Mama You Belong
Welcome to 'Mama You Belong' - a podcast for moms in the thick of it. We delve into the need for belonging and connection that mothers often face alone and help you feel seen. We acknowledge the dissonance between societal expectations of motherhood and the realities of managing our mental and physical load, with science and trauma-informed support. Co-hosts of 'Mama You Belong' are Kirsten Desmarais, PT, DPT, OCS, CD(DONA) a physical therapist, birth doula, and mother of three, and Molly Hilgenberg, MSW, LICSW, a psychotherapist, singer/songwriter, and new mom.
Kirsten and Molly were both kids who collected rocks, hugged trees and grew up in different towns in Minnesota. They met only a few years ago when Kirsten became Molly's PT and then her birth doula. They bonded when they both realized they could pretty much share anything without judgment and text each other about the moon.
Through shared stories and expert insights, 'Mama You Belong' seeks to empower mothers by creating a supportive space for connection and understanding in their unique journeys. Each episode aims to provide validation, education, and some laughs. By sharing our stories and inviting expert guests in future episodes, we aspire to create a nurturing and inclusive environment for moms.
Mama You Belong
Unlearning Sleep Rules: Choosing Connection Over Shoulds (Transforming Our Sleep Practice) - Part Two
We follow Kirsten’s path from noticing things about her child to an autism + ADHD diagnosis, showing how clarity changed home life, school decisions, and self-trust. We talk sensory needs, high masking in girls, 504 vs IEP, and choosing connection over forced resilience.
• trusting instincts alongside expert guidance
• sensory needs hidden as quirks and stims
• second child as context for nervous system differences and what's "typical"
• pandemic chaos
• teacher concerns - they finally see what we've been seeing
• 504 accommodations vs legally binding IEP
• choosing a clinic for diagnostic testing
• diagnosis as language, not stigma, for self-understanding
• school focus on tolerance versus environmental change
• boundaries with systems and protecting family energy
• resources for autistic girls and high-masking profiles
This conversation is a map for parents who feel unseen by charts and checklists. It offers language for advocating with schools, ideas for crafting a home that regulates instead of battles, and resources for recognizing high-masking autistic girls. Most of all, it’s permission to replace “tolerance training” with environments that fit. If this resonates, share it with a friend, subscribe for more grounded conversations, and leave a review so others can find us. Your story could be the lifeline another parent needs today.
Resources:
Yellow Lady Bugs - Podcast, book, source of a ton of info for neurodivergent girls and gender diverse youth
Tilt Parenting/Differently Wired book - This is another awesome resource to help make sense of how to navigate parenting neurodivergent kiddos
Telepathy Tapes - A podcast exploring how some non-speaking autistics communicate.
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You can always email is at mamayoubelong@gmail.com to let us know what you think, leave a story of how the show impacted you, or just say "hey"!
Kirsten's Physical Therapy website
Hey mama, you belong. We're so glad you're here. We are your hosts, Molly, mental health therapist, singer and songwriter, tree hugger, and a new mom like many of you.
SPEAKER_00:And Kirsten, physical therapist, birth dua, deep feeler, lover of trees, and fellow mama. We hope you feel seen through these episodes and truly believe that you belong.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. Hi, Kirsten. Hi, Molly. We're back for part two. Part two. We need to find a really good name for these episodes. You're saying some really powerful things about matrescence right now. And trusting yourself, trusting your child. So where do you want to go next in the conversation?
SPEAKER_00:Well, those are those are truly like big themes in my story, but I feel like they're probably big themes in a lot of people's stories because societally that doesn't really feel like what we are supposed to be doing. You said in in the first sleep episode about how you know these the expert advice and guidance and things like is super important. And like we need to have that. And parents need to use that as a guide, but they still need to understand and know their children. And we can't be just like kind of blindly listening to and following different philosophies without really understanding and continuing to understand our children as they develop. And I think without being in the right circles who of people who can support you in figuring out what trusting yourself and trusting your children look like, it might feel really scary to not kind of like blindly follow something that has the doctor as an author. Right. Or, you know, blanket statement guidance about timing for certain things, where it's it's kind of that what if, like the whole like bottle thing. Like, oh, you're supposed to be done with bottles, and it's this thing. And there's a lot of fear in there about like this is a provider telling me this thing. And and there's this sort of like internal conflict of like, am I ready for that? Is my child ready for that? What are the pros and cons of removing the bottle from our routine right now? What's the best way to do that? What are alternatives to that? What if I pushed it another two months? Like, yeah, I don't think we're always given that conversation around some of these really important things. We just kind of like, oh, okay. And and have to like bury that conflict and then kind of force our kiddos through things that might be really tricky for them. And you probably come out the other side. But like that process is so unfair. And developing that internal trust that you do know your child. And even if you don't have all the right answers, you trust yourself to figure it out. That doesn't mean you just ignore any and all guidance. Right. But it means that you also value what you know too.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I I think that bottle example is just like it was a small window into what your experience must have been like all the time, right? Of just throwing out what I was seeing his needs were like, and then just listening to that physician and thinking that's what I had to do and I didn't have a choice. And I still see, like, I mean, it's more of a sippy cup style now, but like we still sit and snuggle and do a milk routine. And I am not letting that go until he tells me he doesn't want to anymore, because he clearly gets like a total oxytocin like immersion from that multiple times a day, right? And I'm not gonna be like, you have to go like drink this by yourself. Right.
unknown:Oh no.
SPEAKER_01:So that's all to say, like reductionist like Western science methods have gotten us to a lot of advancements, and there can be a balance, right, in what you're saying too, of like also trusting yourself and listening to your own child's unique needs. Yes.
SPEAKER_00:So I learned a big way through the sleep, but also through these various observations where my child had unique needs. And it took me a long time to put them all together to mean something bigger than what we used to say is that's just Lena. And it it might be that she was really, really close in proximity, like her face was like in your face for no reason. She was just all of a sudden right there. We're like, oh, Lena's just being Lena. Or food-wise, couldn't have certain food on her plate. She couldn't even eat until it was off her plate. Lena just being Lena. She's just picky. Or like the sleep stuff for sure. The could do pro big gross motor proprioceptive input play the entire day and not get tired.
unknown:Wow.
SPEAKER_00:Like the there's certain playgrounds that have spinny toys where they get going like really kind of fast. And she would, she would, she would live on there or like hanging like monkey bars, constant swinging back and forth, but even just like jumping down off of stuff like all the time. That's just Lena being Lena and transitions. So like waking up after nap, she would cry so sad, be like kind of inconsolable for like 45 minutes. It's just Lena. I I didn't have context to compare anything, really. And I had already tried to block out or minimize the differences because the sleep thing was like a whole thing where I still felt othered when she was really young and tried to minimize differences as much as possible, whether it was like verbally with other people. So I wouldn't ask, like, does your does your child just cry when they wake up from a nap for like 45 minutes and they just need to like decompress? You know, like I wouldn't ask questions like that. It was just Lena being Lena. And I I never assumed other kids were like this. But I didn't really know the extent of these, a lot of these sensory and emotional needs, like the the play needs that I talked about in the first part of this, until I had my second child. And he, you could kind of feed him. He would kind of go down like drowsy but awake sometimes. I could just like rub his back for a little bit or just hold him and he would just fall asleep. And I was like, oh, he might still get up a couple night times a night to eat, but then he would like go back to bed. He was never just like awake, sad. He didn't wake up super, super early like that, like Lena did. He would just like wake up and like hang out in our bed till we got up. He would wake up smiling from a nap. Like he would just, I would just like hear him up there and I'm like, oh, he's awake. And I'd be like, hi, buddy, like kind of worried, and quickly realize, like, oh, he's actually just like happy. He's not sad. Or like food. He would just like eat whatever.
SPEAKER_01:It was really him and his development that was the context for it's not just Lena being Lena.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. So it started to be like, is he just like an easy baby? No. I think he's just a typical baby. Yeah. And and then Or wait, I'm sorry, a good baby, quote unquote. Yeah, right. Right. I know. I know. And and I was like, no, I I still think this is just like pretty appropri like appropriate. I just think I didn't realize how much work some of these things were until I did them again and they just kind of like went. It wasn't without, I mean, it wasn't without like typical struggles, but but it wasn't like my first time as a parent. And I can't say it was just because we had experience. This was more than a learning curve. Okay. This was more than oh, it's really tough to adjust to being a first-time parent. Yep, that's a big transition. Like, no, this he was just a different child. And through his development, we I noticed like it took Lena a little bit longer to figure out how to ride a bike. His interest in riding a bike piqued her interest. But we we we got to see some pretty big differences in basically their nervous systems. And I was like, oh, okay. That that was kind of the first thing where like I still didn't have language around Lena's, Lena's just being Lena, but I definitely could see them as uniquely different people. It wasn't just these random things with Lena. It was like, okay, as people, we've got two really different children here. And so then we had COVID. And I feel like those years were a little bit lost in terms of typical developmental milestones. She was in kindergarten in 2020 2020. So COVID happened in the spring, late winter, early spring of that year. And she started kindergarten that fall. And so they can you hear me?
SPEAKER_01:Yep. Okay. You were just saying it she started kindergarten that fall of COVID and then it cut out.
SPEAKER_00:She had alternating days of in-person and online learning. And we didn't have a lot of interaction with other peers her age because of just limiting a lot of interaction in general. And at that time, like if you got sick, you had to be out for a certain number of weeks. We had to use PTO. If the other child in your house tests negative, they had to be out until everybody was testing negative for 10 days. And we didn't have enough PTO. So we did not have much learning happening about our own children because we had like no, it would nothing was normal. Yeah. Lifeline. The first school year that we really moved back into more of that typical five-day-a-week in-person school structure was first grade. So that was our first real school year. So we just were like, I don't know, okay. She was really into making some really weird vocalizations, I'll say. Really like Darth Vader, kind of like talking in an interesting voice. But when I asked the teacher about it, she's like, everyone in the class is kind of doing that right now. And so for me, looking back on it, I realized that she was stimming in school a lot and at home. She just happened to find a stim that was a little more acceptable by her peers because other kids were doing that. Oh. In the moment I had asked about it, I noticed it. I was like, what is this? And it was like, yeah, everybody's doing it. And I'm like, okay, kids must just be kind of silly at school. I don't know. We made it through that year and got into second grade. And that seemed to be where we she had a really kind of strict teacher in terms of like classroom behavior, we'll call it. And she brought up concerns in the fall about Lena being really impulsive, not following along in class, not keeping her body to herself, not being able to sit still. And we were like, yeah, welcome to our life. Like half the time she's crawling and slithering around on her stomach through our house. She can't sit down to eat a meal. She will forget she's eating while she's eating. And her teacher was bringing this stuff up to us as if it was new information. But we were like, kind of like, yeah. So we're on the same page then. These are this is home stuff that you're seeing at school. And she was pretty prompt about if you'd like to get her tested or pursue any kind of medical intervention like medication, I can definitely write a note for you. Here's some information. We can try to figure out some accommodations. She was very supportive of some sensory tools and strategies in class and looked around for some things to try to help because it just seemed like she didn't have enough outlets and could not handle being in this highly structured classroom. And we were like, yeah, absolutely, let's do all the sensory things. So we ended up creating a 504, which, for folks who don't know, is not a legally binding document, but it is basically a list of accommodations that the school agrees to be able to offer your child to just improve their ability to be in school. But it is not the same as an IEP, which is individualized education plan, which is a legally binding document. The process for those two things are different. The 504 was faster. And so we were able to get accommodations from school while we pursued kind of further testing. And my husband and I talked about things then, and we were like, yeah, because all this stuff is stuff we were seeing at home. And we sort of started piecing things together even more that maybe it wasn't Lena being Lena, maybe all these things combined together to mean something. And we felt like we were just trying to keep up with all of these sensory needs and ongoing sleep supports, and seeing the differences in development and nervous system of our middle child and her. And I had also had a third child at the time. And seeing how now I'm spreading a tension between three children. And it was just, I really felt compelled to learn more. I felt like I had done everything I can from an at-home perspective, but I just felt like it really the idea of maybe this all is something specific felt really compelling to me. Like I really wanted to learn more about her from a neuropsych perspective. Yeah. And I was fully on board with maybe it isn't just Lena being Lena. Okay. Maybe she isn't just really quirky. And so summarizing our pursuit of assessment, it was an 18-month wait for the Duluth area for an assessment. Yeah. We were identifying these issues in like November of that second grade year. And we wouldn't have gotten tested until, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01:Like that's like a year and a half wait. Yeah. And it's still this that bad, if maybe worse, I don't know, up here right now.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I randomly see questions and things like that on different Facebook groups. And it doesn't seem that much better. I don't I don't know if I don't know. So what did you do? And so, well, I did send a letter of dismay back saying, first of all, I haven't even received a call to schedule. And I had waited about a month. And second of all, the entire reason why we were getting scheduled is to pursue more formal supports at school. And if we wait for 18 months, we will go through an entire extra school grade before ever even getting any information, let alone starting the IEP process, which is a process. You don't immediately get support. No. And her provider was understanding, but also basically like, well, here's a list of places I think do pediatric neuropsych assessments, but you'll have to call each one. Like one was Nystrum, another one was like closed, another one, it just looked like it was just adults. And I was like, okay, I'm just gonna have to do my own research here. So I started, you know, contacting people that I know in the cities who who work in school systems who support families like school counselors. And I mean, I'm so thankful for people who are very willing to provide advice and support. Especially like, I mean, these are people that I I like knew in college who I hadn't talked to in like 12 years. And they were like, they were so willing to email me a ton of stuff and talk to me and hear me out. And so I settled on a neuropsych facility in the cities. I will name drop because I'm not gonna gatekeep anything. Developmental Discoveries is the clinic we went to. It's an out-of-network practice. At the time that we went, there were two doctors practicing there. It was incredibly friendly. It was a two and a half hour drive, and they got us in on a cancellation. So we only had to wait like a like less than a month, I would say, which was fine because traveling it was easier to work into our schedules.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:We ended up going down, it's supposed to be two separate days of testing, but we went down and it was a snowstorm. So we got there and then it started to like dump snow. And I was like, the odds of us getting home and coming back down are kind of low. I said I did pack a bag to stay at a hotel tonight, but if you get a cancellation because of this snow, we would totally stay and just finish the testing today. And they were accommodating and they did. That's great. But this f this clinic duh does great work, especially with children who are higher masking or gifted. Okay. May present as what may be more socially understood as like classic autism, which I struggle to even say because there's no such thing. But I definitely also want to acknowledge that people have a specific expectation about what autistic individuals look like and act like. And I purposely chose, since we were gonna go out of network, chose to go to a place that specialized in all different presentations and levels of neurodivergence. And the process was great. Lena loved it. Honestly, it was one-to-one with an adult where she got to just like bounce around between activities and talk about herself and show what she knew. That's the perfect environment for her. So she was like, when can we go back there? She randomly still asked that. And we learned that Lena is indeed autistic and has ADHD. And that that specific combo helped explain some of just what we were seeing in life, where she really needed structure and routine from a nervous system perspective, but also the attention piece as she got older and impulsivity and emotional control and regulation, both from ADHD and the autistic perspective, are it was so helpful to see. So I was immediately reflecting on her entire childhood, realizing okay, the nutritional things, the sensory needs, the sleep stuff, the attention, the impulsivity, the creativity, and like the nervous system. Just a hundred percent. I was like, okay. So now I immediately opened a can of worms of like, I'm gonna learn anything and everything I can about autistic people, raising children with, you know, differently wired nervous systems. That does a book called Differently Wired. I highly recommend it. We will, I'll go put my favorite resources in the notes for you. But I immediately, for like a year, dove straight into learning anything and everything I could because I finally was like connecting all these dots that I thought were all separate islands. And that diagnostic process was one of the most helpful things we have done.
SPEAKER_02:Wow.
SPEAKER_00:And I think I just want to say like I fully understand parents maybe being concerned about what a label would mean for somebody. Especially right now.
SPEAKER_01:In the political environment we're in.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. But at the same time, we all kind of understand where we're at from like a hierarchy perspective of like, are we normal or not? Or like maybe you know, when you get to be old enough and you start realizing like my peers can do these things, or why can't I? Or and I just want to say like a label doesn't have to be just a label of othering somebody. These children will other themselves and not have a reason why and internalize it. And shame and blind will kind of take center stage instead of being able to realize that there isn't there's a reason and it's okay. And speaking of that, I need a timeout to help somebody.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. So I just had to cut out for a second so that you can check in with a kiddo. But that was really important what you were just saying about like diagnosing, testing or not, children, if they have some form of neurodiversity, are going to internalize that they are not typical or normal or whatever, and it's going to become more significant in their lives if it's not acknowledged. Yeah. And that if they're not given the support and the tools that they deserve. So yeah, I I just really appreciate that you were saying that. But continue.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And I could see that happening when she didn't understand why certain things were hard or why things took longer. Or we realized she had a slight fine motor delay. And so it took her quite a while to figure out how to tie her shoes. And her hands would get really tired, and her handwriting wasn't as good as other kids in school. And she would get really frustrated and make comments about her friend in class, and her handwriting is so perfect, and like mine is just so bad. And it happens anyway. I think I fully understand that this desire to protect our children from shame and societal, you know, finger pointing. And I mean, what I insert whatever you're afraid of. Like I understand, like I've been there. But when you withhold an a diagnosis, you potentially withhold an opportunity for them to actually fully understand themselves and opportunities to support them. And I get how scary it might be right now to pursue a diagnosis when we don't know what is going to happen to the neurodivergent community in general. And I don't even know if I have words for that. That would be an entirely other episode. But I can understand if if there's any listener out there who is in the middle of considering pursuing a diagnosis just to learn more about your child, but now are faced with the very real concerns about like what does that mean for you and your family now? My heart goes out to you.
SPEAKER_01:And can we just say like all of the discourse right now is so lacking in research and in blaming it becoming a condition because of certain like external factors when like we I don't know, you probably can speak to this much better than I can, but like from the way I see it, it's like this has been a part of humanity since probably the beginning of being human for certain reasons of you know, like having different skill set for the tribe or however it worked, like having differently wired nervous systems, different brains, and that it's a part of our beautiful, you know, ecological diversity as humans. And my heart goes out to those parents also who are in that place of fear and you know needing to try and protect their kids and you know not being not being able to like celebrate it in that way.
SPEAKER_00:Right. I think when anything goes differently than what we expect, I think it's human nature to want to know why. Yeah. And when families experience maybe more, you know, severe autistic traits or really like like physically like that maybe like self-harming or you know things that like are incredibly challenging to navigate, I think those why questions can be, you know, for very real reasons, so loud. And so when there's this kind of like causal language around whether it's medication or vaccines or environmental triggers, I think there can be definitely Families who might that those things might really resonate with them because they really feel they deserve an answer about why their child's brain is wired the way it is. And I think there is a lot of just immediate self-blame that they must have done something or they must have exposed themselves or their child to something. Human nature, we want to know why. And I definitely don't shame any family for really wanting to understand how neurodivergence happens and why their particular loved one, child, family member has the brain they have. And that conversation is so complex.
SPEAKER_01:It is. And hoping that it reaches other people who can relate.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Right. Yeah, I've wondered if what flavor of neurodivergence I am. Because the entire testing process and all the things I learned when I deep dove into information following her diagnosis is like all of this is me. Uh-huh. And I I feel validated even if I'm not formally diagnosed with something. But I do wonder. And I just always thought it was me. Like I always thought that's just Kirsten. That's just me. I'm really sensitive. I can't do that. This, you know, these environments are just way too hard. And I also thought in some respects that everybody was like that. And that people were just better at dealing with it.
SPEAKER_02:Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:That everybody felt like, you know, could hear the lights and that the loud noises caused rage. And I just I thought other people, like the the voice in your head, like I thought everybody was like me in some of these ways. And it wasn't until I got married and actually like, you know, over time just kind of interacted on a very daily basis with somebody with a different brain to be like, what? And so I mean it's been validating, but yeah, I would I would be very curious to see just truly like if Lena and I are very similar and from a diagnosis perspective, because I definitely know we are from like a sensory perspective. But yeah, going back to that, it's like we want to know why. And I think the why is a lot more complex than what is comfortable. Totally. And that's really hard.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So one side note, I just have to mention that amazing show, The Telepathy Tapes, for anyone who needs a really heartfelt show listening to like some incredible stories of people with autism, especially in the like the non-speaking form. So anyway, Lena and school, is there anything else like coming up that you want to share with everyone about like the process where you're at and kind of our final few minutes together?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I'm I'm just like very much kind of in a transitional point. And as I allow myself to just sort of be a student of hers instead of trying to map things out ahead of her and have her follow this one path that I think she should be able to do. I just find that life might just look different for us. And I don't really know what that means right now. It feels freeing to be able to look at different options, but it's incredibly new. And sometimes I feel really overwhelmed about it, and other times I feel really awesome. But I just feel powerful in that sometimes you just take a far enough step back and you realize that all of this is made up. Yeah, like this is all just made up.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And I I don't need to do it. What grade is she in now? Fifth grade. Okay. So in second grade she got the diagnosis? Yeah. And then she got the IEP by third grade or by when?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think we got it in the spring of I can't remember. It might have been in the fall of the next school year of third grade. Okay.
SPEAKER_01:What do you wish you knew then that you know now about getting an IAP for your child?
SPEAKER_00:A lot of people in public education don't understand high masking autistic individuals. They immediately met me with, oh, that's so wild. We don't see any of that here. She's always smiling, she does great, she tells me exactly blah, blah, blah. We don't ever see that. And that's the entire point of high masking individuals, is they they don't show that. So they don't. I have not witnessed a public education system trust me or my child as a source of information until their attempts fail. And the other pieces, neurodivergence still seems to be viewed slightly behavioral. And we have been met with comments of as soon as I raise a concern, they turn it around and ask, Well, what are you doing? Are you doing therapies? Are you doing medication? Are you doing XYZ? You need to hold them accountable. They need to build resilience. They need to, you need to have a really good routine. Like I'm not doing anything. And so for people pursuing the process, getting an IEP is really important. And the process of an IEP can be incredibly frustrating and maddening when you are met again and again and again with people who don't trust you as a source of information about your child and don't necessarily take ownership of how the school's role in their dysregulation. And they turn a lot of things into parental issue. And I just want to say like you do not need to tolerate that. That just demonstrates their lack of understanding or their lack, their unwillingness to understand your experience.
SPEAKER_01:That makes so much sense. And that I really appreciate the way you're putting that into words right now. Like, I think that there are a lot of people who are experiencing what you and Lena are in the school system. And that's not to say that there aren't great school administrators and teachers who will work with that. But like there's often this big gap in willingness to acknowledge or focus on the school environment as the place for dysregulation and how to meet those needs in a different way. Her yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Her intolerance was our problem. Yeah. And this all solutions were aimed at improving her tolerance to the school environment. And they can make some modifications and accommodations to the environment itself, but ultimately it's our job to get her to tolerate that environment for learning. And we just had to make the decision that that was no longer something we wanted to pursue because that process of trying to help her be resilient enough to tolerate school the way it is with accommodations was so detrimental to her and to our home life. And I think it just comes from honestly, just an actual lack of understanding of what their nervous systems are like and what these children tolerate on a daily basis to just be present at school and to get through life. And I don't blame any educator or administration administrative person at school. I just truly don't think they understand. And I chose a while ago to not be the person who was going to try to educate a school system on what high masking autism is.
SPEAKER_01:That sounds like a pretty important boundary for your well-being. Oh.
SPEAKER_00:I started out trying to do that because I was like, well, if everybody understands, then we can all be on the same page and quickly realized that was not how this was gonna go. So yeah. Yeah, I just really don't have the energy to fight a system right now. Yeah. And I think it's amazing if other families out there really feel like they can and it needs to happen. And I'm not saying I can't support that cause, but I cannot be the one out there battling it out. I just I don't have it in me.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. You're you're focusing on your child's needs right now. Well, I hope you put all those resources in our show notes because they sound like, you know, a wealth of resources that could really help some folks who are in this process right now.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I'll put the um developmental discoveries where we did our assessment. I'll put a podcast out of Australia that's been the most helpful for me to learn about autistic girls, especially high masking.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:And I'll put the book and podcast of the differently wired, which was just a helpful thing, even if your child isn't necessarily neurodivergent. It's a really helpful way to kind of see the nuance and complexity of our children and learn to support it rather than fight with it all the time.
SPEAKER_01:Well, and we didn't even like name it outright, but also just the whole experience of it being your daughter, right? Who's high-masking autistic and how unseen that is for girls, especially. So just naming that too. We see you out there going through that. Yeah. Thank you so much, Kirsten. I really, really appreciate you sharing so much about your whole motherhood experience with raising Lena and you know, also just she's not here, but acknowledging like Lena's short story is getting shared here, and we appreciate and you know, just really hold her in this conversation with so much admiration and respect.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Okay. Talk to you soon.
SPEAKER_03:I'm already Mamma you belong. Mamma, you are seen. We are connected like the mother trees. Mamma, you belong, Mamma you are seen strong as the mountain and gentle as the stream flowing underneath and throughout the stories of our lives. Centering each other so families can thrive. Centering each other so families can thrive.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks for listening. We hope you feel seen. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with other mamas. Subscribing to our podcast and leaving us a review is one of the best ways for other people to find us. So if you enjoy what you are hearing or if it resonates with you, please subscribe and leave us a review. It would mean a lot. You can find me, Kirsten, at empowerorthoandpublichealth.com, or on Instagram at Kirsten Demoray DPT.
SPEAKER_01:And you can find me, Molly, through my music at Sister Veri on Bandcamp or other streaming platforms, or through my clinical practice at Insight Counseling in Duluth, Minnesota. You can follow us or send us a DM on Instagram at Mama You Belong, or email us if you have questions, ideas, or just want to connect at mamayubelong at gmail.com. We will see you next time.