A Jack of Some Trades

Most therapists ultimately find their way into niches, the glorified ‘you made it!’ standard of the mental health practice. As interns, we are encouraged to adopt the ‘dabble’ mentality as we find what facet of focus emphasizes our curiosity. This is what encourages us to become masters of our trade. Or so it goes.

Neurodiversity is my chosen niche, however I feel somedays it’s a peephole into an expansive, chaotic world where one diagnosis has the capability of presenting so colorfully different from the other, even though they share the same lettering. ADHD, Non-Verbal Learning Disability, and Autism Spectrum Disorder pepper my notes, and are woven into the predominate population that I work alongside with.

It’s peculiar that I have spent so little time utilizing this platform to share therapist tangents from this niche. Although I identify fiercely as an Ally to the Neurodivergent community, I have a strong desire to respect the privilege I carry as a Neurotypically-titled adult. Please note as I speak on my behalf of my Neurodiversity therapeutic experience, I am not speaking from a place of inherent experience, only a pupil from the outside looking in.  

Autism is not a cluster of behaviors, behavior is simply a symptom of the struggle. The struggle is the singular perspective that reacts to the full picture of stimulus presented. There is an existential belief that we all experience the world from different shades of perspective, so in that Autism is refined by the shades of individualization.

Compulsive lying is a mask of ingrained desire to connect through saying what has been taught as ‘correct’.

Thematically, I notice those struggling to experience success long enough to recognize what is different from survival mode. Routine navigations in a world with varying and consistent dumpster fires. While there is a strength in singularly attending to one fire at once, this inevitably results in a perceived failure of achieving ‘correct’ use of time and resources. Ultimately, there is vacillation between panicked and pressured productivity and Autistic burnout. Research has shown Autistic burnout results from the sensory and emotional overload that correlates from long-term masking and suppression of autistic traits.

“Out of compliance “
“Quirky”
“Commonly misses the mark”

I’m routinely dumbstruck at how threatening variation is. ‘Different’ carries such heavy stipulations. It’s the kind of awkward smirk I get when a couple is arguing so passionately about change they’d like to see in the other, yet it’s the change that is so desperately needed in themselves. The solution seems so plain and concise.

We are all varying shades of different.

Even the folks that can be tucked away so inconspicuously into the box of ‘normal’. The box so dutifully deemed standard, yet carries own dents, scrapes, and scuffs. Those who assume the power to define normal are largely ones to talk.

It’s that smirk again.
I have met some pretty remarkable people through the work that I have the honor of doing. They radically shift my perspective for the better. The kinder. The more empathetic. Autism, nor any other diagnosis interrupts their remarkability. 

We are all worthy of burning the scuffed up, dented box of stifled and poorly defined normal.

Why?
It’s simply the boogieman beneath your bed. Somewhere in myself I can empathize with missing a mark or ten, deviating haphazardly out of compliance, and possessing a quirk or two.  Normal exists on a spectrum, just as Autism does. No two ‘normals’ coexist. Perhaps that is why it’s so dangerous. So easily manipulated.

The next time someone presumes the power to cultivate a definitive normal, remember to pause and smirk, fully knowing the truth about that particular boogieman.