My best nurse friend describes me as a medical anomaly. I will extrapolate to say I am an anomaly to life in general. We are in a world of labels. I think there is some misconception that with the right label we will find resolve. This has not been my experience. There were times a moment of clarity was found, sometimes deceptively so when it was an inaccurate label. There is no individual sustaining form of peace that comes from a label. That has to come within. The label I have come to utilize outwardly and embrace is that I am neurodivergent. This is the most simple way to concisely describe my presentation and needs. On an individual level, yes, it is far deeper and more intricate than that as I would presume it to be for every person. There will be plenty later in time on my specific diagnosis and the process to achieve it as well as what adequate labels brought to my treatment. As a system we cannot broadly recognize so many hypervariances and expect it to be effective in making changes across the board.
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The concept of neurodivergence by definition is that we all are. It quite literally refers to the idea that each of our brains develop differently. As a social movement the term neurodivergent is one I lean on as a way to encapsulate “the other minded” or those whose brains have developed in a notably different way from what is typical. My belief is that grouping a variety of those with similar struggles allows much more opportunity for growth rather than forcing a larger whole to recognize many subgroupings of people. Before you attempt to refer to this as cold or oppressing understand that I am interested in real systems changes. As an “other” myself and in combination with my long-term social studies, I know joining forces is the most likely pathway to achieve anything. We are at a point in time when it is imperative for a broad movement for social justice on behalf of everyone who has experienced trouble with their mental wellness.
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As a neurodivergent, I think one of my favorite descriptives of this yet was to present the idea that we are walking around speaking a second language constantly without the recognition of it. The term “neurotypical” is what is used to describe individuals who have experienced traditional stages of development and nurturing in a healthy or more anticipated way. It replaces the less accurate descriptor of “normal” and catalogs those whose brain activity falls within the majority. What I have added to this idea of our duolingual nature is how it relates mental breaks. This occurs when we have made repeated attempts to convey our message in a way that is understood by those around us and then eventually our brains just break. And that’s where you get word salad. This is the term used to refer to nonsensical loose associations and garbled words uttered by many experiencing severe mental illness symptoms. It was interest during my time working in a group home over my graduate level practicum, I was able to access this theory of mine to enable a communication pattern with a resident. In my mind I laid out the words he used as he said them. I did my best to attach a synonym to each of his words and then pull out the true nonsense filler words and was able to make sense of the rest. Staff there were truly impressed at this ability to communicate with him as I was and his eyes lit up at our connection. This is just one benefit in having those who think like us be made to be those who are in treatment to us.
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Complicated ideas have always come easy to me. Of course I didn’t notice it in that way. It is theories and patterns that are easy for me to see and point out in a way that did not appear as obvious to others. And so much of what they call simple provide me with daily challenges. In my mind this scenario allows room to call to question the very definition of the words “simple”, “obvious”, and “easy”. I think one of the most widely used cliches is that comparison is the thief of joy. Whoever it was that coined this was a master at misdirection. What steals someone’s joy is the value they assign this comparison and thus our perspective that is the real culprit. Over the course of my completion of my MSW I did a presentation on the unique takeaway I’ve noted when it comes to the practice of social work. The field as a whole has experienced a necessary theoretical shift towards strengths-based approaches to community need. This includes looking at the environment and the qualities it possesses as well as what that community describes as a need. It is my observation that this shift has yet to make it to the mental health division of the field. Clinicians are taking “strengths-based” approach, yes. But these are strengths as they are presented through a neurotypical worldview.
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In a meeting with a Clinical Psychologist I am hoping to work with in a nonprofit I am developing, I commented to him how rare it is that someone whose brain works like mine would end up in a position such as his with the way the current system is set up. The term I have coined to refer to myself is as a “Patient-Professional”. This is a means to establish my difference as a peer from someone who is specifically a substance use disorder peer. It has had mixed reviews professionally. I can’t take credit for the term, I picked it up from an article assigned to read midway through my three year graduate program and it just seemed to fit. In my attempts to use it through a major corporation my director met it with the scoff of “what do you even mean by that” indicating the need to make myself small once more. I have chosen to enter my graduate level profession open about my experiences with severe mental illness. My experiences with it so far aid my understanding to the reticence by Kay Redfield Jamison, a clinical psychologist who came out about her own story with the famous work, “An Unquiet Mind”. Even more than I can relate to her ambivalence in sharing is the conviction of the responsibility to share. When I consider the invaluable information that has been dismissed if not lost altogether by those who would be able to provide the most insightful of viewpoints. What advancements have passed us by at this missed opportunity for those to feel safe in sharing that can most easily be credited to stigma!
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The nature of the work that I do as a counselor is excessively benefited by the variances in my brain in a way that the neurotypical does not possess. In leading a group with an incredibly young neurotypical, the things that came out of her mouth showed just how unfit she was to be in the position she was. I am not taking away from this young woman’s drive, genuine caring nor her studious abilities. I am saying she is not suited to be in the position she is based on her limited understanding of the population she serves. The limited awareness of the experience of symptoms such as ambivalence. I recall her really not understanding someone’s inability to make up their mind and thinking, if you aren’t able to wrap your mind around that working with those suffering the most troubling mental health symptoms, you are really out of your area of expertise. Other small factors that made a big difference included my ability to recall details about these individuals in ways that became therapeutically beneficial to the group that proved helpful for documentation as well. In working acute care intake I would repeatedly receive compliments to my patient care. Usually I would deflect this compliment with the retort, “real recognize real” or something to that effect. But it was the truth. I’m good with those people because I am those people.
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I am in constant recognition of the privileges I have had in the ultimate safety net provided by my family, the protective factors associated with having higher than average traditional intelligence, and the immense resilience that has been passed down to me. When it comes down to it people who have been through the maltreatment I went through over seven years have ended up in one of three places. That is they have successfully lost their lives to overdose or suicide, they are still lost in the system, or they have gotten out and got as far away from the mental health field as possible. There are individuals in the professional world, they fill up my inbox due to their awareness of just how unsafe it is to be neurodivergent and open about it working in the mental health field. I made attempts to address my concerns to the field through the D.E.I. initiative. In meeting with one woman, she went out of her way to acknowledge my servant’s heart – the look in her eyes told me she knew I was fighting an insurmountable battle.
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Over the finalization of the twenty year backwards approach to my graduate level career I went back and forth on whether to stay within the limitations of the industry or to break out of it and attempt to make influences from the outside in. What I had to come to terms with is that the impersonal nature of the corporate world is not one I was comfortable continuing to pursue. As I pointed out in supervision – I can’t blow up the system if I am standing in the middle of it – I am not a suicide bomber…. So, I am starting my own business as a Holistic Counselor. Every day I feel the responsibility to be a voice for a group that has never had its own voice including the practice that was done on this group by Hitler to perfect his euthanasia chambers for the Holocaust. The way I love the hardest is to find a way to speak in ways that someone can understand. I hope for so many to allow me the opportunity to help them in this way. Just a neurodivergent gal, hoping to lighten up a neurotypical world.
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