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Posts Tagged ‘neurodiversity’

Autism and the Troubling Risk of Suicide

This article has information about suicide and suicide prevention. For help 24/7, please call or text the U.S. Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988. Few people used to think about the risk of suicide among people on the autism spectrum. Researchers rarely studied it. Primary care doctors did not...

Intimate Relationship Failures From an Autistic Perspective

The standard narrative positions autism as the cause of relationship trouble when a non-autistic person dates or falls in love with an autistic person. The autistic partner is assumed to be the disruptive or difficult one. Self-help books offer non-autistic partners tips on how to cope with their...

A Brief Guide to Discussing Intimacy and Sex in Neurodiverse Couples Therapy

Intimacy and sex are healthy, natural aspects of human relationships. Yet, this topic is often unaddressed by both therapists and couples seeking support. While differences and challenges related to intimate connections are not unique to neurodiverse couples, there are core areas of neurodiversity...

The Neurodiverse Love Relationship GPS (Gaining Perspective for Success)

Being married for 30 years and not knowing we were a neurodiverse couple until our 29th year of our marriage created a lot of “unintentional” hurt and pain for both of us. Learning we had differently wired brains helped me see our challenges and differences through a new lens, which led to...

Demystifying Autistic Gender

Search online to learn about Autistic gender and you’ll find a range of allistic (nonautistic) articles stating that the link between autism and gender “diversity” and “dysphoria” are “not so clear.” Researchers apparently “do not yet understand why” there’s a strong correlation...

Inside Dell Technologies’ Neurodiversity Hiring Program: An Autistic Cybersecurity Analyst’s Success Story

How can a company's neurodiversity hiring program be evaluated? In part, by listening to its participants’ stories. Alex Sobil, Cybersecurity Analyst at Dell Technologies, is a case in point. His is a success story as inspirational as it is indicative of a truly inclusive...

Recognizing and Understanding Neurodiversity in Couples

Many couples come to the realization they are in a neurodiverse relationship decades into their relationship, after listening to a podcast, reading a book, or watching a movie that includes an autistic character. But recognizing neurodiversity is just the beginning... Then what? How does...

An Autistic’s Vision for Lasting and Successful Workplace Neurodiversity

Consider Dan Burger, a gifted and autistic computer science student at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN. In spite of the challenges he faced along his journey through school and into the workforce, Burger's exceptional abilities at visual problem-solving and dealing with large amounts of data...

Guidelines for a More Neurodiversity-Affirming Practice for Autism

This article came out of discussions between the authors about guidelines for a more neurodiversity-affirming practice for autism. The training that is discussed in this article was developed by the first author (Rebecca Rosenzweig). Authors’ note: As an autistic person working in a...

Are Autistic Students Traumatized in Schools?

According to a 2017 study, “77% of autistic high school students play a very limited role or no role at all in post-secondary planning compared to 47 % of students with intellectual disabilities and 27% of students with all other disabilities” (Gillespie-Lynch, K. et al., 2017). Why do so...