this post was submitted on 15 Mar 2026
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Aah so you're upset that you're not called "extra special", got it.
A person with cancer has an illness. Someone with autism is neurodivergent. Just how words work. Some are specific and others are broader. Water is a liquid. But not all liquids are water. Spaghetti is pasta, but not all pasta is spaghetti. Autism is part of neurodivergence, but not all neurodivergence is autism.
Also neurodevelopmental issues are part of neurology. Listing those two side by side is like saying "today I drank liquids, then I drank water, then I had pasta and some spaghetti."
I prefer to be called disabled or neurodisabled, rather than neurodivergent. "Neurodivergent" doesn't actually communicate jack shit because there are so many people who say they aren't disabled but identify as neurodivergent. Also, like I said, people will also just assume I'm autistic, which isn't what I want.
While my autism sucks, it isn't my most severe condition. Nobody really cares about the neurodivergent movement if autism isn't the main character in absolutely everything. Sometimes, it feels like my autism is all anybody really cares about.
If I show symptoms of my other conditions, I'm suddenly "too much."
Neurodisabled would be a different category all together. Many forms of neurodivergency aren't disabilities, or aren't always disabilities. Autism is one of these. It can be a disability, but it's a broad enough spectrum that sometimes it isn't a disability.
You can prefer being called whatever. It won't change medical or syntactical facts. But yeah, clearly I was right that you hate that others are being called "special" and you need to be "extra special."
Yeah, ppl are fucking stupid. Just like you are.
"Uh, I'll have a plate of spaghetti and pasta pls."
I can promise you I have more illnesses, both mental and physical than you, and while the doctors aren't even doing what my country's laws require of them, nor being even semi-fucking literate most times, I don't go crying about how I'm not being called extra special and how I disagree with well established semantics.
"I'm not eating noodles and I hate how people assume I'm eating spaghetti when I'm actually eating farfalle."
Have you ever heard of farfalle? Would you get mad at someone who referred to a dish with farfalle as "pasta" or "plate of noodles"? Because that's exactly what you're complaining about.
I like more specific terms instead of vague terms is my thing. Spaghetti isn't nearly as vague as neurodivergent is. There's also a lot of debate about what conditions even count as neurodivergent. I've seen someone argue that having a perfect memory is neurodivergent by itself, which tells me how very vague this term is.
It isn't about being special; it's about having accurate language that isn't dreadfully vague. I've met other people who've run into similar issues as me. Saying that I'm neurodivergent would be like saying, "I'm eating dough tonight," and it's actually a plate of lasagna. That's how vague this term is. Pasta is technically dough, but no one will know what the hell you mean if you tell somebody that you're eating dough.
"I can promise you I have more illnesses, both mental and physical than you," you sound like the one making this a "special" competition now. You're also very aggressive, which isn't helping your argument at all. Not once have I called you any names, yet you insist on resorting to name-calling a stranger.
And why should hundreds of years of established medical literature give a flying fuck what your preference is when your use of the words is 1) prescriptively wrong and 2) very much a personal preference that you personally have?
Again, the language isn't vague. You just don't know how to use it.
You literally said "neurology ans neurodevelopmental disorders are different categories". Which is as silly as saying "spaghetti and pasta are different foods".
And you think that medical literature is wrong.
God if I had one fking euro everytime I hear idiots complaining about things they're wrong about, I'd be so grossly rich.
See, again. You're simply not using those correctly. YOU being illiterate doesn't mean medical literature is stupid just because YOU have misunderstood it and misuse it.
Fking sake. Dough is not pasta. Even pasta-dough is not pasta, it's pasta-dough. That's different. But spaghetti, macaroni, farfalle, penne, etc ARE all pasta and claiming theyre "different categories of food" would be immensely moronic.
No, it isn't, just like a car isn't metal. It's MADE from metal.
You're really having trouble with categories. Definitely neurodevelopmental disorders yeah, WHICH ARE PART OF NEUROLOGY.
If I was competing, sure. And I'd win out fucking right. I'm so sick of morons like you pretending they're better than the still stupid doctors who do make mistakes. But not mistakes as stupid and as clearly wrong as you do.
You don't understand the word "insist" either it seems.
Yes, I do understand what the word "insist" means. You literally did insist on insulting me. Plus, insisting that you have more illnesses than I do without knowing my story is very much one-upping someone and trying to make yourself seem seem extra special.
I get that English isn't your first language, but it is a normal thing to say, "You insist on doing XYZ" after you've done XYZ. You're continuing to insult me, which only concludes my point that you insist on insulting me. This is literally part of normal English grammar, but I'll give you a pass since it isn't your first language.
"And I'd win." You're proving my point. You lose all credibility when you one-up someone in an argument. Sorry, you automatically lose when you one-up someone.
Also, "neurodivergent" isn't even a real medical term. Literally anyone and their grandma could identify as neurodivergent be there is no set medical usage for it. This term was literally only invented in the 1990s by an autism activist. You know that, right? It wasn't some professional doctor who diagnoses autism who created this term.
In terms of cars, you could technically say,
"I'm using a metallic machine," and still be technically correct. So really, my point isn't proven wrong about vagueness.
There are also multiple types of neurological conditions; neurodevelopmental conditions are neurological, but not all neurological conditions are neurodevelopmental. What you are doing is the equivalent of telling someone that it's wrong to mention both squares and rectangles in the same sentence, when not all rectangles are squares.
I really think you should learn a bit more English before correcting someone else's.
Literally after "Yes, I do understand what the word "insist" means "
Clearly you don't understand it, which makes you complaining about the language use of others even more ironic.
Just because I'm doing something doesn't mean I "insist" on it.
I really hope English isn't your first language, because your use of language is so horribly wrong that I hope you have a better one to spare.
Not every turn of phrase is metaphor. If I said "you're as busy as a bee", that wouldn't be taken literally, as it's clearly metaphor. Saying someone is literally insisting on something means that you think they are LITERALLY INSISTING.
Yes, "literally" can be used as emphasis, but especially in a thread where you're complaining that doctors use the wrong prescriptive language, saying that your language is all metaphor is ridiculous.
I haven't even attempted to insult you. No, you've just taken offense at me calling you out on being wrong. And because you take subjective offense at something, you can't distinguish it from someone who actually is very much attempting to insult someone, let alone "insisting" on it.
"I don't understand etymology and how words are coined in medicine"
Yes we can all very clearly see that.
https://journals.sagepub.com/overview-metric/NDY
"hurr durr neurodiversity isn't a REAL word"
There's literally a medical journal with the title "Neurodiversity". To argue its "not a real medical term" is utterly fucking ridiculous.
Do you perhaps mean "neurodivergence isn't an official diagnosis"? Because "being a real word" and "being an official diagnosis" are two quite different things.. Even more different than dough and bread.
Do you have any idea how many new medical terms there have been in nigh 40 years? "It wasn't some professional doctor" (as opposed to a hobbyist doctor?) who diagnoses autism who created the term."
I hope English isn't your first language, but the word youre looking for is "coined", not "created". Seem to be having a little challenges with language. Sure you're not autistic?
Oh how weird you didn't write "a metal machine" isn't it? Or just "honey where are the keys to the metal, I'm going shopping." or "oh give me some of that dough I'll put it in the toaster".
You just can't accept you have problems with categories and you made a language booboo by claiming neurodevelopmental disorders are a different category than neurology.
Yeah and they're all a part of neurology.
Saying "broken bones and orthopedics are completely different categories" would be equally stupid as your statement.
Or saying "well I love spaghetti but it's a totally different category from pasta and I hate if people call my spaghetti pasta".
No, it isn't. You're saying "rectangles and squares are wholly different CATEGORIES." I know you're so neurodisabled that clearly language doesn't come easy to you, but surely even you understand that a category isn't one specific thing. It's a category of things.
Just like the category of rectangles includes squares, the category of neurology encompasses all neurodevelopmental disorders.
What you're doing is saying "squares don't belong in the category of rectangles", which is just fucking wrong.
You also used the wrong form of the word "you're." I have a neurological condition that isn't neurodevelopmental, therefore mentioning both neurodevelopmental and neurological conditions in the same sentence makes perfect sense. I thought you would've understood the hint by now, but apparently not.
Again, using the word "insist" the way I did was correct. English isn't your first language, yet you refuse to understand when a native English speaker is informing you of a clear language barrier. Here's an example provided by a dictionary website,
"Why did he insist on showing up when she was alone?"
Another one would be,
"Do you want to go to the store?"
"If you insist."
Or why did you insist on directly insulting me when I hadn't done so to you? The way I used this word is very similar to these examples.
"I know you're so neurodisabled that language doesn't come easily to you." Whoopsie daises, that's extremely ableist of you. You're going for extremely low blows when I'm objectively just criticising the things you've written. First, you call me stupid, and now you're basically politely calling me rtrded. Nice to know how much you actually support disabled people.
Sure, it's a term used in medical journals, but that doesn't make it a diagnostic term. When I say medical, I mean in a diagnostic sense. The point of going to a hospital for most cases is for receiving medical care, which mostly consists of receiving medical diagnoses beforehand. Absolutely zero diagnoses require the usage of the word "neurodivergent" in their symptoms. It's an entirely optional word and I've never heard someone use that word when giving me any of my diagnoses.
Yeah, yeah, coined vs created. You literally coin words by creating a new term based on old prefixes, roots, and suffixes. To say that a word is created is still accurate because you're still creating a term that never previously existed by mashing prefixes, roots, and suffixes together.
This brings me to another point; people sometimes use the word "neurodivergent" as a dogwhistle. It has been sometimes used to indicate that someone is "one of the good ones" and not like those "disabled guys." I've seen people use it in a similar manner to how people use the word "Asperger's."
If you qualify for a diagnosis that is categorised as a disability, you are disabled. Autism and ADHD, are by definition, disabling. People forget that it's possible to be mildly disabled.