FIC: Of Spectrums and Spoons [The Avengers]

[atraphoenix]

Title: Of Spectrums and Spoons
Author: atraphoenix
Fandom: The Avengers
Characters: Natasha Romanoff, Clint Barton, Bruce Banner, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Thor, Nick Fury and Maria Hill
Rating: G
Summary: Natasha had been taught to pretend - to make eye contact and to act and respond just like she was supposed to act and respond - from an early age.

Author'

Comments

[healer_twilight]

This is really awesome. Really, REALLY awesome. I see that you've already recieved bunches of glowing comments from people and several personal stories, so I thought I'd share mine.

Let me start by saying I'm 25 now, and we think I have Aspergers. It's not a formal dignosis, since we don't live in a very well developed area, and haven't been able to actually find a doctor to dignose me, nor could we afford to see one right now anyway. We've done a fair bit of research on our own, though.

For nearly all of my life I've had, shall we say, 'problems' and we (my family and I) had absolutly NO CLUE what the hell was wrong with me... Just that I didn't react like an 'normal' person to certain things, and while perfectly intelligent, was unable to function in certain situations for long. I'd heard of autism of course, but wasn't aware until pretty recently how broad a range of peole it covered.

And actually knowing that, Hey, there are other people out there who can't stop talking one minute, then have to force out words the next, and listen to the same song a thousand times, or just DON"t GET IT when someone says one thing, but really means the opposite. My mother in particular, has trouble understanding why it is that I can read a situatuion in a book and understand with perfect clarity, but when faced with a similar situation in real life be unable to understand a persons physical ques with any regularity (I'm a fairly good guesser, but after a bit most people seem to figure out I'm faking it...) *Shrugs*

Anyway, I wanted to thank you for writing this, and WELL. I saw the prompt when it was first posted, and was half afraid that, if it even got filled at all, it would badly written or clichely stereotyped, or even that it wouldn't be treated as a serious issue and devolve into a crack fic. I was so happy to see it done right.

[ladyicsaylis324]

Hear, Hear. I'm an Aspie myself, and this story struck a chord in me that none of the others managed.

My mother good-naturedly calls me her part-time Aspie, since I'm extremely high functioning even compared to other Aspies (For example, not only do I understand and recognize sarcasm, I am a very fluent speaker.) But that doesn't mean that I'm not still affected by it every day (such as listening to the same song ten million times). The spoon theory might not apply to me (in fact I had to look it up) but my interactons with everyone around me are forever overshadowed by this. I have few friends and a tendency to bury myself in stories. My stepmother still seems to think I'm a bit of an overgrown spoiled brat because--since I live with my mother--she dones't have to deal with me on a regular basis and see just how defined by this I am. I doubt she even bothered with more than a cursory overview of the symptoms.

Knowledge is the only cure for ignorance. When my diagnosis was first tenatively broached, my parents just heard 'autism' and couldn't find someone else fast enough to tell them otherwise. I've been under the labels of ADHD, Depression, and Bipolar before my parents finally swallowed the truth. I will forever wonder what my life would have been like if they had been strong enough to face it sooner.

So thank you. Stereotypes do no one any good, and only cause countless people needless pain. People cannot see the truth if no one tells them the truth, so I applaude all those who can find it in themselves to speak out.