Episode 463: What All Families Can Learn from Neurodivergence

Hello everyone, this is Rebecca Green for the Winey Palooza podcast, and I am very excited to talk to Samantha Foote today. Samantha, thank you so much for being here with me today.

Yeah, I'm excited. Thanks for inviting me.

Samantha is a very busy lady. She has a very full day ahead of her, so I really appreciate her making time for us, and you are all gonna love her, and I'm gonna tell you why. She is a neurodivergent board-certified music therapist, positive discipline parent consultant, and mother to 3 autistic children. Drawing from both professional expertise and personal ex— experience, she empowers parents of neurodivergent children to navigate their unique parenting journey with confidence, support, and evidence-based strategies. Through her platform, Every Brain Is Different, Samantha provides compassionate guidance that fosters understanding, celebrates neurodiversity and helps families create environments where all family members can thrive. As both a professional and a parent in the neurodivergent community, she brings authentic insight and practical approaches to families seeking to better understand and support their children's unique neurological differences. So now everybody knows why I'm so excited to talk to you. This is so cool that this is your expertise. I want to know how has parenting neurodivergent kids shaped your work as a therapist?

Yeah, I think it's giving me better insight into what families are actually going through. And so before I became a mom, because I was a music therapist before I became a mom, people would say, you, I'm sorry, you sound like you know what you're talking about, but I can't trust you because you don't, You're not a mom. You don't get it. You don't get what I'm going through. And I was like really offended by that. But then once I became a mom, especially a mom to 3 autistic kids, I was like, oh, I get it. I get it now. And so I think it's just given me that experience to know like, this is what day-to-day life is like where you can't understand that unless you're living it.

That is so true. So I'm curious, like, as a music therapy teacher and then a music therapy teacher as a mom, like, what, what do you think looks different in your, in your therapy? Anything?

Yeah, I better understand what kids like. Like, before, I would just do what my training taught me, and it's not that different. But it's just given me a little more insight into how to work with kids, like how, what they're going through, what might happen after the session if I push them too hard or if I don't push them enough. And so just understanding what happens outside of the session, just not when I'm there.

That makes total sense. Well, and you have 2 words that I think are so awesome together: positive discipline. Okay, I have to hear about this. Can you tell us what positive discipline looks like and if it looks different in a neurodivergent household?

Yeah, so positive discipline was definitely not started by me. It is its own thing. They have books and they have trainings, and I have been trained in their curriculum. But it's basically using positive strategies to raise your kids instead of using traditional approaches like punishment, timeout, things like that. It's using— instead of timeout, you might do time in, where if a kid is getting your attention in a negative way, you'll be like, oh, they're looking for a connection. They're looking for my attention. And that's why they're doing this. So how can I give them more positive attention rather than punishing them and sending them away? How can I give them more positive attention? And build that connection with them. And so I take that curriculum and I put it into, through a neurodivergent lens where raising neurodivergent kids is different than raising neurotypical kids because you have to think about, you know, sensory overload. I mean, everyone, no matter your neurotype, can get sensory overload, but it's a little different in kids and adults who are neurodivergent. It's just, more top of mind, I guess, because we tend to get overly stimulated easier than your, you know, your typical person. And then just looking at the behavior reasons. So if a kid walks into a store and they have a meltdown every single time you walk into the store, you might be like, well, they just need to be punished. They need to learn that you don't act like that in the store, you know, but If you, every time you walk in the store, it's too cold or it's too hot, or there's too many people around, or the lights are flickering or whatever, then that's why they're having the meltdown. So you really have to be curious. I really like this thing that Dr. Matt Zukreski said on my podcast. He said, be curious, not furious. And I just think that's so important. And that's one of the key things in positive discipline is getting curious about what's behind your child's behavior instead of getting mad at them or punishing them for reasons you don't understand why they're doing what they're doing.

That is so good. So if our children are having some sort of meltdown or behavior issue, we as parents need to figure out what's going on.

Yes, we— it's our job to understand what they're— what's happening in their life that's causing them to do that, because kids don't want to get in trouble. They don't want to make you mad. They don't want any of that. And so they're not doing things on purpose to make you mad unless they're looking for a connection with you, and that's the easiest way to get your attention is by doing something negative. Then they're going to do that because they want your attention, you know. And so they're not trying to make you mad. They're not trying to make you like crazy or whatever, you know. They're just living their life, trying to get through the day.

That's really good advice. I love all of that. Well, and I know that I don't know enough about autistic children, so I mean, I want to better understand and parents want to better understand. What do you think? First of all, does everything you're saying apply regardless of if your child is autistic or not?

I would say most of it applies because even if you have a neurotypical kid, you still have to be curious. You still have to be curious about what they're doing because they don't do things to make you mad. They're not doing things to make you upset. They're also just trying to get through life the easiest way they can. And so even if you have a neurotypical kid, the positive discipline stuff still applies, um, because research has shown that using punishment does not change behavior overall in the long term. Actually, using positive strategies changes behavior in the long term. And so yeah, it applies to neurotypical and neurodivergent kids.

Well, and I'm curious how you think, from all of your experience, how do you think parents can better understand their autistic kids?

Learn about autism, learn about neurodivergence, learn about it from people who are neurodivergent. I would say, You can definitely learn about it from people who are neurotypical and have studied it, but if you want the real-life lowdown of what's going on, you want to learn from a neurodivergent person because they live it and they know what it's like to go through it.

Yeah, I totally agree with that. I, I definitely need— like I said, I have a lot to learn about this topic, and I love that we have you here to learn from. I'm curious what you think the common myths are about neurodivergent kids, some myths that maybe we could bust right now?

Yeah, the first one is that they don't want to be social. I have heard that for over 20 years.

Yes, they—

there are some kids that haven't been diagnosed with autism because they were too social, and that's, that's a myth. Um, I remember when I was in high school, there was a kid who had pretty profound autism, and he was at his church dance. He came to every church dance. And I went up to him one day because he was never with anybody. He was never with any friends. And I went up to him and I tried to talk to him and everyone said, oh, he doesn't want friends. He doesn't want to talk to anybody. I'm like, why is he here? Like, why would he be here unless he wanted to hang out with his peers? I did not understand that. So that's actually what started like my interest in autism and all of that was I just wanted to understand him better. And everyone always said, you know, kids with autism, they are very standoffish. They don't want to be social. They don't want friends. But most of the time when I ask kids what they want, what they want to work on, they say, I want to understand people better. I want a friend. In fact, when it was probably like 10 years ago, I was working with this 7-year-old and I said, what do you want to work on? Why do you want to work with me? And he said, I want a best friend. Everybody has friends at my school. And I don't have a friend. And so we worked on that and we worked on social skills. We worked on his flexible thinking because autistic kids tend to be very literal thinkers. And so he did not understand when people would say something sarcastically, he thought they were being serious. And that's a barrier between him and his peers because they're like joking about stuff and he's thinking they're being serious. And so about 3 months later, he came to me and he was like, I have a friend. I made a friend. And he was so excited. Um, so yeah, I would say that's the number one myth that I hear all the time.

I totally agree with that. And I think what I had thought is that they want friends, but it's harder for them to make friends is what was my understanding.

Yeah.

Like social, right? Like the social skills and needing to learn some skills to have some friends. So. I didn't know that people— I think you're right. People think that they don't want friends, but they actually do.

Yeah. The reason why they retreat most of the time and they're not super social is because they don't understand what's going on. They don't understand the social rules. There are a lot of made-up social rules that the world goes by that are not innate for a lot of people. And so If you don't understand it, you're gonna be very uncomfortable trying to be in that environment where you're trying to be in it, but then you do one thing wrong. Like for example, I was at a family function a couple weeks ago and my nephew has autism. He's very, very, very literal and people kept making fun of him when he would, um, think something literal. He was thinking people were talking literally, and people would be like, oh, you know, I'm just joking about that. Like, you know, I wasn't being serious. Like, why would you think I was being serious? And I just felt so bad for him. And I was like, hey, let's like tone it down a little, you know. Let's like— he's just doing what he thinks is right. But then he didn't want to hang out with anybody anymore because it was exhausting to have to know, well, are they being literal? Do they really mean what they're saying? Or are they just being sarcastic? Or are they joking right now, like, it's exhausting to try and navigate that.

Man, do I hate sarcasm. I know, not a fan. I am not—

I don't like it.

I am not a fan.

I use it all the time because I think that's what people want, but people don't understand my sarcasm and I don't understand their sarcasm, so I don't understand why everyone uses it all the time.

I don't like it at all. I would love to just nix it from all of us. If I could, I would. So you have 3 autistic children, is that correct?

Yes.

I mean, I'm taking a breath. I'm taking a breath for you. I mean, what I have seen is one is challenging from like observing others. How are you managing with 3?

I would say the hardest part in managing 3 autistic kids is their therapy schedule. It's not— they are not super hard as kids. I, but I don't know, I don't know what neurotypical kids are like. Yeah. And so, um, I would say the hardest part is managing their therapy schedule because there's 3 of them. And so all of them go to occupational therapist, all of them go to AquaAbility, which is just swim therapy, and all of them go to counseling. And I have seen fantastic things change in their lives because of those therapies. But it's so hard to navigate their therapy schedule and then also just not be able to schedule things because they also all go to behavior intervention except for the oldest one. He has graduated from that. He asked not to be in it anymore, and I respected that. Um, but it's hard when Everybody, when all the neurotypical kids are going to soccer practice or football practice or cheerleading or whatever, and your kids don't have time for that because they're going to therapy. And honestly, like, we've made— if they want to do an activity, like, they're in piano lessons and football and actually tumbling, but I feel like a lot of people feel like they can't do those things because they're in so much therapy, but the therapy is needed. They just want to live like a typical life, but you can't because you're in all this therapy.

That makes total sense. And I can imagine with your work schedule, that's even harder to manage it all.

Yeah, for sure. Because I'm doing therapy sessions and everybody wants them after school. Because, you know, after school. But I have decided that being with my kids is more important. And so I'm not taking any more after-school clients, like, because this year all my kids are going to be in school in the upcoming school year. And so that's what's really hard too, is just, um, being in the therapy world while also having kids who go to therapy, like everything has to be after school. And I'm like, but I just want to see them after school. I just want to hang out with them and just be a family, you know.

So anyway, yeah, that's very challenging. Well, and I'm sitting here thinking, is it legal— it's just a random question— to pull your kid from school for a therapy session?

Yeah, yeah, it is. So, um, they are out of school every week for counseling. Luckily for occupational therapy, we have it at 8 o'clock in the morning and they don't start school till 9. And so that works out really well. And then AquaAbility is just during the summer, but there are a lot of kids who miss a lot of school to get therapy because it's more important for them to learn daily living skills and skills that will help them be more independent than learning academic skills, which both are very important, but a lot of parents have prioritized the daily living skills so that they can live independently.

Yeah, I mean, I'm just sitting here thinking that if you were my child's therapist and you were only available during the day, I would pull them from school, right? I mean, we make it, we make it happen. We have been. So, okay. I know this is not, I know, well, hey, I could be wrong. I was going to say, I don't think it's the norm for all 3 siblings to have autism because what I was going to ask you is how to help the siblings with managing with the autistic sibling, like managing the dynamics. But I'm curious, even managing the sibling dynamics within your home. With all 3 of them having it?

Yeah, it's super challenging because my oldest son is very sensory avoidant. He does not like loud sounds. He does not like touching things. He doesn't like sensory input for the most part. In fact, when he was 1, at his birthday party, he touched the cake and that we didn't know that, you know, that he didn't like touching certain things. So he touched the frosting on his cake and he totally freaked out and started crying and kicked his foot out, and then he got his foot in the cake and lost it. And I had to give him a bath in the middle of his birthday party because he was crying so hard, and I felt so bad. But like, as a kid, he didn't like to be— as a baby, he didn't really like to be held. He, you know, that's not how we comforted him. He liked to be in his swing, or he liked to be on the ground. He didn't really smile. He didn't, um, Like we took him to a music and movement class when he was a baby because obviously I was looking forward to that as a parent and he cried through the whole thing. And so he was very sensory avoidant. And then my middle child is the most sensory-seeking child I think I've ever seen. And he is constantly moving. He's loud. He wants to touch everything. He wants to get into everything. He wants that sensory input.

Oh my. Gosh, what a difference.

And so just managing those two. And then I don't know, I think my daughter's like somewhere in the middle where she's just kind of like, she likes the things she likes and she doesn't like the other things, you know? But, um, yeah, so managing those two have been very difficult because the one will be super loud and rambunctious and the other one's like, will you just stop? And so what we've done is create a place where my sensory avoidant child can go be alone, do his own thing, decompress. And then my sensory seeking child, we have like a playground in our backyard, like a, we were gifted, um, a playset with monkey bars and a slide and swing. And he can go out there whenever he needs to, or he can jump around in our living room. We used to have a little trampoline that he could jump on. And so just trying to meet both their needs, like my sensory avoidant child has his own bedroom because he just needs that quiet downtime where the other one, I don't even think he goes in his room. Like he doesn't sleep there. He doesn't play in there. He's always out with people and getting all the input that he can. And so just helping them meet both their needs is what we've tried to do. Um, I would say. I have talked to families who, they have, you know, a neurodivergent kid and a neurotypical kid, and the neurodivergent kid tends to take priority because of all the therapies, because of all the needs. But to do your, the best you can to have one-on-one time with the neurotypical kid too, I would say that's the most important thing because neurotypical kids in a family with neurodivergent kids can often feel like they're not as important because the neurodivergent kid gets one-on-one time with mom when they go to therapy appointments or when they go to a doctor's appointment or when they go here or there. And so the neurotypical kid can kind of feel left out. So I would say that's the number one thing to focus on is, are you giving as much attention to the neurotypical kid as you are the neurodivergent kid?

That, I mean, I think you nailed it right there. That is, you know, perfect advice for parents. I, I'm also curious, so it sounds like with your children sometimes they need space from each other.

Absolutely.

So, so if we take, um, a neurotypical child and a neurodivergent child and we, and their siblings And the parents are struggling with their dynamics together. Any advice for them on that?

Yeah, I would look at your neurotypical child's needs too, like their sensory needs. Just because they're not neurodivergent doesn't mean that they don't have sensory needs. So are they more sensory avoidant? Are they more sensory seeking? If you, you know, if you have a sensory avoidant, or not even a sensory avoidant, just like typical sensory input person, and then you have a neurodivergent kid who's like bouncing off the walls, needing all the input, like they're going to annoy, I guess, the neurotypical kid because they're like, can you just stop? Like, just stop screaming, stop moving. Um, and so just setting up spaces where they can get what they need, kind of like I do with my kids, like just setting up spaces where they can go get what they need. So for example, we have a cupboard in our house that's under the counter, and for the longest time we kept that cupboard empty because that's where my kids went when they needed to be alone. They had their rooms, but they would go in that cupboard and just shut the doors and just kind of like sensory deprivation where it was quieter in there. It was completely dark in there so they could just sit there and decompress. Um, so that's what I would recommend is just creating spaces for both your kids to give them what they need.

That is so interesting. And I want to tell you, you know, first of all, you're reminding us to be creative because we tend— sometimes we need more flexible thinking, right? Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, and also like to watch our kids. What are they doing that works for them? Like, you saw that they were climbing in the cupboard. That's amazing. So you just left it open, left it empty. That is some stellar parenting right there.

Well, thank you. Everyone's like, you let your kids go in an empty cupboard? Like, what's wrong with you? And I'm like, that's what they like. They asked to go in there. Oh my gosh.

I have vivid memories of my brother emptying out the cupboards and climbing in them, but he was just being a goofball.

Oh. That's awesome.

So, um, okay, so self-regulation is just like challenging for all of us. Can you give us parents some advice? Because we need to model self-regulation for our kids. So how do we do that?

I would say before you do anything, like let's say your kid does something and you are just so frustrated. Um, before you do anything, just take a moment to breathe. Take 5 seconds and just really evaluate what you're going to say, what you're going to do. How can you be a problem solver instead of just yelling at them and punishing them? So what are we going to do to solve the problem? For example, my son tipped over a plant on my, um, like half wall thing that I have. And he was just being rambunctious and he threw a Squishmallow. It hit the plant and it hit the floor. And my first, the first word out of my mouth, I was like, why? And then I just paused. I was like, how do I want—

Yeah.

I was like, why? And then just, I just sat there and I'm like, and in my head I was like, okay, how do I want this to go? Am I going to yell at him, which will make him cry? Damage the relationship, or are we going to just solve this problem together? And that's what positive discipline is all about, is just solving the problem together. Like, okay, you broke something, how are we going to fix it? And so I looked at him and I said, what was that for? And he said, I am so sorry, I, I don't know what happened. He just got overexcited. He was overexcited and he threw the Squishmallow, and that's all that happened. So my job as a parent going forward is to monitor him, see when he's getting like a little too overstimulated, and then find ways to calm him down before that happens. You know, and we can talk about that, like when you're feeling this way, let's, you know, do something to kind of bring it down a little bit. And then I said, okay, that's fine. The plant, the planter is broken though. What are we gonna do? So he's like, well, I need to clean it up. And so we went and got the broom and we cleaned it up together. And I said, well, the plant is still good, but we need to go get another planter to put it in. And he was like, well, I said, how are we gonna pay for it? And he's like, I have to earn the money. And so he just had to do like a chore or something. And we went and got the planter and then replanted the plant and it was fine. But how different would it have been and what would he have learned if I would've just started yelling at him? Like, what's wrong with you? Why did you do that? Like, you're so ridiculous, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, so that's what I try to do. The other thing is, is to take breaks as much as you can. I have a whole training on musical breaks that you can do if you— just to decompress, because music is amazing at so many things in your body that it affects, even if you're not a trained musician. It has been shown to switch the stress DNA channel, you know, in your DNA. It's been shown to reverse it 3 times higher than, um, just doing traditional relaxation things like reading or laying down. If you participate in music, it's 3 times higher. To shut that stress channel off. Um, so there's just things like, and if you don't want to do music, you know, you can do other things, but just take those little breaks before you get overwhelmed so that you're constantly like monitoring how you're doing with overstimulation, how you're doing with overwhelm. And then if you, um, can take those breaks, it makes it so that you can not get as overwhelmed as easily. I really like— Jill Wright came on my podcast and she said something about time confetti, where so many parents feel like they don't have time, but you know, you might have 5 minutes here or 5 minutes there, and then just using that to get— I don't want to say self-care because you should be taking more time than 5 minutes here and there for self-care, but there are so many parents raising neurodivergent kids who really like they don't have a couple hours to do what they want. And so if you're feeling like that, just start taking the 5 minutes here and there and try and work up to longer times that you can do things for yourself.

And I hear parents say they don't have time all the time. And then I think about all the mindless scrolling and I'm like, take back that time, people. Use it for something else.

Yeah.

So stay with music because, you know, I love what you do with music and I'm curious how music therapy supports neurodivergent kids.

Yeah. So music therapy is just using music to work on non-musical goals. We work on motor skills, communication, social-emotional, cognitive skills, all those different things using music. And it can really help kids who maybe they're really concrete thinkers. They don't have a lot of flexible thinking. They're very literal. So for example, we were working on that with a group. Well, I work on that a lot with all my clients, but one way that we work on it is we will talk about the emotion and then we'll write a song about that emotion. And part of the song I will say, Okay, what does happiness taste like? What does it smell like? What does it sound like? And they're like, happiness doesn't taste like anything. It's an emotion. It doesn't taste like anything. I'm like, if you had to imagine it tasted like something, what would it taste like? And so that's opening up their thinking. It's more flexible thinking that they're just imagining something, you know? And then I give them an instrument and I say, play this in a happy way. And they're like, I can't. It's an instrument. It's not happy. It's not sad. And I'll never forget this kid who, he said that to me, and then I'm like, just imagine you had to play it a happy way. What would it sound like? And then as we went through all the different emotions, it got easier and easier for him to, to improvise to where he looked forward to improvising on those different emotions. And so that's just one way that we can work on like social-emotional stuff. With communication, this was super cool. I was working with this kid, he had hydrocephalus and it affected his brain. Where he couldn't understand spoken questions. He could talk to you, he could understand what you were saying, but if you asked him a question, he couldn't answer it. But if you sang it to him, then he could answer it. And so I worked with the speech therapist and we built that new neural network in his brain. And that's what music therapy does, is it takes, you know, if you have like a damaged part in your brain because of hydrocephalus, it accesses the healthy part of your brain and it makes new neural connections in your brain so that you can then do things that you could do before, before your brain was, you know, hurt. Oh yeah. Wow. And so I worked with the speech therapist and we got him to, you know, make the new neural connections. And then he was able to listen to spoken questions and he could answer those questions without having the music, which is— that's like the epitome of what music therapy does. It makes new neural, new neural connections and just builds that up where, you know, just spoken language accesses one part of the brain where music accesses almost the entire brain. It accesses both sides of the brain. So that's how it works.

I mean, that makes so much sense. I have to tell you. So my youngest child, can memorize words to any song. Okay, so I hear her singing the songs, she knows all the words, and then she studies for a test and she's struggling to remember. So I'm like, "Lily, you need to write songs while you're studying because you remember songs so well." The difference between remembering a song and studying for a test without music is unbelievable. I can't tell you the difference. She has to sing things. Yeah.

Yeah. Uh, me—

Now I understand.

Yeah. My roommate and I actually did that in college. We, we had an anatomy class that was awful. And, um, we made up songs during test weeks to remember everything because it accesses more of your brain. And so then you can remember it better, which I love that your daughter did that.

I'm so glad that you— I can't wait to tell her. Yeah.

Yeah. That's awesome.

Now I'm going to tell her why that works. For her. I was always curious. I'm like, why can she remember music so well? So interesting. So our kids are in school, and advocating in school is a whole nother skill, and I'm sure you have a lot of experience. Can you give parents some advice to advocate for their children in school?

If you know the laws for schools, if you don't know your rights, I would say get an advocate. There are nonprofits that have advocates for IEP meetings, which is what your child will be on if they're having trouble in school. And it's really hard to get on an IEP, which is an individualized education plan. And you have to advocate so hard just to get tested for one. But if you think your child is struggling in school and they need an individual education plan, then ask for it in writing because the school has so many days to respond and get your child tested if you ask in writing. But if you just ask verbally, they don't— it's not the same. So put it in writing and then go into each meeting, even if they're not on an IEP, even if they're— you're just talking about your child in school, what could work for them, because The school is going to try different accommodations for your kid before they go to an IEP because an IEP is so much more structured. They have to do what's on it by law, and so they'll try other accommodations to see if they'll work before they go straight to an IEP. But go in with a collaborative attitude. So I go into all my meetings saying, hey, I understand he's struggling in school. This is what's working at home. Could it work in school? And then my podcast co-host, she really likes this. She heard this at a conference one time. What will it take? What will it take to make this happen? And that's not a yes or no question. And so you're just asking, What will it take, you know, to get this accommodation? And so they can't be like, well, no, that's not possible because you're not asking if it's possible. You're asking what will it take to make it possible? And so that's kind of a harder question for them to dodge. There— schools are so hit and miss because at my kids' school, they're amazing. They do everything they say they're going to do. They work really hard. But I know— and I've gone to IEP meetings with parents and they just talk around the issue and they don't actually ever solve it. Anything. And it can be so frustrating as a parent and as a kid. And so if you are not getting a collaborative attitude from your school, from the teachers, from the administration, from everyone, then I would say find an advocate to go with you. Or they tend— I don't know why this is— they tend to be more collaborative when a man is there, when the dad is there. And so we're gonna say that, take a man with you. It's like, I feel like it's everywhere else that you go too, like you're just taken more seriously if you're a man. I, I don't like it, that's just the way it is right now. I'm hoping to change that. But, um, yeah, so those are my top tips: get an advocate, be collaborative, take the kid's dad. If possible.

All excellent advice. I love it all. It's like when I tell my husband, you call them, they'll listen to you. Yeah, I'm not talking about school, I'm talking about like the washing machine place right now.

Oh yeah, yeah.

So I'm curious what early signs people can look for that their kids might have neurodivergent stuff going on.

Yeah, I would say the things that I've seen the most of, um, not really engaging with people as babies. So they would rather not look at you, they don't make eye contact, they don't smile. That's definitely not like if your kid does this they definitely have autism, but that's just what I've noticed the most, especially in my kids. And then like play, play styles. If they're not playing with toys, if they don't play pretend, um, that's what I've noticed. Or there was another one, they're just, they just prefer to play by themselves. And they might not prefer it, but once again, it's like with the social skills with older kids where they don't understand the social rules even as toddlers. And so they, it's just easier to play by themselves.

Themselves.

And then, um, I would say just look for sensory differences. So if they're stimming— which stimming is just like moving, twirling, flapping your hands, or I do this all the time, like on my lip. When I am on the computer, I stim so bad, and I just sit there and rub my lip. I'm like, why is my lip hurting? It's because I've been rubbing it for an hour. So sensory differences, communication differences, if they're delayed in speaking, if— oh, this is a good one. So if your child doesn't do spontaneous speech where they're not coming up with things to say themselves, they're imitating other speech or they're imitating, um, especially like shows that they watch, that is called a Gestalt language processor. And they are trying to communicate with you. It's just they might— they learn language in chunks rather than words. So a typically developing kid will learn car, go, fast individually. They will learn those words individually, and then they'll say car go fast. A child with gestalt language processing will learn it in chunks, and so the person on TV might say, I want juice, and they get a drink. Well, to that child, I want juice now means I'm thirsty. And so they might go up to you and say, I want juice, and you're like, okay, and give them juice. And then they have a meltdown because they wanted water. But they learned that I want juice just means that someone gets a drink. They don't know that juice is a specific drink, you know.

That makes sense. Yes, that makes sense.

And so for so long, people just thought that the kids that were doing this were not making any meaningful speech. They weren't doing any meaningful communication and that we should stop the echolalia is what it's called. Like just repeating them, repeating what we say. But we've learned that they are doing meaningful communication. They are just doing it in a different way than we're used to. And so if your child is doing that, I would 100% get them assessed for some type of neurodivergence.

Well, and I think that some parents might have— might suspect it but are hesitant to pursue a diagnosis. What, what would you say about that?

I can completely understand that, especially like in the climate that we have today. Um, just all the things that they say they're gonna do with autistic people or whatever. Um, I can— there's people that are getting the diagnosis removed from their medical records, and I would just say I would still get my child assessed. Even today, I would get them assessed. I would get the diagnosis because it gives you resources that you wouldn't normally have. So in Idaho, for example, when you get diagnosed with autism or ADHD or anything like that, you can get on the Katie Beckett program for Medicaid, which is the Medicaid waiver that does— it does not, um, take into account your income. And so it just takes your disability into account. And so parents can get all their healthcare, all their child's healthcare paid for, which is all the therapies and wow. You know, you can just get all that. If you have a diagnosis, but you have to have the diagnosis. And then also, it's just, I know a lot of parents, like, they don't tell their kid that they have autism, or they don't tell their kid they have ADHD because they don't want the label. But your child is already labeling themselves. Like, my whole life I thought I was, um, too dramatic, too— oh, just too much, you know. I was lazy, um, even though I was like a crazy overachiever in my head. I was still lazy. Um, I didn't get diagnosed with ADHD until I was 36, but when I got that diagnosis, everything finally made sense. And I'm like, oh, there's a reason why I'm so emotional. There's a reason why I go from high to low so quickly, you know. And then I had intrusive thoughts, and I had like crazy rejection sensitivity dysphoria, which is where you just think that no one likes you. And so my whole life I'm like, something's wrong with me. Nothing's— but then I learned nothing's wrong with me. It's just a different neurotype that I have to learn how it works, you know? So your kids are giving themselves all these labels anyway. They think they're weird. They think they're, you know, like not likable. They just think all these things. But when you get the diagnosis and you understand the diagnosis, then you can— there's a reason for it. And it's not just personality flaw that they have. Like, it's a different neurotype.

Yeah, that makes so much sense. So, so they're worried to give the label, but the label helps make sense of things and gives resources. Yes, makes total sense. So if they're newly diagnosed, where would you tell them to even begin?

Um, I actually have a guide. It's the Ultimate Guide to Parenting Your Neurodivergent Child, and you can find that at everybrainisdifferent.com. Um, and it just goes through like, okay, you got a diagnosis, what do you do now? Do you want to pursue Medicaid? Do you want to pursue all the therapies? And then it has— my favorite part is a terminology guide. Where it tells you what everything means. So, so often parents will get, um, you know, they'll get a new diagnosis and then they'll just be like, oh, I have to do ABA therapy because that's the only thing that the doctor recommends. And then people start talking about occupational therapy and speech therapy and music therapy and aqua therapy and all these different things. And they're like, what, what do these things even mean? And so that's why I have the terminology guide. It even has in there like, what does neurodivergent mean? What does neurotypical mean? What does Medicaid, what's the Katie Beckett waiver? You know, all those different things because the Katie Beckett waiver is in multiple states. It's not just in Idaho. The second thing I would say is join a Facebook group for parents of kids raising, like parents raising neurodivergent kids. That has been a huge help in my life and I'm in the industry. And so for example, in Idaho, there's Idaho Autism Moms. Or Treasure Valley Parents of Kids with Disabilities, you know, just those different groups, because you can ask in those groups and someone will say, oh, I have the answer for you. Or you can say, you know, what if you are going to do music therapy? What music therapy places should I go to? What music therapy places should I avoid? You know, there's not very many music therapy places in general, so I don't think you're going to get a huge list, but, but you could just ask those questions like, what has been your experience? What has been your experience with this? And I just think it's so helpful. Or, you know, you can just go on there and be like, I need to vent. Like, today was a hard day. My kid had a hard day. I had a hard day. Um, I just need to vent. And so it's a great place for that too.

Never would have thought of that. That's really, that's really great to tell everybody that. So what is one message? That you want every parent to take away from this about their neurodivergent child or someone else's neurodivergent child?

Yeah, that they're not broken. They don't need fixed. Um, do they need education, I guess, on living in a neurotypical world? Absolutely. I think that neurotypical people should also be educated on the communication differences with neurodivergent people so that everyone understands everyone and everyone can just be themselves. Helps. But there is the burden placed on neurodivergent people to understand the communication differences where that burden is not necessarily placed on neurotypical people. But I would say they're not broken, they don't need to be fixed. Just get curious about what support they need and then give them that support as best you can. And you're going to make mistakes and that's okay. There are so many people that I've talked to that says, I wish I would have known this when my kid was younger, but I didn't learn it until later. And I regret doing things that I did. Well, you, you only know what you know, you don't know what you don't know, you know, so you just do your best and that's okay.

Yeah, because parents are so hard on themselves. So I love that you said that. I've kept you so long. You know, I could ask you questions all day. You are such a wealth of resources. Anything else that you want to share that I didn't ask you?

One thing. If you want music therapy, if parents are interested in that, go to CBMT.org and you can find a music— a board-certified music therapist in your area. And you can, um, that's super important because there are people out there that say they're music therapists, but they're not board certified. And so that is the place to find board certified music therapists. And also, if you're interested in learning, you know, if you just got a diagnosis or your child isn't even diagnosed yet and you don't know where to start, go to everybrainisdifferent.com, schedule a consultation with me. I would be more than happy to help you. Um, we do have a neurodivergent parenting community, so it's like the Facebook groups, you know, where you can go, you can ask questions, you can get education on neurodivergence in general. So what we focus on is positive discipline parenting strategies, understanding neurodivergence. So what are the communication differences? What are the motor differences? What are the social-emotional differences? What are the sensory differences? And then we focus on mastering your own self-regulation so that you don't feel out of control as a parent and you can parent the way that you want to.

Awesome. I am so glad that we connected. You are a wonderful lady. I love the work that you're doing and I loved getting to meet you and talk to you today.

Yeah, thank you so much.

This is Rebecca Green and I want to remind everyone to spend every day laughing, learning, and loving. Thank you for tuning in to the Winey Palooza podcast. If you like what you heard, please be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. While you are there, leave a review. I love to hear your feedback. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time. This show has been produced by Market Domination LLC. To discover how you can have your own show completely done for you and turn it into a real published book and become the authority in your marketplace, Go to www.marketdominationllc.com/podcastoffer.