The Benefits of Neurodivergent Counselling for Neurodivergent Clients

Before March 2021 I was a neurotypical Psychotherapist. I say this because at this time I didn’t know I was autistic and ADHD.

This article aims to explain how different my work is with clients now and how important - I believe - the benefits can be of seeing a neurodivergent Counsellor, Coach or Mentor for people who are neuro different. I talk about my journey too.?This piece can be useful to anyone in the Neurodiversity and Mental Health field and indeed anyone who has an active interest.

For many people COVID was the sea change.?It was in lockdown that thoughts arose when working from home, feeling trapped and maybe having more time to think bringing about a new awareness that the people they always thought they were actually quite different.

There were already seeds of interest in autism, which stemmed from the fact that I had recently started seeing clients with an array of dissociation/shutdown/burnout and meltdown symptoms, which I hadn’t come across before. I started researching the subject in earnest and, along the way, came across a book by Jenara Nerenberg called Divergent Mind. I listened to an audio version of the book, which identifies the largely unrecognised experiences of neurodivergent women and the struggles they face to fit with our majority neurotypical world. It blew my mind. Seriously I cried through the first two chapters and stayed in bed listening to the whole book until it was finished.?

I realised that I showed almost every trait that was being described. I am highly sensitive to light, sound, nature, touch, smell, music, love, communicating with people who don’t understand me/or I them, my environment, animals, the weather and food – all of which can create a plethora of mental and physical feelings which I shall come on to.

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Could it be possible that I was autistic? At the time, it was too difficult to get my head around this possibility and I certainly empathise with others in a similar situation, who are now increasingly becoming my clients.?(If I had known before what I know now, I could have given extra support to many more clients over the years). I needed to know what was happening with me and, as I couldn’t bear to languish on an NHS waiting list for upwards of three years, I paid for an assessment privately. The ￡1000 cost was my hard-earned savings gone. The two neurotypical psychologists who interviewed me for the assessment were pleasant and seemed to ask all the right questions. I had already completed questionnaires devised by psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen, director of the Cambridge Autism Research Centre, and his colleagues. I found these extremely difficult to complete because I felt as though I could have answered many of the questions in different ways. I also couldn’t answer the questions about my childhood experiences which the assessors asked me for because I had no one to check back with.?My mother was nearing the end of her life and had cognitive issues and I couldn’t find my school reports which were somewhere under a mound of boxes and have turned out to be very revealing now that I have seen them.?My main group of friends appeared from age sixteen and Psychologists need information from age twelve and below. There was no one else to ask.?My own memory is full of holes which I now understand is common for ADHD people.

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A month later my report came through and I found I had scored very highly for ADHD but not for autism. My eye contact and communication skills were too strong to be compatible with a diagnosis of autism, I was told and I didn’t have enough information from my childhood to allow identification of certain other autistic traits from the pathologised assessing tools currently in use. Verdict - autistic traits (means nothing) and childhood trauma.?One is either autistic or not in my book and I have no knowledge of childhood trauma so don’t know where they got that from?

I wasn’t satisfied with the report as, by this time, I had spent many hours in research, reading books and articles, watching videos, listening to podcasts, and attending conferences, and was convinced that I was on the autistic spectrum.?More importantly I was actively talking to neurodivergent people and have since gone on to launching my Neurodivergence and Mental Health Podcast having now interviewed nineteen superb guests.?This has been the best form of research I could possibly have wished for.

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I was recommended to approach Sarah Hendrickx, an independent autism specialist who is highly respected in the autistic community. She has carried out 800 assessments over 10 years and is autistic herself. The process was much more comprehensive, requiring me to complete 20 pages of information and undergo a two-hour online assessment. The result: I am autistic. Sarah told me that, if I were to go on medication for ADHD, it is likely that my ADHD traits would subside and my autistic ones appear more obvious. I had experienced decades of masking and doing my best job of fitting into society, so I suppose it was understandable that I was difficult to diagnose.?Masking is when a person camouflages their true personality in order to fit in with society’s idea of what is normal and is an exhausting necessity for many neurodivergent people, especially females.?Sarah’s assessment cost ￡700. All that money spent on diagnosis wiped me out financially. And the whole process wiped me out emotionally. It was extremely stressful and occurred at a time when my mother was in hospital for weeks with a serious illness. At that point I experienced what I recognised for the first time as autistic burnout.?

Autistic burnout affects people in different ways.?For me I became non-verbal and would spend hours sitting in one place unable to move or do activities.?I had brain fog and kept forgetting what I had just thought, why I had gone into another room and became more clumsy. Complete quiet and being on my own was essential and I wrapped myself up in my fluffy black blanket sucking my thumb, which is my favourite stim.?I do this when I concentrate, relax and just because it feels comforting.?I had only five clients at this point and continued to see them as work felt like my saving grace and did not suffer. Indeed, I felt that I was giving even better support, as my work was all that I could focus on properly.?Self-care included watching horror films while eating ice cream and knitting, taking baths, napping and generally resting.?It took three weeks to work through this burnout.

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I went through a period of grief and identity confusion. Grief for the person who had lived all these years believing myself to be mentally ill when I was just wired differently and confusion because I realised I was actually a very different person than the one I thought I was.?I wonder what my life may have been like if I had had the support I definitely needed when I was young? Perhaps I would not have been gaslighted, bullied, taken advantage of and made to feel stupid. Maybe I could have achieved more in my educational settings and gone on to university.?What had made me stressed and low in the past was my inability to communicate in the way neurotypical people do. One of many paradoxes is that I can stand up in front of hundreds of people and talk for an hour on my special interest. I can negotiate complicated sales and I am ace at interviews – because I am in control and I have planned what I will say, how I will look and how I will behave.??When I am put on the spot or I don’t understand context or intention or I perceive that someone has used provocative language or have been unfair I will react in a way that looks weird and inappropriate to ‘normal’ people.???I was having difficulties with executive function, being highly impulsive and under-stimulated?(boredom is my kryptonite) and suffering emotional de-regulation.?One minute I would be hyper-focused with my attention to detail and it would be difficult to budge me; the next I would be poleaxed on the sofa.

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I had been living in a world that just wasn’t made for me and I felt as if I didn’t belong. I was an alien.?Sometimes it was as if I was on a bullet train that couldn’t stop at stations, as it was going so fast. At other times I felt that I was in a bubble with the world going on around me, and on occasion I felt invalid, misunderstood and disliked. I know now that I was often in a dissociated state. As is the case for many neurodivergent people, school was painful and I didn’t do well with auditory processing issues.?I couldn’t understand multiple instructions. Written maths might as well have been in Russion.?I was good at remembering strings of information but my comprehension and grammar was poor. Creative writing was excellent. It was more the fact that I would zone out to what the teacher said if it was boring and if they went on to the next bit before I had processed the first bit, I was completely stuck. Teachers used to get so frustrated with me for constantly asking questions.?I still do this until I understand the meaning. Annoying for others. Essential for me.?I would daydream looking out of the window one minute and fidget as though I had ants in my pants the next. I was bullied and people took advantage of me.?I used to flit around from group to group, not being allowed to join in.?On the rare occasion I was allowed in I would interrupt, try to take over and be generally bossy and I would pick up and drop friends daily.?On the other hand I was a clown and would have kids in fits of laughter. Great for the novelty but not enough to be accepted.??

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At 14, I became a rebel and, by 15, I was very independent and wanted to earn money. My parents took me out of my rough secondary school and put me in a small private girls school, having to repeat the year. I behaved in exactly the same way.?Poor parents.?I embarked on the first of the 23 jobs that I was to start, fail or just get bored and move on from. However, I didn’t feel like a failure. When I lost one job, I swore under my breath, brushed myself down and began another. After 35 years in the workforce I can honestly say that I have a varied skillset, which includes being a published author, taxi company owner, consultant, sales manager for exhibitions and advertising, public speaker, retail manager, leaflet distributer, market stall trader, chef, host of a supper club and more – latterly, hypnotherapist and HG practitioner. I’ve been told on a number of occasions that I am highly resilient. It was certainly true that adversity made me stronger.

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My mother came out of hospital and I, too, recovered. I made the decision to specialise and promote myself as a neurodivergent psychotherapist and mentor, supporting neurodivergent clients. I updated my profiles on therapy directories and my website and started up a podcast interviewing guests about their neurodivergences and emotional wellbeing. LinkedIn has proved to be an excellent platform for writing articles and sharing resources. You can even find me on TikTok!

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I made it my business to find out everything I could to understand and help myself and my clients. During the run-up to my assessment and while waiting for my diagnoses, I enlisted the support of an autistic counsellor and coach to hold my hand and support me on my journey of discovery. She was probably, for me, the best therapist I have seen, and I have seen a few. Because this is the thing. A neurotypical therapist can be highly academic, have many letters after their name, attend lots of courses and read many books, but how they are in front of neurodivergent clients is quite another matter. My autistic counsellor ‘got me’ straight away. I felt validated, listened to and relieved. As a neurodivergent counselor she recognized the traits, feelings and complexity of how I experienced my world because she experienced many of the same things.?She also had completed many hours of research and training in the areas of autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, OCD, and the many other spectrums of neurodiversity?When I was in front of a neurotypical therapist I felt I was being asked to change who I was. It felt like the work revolved around textbook stress, anxiety and depression instead of the complex nature of what it is to be wired differently. It wasn’t about reliving events from my childhood or the CBT way changing the way I thought.?Being educated in this field means better understanding of clients who present with new experiences and ways of thinking and adapting the therapy model accordingly.

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So what do I mean by neurodivergence? For me the term encompasses autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia, Tourettes and OCD. Different people within the Neurodiverse?Community may have different descriptions and that’s absolutely fine.?We are all learning so much. Terms change almost weekly and BOY! what a lot of terms there are to learn!

There are many ways to look at mental health and neuro differences.?We are all human first and foremost. Any one of us at any time in our lives can experience mental health difficulties through illness, insecurity, relationship breakdowns, work issues and so much more.?When we are wired differently we can experience mental health challenges because we are living in a world that often doesn’t understand or accept us. This can cause anxiety, trauma, cPTSD (complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and chronic stress. When not resolved depression is likely to follow.

When I think of all the millions of humans who could have thrived with the proper support but didn’t get it my head spins and my heart sinks.

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ADHD is my own predominant spectrum. I’ve come to believe that my autism keeps my ADHD in check. I identify as a highly sensitive person (HSP) and am likely dyscalculic, with some Pathological Demand Avoidance thrown in for good measure. My world is truly paradoxical. I can sometimes dislike what other people do, yet I do those things myself. I need structure, but I get bored with structure. I’m a hoarder, but I strive for minimalism. I need absolute quiet and I adore loud music. I am a disordered eater. It is difficult to get things right, every day. I barely?practise what I preach. I’m weird, quirky, unusual, definitely different, and as for being popular – I’m marmite. All this means that I feel that I can empathise with neurodivergent clients and share a plethora of bespoke resources and really tailor make a therapy plan that is totally individual.

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A client may land up on my website after Googling anxiety, ADHD, autism, stress and so on, and then make an enquiry. They may not know at this stage whether they are neurodivergent. It is certainly not for me to assess or diagnose, ethically or professionally. My job is to listen, validate and observe.?When the time feels right I may ask if they have considered whether they might possibly be on a particular spectrum. The spectrum is not linear where there is a low functioning person at one end and a high functioning one at the other. In fact, low and high functioning labels are used less and less. I don’t use them. Each neuro difference has its own spectrum and within that spectrum are many traits. (I use a particular metaphor to describe this, asking my clients to imagine the spectrum as a clear plastic ball and within it many little balls of different colours, representing different traits.)?Some people have co-occurring differences and, of course, everyone is unique.?

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Clients may feel like aliens and the information they give me can sound absurd and shameful to them. They may feel overwhelmed, that they are going mad and not understand and question why they have such peculiar thoughts and feelings.?They’ve come to the right place. I’m weird and quirky and if you could only imagine what goes on in my head sometimes!?My lifetime experiences mean that I’m pretty unshockable. I’m blunt and honest and encourage the same with my clients.?My therapy room is a safe place. Anything can be spoken about - or not.

Neurodivergent Therapists often automatically understand so clients feel immediately validated. There are still far too few of us. Saying that, I am a member of an incredible Facebook group with over four hundred international neurodivergent therapists which is so inspiring. I believe it is important for all therapists to become fully educated about the different neurodivergences, spectrums and traits.?

I am a Human Givens Psychotherapist (www.hgi.org.uk), one of the few models of therapy which is recognised by the Professional Standards Authority.?There are hundreds of models of therapy. As my journey progresses I see first hand how learning about different models and incorporating new ideas helps to benefit clients enormously.?This I do by continually learning, reading up to date material and attending courses to expand my ability to support neurodivergent people.

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Before I even meet my client I need to consider the environment I provide for them. This is extremely important.?Clients may have light sensitivity issues so if they are facing a large window they may find the daylight painful.?I had such a client and provided them with sunglasses, ensuring that the next time we met was in a darker room (we were in my conservatory at the time).?I remember watching a training video when there was a dog barking loudly and the client didn’t even notice. A highly sensitive person might think the dog was about to crash through the window and attack them.?Even building work in the distance can be unbearable. My setting is quiet. I keep the temperature at an even level and have the choice of adjusting to suit, always checking with my client that they feel it is right for them.?All are encouraged to make themselves comfortable. I invite them, if they like, to take off their shoes, sit cross-legged or even lie back with their feet on a stool. They can bring weighted blankets. They may bring, crochet, stress balls, drawing equipment or whatever helps them to feel at ease.?I ask them about their needs during our first session.?I also have a box of fidget toys for clients to help themselves to during our session.?Stimming is encouraged.

Sometimes I offer walk/talk therapy which is especially beneficial for clients who prefer less eye contact or who are not so verbal. As an ADHDer I have to practice silence more than a non ADHDer. If I hear something a client says that is particularly interesting it can be difficult not to interrupt for fear of missing important information. Over time I am learning the benefit of keeping silent, often with long pauses.?It’s in the silence that nuggets of key information may eventually become available. Some clients love being out in nature and we may stop and listen to the breeze through the poplar trees or birdsong. If there has been rain I ask clients to bring their wellies. Squelching through muddy puddles has brought instant relief and broken down boundaries leading to beneficial therapy.

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Small talk is often a difficulty for neurodivergent clients. Even asking “How are you?” can be too big a question for them.?I ask specific questions such as “How was that run you did after our session last week?” or “Did you get through to your GP after all?”?Without my clients knowing that I am doing this, I observe the way they sit, their degree of eye contact, whether they have any obvious verbal or movement tics, and I can intuitively feel their stress, sadness or anxiety. I start with active listening. I want to hear their story and rushing is not an option.?When a client feels rushed they don’t feel validated.?If my client wants to spend the whole session telling me about their special interest, then that is great. It might not be my special interest. I show my curiosity and ask questions. I do not try to move them on by getting to the nitty gritty of where they are with their mental health at this stage.

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How this first session goes is crucial. Clients often share with me unhelpful or puzzling things that others, usually ableist neurotypical people, have said to them.?Ableism is the belief that typical abilities are better, leading to social prejudice against people with disabilities/differences “Well we’re all a bit on the spectrum, aren’t we?”?“Well, everyone does that!” “You don’t look autistic” “what are you making a fuss about?” “Autism occurs mainly in right-brained males.” “Autistic people don’t show empathy.” “ADHD, that’s just naughty boys, isn’t it?” “Stop putting labels on people!” “It’s all about bad parenting.”?“It’s behaviour we need people to change.” “It’s a disease.” “We need to find a cure.” (I realise that I have been ableist in the past, too, until I educated myself.) When my clients feel heard and validated instead and that there is hope (the feeling of relief in the room is palpable), I know that they will return and they do.

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Now I want to know about my clients’ family and friends, work colleagues and a short timeline of their life – birth, school, family life, employment, their environment, any illnesses, their likes and dislikes. They may tell me their mother had a traumatic birth or that they were premature.?At school they may have got into trouble for stimming, looking cross (when in fact they were perfectly happy), have problems with time keeping and be exhausted through lack of sleep which is a real difficulty for many neurodivergent children (and adults).?They may have been bullied or never chosen for sports.?Their family may be made up of neurodivergent and neurotypical members so misunderstandings and family breakdown is common. Perhaps they have multiple jobs or find commuting unbearable because of the noise and other sensory issues. They may present with fibromyalgia, ME or CFS, hypo (or hyper) mobility, autoimmune diseases, gastro intestinal issues, migraines and more.?Their environments and relationships could be even more toxic than a neurotypical might experience.

Very often the most important piece of information I learn from a client is thrown in just before the session ends, a Eureka moment.?As they put on their coat to leave they may say something like “Well I suppose if I had been allowed to go to a quiet room for ten minutes I might not have thrown that chair”.?I choose to offer my clients a session by session approach.?Our time together may be brief, four to six sessions, or continue over a period of months.?I am a detective and look for patterns. Compartmentalising issues helps to work through them. Sometimes we may think we’re coming to the end of therapy then a really important piece of information comes to light and we carry on.

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I need to know what my client wants from therapy? How can I support them to use what they already have within themselves to feel better? Often, whatever clients want to do can best be achieved by helping them to manage their traits. I have come up with my own acronym, MACC, that I have found highly beneficial, as it helps validate my clients’ experiences and to find a way forward.

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M stands for Managing traits – the traits my client have within their unique spectrum. Here are some common examples:?

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? rejection sensitivity dysphoria – common to ADHD. While we may all dislike the feeling of being rejected or criticised, for someone with ADHD, it can be crippling and lead to huge emotional de-regulation (such as anger outbursts, crying, self-harm). It can lead to relationship breakdowns, meltdowns, lost jobs and all the mental health and physical ailments that go with the stress.?

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? Alexythymia – not understanding one’s own emotions or the feelings of others, and showing emotional reactions inappropriate to the situation. I remember being in fits of hysterical laughter while giving my vows at our wedding (on video) and at my grandfather’s funeral.?

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?Difficulties with interoception – being over or under-aware of different sensations within the body, such as not recognising hunger, thirst, fatigue or pain.?This can be conscious or subconscious.?It can relate to feeling the beating of your heart too much or feeling the need to urinate or sleep at inappropriate times.

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? Meltdown – a layering up of feelings that may not be recognized leading to for some anger outbursts , aggression or crying or becoming dissociative and non-verbal. Can be explosive or nuanced.?

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? burnout – a layering up of many life events or/and emotions. Overwork, overwhelm?

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? dissociation?- the feeling of not being in your mind which can last for minutes, days, weeks or even years. Can be attributed to living in a coercive relationship and dissociating by complying.

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? zoning out?- when someone is talking about a subject you have no interest in or during high anxiety. Losing time and memory.

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?sensory issues, such as skin picking, nail biting, hair pulling, stimming, tics, and strong reactions to sound, light and touch.

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I ask my client whether their traits are mild or severe, when they occur, what others say about them, how long have they noticed them and, most importantly, what they want to do about them. This will give us our goal.

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A is for Acceptance. When my client tells me about their traits, I will share with them resources and stories about other people who also experience them and what they have done to set goals and work with their traits. When clients feel validated they can begin to understand that these traits are just part of who they are. (Maybe one day we may even live in a world where people can stim and tic in public without it seeming odd.) It is incredibly lifting for clients to realise that there are so many other people who do the same as them, and the road to acceptance can be embarked on.

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C stands for Challenges (good and not so good). I like the word ‘challenge’ because it can be used to refer to both positive and negative experiences. “I love a challenge”;?“I need a challenge”; “I’m going through some difficult challenges right now” – much preferable to words like problems, broken, abnormal, failure, shame, guilt, worthlessness.?A client may say that they have just completed a huge project which left them exhausted however their boss may have believed the project was excellent.?The client may not recognize this was a good challenge.?Another may speak about the challenges of living with fibromyalgia. This is a difficult challenge. Together we can work through the days which are not so hard and look at ways to ease the suffering.

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The second C stands for Celebrate. People who are neurodivergent are not broken and they don’t need fixing. They (we) do things in a different way, feel differently and think differently. There are so many reasons to celebrate because neurodivergent people often have a number of specific?skills, many of which my clients don’t even realise they have.?An incredible ability to see detail or amazing intuitive compassion for other peoples’ suffering. The biggest reward for me is identifying those skills and showing clients how to use their gifts to their advantage. It is so rewarding to dig deep and help my client find their skills, achievements and even superpowers, giving us a great base to work from.?

A client with ADHD may experience emotional de-regulation. What affects a neurotypical person may affect an ADHD person threefold. A car pulls out suddenly in front of a neurotypical driver and they may hit the brakes and swear under their breath. An ADHD person with difficulties regulating anger might well jump out of the car at the next traffic lights and start waving their fists at the driver or even spoil for a fight.

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Powerful though techniques such deep breathing, reframing, distraction, etc are, ADHD anger is often on another level and people can go from 1 to 100 in a blink of an eye. So it is particularly important to be proactive here. Listing the occasions which often lead to anger and working out a plan to avoid these triggers is especially beneficial I find. I emphasise maintenance or coping strategies to support a client and to avoid relapse.?Two of my clients have crying issues. They are highly sensitive people (HSP), so there are many things that can set them off. Again, looking at the most likely culprits and planning how to react in a calmer, more proactive way really helps.

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For my tearful clients it might be that criticism will set them off so rather than going the perfectionism route we may look at the different types of criticism they have experienced. We can role-play wearing a magical suit of armour to defect arrows (of criticism) and look at some emersion techniques or a dial, turning down the heat of the criticism and not being consumed by it. I do try to normalise the feelings as they are part of who a Highly Sensitive Person is. In a working environment the crying person can warn her colleagues and use humour.?It’s not the end of the world to have a good cry now and again to relieve the pressure. Fidget toys also work well here.

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Some people with neurodivergences have OCD as a co-occurring difference, which can be very disabling. I have developed a particular interest in OCD since seeing many clients with many traits. Separating the client from the intrusive thought and thinking of it as a bully often works well. So does distraction, saving the thought for later and getting on with something else instead. I also like to scale how bad the OCD thoughts are for the client and suggest an appropriate level of response. So, if the symptom is quite mild, then maybe making a cup of tea will suffice as distraction; if it is really severe, doing some exercise (even a short walk) will be more effective.?Pure O (obsessional thinking without obsessional actions) is something I have seen in my clients, and the content of those thoughts can be rather dramatic such as not being able to walk past a knife without wanting to stab someone with it or wheeling your toddler about in the trolley at the supermarket and thinking of ways they would harm them. Normalising some of the thoughts and changing the thought to a different one, perhaps even using humour, has worked well.?Imagining the knife as a banana or seeing the child as an adorable kitten with a smiley face might work. The feeling is normally very short lived.

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Sensory issues are common.?I spent most of my life being highly sensitive to daylight and fluorescent strip lights. I never realised that wearing sunglasses much more than I used to, even indoors, would help so much. Some clients experience under-stimulation like needing to eat most foods covered in hot chilli sauce, others over-stimulation, the shower hurting their skin.?One autistic person may dislike being touched softly (I am one of those), or at all, whereas another may need huge bear hugs. It is important to ascertain by informed questioning all the different clothes that can cause discomfort (tights, seams on socks, zips) or foods that should be avoided at all costs (meat, sauces, particular textures like mince or mashed potato).?

I realised only recently that I have traits of misophonia – intense reaction to sounds such as other people chewing or even breathing. I left a job because the boss spoke too softly sitting behind me. I couldn’t hear him properly and he sounded like a snake. The sound of the air conditioning unit above my desk made me feel horrible.?Chewing, yawning, someone their biting nails, scratching behind the walls, barking, far-off machinery – all make me angry or stressed. These are some of the many things that clients bring to therapy.?

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I give my clients homework, mainly to practise what they have learned, and put everything together at the end of the session, normally using hypnotherapy techniques to rehearse success. I usually introduce guided imagery at the second appointment, to see how clients respond to going into trance and how deep they go. This will also help me assess whether the rewind technique, if appropriate, is likely to be successful. If I surmise that trance work will be too stressful or the very act of not feeling in control is too much we can do we can work with other methods. I have found that all my clients benefit from some form of meditation-style guided imagery just to feel calm and relaxed. Even my hyperactive ADHD clients respond well.?Neurodivergent clients live a life of constant stress so just a few minutes where they feel understood, cared for even pampered is often welcome.?I send summary notes through to my clients after the session, as the information can be a lot to take in and they tend to appreciate a worksheet. If they don’t manage to do the homework we agreed on, we work through the practice in the next session.

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I have never felt so rewarded in my work as when I am showing neurodivergent clients the possibilities and positive outcomes that can open up for them. It is very rewarding to see the relief and to hear my clients tell me that, for the first time, they feel really heard.

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During my own life I have felt gaslighted, not listened to, frustrated and alien in a world I didn’t fit into.?The stress or depression I have experienced has come about as a direct result of living with undiagnosed ADHD and autism. I cannot begin to describe how different my life is after having my neurodvergences validated. I am now an advocate for the Neurodivergent Community and strive towards acceptance, support and education to show society that neurodivergence is not an illness we ‘suffer’ from or a ‘condition’ that needs to be cured. There are countless opportunities for us to take our place as equals. All that is needed from our neurotypical society are a few basic accommodations, more understanding and an active curiosity to discover what it is like for us who live with our spectrums and traits. The way to do that is to talk to us, ask us questions and actively be around us. We are not as scary or as weird as we might sometimes appear. We just want to join in and be heard. I feel better equipped as a therapist now that I have researched neuro differences more fully and I look forward to continuing the work I do within this fascinating Community.

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