The Blog
Why Autism Awareness Month is Exhausting (And What We Actually Need)
Autism Awareness Month is often exhausting for autistic people because it prioritizes outdated, pathologizing narratives, performative allyship, and harmful symbols like the puzzle piece and blue lighting rather than meaningful action. Many awareness campaigns focus on fear-based messaging, exclude autistic voices, and disappear once April ends, leaving systemic barriers unaddressed. What autistic people actually need is year-round acceptance, inclusion, and systemic change that prioritizes accessibility, neurodiversity-affirming perspectives, and leadership from autistic individuals themselves.
Why “Just Ask for Accommodations” Doesn’t Work for Most of Us
The advice to "just ask for accommodations" oversimplifies the complex barriers neurodivergent employees face, including fear of discrimination, inaccessible policies, and workplace stigma. Even when accommodations are granted, they are often ignored, resisted by management, or create tension with colleagues, leading to burnout and job loss. Instead of placing the burden on individuals to constantly self-advocate, workplaces must take systemic responsibility by proactively designing neurodivergent-friendly environments that support all employees equitably.
The Rise of Autistic Mutual Aid: How We’re Supporting Each Other When No One Else Will
Autistic mutual aid networks have emerged as essential support systems in response to the failures of government and nonprofit organizations to adequately serve autistic individuals. These grassroots efforts provide financial assistance, employment support, housing aid, healthcare navigation, and emotional solidarity, ensuring that autistic people have access to resources that traditional systems often deny them. By prioritizing community-driven care and lived experience, autistic mutual aid is reshaping disability support, proving that when institutions fail, autistic people step up to support one another.
The Future of Neurodiversity Advocacy: Where Do We Go from Here?
The future of neurodiversity advocacy faces challenges such as funding limitations, corporate tokenism, and reactionary pushback, but also opportunities for growth through intersectionality, digital activism, and systemic reforms. Ensuring sustainability requires centering neurodivergent voices, securing equitable funding, and demanding accountability from institutions that claim to support neurodivergence. By embracing inclusivity, leveraging technology, and pushing for policy changes, the movement can continue to drive meaningful progress and create lasting change for neurodivergent individuals.
The Cost of Being Autistic and ADHD in 2025: Inflation, Disability, and Economic Survival
Autistic and ADHD adults in 2025 face significant financial struggles due to employment discrimination, inadequate disability benefits, rising healthcare costs, and housing insecurity, all exacerbated by inflation. Many neurodivergent individuals experience job instability, barriers to accessing necessary support services, and economic precarity, often relying on mutual aid and community networks for survival. Without systemic policy changes to improve workplace protections, increase disability benefits, and expand affordable healthcare and housing options, neurodivergent individuals will continue to face disproportionate economic hardship.
Not Just a Phase: Why We Need to Believe and Support Neurodivergent Gender-Diverse Youth
Neurodivergent gender-diverse youth, particularly autistic trans and nonbinary individuals, face unique challenges due to widespread misconceptions, systemic barriers, and increasing anti-trans rhetoric. Despite claims that their identities are a phase, research shows that autistic people are more likely to be gender-diverse and that affirming their identities significantly improves mental health outcomes. To support these youth, we must listen, believe, and advocate for their rights, ensuring they have access to gender-affirming care, safe educational environments, and communities that celebrate their existence.
Neurodivergent Joy is Resistance: Finding Happiness in a World That Others Us
Finding joy as a neurodivergent person is a radical act of resistance against a world that tries to suppress our authentic selves. Embracing our special interests, sensory experiences, and community allows us to reclaim happiness on our own terms, free from societal expectations of productivity and conformity. By prioritizing joy, rest, and self-acceptance, we assert our right to exist fully and unapologetically, creating a more affirming and inclusive future for ourselves and others.
Why Neurodivergent People Are More Susceptible to Workplace Bullying
Neurodivergent individuals are disproportionately targeted for workplace bullying due to power dynamics, ableism, and a lack of understanding about neurodivergent communication and work styles. Many workplaces prioritize neurotypical norms, forcing neurodivergent employees to mask, struggle with unclear expectations, and endure mistreatment that is often dismissed or justified. Protecting oneself involves recognizing the signs of bullying, setting boundaries, documenting incidents, and seeking support, while also pushing for systemic change that values neurodivergent workers for their strengths rather than forcing them to conform.
Reclaiming Your Autonomy: Understanding and Unlearning People-Pleasing as a Neurodivergent Person
Many neurodivergent individuals struggle with people-pleasing, a behavior rooted in masking and learned survival mechanisms that prioritize the needs of others over their own. Breaking free from these patterns requires recognizing when people-pleasing is happening, reconnecting with personal needs, and setting boundaries without guilt. Healing from a lifetime of suppressing one's own desires and limits is a gradual process, but it leads to greater self-trust, authenticity, and the ability to build relationships based on mutual respect rather than appeasement.
How to Reconnect with Lost Special Interests
Reconnecting with lost special interests is a deeply personal and healing process for neurodivergent individuals who have set aside their passions due to burnout, external pressure, or the demands of adulthood. This article explores ways to gently reintroduce curiosity and creativity into daily life, emphasizing self-compassion, exploration without expectation, and reclaiming joy for its own sake. By removing the pressure to be productive or "good" at an interest, neurodivergent people can rediscover the fulfillment and comfort that special interests provide, allowing them to reconnect with a part of themselves that may have felt lost.
Why So Many Neurodivergent People Struggle with a Sense of Self
Neurodivergent individuals often struggle with a fractured sense of self due to factors such as alexithymia, identity masking, and the pressure to conform to neurotypical expectations. Many spend years suppressing their natural traits, leading to a disconnect from their authentic identity and internalized feelings of failure or inadequacy. However, through community, self-acceptance, and engagement with special interests, neurodivergent people can reclaim their sense of self and build an identity that embraces their unique ways of thinking, feeling, and experiencing the world. A guide to knowing yourself is included in this article.
How Special Interests Shape Identity in Neurodivergent Adults
Special interests play a profound role in shaping identity, providing comfort, and fostering connection for neurodivergent adults, offering a deep sense of joy and stability in a world that often feels overwhelming. These passions serve as a form of self-care, a pathway to career fulfillment, and a means of building community, yet societal stigma often discourages neurodivergent individuals from embracing them fully. Recognizing special interests as a vital part of neurodivergent identity allows for greater self-acceptance, validating their importance as more than just hobbies but as essential aspects of well-being and self-expression.
What are Sensory Sensitivities and What Do I Do About Them?
Sensory sensitivities mean that everyday sights, sounds, textures, and smells can feel much more intense and sometimes overwhelming, impacting your emotional and physical experience. These unique perceptions can be both challenging and enriching, allowing you to notice subtle details and beauty that others might miss, while also requiring adjustments to maintain comfort. By understanding your triggers and creating supportive environments and routines, you can honor your sensory profile and live more comfortably and authentically.
How to Meal Plan When You Have Executive Dysfunction
If meal planning feels overwhelming due to constant decision-making and executive dysfunction, the article offers strategies to simplify the process. It suggests creating a go-to grocery list, establishing small, regular meal prep routines, and arranging your kitchen to be calm and organized. Ultimately, it encourages you to embrace a personalized, flexible approach to meal planning as a form of self-care and empowerment.
How to Design a Neurodivergent-Friendly Work Schedule
Traditional 9-to-5 work schedules often fail to accommodate the natural rhythms and cognitive strengths of neurodivergent individuals. The article explores strategies like flexible scheduling, energy mapping, and alternative work structures to align work tasks with your natural energy cycles and reduce stress. It also emphasizes the importance of self-advocacy and tailoring your work environment to support your unique sensory and cognitive needs.
Neurodivergent Parenting: Breaking the Cycle of Shame and Ableism
Neurodivergent parents are breaking the cycle of shame and ableism by rejecting the harmful parenting practices they experienced and raising their children with acceptance, validation, and autonomy. Instead of forcing their children to mask, suppress their natural behaviors, or conform to neurotypical expectations, they are creating environments where neurodivergent children are supported in ways that honor their needs. This shift not only helps children thrive but also allows parents to heal from their own past experiences, fostering a new generation where neurodivergence is embraced rather than erased.
Sensory Processing Isn’t Just About Sensory Sensitivities—It’s About Sensory Joy, Too
Sensory processing differences are often discussed in terms of challenges, but for many neurodivergent individuals, they also bring deep sensory joy—whether through textures, sounds, movement, or nature. The intense pleasure of certain sensory experiences, like the feel of soft fabrics, the rhythm of music, or the grounding presence of nature, is just as real as sensory sensitivities, yet it is often overlooked. Recognizing and embracing sensory joy allows neurodivergent people to fully engage with their environment, self-regulate, and experience the world in ways that are meaningful, fulfilling, and uniquely their own.
How Hyperfocus and Burnout Exist on the Same Spectrum
Hyperfocus, a common experience for autistic and ADHD individuals, allows for deep concentration and bursts of productivity but often leads to burnout when unmanaged. Because hyperfocus does not come with built-in regulation, many neurodivergent people push themselves past their limits, leading to exhaustion, shutdowns, and difficulty sustaining long-term productivity. Understanding that hyperfocus and burnout exist on the same spectrum can help neurodivergent individuals develop strategies to balance deep engagement with necessary rest, allowing for a more sustainable and fulfilling approach to work and creativity.