For a long time, whenever I was failed by a system in supporting my needs, I internalised it as proof that something was wrong with me. These weren’t isolated incidents but a pattern that reinforced itself over decades. Here’s how that happened.

Primary school

Before I entered primary school, my mother tried to inform the principal about my selective mutism, and printed out information on selective mutism to pass to my teachers. The principal decided not to inform my teachers about it, because she thought that if I was treated the same as everyone else, I would get over my selective mutism. She was very wrong. I got heavily bullied by both students and teachers.

I was seen as “less trustworthy” than my non-disabled peers because of the way I communicated. One time, I tried to tell my teacher about a bully, but that bully denied doing anything to me. My teacher instantly took my bully’s side without any further questions.

I was also vulnerable to having narratives constructed about me that I couldn’t challenge. If others spoke negatively about me, I wasn’t able to defend myself verbally. This taught me that I had to do everything I could to please people so they wouldn’t turn others against me.

Therapy

I had bad experiences with therapy growing up. It was impossible to find neurodiversity-affirming resources and support in Singapore when I was younger (not that there’s much improvement today). Many therapists treated my selective mutism simply as an anxiety disorder without addressing the underlying trauma that caused it in the first place.

I had cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) as a teen. During a session, when I told my therapist that I wasn’t sure how to do a CBT exercise, she responded in an annoyed tone, “Didn’t I already show you last time?” Once I sensed her annoyance, I turned into a total people-pleaser, which became my pattern with all therapists. I would say whatever I thought therapists wanted to hear instead of how I truly felt. Therapy ended up being completely ineffective for me as a result. Talk therapy also wasn’t ideal for me as a semi-speaking Autistic who finds talking exhausting.

Back then, when therapies didn’t work out for me, I thought that must mean I wasn’t working hard enough or there was something inherently wrong with me.

Secondary school

In my previous post, I mentioned I was in the Normal (Academic) stream¹ in secondary school. There’s more to that story. In fact, I was originally in the Express stream for my first two years of secondary school. Some of my classmates in the Express stream were in disbelief that I could even get into that stream!

I struggled with undiagnosed depression during those first two years, which greatly affected my school grades. I consistently had the lowest grades in my whole cohort. Instead of receiving adequate support for my mental health, I was often sent to detention. Adults around me thought I was just a lazy student who needed to be disciplined. In reality, I was trying the best I could while struggling with issues I didn’t understand (I wasn’t diagnosed with autism yet). By the end of my second year, I was transferred to the Normal (Academic) stream.

Because of the lack of support and understanding I received in school, and people constantly underestimating my intelligence, I developed deep insecurities about my intelligence and capabilities.

Polytechnic

I enrolled in a graphic design course for polytechnic². After being accepted into the course, I had to go for a health checkup before entering polytechnic. When the doctor saw the way I spoke (I speak in a very soft whisper), he thought I wasn’t fit for the graphic design course. I had to get a letter from a psychologist to prove otherwise.

This and other similar experiences showed me that I had to constantly jump through hoops to prove my competence before I was allowed to do anything I wanted. My disability meant I was automatically assumed to be incapable until proven otherwise.

Job training programme

After graduating from polytechnic, I was encouraged by a family friend to join a job training programme for Autistic people. It was a deeply dehumanising experience. They discouraged me from pursuing graphic design as a career and placed me in an office clerk job (it was either that or a cleaning job). Job coaches monitored my behaviour at work all day, and deferred to my parents to make decisions for me even though I was already an adult.

The whole experience completely decimated my self-esteem. It made me feel as if being myself was wrong and that I was incapable of making the right decisions for myself.

My privileges

While these systemic inequities shaped my internalised ableism, I recognise my experience would have been even harder without certain privileges:

• Being Chinese in Singapore (the racial majority here)
• Living comfortably in a middle-class household
• Having supportive parents

All of these cushioned some of the impact. But despite these advantages, I still internalised so much ableism. My experience shows that even supportive families can’t fully protect disabled individuals from systemic failures. For disabled people without these privileges, the weight of systemic inequities can be even more crushing.