Affirming Neurodivergence: Autism & ADHD with Maverick Joyce, MSW

In this episode we explore ADHD, autism, and rejection sensitive dysphoria through a neuroaffirming lens, moving from damage-based labels to desire-led support. Diagnosis, somatic tools, and group reflection come together to reduce shame and build practical strategies for daily life.

• benefits and limits of diagnosis and accommodations
• executive function, working memory, and decision paralysis
• masking in women and the role of hormones
• misdiagnosis risks and inside-out assessment
• neurodiversity paradigm versus DSM pathologizing
• desire-based frameworks for healing and growth
• choosing neuroaffirming counseling and shared neurotype
• somatic therapy and reworked CBT with body focus
• practical tools, habit windows, and body doubling
• resources including NeuroClastic, Aucademy, and Dr. Nick Walker
• Maverick’s RSD coaching with group reflection and somatics

You can find Maverick at: the.neuroqueer.therapist on Instagram. Six-month RSD coaching program starts in January 2026

Transcript

Welcome And Purpose Of The Show

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to What Works for Say. I'm Screen Dog, and I'm excited you're joining me today. In this podcast, I dive into mental health topics, topics on relationships and overall well-being. With over 20 years of experience with the license clinical social worker, I share insights and invite expert guests who are passionate about making a positive difference. I started this podcast because I was frustrated with the often misleading or recycled information and social media involving self-help and the mental health field. My goal is to provide you with genuine, useful content that's educational and informative. Thanks for tuning in. I hope you find our conversations both enlightening and empowering. I'm glad you're here.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Hi, and welcome to What Would Sabrina Say? I'm your host, Sabrina Gong, and today we have joining with us Maverick Joyce MSW. Thanks so much, Maverick, for joining us today.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Yeah, so if you'd like to share a bit about yourself in terms of your areas of expertise in your profession and what it is that you do, and excited to jump in the topic about neurodivergence and understanding a bit more on autism and ADHD diagnosis.

Diagnosis, Legitimacy, And Accommodations

SPEAKER_02 1:11

Yeah. So um I have my background in social work and I'm a therapist and also a coach. I kind of offer my services in a couple different ways, just because like the limitations that therapy can have, and you can get into that. But I do intensive work, which is like one, two, and three-day intensives specifically for the autistic experience in a way that's very affirming and not pathologizing, because there's a lot of most therapy is kind of centered on deficit, pathology, and damage. And then the other offering that I have are six-month coaching programs for rejection, sensitive dysphoria that are again like desire-based, neurodivergent affirming, and really instead of focusing on pain and damage, really looks at the root core of RSD and how very thing sensitivity, for example, that led to RSD developing in combination with external circumstances, those very sensitivities can actually be used as gifts and strengths in your life.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

What a great way to explain it, how there can actually be strengths and gifts, right? We're always feeling out of place or not like everyone else. And there's so many ways to utilize our strengths. So wondering if we can touch on diagnosis or our labels. Sometimes they're helpful right in the day-to-day in terms of um maybe support uh for for work or at school, but um always great to talk to someone about pros and cons around that. So I was wondering if you can touch on yeah, the diagnosis for ADHD or autism.

SPEAKER_02 2:53

Yeah, I mean, so the the benefit is that it gives you structural and systemic like legitimacy, like according to their kind of rules and framework. So like if you have a very official job or a corporate job or a government job, having those accommodations or having those diagnoses allows you to ask for accommodations that cannot be denied. Self-diagnosis is always welcome within the autistic community and ADHD community. I call it self-determination, though, just because of the way diagnosis has been pathologized, even though that wasn't the original meaning of the word. So if you self-determine, you can always advocate for accommodations, but a lot of people like the protection, the official protection that a diagnosis gives you. Um, and also if you're gonna apply for disability, like you need an official diagnosis through a neuropsych evaluation. Um, and it usually has to come from a psychiatrist or a psychologist.

SPEAKER_01 3:53

So, what are some typical symptoms that bring a person to a doctor or a therapist? Would you say?

SPEAKER_02 4:00

Well, I would say uh executive functioning, which is the ability to manage and working memory, those go together. The ability to like keep something in your mind and hold it there, like waitresses use a lot of working memory because they have to remember, oh, that table wanted this, that table wanted that, that table wanted that. And so we use that in our daily life too, when we're organizing tasks. And that's where executive functioning comes in, where it's keeping all these things in mind and organizing them. So usually struggles in that. And struggles that can bring up a lot of shame for people, even though it makes total sense that these are struggles when you have either ADHD or you're autistic, but things just like remember to brush your teeth, remembering to feed yourself, doing all those things, and then all the responsibilities that life asks of you, the household tasks, like laundry and keeping your space clean and organized. So that's a really big one is the executive functioning and the working memory and the overwhelm that can cause the sort of like freeze response that comes up when you have to make decisions like do I wash the laundry or the dishes, do I do my homework or do I take a shower? All of these things that can lead to what's called decision paralysis, which is kind of like the freezing up of because you're so overwhelmed by these different tasks and you don't know where to start. So things like that are often what brings a person in.

ADHD In Women And Masking

SPEAKER_01 5:26

Great. Um, I was wondering if we could touch on um symptoms that perhaps look different for women sometimes involving ADHD, um what that looks like.

SPEAKER_02 5:41

Yeah. So there's a lot of masking that often happens with women or trans and non-binary folk, just because when you are socialized female in any way, you really get a lot of messaging about being cooperative, making yourself small, what's too much. There's a lot of implicit and subtle messaging, and sometimes it's overt for some people, but there's just a lot of messaging around the ways you need to shrink yourself. And so there's usually a lot of masking. A lot of times, adult women who are diagnosed later and late later in life will have had experiences where ADHD was written off as a possible diagnosis because they got good grades or they are high achievers. Um and that's a bit of a misnomer because they're compensating. So um they're working twice as hard, three times as hard to achieve the same thing that their peers are achieving, but at half or a third of the energy cost. So it's there's a lot of assumptions and discrimination when it comes to what ADHD looks like in women. And also hormones can really affect the way that it manifests. Um, you know, we have different spikes of progesterone throughout our cycle, our estrogen levels change, so it really affects how the ADHD manifests, and that also really influences emotions too. Like sometimes the ADHD shows up more in an emotional way of overstimulation or overwhelm.

SPEAKER_01 7:12

It also affects mood and irritability, and I think sometimes that gets over to in the clinical world, right? And how women's mental cycle affects mood, how anxiety can be heightened during that the time of our cycle. And I think for a lot of times, women here, it's all in your head, but here is our experience, or here is part of another um reason, right? It's like a puzzle piece that finally actually fits in clicks, and and it can be so such a relief for women to know, wow, this is this is why, right? Or where it's coming from.

SPEAKER_02 7:53

Yep. And that actually makes me think about I've had a number of people who were misdiagnosed their entire life with depression. And actually, it turns out it's ADHD, like the kind of the shutdown and overwhelm that can happen when you experience ADHD can lead to it being misinterpreted as depression because the DSM, all of those things, they're very subjective experiences that happen on the inside of our bodies, but you have someone from the outside looking at your behaviors and judging your behaviors and then trying to assign diagnosis to it. Diagnosing from the outside in will just never be as effective as diagnosing from the inside out.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

Right. So there's a lot of focus on behaviors, especially for autism and support like IBI or ABA, it's always focusing on routine. Only recently now are you hearing more about, like you said, it being an internalized experience, exploring with the person how they're experiencing their world and what maybe goals are.

SPEAKER_02 8:52

I've always said that it's really ironic that they call the autistic experience rigid, because if you look at the way they define autism and those questionnaires, they're so rigid. Like they are so rigid. That's just very it's always been very ironic to me.

Neurodiversity Paradigm Versus DSM

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Yes. So I was wondering if we could touch on um before we kind of go into pathology of the brain and body difference, like about rejection sensitivity dysphoria. Um, I think that's a topic discussed where people are researching and learning about ADHD symptoms. And just wondering if we're wanting to share what that is.

Desire-Based Frameworks Over Damage

SPEAKER_02 9:30

Yeah. So I think the most important thing about RSD or rejection-sensitive dysphoria is that it looks different for everyone. Um, it is experienced differently by every person, and it's really complex. I always say the RSD is intersectional because intersectionality is about complexity, social inequality, relationality, social justice. It's about all these different interlocking components. And that is exactly what RSD is. You know, if you grow up in a family where there's neurocultural mismatching, and I use that like as an adaptation of Dr. Stephanie Freiburg's work on uh cultural matching and with indigenous children and in the school system, because neurodivergent children experience something really different. Like there isn't a lot of room in schools for bio-neurodiversity. It's very rigid, it's very structured, it's very stay-in-year-C. And what what is taught is it's a very big focus on like academics, not necessarily like authenticity for the child. So a lot of neurodivergent children, especially ADHDers and autistic kids, will really experience this neurocultural mismatching where they are getting all these subtle cues and messages from the environment where they're basically being told it's not okay for you to embody your brain, like embody your brain body here. It's not okay for you to be who you are. You have to act this way, otherwise you'll get these consequences. And if you act this way, we'll actually reward you for like not being who you are. So it's so subtle of so subtle the messaging. That experience alone can lead to rejection sensitive dysphoria. And that experience is like it's this intense, like whole body visceral emotional reaction that a person gets when they it can just be like perceiving rejection or adjacent to rejection, or it can be actually experiencing rejection. But like, for example, someone setting a boundary, just saying, like, I'm really tired after work tonight and I don't want to hang out. That could be perceived as rejection and set off this whole body visceral experience that kind of spirals down, or just basically an emotional flashback.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Yeah, it's definitely taught at such a young age how you should behave and expectations and can really affect self-esteem when you feel like you don't fit or don't fit in, and then energy that it takes up, right, to again meet those certain school or academic standards. And then what does rejection sensitivity maybe show up as or look like in adulthood?

Choosing A Neuroaffirming Counselor

SPEAKER_02 12:09

Yeah, it shows up in so many little ways, but definitely any place where there's a relationship. It could look like anytime you're you're getting feedback, it it feels really personal. It feels like you did something wrong, there's something wrong with you. Those are kind of the internal core beliefs that are there that formed, which you can never do anything right. I uh always do things wrong, I'll never fit in. Whenever you get feedback, it'll like ping on that. That could come up anywhere. You're at work, you get feedback about a project, or maybe your coworkers go to lunch without you. And then that can trigger that experience within your body, especially in romantic relationships, just like having your partner if they're giving you feedback, like I don't have the energy to do XYZ with you today. Those are all things that can trigger that.

SPEAKER_01 13:00

Right. So noticing those triggers in the environment and where that's coming from. Um therapy can be very helpful to find ways to cope and noticing what those triggers are.

SPEAKER_02 13:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

I wonder if we can touch on pathology of the brain and body differences. We sort of talked about how the diagnostic statistic manual is a pretty cookie-cutter, very defined way of describing characteristics, but people have their own internalized experiences. And then there's the whole brain and body connection.

Somatics And Rethinking CBT

SPEAKER_02 13:38

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So the the DSM really pathologizes human experiences if they deviate from this norm. Well, the neurodiversity paradigm, which is like um is about making space for all brain bodies to exist, and the people who are developing this framework, neuronormativity has been born out of that movement of people to describe the implicit assumption that drives the DSM, which is that there is a normal normative brain body that exists. If you aren't that brain body and you can't meet that level of functioning, then you have a disorder. And so that's what the DSM is is this book of disorders because you aren't like neuronormative in that way. And so it really takes different neurotypes and pathologizes them, like really problematizes the human existence instead of making space for difference to exist and looking at mental health through the lens, perspective, and framework of like where are you in harmony and balance with yourself? And um when you're out of harmony and balance with yourself, how do you get yourself back into harmony and balance with yourself? It's a very different way to conceptualize mental health. Yeah, it's a very different way. And that's the neurodiversity paradigm is more what is in harmony and balance for you that is also in harmony balance for the world, not like how can we get you better so that you're functioning in this way where you work like 40 hours a week and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

Right. So we're learning that there are frameworks to better understand and meet people where they're at with their own goals versus this is what it should look like or what you should be doing. Um and and who's to say it's right, right? Who say it's right to work 40 hours a week.

SPEAKER_02 15:37

It's very subjective.

Practical Tools And Systems That Stick

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we know so many studies from long ago were based on white males or smaller populations. So it's great to hear there's all these frameworks that help people understand themselves. Um we could touch on the desired-based frameworks, just really appreciate the languaging you use because previously it was around persistent behaviors and it's defiant and challenging. And so um yeah, if you could explain about that.

Maverick’s RSD Coaching And Group Work

SPEAKER_02 16:12

Yeah, so that is a term that comes from Dr. Eve Tuck's work. She wrote this like open letter to the research community about using desire-based frameworks within research. And that's really something that I use within like my practice as a coach and a therapist. Um, she was developing this looking from the perspective of being an Indigenous woman and looking at the way that research has treated marginalized groups, especially Indigenous peoples. Like it's their focus on the damage, like what's wrong? How do we fix what's wrong? And it really ignores this whole history of how all this damage that's here was actually created by settler colonialism. And it doesn't actually focus on what indigenous people want, it focuses on what the dominant culture wants. So, capitalism, patriarchy, all of these systems that we know, the things that we take for granted, are actually just imposed dominant cultural norms. And so the desire-based framework is this guiding path away from damage into focusing on desire and what a person wants. And this is actually a really hard thing to do because we are so encouraged and led in this society to focus on the pain and the damage and what's wrong in life and lack, scarcity mindset is so abundant, right? Because we're taught to focus on what's wrong and damage. We're not taught to focus on imagination, creation, and desire. But when we actually start to learn what yes feels like in our body and what desire feels like in our body, then we actually start to get more clarity and we start to engage with our problems, our pain in a different way, our damage. Because there's pain's valid, but our quote-unquote damage, because again, that's subjective, in a different way because we know what our actual like soul's truth and desire is. It's can be a hard thing to describe because when you go through it, you see it from the other side. But before you've gone through that transformation of understanding what yes feels like in your body, it's hard to conceptualize it from like this part of just being like sort of ingrained into your sociocultural conditioning, as we all are when we're when we're born.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Um, someone were to have goals and they would want to see a counselor involving managing ADHD symptoms or help support involving, say, an autism diagnosis. How could they benefit from counseling and what would they need to make sure their counselor knows as far as training and expertise?

Closing Resources And Farewell

SPEAKER_02 18:52

Yeah, I mean, I always recommend if you can find a counselor who shares your neurotype, that's really great. I approach it really similarly to the way you would approach like multiculturalism or like sort of uh like DEI, uh, inclusivity. And so I recommend for people if they can find their ADHD or suspect their ADHD, you know, try and find a therapist who also has ADHD. If you're autistic, try to find a therapist who's also autistic. If you can't, then look for someone who is neuroaffirming. And if they're neuroaffirming, then they're not going to see your neurotype as a deficit or a disorder. They're going to see the society and the environment as the disorder, and they're going to support you in being your most authentic embodied self and finding a way to make that work within the disordered environment. So I think really the thing you want to look for is the gaze, like, where's the gaze? And is the gaze on you as the individual having the problem, or is the gaze on the environment? Environment having the problem.

SPEAKER_01 20:01

Right. So a a counselor who could have an understanding and seeing that it's the environment and how to support and cope within that environment versus again maybe focusing on behavioral approaches specifically. Like in the past. Yeah. So counseling I find can help people find tools. Yeah. To put your energy where you'd like it to be placed instead of putting your energy on other things, trying to fit into those environments. Yeah. And using your strengths. Anything else that therapy can help with?

SPEAKER_02 20:40

Uh I I for me, I always go back to the body. The biggest thing that therapy can be so helpful with, and I especially recommend this for neurodivergent people, is do somatic therapy. It goes slowly, and it's so worth it because when you're ADHD or autistic, you have been subtly trained throughout your life to not be in your body and to leave your body at the end in your body. Um, and learning the tools to stay with yourself in your body, attuned to the sensations in your body and be present to see them through. You will learn so much about yourself and that tool alone of being connected to your body will get you through like your hardest challenges. It's really powerful.

SPEAKER_01 21:26

Right. Because there's recommendations to use cognitive behavioral therapy. And again, that's so much focusing on thoughts and how you're thinking about your environment is wrong, and let's have you reframing. Yeah. I think there are so many other modalities that can help with regulating the nervous system, going into your body versus Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:47

And CBT is another great example of where's the focus. So CBT in and of itself, I don't think is like the monster everyone makes it out to be. It's the fact that it's been applied in an individualistic way instead of a systemic way. And also that it's been applied without connecting it to the body because our thoughts do have sensations in our body. So when you take kind of like the core, like the heart of CBT and you combine it and you well, if you take the heart of CBT, you use externalization and an environmental focus and then connect it to the body, it can be really powerful. And like I'll give an example of that. So when I use CBT with people, if there's a thought come up, right? Typically, like a therapist would call that cognitive distortion. But what I will do first is externalize that thought as in connect it to a system, you know, like patriarchy, settler colonialism, sexism, racism, all of those different systems that are part of the structure of settellar colonialism. And I'll be like, okay, so that's a colonial distortion. It's connected to this system, and you have internalized that colonial distortion. So where do you feel that in your body when you're thinking that thought? Like there are ways to rework CBT so that it's not looking at the behavior of an individual and blaming the behavior of an individual or shaming them. Like there are ways to creatively use like the heart of CBT. And I guess you could argue that it's not CBT anymore, but if you boil it down to its essence, um, is what I'm talking about, and then applying it in this holistic model. I like to think of it as cognitive body therapy.

SPEAKER_01 23:25

Wow, that's great. So just noticing the ways that how we think and where those beliefs might be attached to or coming from, and being able to heal from that and notice what comes up for us in our body because of those beliefs.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

What great work. Thanks for sharing how CBT can be used in in a different way and looking at colonialism. Um so we sort of touched on benefits of today of uh perhaps having a diagnosis and how that can help a person. Talks about how counseling can help, different models of intervention, brain and body work, somatic work, how that can be helpful. You touched on different frameworks that are helpful for people to know, counselors especially to know and use in session. I was wondering if you could share some helpful resources or where people could go.

SPEAKER_02 24:20

Yeah, there are a lot. So I'll have to give you some links to share on show notes if you have those for the podcast. But um, NeuroClastic is one that I enjoy. I think they have a Facebook and Instagram account, and I think they have their own website too, but they have a lot of really great articles about autism, maybe some about ADHD, but I think it's mostly autism focused. Um then there's also it's al Academy, it's like AU for autism, and then academy, so it's autistic and academy put together. Um, and I think that's dot co because it's a UK organization, but they are amazing. They have a YouTube channel with like every single topic connected to autism that you could think about, and they have just this expansive website with different definitions of different terms and what it's like to be autistic and support and resources. So that's also a really amazing website. And then again, for autism, there is uh neuroqueer mom, and that's Dr. Nick Walker, and she just has so many different articles about autism and really looking at autism from the inside out, because she is also autistic, and and then just so many different essays about like bodiment and autism, um and really offering a fresh new perspective that isn't all about autism being pathologized and problematized, but rather being affirming. And then for ADHD, I really like um if you're looking for a practical tool, the anti-planner planner by Danny Donovan is really amazing. But yeah, it's it comes in a PDF form electronically, or uh she also has a like a big book, but it's an ADHD dream. And it's just for when you have to get stuff done, and maybe it's hard, or maybe you're just like going through some overwhelm. She has all these different tabs for when you're feeling stuck, when you're feeling overwhelmed, when you're feeling burnt out, when you're feeling all these, when you're in these different emotional states, she has these different sections of this book with colors and organization and check and games, and it's just really it's really great and it's really cool.

SPEAKER_01 26:29

So that's a really great practical one. I for myself love to use Notion. It's just been such a game changer for me to have everything in one spot and be like another little brain and organize things for me and have templates from like from filing taxes to my day-to-day tasks and reminding me.

SPEAKER_02 26:48

My friend uses Notion.

SPEAKER_01 26:50

I like Asana.

SPEAKER_02 26:51

That's uh I really like the Asana tax uh and uh and I also on Microsoft they have OneNote, which is cool with all these different like notebooks and you can organize them and put different things in them. And I like that too. And I like Notion, I do use Notion too. It's more ideas and the feed of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

I guess yeah, once you find something that works for you, it's great. But there's there's a lot of things, and it's all trial and error and being kind to yourself in the process.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

There is, there is. It's also just a matter of making yourself stick with something, reminding yourself to stick with it. Because I have found that I sometimes get into loops where I try something and just and then just stop too soon. But the brain really forms a habit after three weeks of doing something. So I'm constantly reminding myself, no, give this, give this some time before you decide stop for you. Because I already will get stuck in this loop of trying and stopping and trying and stopping.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Right. Such a great topic, and lots of people ask this. How do you stick to something? How do you not just stop and start? And I think it's giving yourself time to try it, giving yourself five minutes to do a task and permission to switch. But yeah, that's that's a hard one for many, attaching it to some kind of reward. We hear a lot now body doubling, so pairing up with someone to do it. I learned so much today in speaking to Maverick and excited to have you on anytime to talk about great helpful tips or resources.

SPEAKER_02 28:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:16

And learning more about these important frameworks and also talking about rejection sensitivity. So thanks for your time today and for sharing such great resources. Just wondering where people can find you if you they'd like to know more information or seek out further help.

SPEAKER_02 28:33

So uh I have an Instagram account, which is the dot neuroqueer.therapist, and we mostly talk about rejection sensitivity on there. I do my coaching business on there, so it's really about rejection sensitive dysphoria, offering different perspectives and ways to look at it. I'm really a more holistic perspective, including spirituality, because we don't really talk about spirit, but like we all feel that connection to something greater than ourselves. And so um, I really do holistic mind-body emotion spirit work when I'm talking about rejection sensitive dysphoria. And I have a six-month coaching program coming up soon for that too, which will start in January. And it's six months. The big the big thing though is that there is this, there is a group element to the coaching program, and it uses this myth methodology called critical reflections, where you know, you take an experience you had with rejection sensitivity and you share it in a group. And it's this culture of like generosity and curiosity and radical acceptance and compassion and expansiveness, and it's just really holding space for everything and being curious about just really open-ended questions, really curious about the experience, and then like through this process, developing a new way of looking at your experiences, and that combines with the one-on-one where we do a lot of somatic coaching and getting to know your body, and um those two experiences of like the individual and the collective really synthesize together to help you understand your experiences in a new way so that rejection doesn't become so personalized. Because the thing about rejection is that it's it's usually almost it's like always about the other person and the filter that they're looking at you through. And our sociocultural conditioning is the filter that we look at others through. Someone might be looking at you through patriarchy or sexism or racism or their own like family culture, which was maybe like really strict and rigid or something. So it really works at getting at all of that childhood stuff and softening it and um really beginning to embody the understanding that rejection is about the other person and it's not personal.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

Right. What a great way to get support from others to to do those reflecting pieces and understand how you know you may be impacted by others' behavior and ways they communicate.

SPEAKER_02 31:00

And it's so powerful to share your experiences in a group like that. I've gone through this myself. Everything I offer is stuff that I've been through myself in my healing process. So it's really powerful to have your experiences be seen and heard and just held with love and compassion.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Yeah. Well, thanks so much for sharing that resource. I think so many people could benefit from the support that you offer and feel free to share updates. Happy to pass through for you. Thanks so much for being here. Um and the work you do. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 31:32

Thank you. Thank you for having me. It was so fun to talk.