PSINKTOBER_DAY23

Prompt: Rusty

The obvious response is “well, dementia’s different than what you talk about,” in response to which I’ll just say that we play this balancing game between “respecting the disorder” and “respecting the autonomous adult” all the time, even in less serious cases than dementia (or cases that aren’t even illness):

“Some people you can tell are just far enough on the spectrum there’s no point”—say that to his face.

“He was really depressed after you left”—did you ask him?

“She’s a classic narcissist, and we’re just done talking to her”—and again, as in the comic, I can’t argue, because she is, and she won’t listen to anyone who says otherwise.