot read your thoughts.

What people can read is your facial expressions and body language.

just wanna reassure you I'm not picking fights before I proceed to make my point here. I know you said this with good intentions. just hear me out though:

tbh that's not quite the remedy here, if not making someone feel worse. for example, person has Tourrettes. that's very outwardly obvious (and a lot of people would stare even when they know what this is), where the tics constitutes none of the person's body language. or say autistic stimming and facial expressions. this sorta things would be what OP is referring to, I think. being made to appear palatable to others, holding tics and/or masking one's autism, is painfully hurtful, and how discrimination manifests in the first place.

and thought-broadcasting, albeit not real to the other person, is a very real fear for people like me. it's a feeling of being judged down to one's very core, at least in my case. there's a difference between sense of insecurity and straight-out delusions. just hoping you'd understand. the comment is more or less invalidating. but I know you said this with good intentions. you're good.

 

[Julgran]

I don't have this kind of problem myself, but I have had something similar before. What helped me was to observe how people treated other people? I mean, if you are worried about what people think of you and think that other people look at you in a strange way, you will eventually see that those same people look at other people the same way, which means that you don't have to care about what other people think.

I know that it's a tough situation - this is just my input.

 

[Sherri]

Most see us as weak, lazy , drama queens/kings. They don't know we are the opposite that we fight everyday to stay alive and fight this illness, That alone makes us stronger than most of them, cause some of them never reached rock bottom or be in our shoes.

 

[Sanva]

I'm autistic and people often think I'm being rude or just overall weird which causes them to treat me like shit. I've considered ordering one of those shirts that say "Please be patient, I'm autistic". Feels like people might be more understanding because while it's still perfectly acceptable to treat anyone who isn't like them like shit, treating disabled people like shit is becoming more and more frowned upon. in a way, i always feel like i need to justify myself. then again, people might also be assholes about that so i don't know. I'm sorry for what you're going through. Nobody deserves to be treated that way.

 

[Mixo]

I have a multitude of invisible, hidden illnesses that are physical and I can understand where you're coming from. It is very hard for me when I have to face NHS doctors because they're so willfully ignorant, rigid, and act like nothing is wrong with me so they can keep their load light and grind you down into submission. The shit they say to you to gaslight you, pathologize you psychologically, and make you feel so small can be unbelievable at times.

But when it comes to people who aren't close to me, I try not to fault them as much because they usually don't know I have chronic physical illnesses. If I'm being honest, I actually try to avoid that self-disclosure because I don't want to be judged or gaslit further, and I know the random average person is just not going to get it. Sometimes saying less is just better, even if you're misunderstood than telling people why you operate the way you do and being invalidated or gaslit. That's just the trade off I make personally because the judgment is just too painful at times, especially when I struggle to function on a daily basis. Overall, I just try to remind myself that people who judge are often just ignorant themselves and detach myself emotionally from their shit judgments that way.

 

[AndrewWood'sDeath]

Man I so sorry so many people have to go through this I fucking hate it. Like I totally feel you it can just make you feel so low down on yourself when you're already losing your shit.

Honestly I don't know how to handle it either I am a dirt poor homeless (not really I live in a fucked up van but they treat me like homeless anyway) depressed trans man with frequent psychosis symptoms and internal organ issues (biliary dyskinesia) at a large fancy university so I apparently act pretty fucking weird. I do try to dress nice (thrift stores sell a lot of fancy dead white mens clothing) so I don't look so poor. According to my sister I look like I just did a line of coke about 80% of the time and like I am catatonic the other 20...IDFK. People kind of treat me like shit tbh. I always try and justify it to myself and stuff like "well I'm sure my shaking is quite distracting during an exam so its not his fault he scolded me" "Well neither the girls nor boys want me in their bathroom but its not their fault they are just confused" "I am sure I looked shady maybe I was looking around fast or freezing up thats why the cops bothered me even though I didn't do anything" etc. but really I don't often believe all that. I am so furious and so heartbroken that I am shamed and mocked for things that already cause me suffering. I am just so ashamed of mankind and of myself. I just don't talk to anyone, I always wear headphones (the sound of overlapping voices drives me mad and I don't want to hear the things people say about me), I try not to make eye contact with anyone, and I don't ask for help with anything no matter how hard the delusions and terror make things because I've learned that I will be judged and turned away so I'd rather save myself the extra embarrassment and tears and just keep my head down. Also at this point I am so terrified and frustrated going to class the only way I can make myself do it is liquor in my coffee.

That being said not everyone is terrible. At my old school there were many people who were really nice and supportive without ever questioning what my deal was. My lab partner in physics would mess with me and erase my backwards letters and fix them but like in a friendly way, instead of making me feel stupid he made it into a something funny, and one time he literally just pushed a white board in front of me when the professor came around because I had randomly started crying. Never even asked about it, just asked if I was good and we moved on. A few other kids were pretty nice and supportive and didn't care how much I shook or all my backwards jumbled letters and the freezing/spacing and the professors just cared whether my work was good and not much else. There were definitely some people who were less than kind but nothing like the school I'm in now.

I really hope you can stay strong and we can both try to remember that these people are in no place and have no right to jusdge your value as a human. You are you and you are doing the best you can. < 3

TLDR: I don't know mate this shit sucks *hugs* stay strong