There needs to be more talk about the way autistic people can respond to pain differently.
I get sick, I injure myself, I feel pain, and I do not like it. But you can't see that by just looking at me a lot of the time. I almost never cry or make any sort of pain vocalizations. When I am sick I almost never "act sick", I will act as I normally do, only I sleep sooner and wear a mask/wash hands often when around people.
This is true even for severe pain and illnesses that I gather would have most people bedridden and moaning, such as rib fractures and influenza. Both of which I have just walked around with, "as if nothing was wrong", as put by my roommate.
This is the main reason for my medical neglect as a child. It never "looked like" I was in enough pain to be taken seriously. And if I attempted to perform pain, it looked like I was doing a terrible job at faking.
I have had to walk over a mile home with a dislocated kneecap because adults did not believe I was injured. I still have issues with that knee to this day. A doctor never even saw it because my parents didn't even want to see it, and didn't believe me, because I wasn't crying.
This is not the only case of this happening, it was such a common theme during my childhood that I stopped going to my parents when I was hurt or ill. I started going to my teachers instead, which caused CPS to be called. Nothing came of it, other than my parents getting angry with me for "lying about them", so I stopped going to my teachers for help too. And I learned to ignore every injury and illness I got until I moved out.
I was unable to express when I needed help, so I never got it.
