This week, David and Isabelle sit down with Avari Brocker — Neurodiversity Alliance student advocate and founder of Learning Curb — for a conversation about something so many neurodivergent people carry quietly for years: knowing you’re different, only seeing your deficits, and not having language for why life feels so much harder than it seems to for everyone else.

Avari shares what it was like to be diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia at 16 after struggling for most of her life, and why the worst thing she thought she might hear was that something wasn't actually wrong. David and Isabelle unpack why that fear lands so deeply, especially for high-achieving, high-masking kids who get told they’re just too anxious or “you'll be fine” while they’re privately drowning.

Avari also shares how that late diagnosis lit a fire under LearningCurb.org, the resource hub she built so other neurodivergent kids and families don’t have to spend a year desperately searching for answers while they’re still in the middle of struggling.

If you’ve ever thought, “I know something’s different, but I don’t know what”… if you’ve ever worried that a label would make things worse… or if you’ve ever needed someone to say there’s a reason this has felt this hard, this one’s for you.

Here's what's coming your way:

• Why the label you fear can sometimes be the thing that finally brings relief
• A powerful breakdown of what it means to grow up seeing only your deficits and not your strengths
• Why high-masking, high-achieving kids can get missed for years
• How research, self-understanding, and advocacy can change the trajectory of someone’s life
• What Avari built after diagnosis — and why it matters for neurodivergent kids and families now

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Wait, What's That? Here are some of the terms and people mentioned in this episode explained:

Neurodiversity Alliance: An organization that supports neurodivergent young people through leadership, mentorship, and advocacy. In this conversation, it’s also the community space where David and Isabelle first connected with Avari.

Dyslexia: A learning disability that affects reading, spelling, and language processing. In this episode, Avari talks about finally having language for why reading and spelling had felt so hard for so long.

Dysgraphia: A learning disability that affects writing. It can show up in handwriting, spelling, and getting thoughts onto the page. Avari references how physically hard writing tasks could be for her.

LearningCurb.org: Avari’s resource hub for neurodivergent kids and families. She created it to give people one place to find tools, support, and information for different neurodiverse needs.

Interconnected Thinking: Avari’s phrase for the way her brain naturally links ideas, experiences, and patterns together. She talks about this as one of her neurodivergent strengths.

Hyperfocus: A common ADHD experience where attention gets locked onto something intensely. Avari mentions that she used to assume everyone experienced hyperfocus the way she did.

Eye Diagnosis for Slow Tracking: A diagnosis related to how the eyes track across a page or visual field. In Avari’s case, that diagnosis helped her access extra time on tests before she later received her ADHD and dyslexia diagnoses.

Trauma Mastery: A phrase Isabelle uses to describe the way people sometimes make meaning out of painful experiences by using what they learned to protect or help others.

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💬 Have you ever gotten an answer or label that finally made your life make more sense? Drop your story in the comments on Spotify.

🎧 Follow Something Shiny: ADHD for more conversations that help you understand your ADHD and remind you—you were never too much.

This week, David and Isabelle unpack why moving can hit neurodivergent brains so much harder than people realize. Yes, there’s the obvious stress of boxes, clutter, visual chaos, and trying to remember where literally anything is. But underneath that, they get into the deeper part too: what happens when your routines disappear, your environment stops making sense, and even the tiniest automatic actions suddenly don’t exist anymore.

Because this episode is really about more than moving. It’s about that awful, disorienting in-between where something is objectively good… and your nervous system is still like, “Absolutely not.” David breaks down why change itself can land as painful, why losing patterns can feel like losing your footing, and why so many neurospicy folks get slammed by overwhelm before the new environment has had a chance to make sense yet.

And instead of just naming the problem, they get to what actually can help. The conversation gets into why your brain may need to physically build new patterns before anything feels manageable again, why body doubling can interrupt the buffering, why visual overwhelm matters more than people think, and how different neurospicy brains need totally different systems in order to function.

If you’ve ever been excited about a change and still felt totally wrecked by it. Or, if you’ve ever looked around and thought, “Why does this feel so hard when this is supposed to be good?” this one will probably hit home.

Here's what's coming your way:

• Why “good change” can still feel painful, disorienting, and weirdly grief-y for ADHD and AuDHD brains
• A really helpful breakdown of how routines, environment, and repeated actions quietly hold daily life together
• Language for the specific kind of overwhelm that happens when nothing feels automatic anymoreWhy unpacking can create instant buffering, shutdown, and decision fatigue
• How body doubling, music, and visual clarity can help interrupt overwhelm and make starting easier
• Why different brains need wildly different organization systems--and why that doesn’t mean anyone is doing it wrong

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Wait, What’s That? Here are some of the terms and people mentioned in this episode explained:

Bobby: Isabelle’s husband.

Sarah: A partner in David’s practice. David brings up a conversation with Sarah while wondering out loud whether change can actually register as pain in the brain.

Robin: David’s partner, who comes up while he’s describing the home setup that helps his own brain keep track of where things are.

Clutterbug YouTube: The decluttering channel Isabelle shouts out because those videos have basically become her fake body-doubling companions while unpacking. https://www.youtube.com/@Clutterbug

Body Doubling: A support strategy where doing a task gets easier because someone else is there with you — even virtually. Isabelle talks about using decluttering videos that way during the move.

Object Permanence: The very real neurospicy experience of something effectively disappearing once it’s boxed up, put away, or moved out of its usual place.

Externalized Memory: David’s phrase for needing to physically put something somewhere yourself in order to actually remember where it is later.

Procedural Memory: Isabelle’s way of describing how much she relies on repeated physical action — reach here, plug this in there, turn this direction — instead of remembering things abstractly.

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💬 Has a “good change” ever completely overwhelmed your brain at first? Drop your story in the comments on Spotify.

🎧 Follow Something Shiny: ADHD for more conversations that help you understand your ADHD and remind you — you were never too much.

Ever needed extra time, extra support, or a different way of doing something and immediately thought, “Wait… is this cheating?”

Yeah. That feeling is way more common than you think.

This week, David and Isabelle are back on stage at the Neurodiversity Alliance Leadership Summit in Denver for the second part of their live conversation with Jesse Sanchez, President of the Neurodiversity Alliance. Jesse has been part of this community for years as a mentor, leader, and now the person helping guide the organization forward. The Leadership Summit is where Neurodiversity Alliance mentors and student leaders from across the country gather for training, storytelling, and connection. It’s a room full of neurodivergent students learning how to talk about their brains with confidence—and how to help younger kids do the same.

In this part of the live conversation, Safia Mohammed, a Brooklyn-based nursing student and Neurodiversity Alliance Student Ambassador who’s been part of the community for several years, joins the conversation. She shares her story about something a lot of neurodivergent people wrestle with: the uncomfortable feeling that needing support somehow means you're doing something wrong.

Safia talks about her experience first received an IEP (Individualized Education Program) in elementary school. At the time, it felt confusing. She was being pulled out of class for extra help and didn’t really understand why. And like a lot of neurodivergent kids, she started wondering something was wrong with her. David and Isabelle unpack why moments like that are so common in the neurodivergent experience, from the stigma around accommodations to the deeply ingrained belief that success only counts if it’s hard.

If you’ve ever hesitated to ask for help because you didn’t want to feel like you were getting an advantage, this conversation might shift how you think about support and what it’s actually there to do.

Here's what's coming your way:

• Safia’s story of receiving an IEP and why it felt confusing when she was younger
• The moment that changed how she understood accommodations
• Why so many neurodivergent people feel shame around getting support
• How stigma around accommodations keeps people from advocating for what they need

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Wait, What's That? Here are some of the terms and people mentioned in this episode explained:

IEP (Individualized Education Program): A formal education plan used in U.S. schools to provide accommodations and support for students with learning differences or disabilities. These supports can include extra time on tests, alternative learning environments, or additional instructional support designed to help students demonstrate what they actually know.

Accommodations: Adjustments made in school or work environments that allow people with learning differences or disabilities to access the same opportunities as others. Examples include extended time on exams, quieter testing environments, or different ways of presenting information.

Neurodiversity Alliance (formerly Eye to Eye): An organization where neurodivergent young adults and teens mentor younger neurodivergent kids through art projects and advocacy work. The rebrand reflects what they actually do: build an alliance of humans across the neurodivergent spectrum who know how to tell their full stories, vulnerabilities and superpowers included.

OI: A term used by members of the Neurodiversity Alliance community to refer to the organization’s annual leadership summit where mentors and student leaders gather for training and connection.

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💬 Have you ever had a moment where getting support changed how you saw your abilities? Tell us your story in the comments on Spotify.

🎧 Follow Something Shiny: ADHD for more conversations that help you understand your ADHD and remind you—you were never too much.