Every spring, Autism Awareness Month puts a familiar hashtag on social feeds, but the real conversation is happening in grocery store parking lots, on playground benches, and outside fitness centers where a stranger’s sharp glance can undo an entire morning’s worth of patient, loving effort.

Meg Raby knows exactly how that feels. She’s a mom, a Speech Language Pathologist in Salt Lake City, and an autistic person herself. She’s also the author of the My Brother Otto series, books designed to help kids understand neurodivergent peers. When she tells you the judgment is relentless, she isn’t exaggerating for effect.

Raby was 23 years old the first time a stranger made her feel the full weight of it. A teenager she was caring for walked outside a Lifetime Fitness, shuffling across the pavement in a way that clearly felt good to his body. He was regulated. He was calm. A woman stopped, looked directly at Raby, and said, “Ick. Aren’t you going to teach him some manners?” The teenager wasn’t hurting anyone. He was just moving in a way that didn’t match her script for normal.

That moment stuck.

Not because it was shocking. Because it wasn’t.

Parents and caregivers of autistic kids describe a world that wasn’t built with their children in mind, and the exhaustion of navigating that gap every single day. Somewhere along the way, a very narrow checklist became the definition of “good.” Eye contact. Quick verbal responses. The right tone, the right distance, the right kind of play. Step outside that checklist and you’re labeled rude, difficult, or a problem to be corrected.

As Scary Mommy covered in a recent piece on autism and public judgment, the gap between what an autistic child is doing and what observers assume about that child can be enormous. A kid who doesn’t make eye contact isn’t being disrespectful. A child who shuffles, flaps, or hums isn’t misbehaving. Their nervous systems are working hard, often in a sensory environment that asks far more of them than it does of neurotypical kids the same age.

Raby makes one point that deserves to land somewhere quiet and stay there: autistic doesn’t mean unaware. That teenager outside the fitness center understood exactly what the woman’s tone meant. He didn’t need words to read the room. He didn’t need eye contact to feel her disapproval.

Nonspeaking doesn’t mean unknowing.

Kids carry those moments. Parents carry them too. When a stranger scoffs at your child in the cereal aisle or shoots you a pointed look at the park, you walk away feeling like you’re failing at something you’ve already given everything to. The Autism Society of America has long documented the isolation families experience, and it doesn’t start with formal systems or clinical settings. It starts with small daily moments of public judgment that add up to something crushing.

What makes Raby’s perspective worth sitting with is that she isn’t asking for special treatment. She’s asking for basic curiosity. There’s a real difference between a child who’s been poorly guided and a child whose brain processes sensation, communication, and social cues differently. Before you form a conclusion about a kid you’ve watched for thirty seconds, consider whether you actually have enough information to judge anyone.

Your family will almost certainly encounter a child at a birthday party, a school event, or a neighborhood barbecue this spring who seems to be on a different frequency. Maybe they don’t respond when you say hello. Maybe they need to move their body in ways that look unexpected. Maybe they get loud at exactly the wrong moment.

Don’t fix them. Don’t give their parent a look.

Ask yourself what you don’t know yet.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 1 in 36 children in the United States is identified as autistic. That number means autistic kids are already part of your neighborhood, your child’s classroom, your church, and your local Little League team. They’re not outliers. They’re neighbors.

Raby puts it plainly: the goal was never to be “less autistic.” The goal is safety, belonging, and understanding. Not better kids. Better neighbors.

That’s something every suburb can get right.