Online Therapy & Assessment for
Autistics and ADHDers
Neurodivergent affirming therapy and assessment means valuing your lived experience and the wisdom of our communities as guides to self-understanding and wellness.
I’m an AuDHD practitioner, and I’d love to help you meet your goals.
Whether you’ve always known, are late-diagnosed, are self-diagnosed, or are still questioning whether you’re Autistic , ADHD, AuDHD, or another neurotype—as a neurodivergent person, it can seem like you have no map to follow in life, and it’s easy to get lost.
Meeting your neurodivergent needs
For us, life can be an ongoing process of self-discovery—oftentimes, a desperate process. The world doesn’t give us the tools and knowledge to meet our needs. We frequently end up struggling to fit into the molds that are available, but that are a poor fit for us. That ends up creating chronic distress, including sensory, relational, and other kinds of trauma that lead to anxiety, depression, burnout, and more. Our struggles with these stresses are often met with additional invalidation as we’re told we’re “too sensitive,” “too much,” or “not enough,” so the complex trauma is amplified further.
Many of my clients have felt misunderstood by clinicians in the past, who held outdated, biased views of Autistic and ADHD experiences, and didn’t recognize the true struggles and hidden pain. Maybe you, too, were told you “looked okay” or have plenty of “insight,” or your needs were simply dismissed or misunderstood. Maybe you know a lot about what’s going on, but CBT and Googling “coping skills” just aren’t helping you feel better.
I find that there are special areas of knowledge and tools that Autistic people and ADHDers need to feel our best. And a lot of what we need is counter-cultural—that’s because we have our own culture that aligns with us. Having a clinician who is immersed in Autistic and ADHD lived experience and in touch with those cultures can help you learn and apply those lessons you’ve been missing.
Recovery from Burnout, Overwhelm, and Meltdowns/Shutdowns
Autistic and ADHD adults (and the people around them) may not even recognize the most significant signs of neurodivergent distress—meltdowns, shutdowns, and burnout—which all come from unique experiences of overwhelm, exhaustion, and chronic dysregulation that result from the mismatch of our wiring with the expectations of the neurotypical world.
The process of recovery from these patterns involves regulating your nervous system, which happens through many small steps over time. This is a big part of my approach to ND-affirming therapy: each time you move back towards regulation with self-compassion and effective skills, you retrain your embodied nervous system to recover more readily and you adjust your baseline level of stress to a place that feels better. We do that in sessions, and I teach skills and help clients strengthen mindsets that help them apply that on their own, until relief takes hold.
Unmasking & Accommodating
Recovery from stress only “sticks” if the source of that stress is addressed. This means adapting life to suit your genuine needs and joys for the long-term. This can include exploration of unmasking options, discovery of what sensory protections and inputs you need for day-to-day wellness, developing strategies for holding boundaries, and identifying and self-advocating for other supports you need.
In our community, unmasking can sometimes be discussed as if it’s all-or-nothing, but there are many nuances to how people might unmask, and it’s a process that grows over time. In particular, intersectional identities, especially race and gender, matter a lot in terms of how safe it is to unmask in various ways. Self-disclosure is a related topic that also often benefits from support and reflection so you can use it in the most beneficial ways.
Formal Diagnosis and Support Options
Do you want to get an extra level of clarity with a formal diagnosis?
Together, we can explore questionnaires, trait lists, and diagnostic criteria to affirm your self-identification and allow me to provide a clinical diagnosis of Autism or ADHD when applicable. I’m qualified to provide these diagnoses in all my states of licensure, and I can provide you with letters and reports for documentation. (Note, I don’t do full neuropsychological testing, which may be required for some accommodations at work, school, or other benefits—review the relevant policies to ensure you will be able to get the outcomes you hope for. I am also unable to prescribe medications, but I can confirm diagnoses to providers who can prescribe.)
If you’re less sure whether you want a formal diagnosis, I understand! There are many considerations in pursuing a diagnosis, and I’m happy to help you think those through. One of the biggest “pros” is that a formal diagnosis would allow me to write you a letter to support work or school accommodations (if they will accept my credentials: PhD-level LMHC). This is something I’m passionate about, having worked in campus disability services and having been a college instructor and an employer in the past, which allow me to understand the process from more than one angle. I want to ensure you get a level playing field to experience what you’re really capable of, in the best way.
I’ve also noticed that this process is not just about getting the diagnosis or letter for most people: they also need to work through their internal barriers to using and fine-tuning support options, and that’s something we can do together in therapy, too. I can also help you decide if formal diagnosis isn’t what you want, so you can feel more confident about that choice and your own self-confirmed identity. This can include recognizing facts and dispelling myths about how formal diagnosis works and comes up in life.
For any of these concerns and more, I’d be honored to support you in creating your unique best life. To learn more about what we can do to support you, please visit my specialties pages. There is also an item on my FAQ about assessment and diagnosis you might like to visit.