I lost a parent shortly before starting high school. So when teachers said things like “You’re so smart, just imagine what you could accomplish if you really tried!”, everyone was content to call it grief. And I was absolutely grieving. When my grades dropped suddenly halfway through my undergrad, I called it burnout. And I stand by it. I was burnt out. When the learning curve wore off about two years into my passion-fuelled non-profit job, I was diagnosed with an idiopathic

When the grade two teacher suggested having my kiddo assessed for autism, I thought she was crazy. At this point, I had three kids in school, and he was definitely struggling more than his brothers, but not a lot more. I thought, “okay, maybe ADHD.” The family history is there. Sure, it could be neurodiversity, but he wasn’t struggling enough for it to be autism. Fast forward many many months, and my spouse and I are sitting in a virtual meeting with a psychologist going over

My instagram algorithm knew my neurodivergent mix before I managed to get access to a diagnosis. It’s becoming a common story, even though the opposite can absolutely be true: the algorithm has been known to hand out the most convenient label when a set of traits or symptoms might be better understood under a different umbrella. (For example, there’s lots of overlap between traits that can fall under both ADHD and burnout, or autism and trauma responses.) As a mental health p