Shona Davison, an autistic woman herself, wrote "Why I Do Not Hate Autism" for the site Thinking Person's Guide to Autism to explain her experiences living with autism and the feelings that she has and believes that others should as well. This site was created with the mission of being a source of carefully curated and evidence-based information for and from autistic people, parents, and professionals. The blog, in particular, features content from autism seminars, books, and scientific studies. In this particular article, this author writes about the comments she saw under a post in a Facebook support group specifically for autistic people. The thread started from a person expressing their hatred for autism; the comments section was a continuation of that thought, mostly with expressions of how difficult life is. Davison says, "If we blame autism, which is an integral part of us, the consequence is that we try to change ourselves for a better life." In her opinion, the blame for most of the challenges they face is on their environments. She claims that she had more success improving her own life once she stopped focusing so much on trying to change herself and instead, focused on changing her surroundings. Changing the immediate environment will help the autistic person in your life, whether it be you or your child, grow and do "better" personally. She ended her piece with a phrase she saw on Twitter that says, "We don't grow out of autism, we grow into it."
