I am often asked how I got into this work. Here is my story:

When I was 16 my boyfriend was diagnosed with, “Autistic tendencies” and I believe that this was what Asperger’s was often called, back then. I already knew that my calling was in counseling of some sort and I was hungry to read a great number of psychology books. How he was treated in the mental health system caused me great pain, and caused him even more pain. We went our separate ways for other reasons, but he is my friend even today. He is a retiree from a good job that he held all of his life for the State of New York. He was good parent and raised a son who is stable and very successful.

I remained very interested in all things ASD, securing jobs as “housemother” in Residential Treatment Centers for children, but it seemed that I kept being given children, adolescents and their parents with Asperger’s/High-Functioning Autism and Learning Disabilities. It seemed Mother Nature wanted me to work with Asperger’s. As an adult, I met someone I thought was the man for me. After a short time, I found that he was on the spectrum. I also knew that his children could not understand on their own and I reached out to them, to create trust and understanding, before he passed on.

This only served to increase my interest. Some of the agencies that I worked in, specialized in ASD and provided services to children in their homes and at school. I was fortunate enough to work with a great number of children, adolescents and their families, who were on the Asperger/Autism Spectrum. There is no experience that could have been afforded me, that would have taught me more. In this fashion, I was able to see so many angles of how those on the spectrum were treated in their families and in the larger world. I was also able to be involved with older adolescents when they started to date.

It is no coincidence to me that the series, “Atypical” focuses so much on that. High school and preparing for the social scene in college, is quite a challenge to NT (or neurotypical) adolescents, who are mostly more adept at picking up on social nuances. Oh how I wished I could explain to high school and college counselors, what I knew and I certainly did not know it all. To say that information on this subject was extremely limited and therefore unavailable to modern medicine and psychiatry at that time, as well as psychologists, would be an understatement. Those with Asperger’s were and are the true experts and my best teachers.

My learning continued. When I began receiving calls from spouses looking for support, I began realizing how many neurotypical partners were in neurodiverse relationships and they had almost nowhere to turn. I look for these types of misunderstandings and ask people to bring in their partners, so I can identify if this is the problem and I am always looking for those who would fit into a group for neurodiverse couples or individuals. Similarly, when requested, I develop and lead groups for siblings of adults on the spectrum and for grandparents of someone on the spectrum, but my primary focus remains how to help each partner in a neurodiverse relationship.