I experience something similar. I had a stroke, lost a bunch of my vision and a few other things. After "getting my shit together" enough to handle hanging out with friends, I started noticing how they act around me, drunk or not.

People hear the word stroke and think "droopy face, immobile, unable to think clearly, etc. But to look at me you'd have no idea anything was wrong, till you see me moving my eyes all over the place so I can identify object/people in the room. But my speech, communication abilities, personality and intellect all remained intact.

My friends in the beginning were sorta walking around on egg shells around me, till I had to explain it, "look I'm cool, I just can't see". etc etc

Then being around people that DO NOT know me, if it has to come up that I can't see well, (like getting directions in a large building, or finding something in a store), people's reaction towards me changes instantly. I don't mind it, I try to ignore it. I've never experienced "hate crime" type behavior because of my new "disability", but I have noticed that people who know me, know what happened to me, do treat me differently.

It's kinda ironic, I used to work with individuals with disabilities for a living. Mostly pretty low functioning individuals, retardation, autism, blind/deaf guy etc. Anyway the whole point of that job was that we "Support the individual to give them as much independence as they can handle." At the end of the day, that's all people want, is to be considered as "normal" or as viable as everyone else around them.

The only real time I've felt like I'm being judged is when I go into pick up meds. I take xanax, (among other things) for sleep and for anxiety. I get that "hey look another druggie" look when I go in to pick them up. But again, I just ignore it.