Dr. Thomas Armstrong: EPISODE LINK

The Power of Neurodiversity: BOOK LINK

TRANSCRIPT:

Colleen: Welcome back to Hot Flashes and Cool Topics podcast. Today we are talking to Dr.

Thomas Armstrong, who is the author of The Power of Neurodiversity, Unleashing the

Advantages of Your Neurodivergent Brain. Welcome to the show.

Dr. Armstrong: Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Colleen:  Well, we were just saying off air how much we appreciated this

book, especially now with just so many negative connotations going around in

conversations about neurodiversity. I wanna just start with, can you explain what

neurodiversity is? Because I didn’t realize it was such a new concept.

Dr. Armstrong: – Right, it’s only about 25, 30 years old at the most. And basically it says that

we should give the same, we should have the same attitude towards differences in brains

that we have in terms of differences of flowers, for example, or differences of

culture. We don’t say that a calla lily has petal deficit disorder. We acknowledge

the calla lily for what it is, you know, for its uniqueness. Same thing with people

who have labels, you know, like autism and ADHD and dyslexia. There’s been a

tendency, and I was a former special education teacher, to put a deficit spin on

those labels. And so this book really says we’ve got to stop doing that and start

really examining the strengths that are associated with each of these conditions.

Because I mean, if you’re growing up with, you know, one of these neurodivergencies,

you probably have been exposed to people kind of, you know, talking about you in

terms of what you can’t do. And, you know, we need to know that to help you get

better at something, that’s for sure. But, you know, over and over and over again,

it gets to be kind of a sap on one’s own inner self -esteem. And so I’m trying

to rouse up a focus on a strength -based approach to,

I mean, I think strength -based approaches have really begun to take,

you know, new momentum in the last few years. And so I’m just kind of adding to

that by suggesting that we talk about, you know, differences in brains as

neurodiversities. You know, this is a tough time to talk about diversities because in

high places, there’s not a lot of support. In fact, no support for diversity.

But, you know, we nevertheless carry on. And so that’s the essence of what

neurodiversity means. It was coined in about 1998, 1999, by an autism activist,

Judy Singer, and also a New York journalist, Harvey Bloom. And it was kind of slow

to get started, but once it got going, it just really has taken off. And I’ve

seen, you know, when I did this, this is a second edition of a book and we

initially did in 2010. And in 2010, not many people knew what neurodiversity was.

But when I went back to do the research to update this book, I was just floored

by, you know, it was on everybody’s lips.

There’s been over the last, let’s say, 15 years or

so, there’s been a lot of research done on the strengths of people with conditions

like ADHD, autism, dyslexia, intellectual disabilities. And so this research provides a

lot of support for the notion that neurodiversity is a real experience,

is a real phenomenon, and that we need to really support it and use its ideas in

our care of individuals who are neurodivergent.

Bridgett:  – Right, you know,

I’m a former teacher as well. I was an elementary school teacher and I’m reading

through your book and I’m hearing all the people that are referenced in the book.

And you also pointed out eight different principles of neurodiversity.

And there were so many in there, I left the teaching field in 2012. So so much

has happened since then. And there were so many other things in there that we

didn’t consider under this umbrella. I really love how you said it’s not a machine. Your brain is not

a machine. Can you talk about that?

Dr. Armstrong: Well, – Well, that’s, you know,

when I was in special ed, I would read about ADHD and people’s attempt to explain

ADHD to kids. And they would often say, it’s like your cockpit,

you’re an airline cockpit brain doesn’t work quite right. Or, you know,

you’ve got a Ferrari brain, you know, without the right breaks.

I mean, there were all these machine metaphors, and I thought, you know, that’s not

too far away from saying that a person’s elevator doesn’t go up to the top floor,

you know. And so we’ve got to be real careful, especially since the brain is not a

machine. It’s an organism. It’s the most complex organism that we know about in the

universe. And it consists of trillions of neuronal connections. And it’s not software,

it’s not hardware, it’s wetware. And it’s taken millions of years to evolve.

And so we should really think about it more in terms of a rainforest. And I’m not

the one to come up with that. A Nobel Prize winner, Gerald Adelman, came up with

the idea. He said that it’s almost like a Darwinian jungle in there with neurons

competing against each other for attention from the outside world. Because when they

respond to stimulus from the outside world, they wire together.

And if they don’t, then those connections disappear. So he likened the,

you know, species in the wild. So I thought, why don’t we talk about the brain

forests instead of, you know, machines and computers and that kind of thing. So

yeah, that’s really important. And it goes along with neurodiversity, which is an

ecological concept. I mean, we’re really talking about the ecology of learning and

the ecology of growing. And so I think that that’s the first principle that should

impact our thinking about this matter.

Colleen: – Why do you think that people feel the need

to have to find a blame as opposed to spending their energy on how to make things

more diverse and more accepting? It’s like, I don’t understand why they put so much

energy into what to blame for.

Dr. Armstrong: – Well, one of the practical reasons for that is

that there’s no research money for diversity, whereas there is research money if you

find a problem, a medical problem especially. And so that’s been fueled the research

industry and the government and their legislation.

And I should say that all this is good. There’s a good purpose behind it. Good

intentions, certainly, in that they’re trying to find, you know, reasons for behaviors

that do not fit into the normal, whatever normal means, context.

And I pointed out to people that there’s no normal brain, if you think about it.

You know, they used to have, if you went to France and went to the department of

weight and measurements and went into the basement they had under two bell jars they

had a kilogram just a piece of metal that represented the standard kilogram and

people around the world took their own kilograms to this place to calibrate to make

sure that they had the same weight as the normal kilogram but there’s no brain

under a vat anywhere under a bell jar in a museum or a laboratory that represents

the normal brain. And if there is no normal brain, then how can we say what an

abnormal brain is? It’s just kind of a logical consequence. So I think that we

really need to focus on helping people with neurodivergencies.

I think that it’s important to work on what’s not working. But I think if you’re

going to start someplace, you should start with what’s working and then also work to

help support what is difficult. And the way I put it is what we should do is help

people maximize their abilities and minimize their difficulties. You know,

it’s not about curing. It’s not about even remediating, you know,

like getting rid of this nasty defect. It’s about each of us as a whole person,

you know, living our lives and wanting to live optimal lives. And so that basically

means, you know, each of us has strengths. everybody has strengths. And so it’s a

question of knowing about them. That’s why I included in my book a 200 item

checklist that lists all these strengths that people can go through and check.

And so they can become aware of their strengths. That to me is the first job of

any teacher or therapist or caregiver or for the person themselves,

find out about your strengths. Find out about, oh, I didn’t think that was a

strength. Yeah, that is a strength. That’s what I found in special ed. I’d say your

child is really good with Legos or a really great painter. Oh,

well, I just thought that was a talent. I just thought that was this quirky little

thing that he did. No, that’s a strength. And it’s a very important part of who

they are as a learner. So that’s number one is that we should help people

understand what they’re good at, but also help them deal with their difficulties,

but not by rooting them out. I mean, that’s painful. It’s like a root canal,

you know, but helping them by, Well, for example,

one of my, one of my, I’ve got maybe a couple of lists of eight things and one

of my lists of eight things is something I call positive niche construction, which

is building and it’s like building a nest. It’s like birds building nests or beavers

building a dam creating an optimal environment. And so one of the things that I put

on that list was using apps and other assistive technologies to work around

obstacles. So that if you have dyslexia, for example, you can use speech -to -text

software so that you can talk into the computer and have it print out whatever it

is that you’re saying. So it sidesteps that difficult period of putting your thoughts

down on paper, which some people have a terrible time with,

with disorthographia, among other things. And so that’s, some people call them

workarounds. It’s a way of, you know, if a door is closed, don’t bang your head

against it over and over and over again. Go and find the open door and go in

there. So that’s the behind assistive technologies. And there are so many out there

now that weren’t there 15, 20 years ago. I mean, it’s unbelievable. I mean,

for example, augmentative alternative communication devices. So someone who’s non

-verbal, someone who’s never communicated with anybody who has a keyboard that they

can push keys saying, I’m hungry, I need to go to the bathroom, you know,

et cetera, ouch, you know, whatever. But some way of communicating, and it’s opened

up communication channels for so many people and it’s enabled them to engage with

life rather than, you know, live in this kind of isolated environment.

Bridgett: I loved how you pointed out in the book what we think you need in this life at

or at this time of life. So you pointed out that 150 years ago,

not everybody read that was one thing that I would point out, not everybody needed

to read, which is where I’m not, I’m not knocking reading by any means. I love

reading, but it was amazing when I was reading that thinking,

Oh, you know, not everybody needed this at this time and how different things have

evolved and how it makes children in the classroom behave differently. I taught kindergarten,

first grade, second grade and how you would get this group of children. I think at

one time I had up to 30 children in one classroom and trying to adapt to that.

And then trying to get interventions, trying to work with special ed as well.

And then you also pointed out another thing that the least restrictive environment

and how that maybe wasn’t always the best thing. I kind of asked like four

questions right there. So yeah, but But you did point it out, so many of these

things that were just aha moments to me when I was reading it. Uh -huh. But I

don’t know, you can take off from there.

Dr. Armstrong: Well, what I like to say to people is

that there were no remedial reading instructors during prehistoric times, because no

one was reading. Reading didn’t exist, and consequently, a person might have been

born during that time with the same kind of brain that a dyslexic person classically

has, and it would have had absolutely no impact on their life. And in fact,

what they’re finding, of course, is that people with dyslexia often have areas of

the brain that are working exceptionally well, related to things like big picture

thinking and visual spatial processing, and the fact that they had those parts of

their brain working in prehistoric times would have been very important because, you

know, having visual spatial intelligence living in the wild, I mean, that’s where you

needed it, you know, to find out where you are and where other people were, where

other animals were and that kind of thing. So, you know, there are evolutionary

reasons why these conditions exist today, why they haven’t been weeded out by natural

selection from the gene pool. And that’s because they conferred, they likely conferred

evolutionary advantages on people, and thus they stayed robust until the present day.

But the context has changed. You raise the issue of context, and that’s One of the

things I discovered in Special Ed was that I, in fact, I shared a story of working

with a child when I was working for a place called the Educational Arts Association

in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And we would go around and we find recycled material that we could use that teachers could put together for, you know, various kinds of learning

kits. And this one child was one of our most active and excited and enthusiastic

members. And so I saw him in that way, in that context.

Then I was doing a research for my master’s degree at Leslie Graduate School in

Cambridge, and I ran into him in a resource room in, you know,

a special education program. And he was, you know, had the same enthusiasm,

the same vitality. But in that context, it was a problem. He was like a tiger in

a cage, you know, and he was driving the teacher who was relatively inexperienced,

he was driving the teacher crazy. And so I realized, you know, it just depends upon

what setting you’re talking about, whether a person is going to be seen as disabled

or gifted or normal or impaired, or whatever it happens to be. That’s why we need

to be really careful with these labels. You know, I mean, I have railed against

these labels for many, many, many years. And I wrote a book called The Myth of the

ADHD Child. Before that, I was railing against learning disabilities.

And the thing is, you know, my reaction against them was wise, but I didn’t have

something really, really big to back myself up on. And in fact,

neurodiversity is that thing. Because, you know, people say, “Well, they do have a

different brain.” And I say, “I agree with you. They have a different brain.

Different, not disabled.” And that’s the big difference. And I think, I really think

society is beginning to come along, because ever since I did all that railing, and

I certainly wasn’t the only person, I’ve noticed the term learning differences coming

back in a lot of different places. And it seems like people’s awareness is changing.

And that, of course, is what neurodiversity is feeding on also.

Colleen: In the book,

you mentioned seven varieties of neurodiversity. Now, there are a lot more, but you

picked seven for the book. And it’s autism, ADHD, dyslexia, intellectual disabilities,

anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and schizophrenia. And I wanted to start with

autism because I think that is the hot button topic for everyone.

And it seems like what I appreciated about your book is you talk about the

strengths and how they can not only learn in a classroom,

but autistic adults can be successful and I have an autistic daughter who is late

diagnosed and she’s highly intelligent so she was able to mask for years and it was

so interesting to me because there are areas now that are opening up to autistic

adults like entrepreneurship. And I love that you mentioned that in the book. But

you know, I was surprised because you mentioned that about 5 .4 million. I think you

said in the book, people are autistic. And I think there’s that number is so much

higher because it’s the fact that it is a spectrum.

Dr. Armstrong: Right. Exactly.

Colleen: Why do you think that people assume when you say autism, that it’s got to be severe

versus moderate versus mild. Like you meet, one autistic person, you meet one autistic

person.

Dr. Armstrong: Right. I think this idea of the spectrum is only now beginning to be

understood. That is one of my other principles that that encompasses, he exists along

a spectrum. And in fact, each of those diversities that you mentioned exists along a

spectrum, even schizophrenia. There are, you know, milder forms of schizophrenia,

schizophrenogenic syndrome, etc. And then obviously there are really difficult kinds.

And a lot of it depends upon how much of the brain has been affected. And of

course, the one area that we use the word spectrum regularly for is autism.

And I totally agree with you, it exists along a spectrum that can include,

if you want to, you can include people who are shy, people who are introverted,

people who are a little bit eccentric, who kind of keep to themselves, who would

rather listen to or read a book at home rather than be at a party.

I mean, that’s extending it quite a ways over in the area closer to whatever it is

that we call normal and then of course we can go the other way and until we get

to the sort of what used to be understood as autism which was the individual who

usually is not communicative, the person who has frequently emotional meltdowns,

the person who is locked into what’s called rigidity and you and having to have

things in the same way, the same structure, et cetera.

But those are a few people there, a few people here. How you actually come up with

a number. And I think that one of the reasons President Trump has kept on harping

on how this number has been rising, and it’s an epidemic, and it’s taking over. And

I think part of the reason for the number is that people, the diagnostic criteria

has changed. And as it changes, more people become eligible.

I remember the very first time I was aware of autism was in about 1975.

And I attended a lecture by a woman, Claiborne Park,

I think her name was, she’d written a book called “The Siege” about her daughter.

And her daughter had, you know, I think she was there on stage, you know, pretty

non -communicative. But the interesting thing is, later on I found out she was an

artist and you can look up some of her art on the internet. But we had this kind

of fixed- in locked in idea. In fact, I was at University of Massachusetts at the

time. And I remember thinking or hearing that the way you could tell a person was

autistic is if you said something to them and they repeated it back to you. I

mean, that’s how limited my understanding was and how stereotypical it was.

So, yeah, it’s a real spectrum. It’s a complex.

You know, changing all the time and your point is very, you know, as to what we

were talking about before that context is so important. And you mentioned

entrepreneurship for autism and even bigger sort of breakthrough is in the area of

information technology. Because there was this guy in Denmark who had a business that

consisted in taking the software codes from companies like Microsoft and going over

the code meticulously looking for errors, looking for bugs in the code,

essentially. And what he discovered was that people with autism could do that better

than so -called normal or neurotypical people. And that’s because of research backing

this up, The number one, they’re very good at systems, the systemizing so much more

than empathizing, and also very good at small detail work. And so it turned out

that he was hiring right and left people with autism. And right now,

or at least back when I was reading the story, three quarters of the company were

people with autism. And his example started to spread and pretty soon software

companies around the world were hiring people with autism. In fact, an article

appeared in the New York, excuse me, in the Wall Street Journal saying how autism

can help you land a job, which I thought is really great. Because again,

it’s the context, put them in certain contexts and, put them

in a context where they’re expected to sort of go with the flow and You know sort

of interpret other people’s ambiguous signals and that kind of thing and they’re

they’re going to just really do bad. They’re going to get frustrated and that’s

going to come out perhaps in a meltdown. But put them in an environment where they

can be left alone to work on their own to focus on Systems like a computer

language focused on small details, and they’re in their element. This is,

you think about your own situation, where in life are you in your element,

where you’re really smoking and you’re feeling like needed and you’re feeling like

whole and you’re feeling like, this is what I was put on earth to do. And that’s

essentially what we need to do for each divergent person has helped them find that

place.

And we should start, you know, in terms of career, we should start doing that in,

you know, the elementary grades, helping kids, first of all, understand their gifts,

their abilities, their intelligences. And second of all, starting to become acquainted

with places out there in the real world that would love having someone with your

particular gift. And, you know, then we wouldn’t leave them at the end of high

school or college, you know, flailing about. I mean, we should do this for all

kids, obviously, because we’re not doing it for anybody right now. And, you

know, it has a lot to do with why college depression is so high. But, you know,

the context is really important to keep in mind.

Bridgett: Right. You know my husband worked

for a company. He’s retired now where they were starting to look at people who are

divergent. I wish I could cite whatever study

or whatever reference it was but  also the loyalty of the workers.

He said that job turnover with them does not happen as easily and that they’re very

loyal employees.

Dr. Armstrong:  that came up for me too,when I was working on the chapter on

intellectual disabilities. Intellectual disabilities is an area in which people say,

well, these other areas, maybe there’s diversity, but this is, you know, these are,

you know, really using kind of stereotypical thinking.

But in fact, you know, like each of those other neurodivergences, people with Down

syndrome, for example, have incredible personalities. They’re warm. They’re,

they’re very interactive. They’re dramatic. Some of them make amazing actors and

actresses. And as you point out, they’re loyal. They get into a job.

Once they understand what’s expected of them and assuming that they, you

know, have a good optimal environment to work in, they stick with the job as

opposed to so many other people who, you know, take on, you know, I won’t poke any

barbs at any particular generation, but we do have a case of young adults who seem

to have, you know, no deep commitment to a work life, you know,

to a long, a lifelong attitude of loyalty and persistence and stick -to -itiveness,

whereas in this particular group of individuals, as well as in some of the other

neurodiversities, we do have that element. And, you know, people say,

well, what you’re talking about is all well and good, but in the real world, well,

I’m talking about the real world. In the real world, it is important to have these

things, loyalty to be have a warm personality. You know,

when I bring this up to people, I say, okay, you’re on a desert island. Who would

you rather be on that desert island with someone with Down syndrome who has a warm,

engaging personality, or someone with a high IQ score, who’s a total jerk,

and you gotta, you know, make a choice there. And I think most people would choose

the first option. And that’s because when it comes to real life, that’s what we

want. We want to be around people who are, one book was suggested that was written

by people with Down syndrome, said we like to call it “Up Syndrome” instead of down

syndrome because that’s kind of where our mood is at. Assuming that we’re not being

bullied and looked down on and having insults hurled our way,

which is a big problem. And needs, you know, as part of the niche construction, one

of my other components of niche construction is looking at your overall social

network, you know, we all live in the midst of a social network of relationships.

You know, we have good relationships. We have not so good. Sometimes we have really

bad ones. Some of them are professional, you know, if we’re seeing a therapist or

educational, you know, if we have teachers, that kind of thing. But our overall aim

should be to provide ourselves or to have somebody help us with creating as optimal

a social network as possible. That means, you know, I mean, and so many

neurodivergent people end up, you know, if you look at their social networks, they’ve

got parents who are harping on them. You’ve got teachers who are railing at them

for not being on grade level. You’ve got bullies in their world who are threatening

them to beat them up after school or making fun of their, of their “disabilities.”

So those things need to be changed, you know,

actively changed, sometimes by finding another teacher. I found that sometimes the

disability that a child would have would disappear as soon as they had a new

teacher that they got along with where there wasn’t a kind of constant pull that,

you know, power struggle kind of thing going on. So yeah, so that’s another

important aspect of the ecology or the niche construction process is creating an

optimal environment of interaction with people. And so I say, surround yourself with

people who see the best in you. You know, that comes not from me, but from Jack

Canfield, who is one of my early mentors, who wrote Chicken Soup for the Soul,

you know, and other related books. He said, you know, he impressed me with the idea

that, you know, don’t hang around people who are energy parasites, you know,

you want to be around people who acknowledge you, see the best in you, who you feel

inspired by. And I think, fortunately, in the schools, there are a lot of great

teachers, And especially in special ed, there are a lot of amazing teachers that

have chosen a very challenging vocation, but have the personalities to pull them off.

So, but, you know, there’s always somebody in the environment who’s not that way.

And so, you know, part of the process of helping individuals who are neurodivergent

involves going in and doing an assessment, you know, and then seeing what you can

do. Obviously you can’t, you know, it’s not like a shell game. You can’t just take

this person and switch him over here and bring the positive person in, you know, it

takes a lot of work and needs a lot of strategizing. But I think at least it

gives us a focus for our energies. So that instead of just totally,

I’m talking about the special education world, instead of totally focusing on the

remediation of the deficit, which is, you know, I mean, as a special education

teacher, we had to write these IEP objectives, which do drove me crazy, because we

had to put things like child will increase on the wide range achievement test from

a 3 .0 grade level to a 3 .9 grade level in the next 10 months.

And so that would have to be our focus. Instead of looking at their life and their

relationships and their feelings about themselves, we would be giving them more and

more worksheets to get them up to grade level or up to, you know, achieving their

goals. And the strange thing is once they achieve their goals, you know, some of

these kids actually thought once they achieve their goals, that’d be it. And they

could go back to the regular class. And I didn’t tell them that,

in fact, what we would do is rewrite their objectives. So they’d be essentially

stuck in special led maybe for the rest of their lives. That would be a good thing

to tell them.

Um, you know, what could I tell them, you know, we’re, we’re living in a system.

You’re engaged or you’re stuck in a system that pretty much is based on deficits.

The only special ed area that focuses on gifts is the gifted child gifted and

talented. And I, you know, I said, why aren’t you doing the same things, uh,

in special other special ed programs that you do in the gifted and talented, you

know, they have all these creative games and these project-based learning activities

and, you know, neat things and field trips and stuff like that. They’re just kind

of really stimulating their brain. And why aren’t you giving, oh,

because we have needs that have to be addressed by law, you know, by law.

Uh, so there you go.

Colleen: You know, I also wanted to explore the second one that you

talk about is ADHD. And I know from, my girls are now adults,

but when they were in school, so many kids were on ADHD medication. And I wonder what your

opinion on number one, getting them diagnosed at a very early age, some were two

and two, the need, And then as they got older, some of them took it just

to do better on tests. Right. I’m curious about your opinion on the use and misuse

of medication and diagnoses.

Dr. Armstrong: Right. That’s a great, great question. I have a rather

complex relationship to ADHD.

I wrote a book called The Myth of the ADHD Child and got a lot of people angry

because they thought I was saying that there was no such thing as hyperactivity,

distractibility, and impulsivity, which was the last thing in the world that I wanted

to do. Obviously, as a special ed teacher, I knew that these kids had difficulty

paying attention, sitting in their seats, you know, behaving appropriately in a school

setting, et cetera. And the medication issue, I came down fairly hard on until I

went on medication.

Back in about 1992, and I was going to Holland to teach in a program,

and there were a lot of stresses. I was going to have to teach at my aunt’s school

at the Amsterdam International School. I was terrified about that.

Then I was going to go to Russia, where, in fact, Yeltsin was,

you know, destabilizing the country, and I just broke down and I didn’t sleep for

five days. So when I went back home, I got some, you know, antidepressants,

essentially, because I have depression in my family and myself, too. Unipolar

depression. And so my attitude towards medication changed a bit. And I said,

oh, maybe these medications have a role to play. And I think that they do.

I’m not just saying that because of myself, because, you know, the literature

suggests that in some cases, medication can help turn a child’s life around by

providing a kind of a foundation for success. But having said that,

I think the ADHD issue has a lot of problems with it.

Again, because of the issue of what’s their brain like? Is it brain damage? Is it

brain difference? In fact, it is brain difference because research suggests that the

brain of a person who has ADHD matures two or three years later than a neurotypical

child. It develops normally, but it develops later. So basically we’re talking about

and I don’t want to get into this idea of Neotony. Neotony means holding youth and

in terms it’s and it seems to be one of the most amazing parts of being human.

Humans are different from other creatures in that we are born and have more of our development in youth, you know,

and we’re more youthful later on in life. Whereas the chimpanzee,

you know, looks very kind of childlike, but then immediately grows into a very old,

you know, kind of, you know, severe looking creature. So in fact,

kids with ADHD have more of this than the neurotypical person.

They’re more apt to be youthful later on in their life. And that is not just a

plus, but it’s actually one of the key elements in evolution. And to that extent,

they’re like, they’re forerunners of the vanguard of evolution in human beings.

And the fact that we should be using three negatives. That’s what really gets me.

You see my excitement comes when we talk about ADHD. We use three negatives to talk

about them.

Attention is neutral. Hyperactivity is negative.

Deficit is negative. Disorder is negative. And so we’re taking three negatives and

describing someone who’s in fact in the guard of human evolution. That doesn’t make

a lot of sense. And then they have something called hyper -focus, which has more

recently been seen as one of the warning signs of ADHD. And hyper -focus is kids

getting interested in something and just becoming totally absorbed in it and losing

track of the time and that kind of thing. And that’s actually a good thing. You

know, if your child spends a lot of time focusing on something that interests them,

Montessori called that the great work. She said that’s the pinnacle of learning when

a child moves into a space like that. A University of Chicago psychology professor

called it flow. And he studied it as an optimal condition of functioning.

He studied it in rock climbers and artists and surgeons who will operate for like

15 hours, totally absorbed. And then when they are finished, they’ll feel totally

energized. And so again, you’re looking at something that is like the pinnacle of

human functioning. And you’re saying it’s a symptom of a disorder. That doesn’t make

a lot of sense to me either.

Bridgett: – And it just, it’s another thing that mentally puts this group that already

is feeling different. It’s putting them down one more time because I have a child

who was diagnosed with ADHD as well. And,

you know, going through school and how difficult that was. So that’s just another

thing on top of that, that’s putting them down. And I also love how you include

just different ways of educating different things you can do in a classroom that

could be helpful for anybody on a different neurodivergent spectrum And I love

the part going outside like just nature is so important.

Dr. Armstrong: Because the more

nature that is out there in other words the wilder the environment the more their

symptoms go down So it’s you know providing an optimal environment for them.

A researcher at Purdue University is Cindy Sidney.  She

said that people with what they called then hyperactivity are under -stimulated.

They’re not over -stimulated. People would think they’re overstimulated, and they used

to have a classroom called a crook shank classroom for such children, and it had

absolutely nothing in it. And the teacher was told to not put on red lipstick for

fear that that would over -stimulate the child. And so it turns out the truth was

exactly the opposite. They are under -stimulated. The reason they’re hyperactive is to

create more stimulation. And they’ve noticed if they allow children to fidget in

class, they do better.

They have these bouncy bands and wiggle balls, stability balls,

ways for them to be able to move. And they’ve found that they can study better,

they can think better, they can attend better. So we should be thinking about

educational stimulation first. And if that’s not working,

then think about medical stimulants, because that’s what Ritalin and what Adderall

are, they’re and they provide that optimal stimulation for the child.

Bridgett: – Right, and I do remember they would advocate don’t take away recess from those

children. – Right, all, yeah. – Don’t take away, but I do remember another time we

couldn’t call it recess. We had to say gross motor skills. I remember that was some

law, and so on my schedule, I had to put gross motor skills. Yeah, it was so silly, but I do remember that was a big thing. You don’t want to take away their recess. Especially that age.

Dr. Armstrong: Yes, it’s like take the one thing that they’re succeeding at away from them and expect them to do better. That’s crazy thinking. That’s crazy thinking. My

administrator told me I had a thing in my classroom called free time where I’d have

a lot of activities. And she said, don’t call it free time. Call it choice time. I

know.

Bridgett: Oh, so you have no idea, Colleen.

Colleen: I don’t know. That just sounds very complicated.

Like over complicating a simple concept. As I was reading

your book, I did know some of these are crossovers, like they may have one and

something of another.

Dr. Armstrong: That’s a common theme as well. Yeah, and it’s called

comorbidity, you know, another wonderful word. Comorbidity means you can have ADHD and also be learning disabled and also, you know, having an intellectual disability or

whatever. And there’s a lot of crossover, as you mentioned. To me,

this is a way of trying to cope with the fact that each child is a complex human

being with a variety of issues. And what they’re saying is they’ve got a variety of

problems, and some of them seem to be associated with this disorder,

some with that disorder. It can be very confusing. But it helps the professional

deal with the situation that it could be if a child’s not paying attention,

that they’re depressed. And so they’re not able to focus their attention because

inattention is a symptom of depression. And to me,

that was another kind of warning sign or red flag, if you’re having trouble or if

you’re taking something that doesn’t fit into your existing way of thinking about

things, and you’re saying, well, that could also be part of it. You know, if you

say, well, what about the fact that depression can also cause inattention? Well,

depression can also be part of ADHD. So you sort of solve the problem. And at any

rate, comorbidity is important. If I were to put on my more traditionalist hat,

I would say it’s obviously important to do a good diagnosis in the beginning.

And that diagnosis should include the strengths as well as the disabilities. And

that’s what’s missing for the most part. I don’t, you know, there’s a lot of

checklists for ADHD. But no strength checklist. There ought to be a strength

checklist like I created in my book that goes along with every of the you know the

standard checklists so that you can have that information available to you as well.

Doctors are not trained this way however that’s another reason why the focus is

always on the problem. Doctors are trained to treat diseases. They are trained in

the medical model. They don’t take courses in anthropology and sociology.

Most of them not in developmental psychology, although developmental and behavioral

pediatricians do have that familiarity. But they’re not interdisciplinary thinkers,

which I think is what is required in order to really fully understand and pick

apart the different aspects of a child’s behavior complex.

Bridgett:I was going to ask for someone who would want, you know,

because I was like, one fourth, I think in your book, you said one fourth of

Americans at some time, have a could have a psychotic episode within a given year.

Where would someone go if they wanted to get a really good thorough assessment to

see, “Hey, something’s going on with me. Wonder if I fall into this category.” Where

would be a good place to really get a good assessment?

Dr. Armstrong: Well, I think either a

psychiatrist or a psychologist. If it was psychosis, I’d go to a psychiatrist with

experience working with psychosis. But psychologists with the appropriate training and

background can also be good. Those would be the two that I would go to.

Colleen: I think also towards the end of the book you talk about the future of

neurodiversity and the challenges that you call the six challenges to neurodiversity

survival. And, you know, again, part of it is political bias and personal bias.

People are afraid to tell someone if they do fall within one of the neurodiverse

categories because of the response they’re going to get from other people. And is

there something that we can do to make it maybe easier for them to survive in this

world because I do love the fact that you talk about neurodiversity in the classroom

And then again neurodiversity in the workplace, right? Because these children grow up

and they need to be able to function in the world So what can we do to support

them to make it without without like doing too much? I guess we as who we as

parents as teachers, as just family members, friends. Employers. Yeah.

Dr. Armstrong: Right. Well, I think, you know, we need to take the same kind of approach that we would for racial discrimination, for example, or gender discrimination. We need to

raise awareness. We need to, if somebody uses a racial slur or a disability slur,

we need to stop the action and say, okay, What’s going on? You use that word.

What does that word mean to you? How do you think she feels? How do you feel when

you have somebody saying that word? Those kind of sessions need to go on, you know,

and damn the curriculum, you know, you need to deal with what’s critically important

first, because otherwise it’s just going to come up again and again. So, you know, being active, being aware,

being person -centered.

And it does ask a lot of the teacher or the therapist to attempt this,

because it is systemic. And it isn’t just connected to just one person.

It’s this person learns it from this person who learned it from this person who

learned it from, you know, it goes all the way back. But we need to do it

nevertheless because it is, as Colleen said, it really gets in the way and it

creates masking. You know, you’re afraid to come out of the neurodiversity closet

because, you know, you’re going to be put down for it. And so I think the other

part of that is creating an atmosphere in the classroom that is neurodiversity

positive so that you celebrate neurodiversity day, so that you have neurodiversity

festivals that honor the great things that people with neurodivergence have been able

to do in life. One of my key ingredients for niche construction is being aware of

all the exemplars or the positive role models of people who have done amazing things

with these disabilities or with these descriptions. So you’ve got Temple Grandon

having done a marvelous job of advocating for autism. And you’ve got, I mean,

ADHD, Steven Spielberg, dyslexia, John Irving, the novelist. I mean,

there are novelists and writers who have dyslexia. That’s important, I think, for

people to understand. And people with intellectual disabilities.

There are our Jason Kingsley, who is an actor, who’s written a book. You know,

there are there are amazing people out there. And those should be our inspiration.

And for letting people know there’s not something wrong with that

person. This person is just like you except that they’re different and let’s explore

differences It should go along with any kind of cultural diversity racial diversity

program really

Any DEI program

Colleen: Yes, that’s a whole other topic.

Dr. Armstrong: We won’t get into that here Exactly.

Colleen: Dr. Armstrong, thank you so much for

coming on the show. Thank you for writing this book. I think it’s going to help so

many people. We’ll have the link in the show notes and you give such, you have

such great resources in the book as well. We want to let our listeners know, but

thank you so much for your time. We appreciate it.

Dr. Armstrong: Thank you, Colleen. Thank you,

Bridgett. It was a wonderful being on your show. I appreciated your questions.