If you recently discovered you might be autistic or you're a parent who recently discovered your kiddo might be autistic & you're looking to learn about autism through science and lived experience…

I'm noticing a lot of confusion around neurodivergence... particularly because there are so many conditions that have similar "symptoms"... in other words, they look the same on the surface but have different underlying explanations...

If you're wondering why there are so many people figuring out they're autistic, ADHD, or otherwise neurodivergent as adults or much later in life... I can explain...

I don't know who needs to see this, but when you're an undiagnosed, high masking, lower support needs, autistic adult living independently... your only path towards diagnosis is by first self-identifying as autistic…

So, I'm autistic, level 1, and I recently started opening my videos with this.

And the reason I started to do this is because I realized that a lot of the things that I was talking about, particularly as it relates to my personal lived experiences as a neurodivergent person, represents a very specific type of lived experience, which has to do with the level of support needs a person has...

Hi, I'm Nicole, and I'm autistic, and I'm also an autistic advocate. And for those who aren't familiar with me, I have a diagnosis of autism level 1 for both of the categories, so social communication and restrictive repetitive behaviors.

In this video, I explain why I feel the level designations are so important and why the push (from some) to remove them puts our most vulnerable members of the community at risk...

There's a specific reason most people misunderstand neurodivergence... and it has to do with the way neurodivergent conditions are diagnosed.

The core issue basically comes down to one thing... the fact that neurological conditions are diagnosed almost EXCLUSIVELY by what's observable…

There's a pipeline for internalized neurodivergence that no one is talking about.

So I will…

I will never question a person’s self-diagnosis. I’m sure there are people out there claiming to be autistic when they’re not, but those people are not the ones coming to this space for answers and support…