What Everyone Needs to Know About Neurodiversity

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You're juggling retirement plans and second chances. When life throws you another curveball, you're suddenly raising your grandchild, who's been labeled different. The terms ADHD, autism, and OCD swirl around, but what do they really mean? Your grandchild seems fine, but different. How do you help them thrive in a world that doesn't always understand?

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And what do you do to help them thrive better and help you cope better with what's going on? Join us in this next episode with Katherine McCord, where we dive into neurodiversity, personal stories, and practical advice that promises to be a beacon of hope for every grandparent navigating this uncharted territory.

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Welcome to grandparents raising grandchildren nurturing through adversity in this podcast, we will delve deep into the challenges and triumphs of grandparents raising grandchildren as we navigate the complexities of legal, financial, and emotional support. I invite you to join us on a journey of exploring thoughts, feelings, and beliefs surrounding this growing segment of our society. Drawing from real stories and expert advice, we will explore the nuances of child rearing for children who have experienced trauma, and offer valuable resources to guide you through the intricate journey of kinship care.

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We'll discuss how we can change the course of history by rewriting our grandchildren's future, all within a supportive community that understands the unique joys and struggles. This podcast was made especially for you.

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Welcome to a community where your voice is heard, your experiences are valued, and your journey is honored.

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Katherine McCord is the founder and president of the people consulting firm Titan Management, the chief people officer for previewed, an innovative job board that fires the resume, an international speaker and founder of the Neuroverse, a not for profit organization dedicated to neurodiversity. And Katherine, you're attributed with saying, I am successful with my diagnoses, not in spite of them. So could you start by telling us what your definition is of neurodiversity? I mean, I can read you the Wikipedia description, but.

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I want them to get a virgin opinion of what you consider neurodiversity. Yeah, so the term was originally coined by australian sociologist Judy Seger, and she meant it more in a broad scope, originally to talk about a variety in human processing and thought, etcetera. And she did very much tend to give out the message that different is not a deficit. So that part is still true. However, since the original coining of the term, the meaning of it has, as terms do, evolved, so now it specifically refers to a medically visible and or diagnosable difference in how the brain processes information and stimuli, and there's a broad scope for that. So on the medical side, you have maybe cerebral palsy, different seizure disorders. On the learning and communication side, you have dyslexia, adhd, autism, these types of things. And then you have the mental health side, which has everything from anxiety to bipolar and obsessive compulsive disorder. And that's what neurodiversity is in a nutshell. This is new to me as a grandparent raising a grandchild who I now understand to be neurodiverse.

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When I was a child, and even when I was raising my children, there were very few words attributed to children that didn't fit the norm, and none of them were nice, and none of them were nice.

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And one description that was applied to one child didn't apply to another. As far as I was concerned, even. With m diagnoses, every individual's experience is widely varied. So there is still to that aspect.

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I think there's definitely some accuracy.

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The hope that I have from what I'm learning is that my granddaughter, who has a couple of labels that have been applied to her, she really doesn't feel that she has any issues with her own self esteem, but she knows that she's different. So being able to give her these tools to explain to her how to manage her life is a beacon of hope for me as her grandmother. Good.

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And, you know, it's not doom and gloom. And that's one thing I think parents see these rare cases, and they are rare on the Internet, of somebody who has an extreme case of a diagnosis or has multiple. And a lot of times that's not what's shared, but it's, it's often true, is that this person has a complex medical system that has incorporates multiple diagnoses, and they see this one, what they perceive as difficult situation, and they think, oh, God, that's going to be my kid, but that's not it.

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So, for instance, just use autism as an example. It's a very broad spectrum, right? And most people, the vast majority of people that are on the spectrum, live perfectly quality lives and contribute highly to society, have healthy relationships, raise families, all of these things. They just do it in a different way, and it's just not a big deal, you know? And we started to realize the science has started to come out. And you can look up studies about this in PLOS genetics, the National Institute of Health, National Library of Medicine, Johns Hopkins, the list goes on and on.

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Johns Hopkins has actually done some of my favorite work on the topic, and they've started to realize that as the body is inclined to do, we balance ourselves out. So if one area, and this is true for all human beings, by the way, if we're not strong in one area, we're strong in another.

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We're designed to balance. So if someone is not strong in math or reading or communication, whatever it is, they will be strong somewhere else. We are designed that way. That's how we survive. That's how we thrive.

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So these people who are different, it's the same thing for them. It's not a doom and gloom diagnosis. It's not. This is just a new way to communicate how this person functions. And I think it's exciting to get a diagnosis, because then, to your point, you know how to communicate. You know how to kind of have. You have a base starting point of, okay, these are the things I might need. Let's try a few things and go from there. And there's experimentation involved. There is.

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I like that you say we're designed to balance, because I was speaking with a pediatric therapist the other day, and she adopted a young girl who, when she graduated college, could still not read above a 6th grade level. And this child has just graduated with a degree as a medical assistant. That gave me inspiration. Conversations like this give me inspiration to understand that each one of us balances our own way. We're designed to balance. More importantly, we're designed to balance. And the feedback that we give our children is so important, especially at a young age, for them to understand that they have everything that they need to be successful in life, rather than to come at them with the opinion or feedback that tells them that they need to be better and what that does to a human being.

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We've all probably experienced that. Maybe not you, because I know you have very great parents. I had very unique parents. I had very unique, very unique parents. Yes. Tell us about your parents and your. Background, just to fully disclose for neurodiversities. I have a seizure disorder. So I have one on the medical side. I have obsessive compulsive disorder. And no, not everybody has obsessive compulsive disorder.

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I hear that all the time, and it makes me laugh. I said, the difference is you may not like something a certain way, or you may like to do things a certain way, but there's not an actual compulsion to do those things. You basically have to, or your brain just turns off.

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And so I have misophonia, which is the most annoying of all of them, because basically it means that certain sounds actually make me malfunction. It will cause my neural pathways to defunct, so to speak, and it causes actual problems, discomfort, these types of things. Actual physical discomfort in some cases. And then I also have bipolar one, so I'm kind of in the broad spectrum of neurodiversity. And my parents realized at a very young age that I had a different brain. They were like, okay, this is just how our kid is. This is just how it's gonna be. And the first two that popped up, they didn't know the name of it at the time, but the misophonia and then the obsessive compulsive disorder, which my mother, as a registered nurse, did recognize. So my parents just steered into it. They were just like, all right, this is how she works. No problem. And they taught me how to use it as an advantage, and then how to accommodate myself with the disability aspect showed up. Because all of these diagnoses have both elements. Almost all of them have both elements of there is disability and there is also benefit.

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Right. It's, again, the balancing act. Right?

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So they did. They just steered into it. And as I got older and the bipolar started to emerge, which was the next one that came about, they put me in contact with a great psychologist, and then they also worked with me on self mapping, and I'm learning to understand myself, how to work through things on a practical level, and, again, how to use some of this to my benefit. It's like, oh, okay, you're. You're having mania, but let's throw you into something creative.

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But now I apply it to my work. Let's do these things while you're working. You're in a depressive cycle. Well, when you're in a depressive cycle, you write really well, so let's do your writing. You know, that's great.

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And just. Just kind of, you know, and they taught me the science, what was happening to me, so I could understand it and say, these feelings are not based on things happening in my life. This is just. My chemicals are wrong. And that power really is wonderful to understand your body and what's happening and learning to do things that help, not 100%, but help.

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Right. You know, these chemical balances. So, yeah, I had extraordinary parents. They were super funny. My parents roles were reversed in a lot of people's minds, which was that my mother was the ultra professional when I was younger, and my dad did a balance of working and stay at home parenting, which was amazing. And he is also a highly successful professional, especially now that he doesn't have kids in the house, but it was very interesting. So, yeah, I did have interesting parents with a very different take, but I want other people to have that same experience.

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How would you advise grandparents who come from a whole other generation to begin to, I know this is not something that they're going to absorb quickly, but how would you help them support their children, who they may or may not know, have diversities? So my grandmother, on my mother's side, my family unit, was always very much part of my life. I always say everybody in my family had at least something of a hand in how I turned out, and I can point to different parts of me that come from them. And my grandmother, when I was growing up again, she. She caught on that something was different right then when the bipolar kicked in, she actually recognized those behaviors, and it was called something different at this time from her mother in law and how my grandfather's mother had.

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Had behaved. And so she recognized those behaviors and she thought, okay, all right.

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So she did this really interesting thing where if she could tell that I was in a more manic phase, she would adjust her expectations for that day. And I noticed this looking back. These were not things I was aware of at the time. Okay. She would adjust expectations of her day around what was happening there. It was just purely observation.

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She didn't know the name of it necessarily, and she didn't know that I definitely had the same diagnosis. She just recognized certain things. I didn't notice these things until I was much older than I circled back and went, hey, wait a minute, I have questions about this. It was very interesting. And my grandfather would kind of do the same thing. He would steer into these aspects of my personality. And my other grandmother on the other side, her gift was working with the depressive cycle and her family. It was very rampant to have these issues, and she didn't understand it from a clinical standpoint, necessarily, but she would always just gently talk me through things, gently get my energy to a point. I was functional, you know, early on in my process when I wasn't able to do that for myself and just kind of guided me. So my advice is, don't worry so much about making a thing of it or making the person more aware of what's happening to them. That's not so important. It's more important to, again, work with them where they're at and help them get to a better place if need be, as was done. That can help a lot with anxiety, with depression, and with mania, that kind of thing, focusing it somewhere that's productive and helping a person just gently, you know, work through. So my grandmother would gently wake me up. She would do something that she knew was soothing, like talk to me about one of my pets, or she would tell me a nice story about my dad when he was a kid. And then it was, okay, now let's get up, and why don't you shower and brush your teeth? That would be really nice. And I'm like, okay, I could do that. So then now I'm functional, right? And I'm doing the things.

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And then she would make me something that she knew I really like to eat.

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So she knew I would eat because it was something I really wanted. And if I just smelled that thing, I just had to have it, right? And so she would make that for me. For me, it was her shepherd's pie, and she put tater tots on top, not mashed potatoes, which I always just loved. So she would do an orange jelly and always orange. Orange was the correct color for me. So she would make these things me, and if I was really lucky, her famous chocolate pie, too.

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And. And that would get me going, right? And then, because I had these things that release serotonin and oxytocin. And again, she didn't know the chemicals, but she knew the end result, right. That it made me happier, it elated me. It would calm me, and so, in a good way. And so having these things that put happy chemicals into my body actually adjusted. And then I was able to be functional.

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And, yeah, I still had the depression, and, yes, I still have these things, but she just did the steps to help, to help kind of balance out these issues, and that helped me learn how to do it for myself. I'm curious if your parents ever used medication with you. So. They did not, and I'm not. Or if you do now, I'm not anti medication. I want to be very clear about that. I'm not.

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At the time that I was going through diagnosis for what at the time was called manic depression is now called bipolar. The medicines were not good, and they were highly addictive. And I just said, no, this isn't happening. Now I recognize need to take care of myself, but I was like, yeah, I'm not doing that. And my parents respected that in me. Now, fast forward when I hit menopause. And this same thing can happen in puberty, by the way. This same thing can happen once you have a baby. So post part of these types of these types of things. So any major shift in hormones can just completely change how these different diagnoses work. Within your system. So all of a sudden I wasn't getting the same cues from my body. The same things were not working for me and I was thrown into menopause. It was not gradual. I had a hysterectomy, so it was very quick. So for a brief period, I did use a medication when my, because my mania was just out of control for a while. And so I did use a medication only when manic for a very brief period until I was able to re regulate, figure out the systems and put all those back in place. My parents supported the idea of medication, but they also let me choose my journey and they said, basically, as long as you're taking care of yourself, we're good. Which I think is a beautiful approach because it's different for every human. That's great.

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And look how you've turned out. You're, I think I'm pretty functioning happy, doing some amazing things and helping a lot of people in the process.

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That's wonderful. You speak about in your writings about universal design and how you quote unquote, say that it can fix the world. Can you explain more about that? Yeah, yeah. I actually just had a call about this too. It was so cool. So universal design is more prevalent of a term and concept in the it world. So what it basically means is that you, you design holistically and in a way that is effective for everybody as best you know. But then you build in flexibility. It's actually built in to whatever process or technology or whatever it is. So that when it does need to be changed, it's very simple to make those changes. And the same concept works in relationships. It works in the workplace, it works in schools, it works in society. Universal design, when it's designed for everybody, makes more sense and it makes it more comfortable for everyone. So, for instance, one of the things I teach my clients is to change the accommodation process into just standard options. So no more jumping through hoops and letters from doctors and blah blah blah and making submittals. You just go to a list, you click it, you get what you need, which works very well because, by the way, 54% of accommodations are free for the Department of Labor, so it's not even expensive to do. So they're doing these things. And what starts to happen is it's not just for the neuro community, it's not just for the disability community. Other people who just have different communication styles learn differently. Whatever it is, they start going, oh yeah, this works for me too. And then it starts to grow. And so more people are working and functioning in ways that are healthier and more natural to them. And Maslow's hierarchy teaches us, and that's an established psychology principle, that the more our base needs are taken care of, the more we can, quote, climb the pyramid, or elevate ourselves into a more cerebral place. And that's when we do our best work. We do our best schoolwork, we make our best connections with our loved ones, we enjoy the world around us more, we connect more with other people, we connect more with the things that are happening to us. And so we become happier, we become more productive, we become more connected. So it works. This idea of universal design truly works for other people. So it's just designing for everybody. That's all it is.

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And that's an application, a term that you use in the workplace?

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Oh, yeah, I just say universal design for the workplace. Yeah, because it's the same concept. It's just instead of doing it with a technology, we're doing it at home or we're doing it school or we're doing it at work.

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That's comforting to know, as our children, our neurodiverse children, are moving into the work world. And I would think that as we prepare them for that, maybe those are conversations that employers are starting to have with prospective employees. Yes. Which is nice.

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It's slow and everybody's trying to figure it out. Right? Like, how do we balance being weird and awkward or accidentally discriminating with creating universal design, these types of things? And one of the main principles I impart on workplaces is you don't need to know a diagnosis, you just need to know what they need and how it helps, so it kind of avoids that nosiness. I've spoken to a few teachers as well, and I've told them the same thing. You don't have to have a diagnosis. Just believe what the child needs and go forth. I think it's very interesting, because you see, when you do this, and Hewlett Packard did this, by the way, they're famous for, they've actually. It's astronomical. So when they did this and they experimented, and they only did it with one group, and when they used universal design, so people were allowed to work how they needed, when they needed all these types of things. Productivity went up 33%, innovation went up, retention went up, employee satisfaction went up, and people reported being happier and healthier at work. I mean, production went up 33%. That's huge. Right? So it factually works. It factually works, and it works in schools. So I just tell people, let people do what makes them comfortable. And if you're working with a child, let's say, who has ADHD, and you're asking them to sit still in the classroom for 8 hours a day, you've already lost the battle. You're done. You're done. So why not let them walk around, sit on a yoga ball, play with fidget spinners? And what people don't realize is that doesn't distract them, it actually helps them to focus. So just letting people, it doesn't hurt you, it doesn't affect you. You know, everybody can just do whatever they need to be doing. So it's important to, again, steer into the person, not ask them to change for you.

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What is ego defense? Oh, that's a good one. So the ego defense is something I started doing a lot of research on a while back because I wanted to figure out why people were so averse to just helping other humans or listening to other humans or any of these kinds of things. And I discovered this fascinating little mechanism that every human has. By the way, if this applies to you, it will apply to you factually. And do not feel bad. It is natural. This is a thing that you cannot help, but you are probably never made aware of. So we all have what is referred to as the ego mechanism in our brain, and it's not ego as we typically think of it. Our brain needs to be correct because correct equals safe. So that's kind of how the brain works. It must be correct because correct is safe. And so when something is contrary to what we do, what we think, our experience, our brain says, oh, no, we might not be correct, that's unsafe. And it just starts throwing up defenses as to why it's right, because it needs to be unsafe. Because if that doesn't happen, if that ego mechanism is not there, then more stress chemicals get released and our brain becomes even more unhealthy. But the problem is that the ego mechanism still also releases bad hormones. So it still releases adrenaline and dopamine. It just won't release it for as long. So there are even people who are addicted to their ego mechanism. Like when you see those people on social media that just argue beyond all reason and they just want to argue and fight, that's what that is. That's their ego mechanism just gone haywire. And so how do we combat that? Yes, that's the thing. So you can, you can just shut it off and say, it's okay, brain, it's okay. You know, it's okay. We don't, we don't need to be doing that. Thank you so much, though. And how do we speak to that? Or how do we respond when someone is doing that? So, first of all, to recognize your own, because that's step one. You have to start to realize when it's happening, and it's usually very distinct cue. So some people have told me they feel tension in their foreheads. I feel a twinge. I can actually feel my nerves start to fire up just above the nape of my neck. What you do to find your target is intentionally seek out something that you know is going to activate the ego mechanism, is going to upset you, and then pause and make note of what you feel, and you will. And do that, like, a few different times over one day to let it calm down all the way and then kind of reactivate it, make sure you've got the target, memorize that feeling, and then you can go, okay, it's happening. And so then how you stop it is you come up with a way to do what's called grounding yourself. So for me, I either lightly tap my foot on the floor or I touch my hands on my desk chair. And I spent literally five minutes training my brain that when I do that, I have food in the pantry, I have a roof over my head, I have water to drink. Nothing is attacking me. It actually calms my brain.

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Some people tap their fingers. Some people snap. Whatever it is, I know one lady, and she just blinks for kind of an extra long time, and that just does it for her. And it tells your brain, we're okay. It's all right. You don't need to release these. I don't need to react. Yeah. And then you respond with a question, and the intent is to actually engage. It's not one of those I'm trapping you kind of questions. It's I want to actually learn from you. And you start digging and probing. Why? What is this thing that is happening over here? Because even if you're still not going to agree with them, that's okay. And maybe you will. Maybe it'll just give you new reasons why you don't. You never know. But you engage with them and you ask questions, and then what happens is your brain starts to learn that asking questions is healthier and it's happier because it releases oxytocin and serotonin. So you start to ask these questions and engage. And in terms of this show and grandparents working with their kids, this is how you can best come to understand them, because we make assumptions. Right? So when somebody does something, and maybe it offends us or hurts us. You know, we just. Or we think, that's not what I would do. We label it as wrong. Right? That's the ego mechanism saying, this is wrong, this is wrong input. But maybe it's not. Maybe that's what they needed, or maybe we missed something.

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Maybe this person made a snarky comment and we think we didn't do anything, but really we did. We said something really awful that really hurt them and we didn't mean it. It gives a chance to heal. And so then your brain starts to recognize this is the better choice, and your mind literally starts to change. It actually changes shape. Like, your synapses do different things and you start to respond differently. Your brain gets more information to make better decisions, which decreases your stress level and allows you to end stressful situations even earlier. And it just compiles. But when you're working with a neurodivergent child, this really comes into play. This is something my parents did with me. I don't know if they did the whole breaking the ego mechanism practice, but the curiosity aspect they definitely did with me. And they really would sit there and talk to me about why. How is this working for you? You're doing this thing. It seems pretty weird to me, but why are you doing it? How is this helping you? What is the thing that's happening? And that always gave them the information to then guide me in the best way possible. And it made for far, far more productive parenting than I see overall right now.

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Well, Katherine, this is great news, great information, and a great introduction to neurodiversity. And I think that this conversation will be extremely valuable to our listeners. I appreciate you sharing all of this with us.

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Can you recommend some good podcasts or audiobooks for our listeners? Because we have very little time to read, actually.

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There are so many different wonderful creators and content writers. I don't want to just limit to one show. My best advice is to get on LinkedIn, make you just a basic account. You don't have to make a whole profile full of tons and tons of jobs, but go through and search neurodiversity and start seeing what to you and who might really work with you. There are tons of wonderful, wonderful folks out there who work with children, who specialize with children. If you want to speak to somebody who maybe specializes in diet and neurodiversity, eating healthy and working with the neurodiversity, if you want to work on grounding and things like that, I have specific humans. Anyone can reach out to me I'm sure that you'll drop my contact information in there. You can also find me on LinkedIn, Katherine McCord or you can go to Kay McCord speaking and do the contact form and reach out to me. I'm always happy to make direct introductions, but honestly, get on LinkedIn and see what speaks to you and your specific situation, your specific child.

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I will do that, and I'm sure my listeners will as well. Well, thanks, Katherine. It's been wonderful getting to know you, and I hope we have more conversations in the future. Future. I absolutely do too. And best of luck to all the wonderful grandparents out there raising those sweet babies.

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Thanks so much for joining us today for another episode of grandparents raising grandchildren. Nurturing through adversity I encourage you to share your challenges and your successes with us. Your story is undoubtedly one someone else needs to hear.

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You can submit your stories to the links provided in the podcast information. Your contributions will enrich upcoming conversations, creating a more supportive community in which we can learn and grow together. If you enjoyed this show, please share it with a friend that needs to hear. And if you love the show and you're listening on a broadcasting platform like Apple or Spotify, just scroll down in your app and please leave us a review. Oh, and you won't want to miss next week's episode. From curveballs to Communion, as we delve into the inspiring journey of a grandmother who transitioned from being a baseball coach to taking on the role of raising her grandson and eventually finding her calling as a pastor. Join us as we uncover her remarkable story of resilience, love, and faith in the face of life's unexpected twists and turns. And thank you for tuning in to grandparents raising grandchildren nurturing through adversity remember.

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You are not alone. Together we can find strength and hope in the face of adversity.

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Peace be with you, and I pray that you find some time this week to listen to your inner wisdom amongst the noise and the pandemonium of this world.