ND-Affirming Talk Therapy

Many neurodivergent people have done talk therapy and unfortunately not found it to be helpful. This is often because it was done with a counsellor using a neurotypical lens. When done through the lens of neurodivergence, talk therapy can work for neurodivergent people, particularly after processing and releasing trauma. Much of our trauma as neurodivergent individuals stems from societal pressure to conform to neuronormative standards. Once we no longer carry this burden, talk therapy can help us conceptualize and learn skills that more closely align with our unique neurotype and authentic self.

Talk therapy is typically not useful for healing from trauma. When we are talking about and analyzing events, we are using the analytical parts of our brain (called the neocortex). However, trauma and emotional dysregulation do not reside in the neocortex, but rather in the deeper regions of our brains tasked with our survival (and in our bodies). Consequently, if past traumas are driving current emotional dysregulation, talk therapy may only have limited impact and the issue can continue to arise until deeper healing is done.

We often interweave talk therapy with somatic processing methods (including Brainspotting, EMDR, and Internal Family Systems), and will follow the client’s lead on what approach is most helpful each session.