(I’m working my first real back of house restaurant job, and due to a scheduling error, I was scheduled to open and run the salad, dessert, and fry station alone on my second day on a busy weekend. During my interview, I disclosed I have very severe social anxiety and other neurological issues and therefor go nonverbal, meaning I physically can’t speak if I am under stress. Today is one of those days.)

Head chef, looking directly at me: She’s a little slow, but I think she’s doing good.
Sous chef: Yeah, for her second day she’s handling it fine.
(I realize they are talking about me, three feet away from me, while looking directly at me.)
Head chef: Has she got her station set up?
Sous chef: She’s working on her shredded lettuce and she’s gotta do onion straws next, but after that she’ll be fine.
(Note: I don’t have headphones in or anything like that. I also never claimed to be deaf, or blind for that matter, considering they are standing directly in front of me. They continued to talk about me for about 3 minutes without ever actually addressing me and acting like I wasn’t actually there. It was incredibly weird and kind of dehumanizing. I still don’t understand what they were thinking.)

Bonus:
line cook: I heard its your birthday soon!
Me: *Nods*
line cook: (laughs) So you’ll be a next level of r*tarded?
Me: [would’ve been speechless if I wasn’t already speechless]

(I completely understand that the back of house is known for having rough and rude humor, and I usually like it, but that’s such an insane thing to say to someone you’ve known for 2 hours who you know struggles with cognitive deficits.)

I’ve been with the company 15 years, straight out of school i joined without the greatest grades and It took a lot of hard work, night school and dedication but I’m now a recognised senior engineer. (Normally needing a degree in this company. )

Because I came in to the company at a young age, I am often asked to help the apprentices acclimatise, be a bit of a friendly face that they can recognise and ask any questions. Its a great opportunity and the company puts in a lot of time effort and money to get these guys through.

I’ve been asked to speak with one of the ex apprentices, which is odd. He should be settled by now, I recognise the name as one of the less ambitious ones , who had a bit of an attitude. They want me to chat with him as he is circling the drain and will soon be kicked out of the company.

Me: hey James, how is it going?

James: oh its you.

Me: well, you remember me at least. I hear you’ve been struggling a bit, is that right?

James: no I’m not struggling, just don’t see the point.

Me: what do you mean?

James: minimum effort for minimum wage innit.

Me: ….your pay goes up, the more of your studies you sign off. Are you struggling with the work?

James: that crap, why should I have to do all that paperwork?

Me: well, finish the paperwork and you get a qualification that you can take anywhere, and the money side of things.

James : don’t see the point.

(I try to talk to him, but he seems stuck to the idea of doing as little as possible and not very well. I gently point out that he isn’t doing the apprenticeship the company is paying him to do, there would be others that would bite his hand off.
But its no use, eventually he is taken off the course and put on cleaning duties, which he complains about and from what i hear did a lousy job of too. He leaves or gets fired not long after.

I have 2 cats, Aly and Pounce, and 1 dog named Beka. I recently moved, so I was getting my pets set up with the vet. They all needed to get updated on their shots. Due to the plague, the vet isn’t letting owners into the exam room. They just take your pet back and then call you when they are done. Sadly, I wasn’t able to all get them appointments on the same day. But after each appointment, I asked how they did.
(Ali’s appointment)
Vet: Oh, she was really nervous. But she is so sweet. We were able to get everything done with no issues.
(Beka’s Appointment)
Vet: She is such a smart puppy. We had to distract her with a treat to get the shots done, but she did really well.
(Pounce’s Appointment)
Vet: Well, no one got injured and he got his shots.

Years ago, when my wife and I were still boyfriend and girlfriend, we were making arrangements to start living together. I move in with her, yet her appartment is very small, which requires sacrifices on both sides. I have to get rid of almost all of my furniture. She, on the other hand, donates many old clothes. They didn’t fit anymore, but she hadn’t been ready to throw them out yet, which I respect.

Months later, I have moved in. We visit my parents for a birthday. My uncle and his wife are there too. She’s well meaning, but a little outspoken. A little far too much…

My wife: ‘Yes, it was quite a move. We had to get rid of lots of stuff. I donated bags of clothing. I didn’t fit them anymore, anyway. So that’s a good motivation to get rid of them.’

Aunt: ‘Or a good motivation for losing weight!’

Not very subtle. However, a year before, she behaved even worse to me.

Aunt: ‘Want kind of job does [my wife] have?’

Me: ‘Oh, none. She’s always tired.’

Aunt: ‘Well, people should not keep in the mindset of “Oh, I’m so tired”, because then it will never get better.”

Me: ‘Well, it might never get better, since it’s chronic.’

Aunt: ‘Yeah, yeah, but if you keep being like ‘Oh, I’m so tired’ it won’t get better.’

What part of “chronic” is so hard to understand? I absolutely hate it when people say “but” and then just repeat the statement you invalidated. It shows a complete lack of attention to what the other party says.

I have a slight problem that many around me suspect is a mild form of dyscalculia. For me this means I have trouble reading, copying and writing large numbers. One of my recurring nightmares for example is being unable to correctly dial a number on my phone, even if it’s my ridiculously easy home phone number or even 112 (our emergency services number). Apart from that I often make mistakes in even the silliest of calculations, without realizing it and I have a different way of doing maths in general.
As this is not a well known problem, I often find there is a general lack of understanding when it comes to the problems and the solutions I found myself. Below are a couple of the situations I’ve run into.

Before the current crisis I loved to travel. I did need assistance and for that I often needed to call to arrange this. At one point, I’m calling a train company and they ask for my reservation number, which is more than 10 numbers long. The way I read these long numbers is that a. if it’s on paper I draw lines after every pair of numbers or b. if it’s on a computer I copy the number into a word document and put a few spaces after every pair. This way the numbers don’t start dancing in front of my eyes. In this case, I start reading out the number in my usual way, in pairs. After doing this for 2 pairs, the person on the other side snootily tells me that ‘they can handle more than that at once’. I immediately responded that I could not due to a disability. This was followed by a most awkward silence, after which I was allowed to continue with my reading.

When I did math in school, I used to be very meticulous. I mean I would write out every step in a calculation. This to the frustration of one particular teacher who said that I could put x, y and z in one step easily. I explained that that wouldn’t work for me, but he never understood and kept grumbling about it. It never affected my grades nor did it affect the way I did calculations, but still it feels to me like a teacher shouldn’t have done that.

The last incident is for me the most annoying. I’ve been without a job for quite a while. In fact, I never really had a job. I’ve been with this particular job coach for a while. At one point she had it in her head that I was perfect for administration. She showed me an opening at a job where I had to do parts of the financial administration. Now can anyone see the problem there? That is exactly the kind of setting my problems would be more problematic than most.