If someone asks a deeply personal question, they really shouldn’t get upset when they receive an honest answer.

In this story, a college student lives with a visible disability and uses a cane or wheelchair full time. Over the years, he’s gotten used to people asking questions about his condition, even when those questions cross into very personal territory.

Because of that, he’s become fairly direct when people ask why he’s disabled.

Well, during class, someone noticed he was allowed to use his phone despite a no technology policy and asked about it. That conversation eventually led to questions about the student’s disability and why he needed a cane.

After getting the full answer, though, the classmate immediately seemed uncomfortable and accused him of sharing too much information.

Read on to see how it all played out.

AITAH for telling the direct truth when a classmate asked about my disability even though it’s a sensitive topic?

I’m visibly disabled and switch between my cane and wheelchair full-time.

For people who are not visibly disabled, you may be surprised to know how many people ask invasive questions about it. Over time, I have grown more direct and will tell anyone the truth about it.

I’ve been told by others that explaining my story has helped them seek treatment for their mental health and not do what I did. This is part of why I feel comfortable explaining it to people as I like the idea of something positive coming out of my struggles.

The guy regretted asking.

I’m a university student and am at my first semester. I have accommodations in place.

I have a classmate who sits next to me in one of my classes. He asked why I was able to use my phone when the teacher has a no technology policy.

I told him it was an accommodation because I had medical information that I need to access regularly.

He then asked if it had to do with my cane and asked why I needed my cane.

I asked him if he was sure (he said yes) then I told him about what happened. He told me it was a “TMI” and seemed to get very upset with me.

It all seemed very odd to me, but I’ve never been good in social situations so I told one of my friends about it.

Now, his friends have opinions.

She told me that I might come across as too direct about the sensitive topic which can make people uncomfortable. In general my friends all say he was out of line for asking in the first place. However half of them think that I should come up with a different response/decline to answer as the sensitive topic might make people uncomfortable.

I had thought before all of this that if you ask about a sensitive topic then you should be expecting to receive a sensitive answer. I had even asked if he was sure. I have also been given positive feedback previously which made me more comfortable sharing.

Now I’m second guessing myself as there was clearly a negative reaction from my classmate. I don’t want my actions to cause anyone to feel hurt and have been thinking about this for a few days now as I feel guilty.

AITA?

Yikes! Well, he did ask the guy if he was sure.

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Let’s check out how the readers over at Reddit feel about this situation.

This person thinks asking personal questions comes with the risk of getting a very personal answer.

According to this person, he shouldn’t ask in the future.

Well, they asked.

And a valuable lesson it was.

It’s hard to understand what people expect sometimes.

The classmate could have stopped asking questions at any point, but instead kept digging into a very personal topic and then got upset when the answer turned out to be personal too.

Don’t ask questions you don’t actually want the answers to.

And when you think about it, when someone asks about a disability, especially after getting a chance to back out, they shouldn’t act shocked when the answer involves something difficult or sensitive.

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