Why the 'neurodiversity movement' can be so toxic - and what to do about it
My LinkedIn feed can often feel like a nursery class, with constant arguments and outrage. More and more, I feel this reflects the wider neurodiversity 'community', which is ironically filled with in-fighting and divisions.
The line between education and judgement is very blurred in the best of cases, but when it comes to situations where we're all working alongside sharing our lived experiences, this becomes even more confusing to navigate.
When I first published ADHD: an A to Z, I was absolutely terrified of being cancelled for getting it all 'wrong'. Then I remembered that no one was likely to read this book, so I decided to go ahead and share it anyway, in the hope that it might help one person.
The first edition of that book was wrong in many ways. From the misspelt title of 'AHD', to calling ADHD a mental illness, because that's what I'd read on 'official' healthcare websites, it was far from 'perfect'.
I wasn't cancelled, but along the way I did learn more and was fortunate enough to make updates to it (the joys of self-publishing!). Now it's published by Hachette, there's no opportunity to change the word 'neurodiverse' to 'neurodivergent', but these things haven't stopped it from helping tens of thousands of people.
Nobody emerges from their neurodiversity journey with a full handbook of language, resources, and support. We are all just figuring it out together, learning what resonates with us, and trying to fit in with this new-found understanding about ourselves.
The internet, and the neurodiversity 'movement' is an exhausting place. I was extremely proud of myself when I said no to going on LBC radio this week to talk about the 'dramatic increase in welfare payments' for people with ADHD. I knew this was a toxic debate I didn't want to enter, one I also didn't feel personally qualified to talk about.
Every day, we see news articles stigmatising people with ADHD, causing outrage and a flurry of posts about it. It confuses me - it feels like these things become a trend in themselves, but I still feel a sense of obligation to educate because of working in this space.
Every time I do a corporate or ADHD coach training, or group coaching, I try to reassure people that they can say whatever they want. I am very difficult to offend, having been a fashion model for a decade, receiving direct personal insults to my face on a daily basis.
I don't believe anyone genuinely wants to offend anyone.
👉 Not the 5 year old girl who asked me how to get rid of ADHD.
👉 Not the people who think ADHD is being mis- or over-diagnosed.
👉 Not the people who think ADHD is a damaging label (the word 'Disorder' isn't particularly great).
👉 Not the people who think ADHD is a trend.
👉 Not the people who don't understand the Equality Act or how to make reasonable adjustments.
👉 Not the people who say ADHD is their superpower.
👉 Not the celebrities talking about their opinions that ADHD is linked to sugar or screens or coffee.
👉 Not the people who are concerned about the wider implications of a huge number of people who have previously been undiagnosed.
👉 Not the people sharing their misinformed beliefs about neurodiversity, spurred on from misinformation they've received through places like our national media.
👉 Not even the member of my own family who told me ADHD was made up by psychiatrists to get money when I was diagnosed.
These conversations may be damaging, and they might be extremely frustrating and upsetting to hear or experience, but they are critically important to be having. We are all responsible for our own boundaries, as nothing and nobody is controllable in this life.
It's only through conversation that we learn from each other in a non-judgemental way, where we truly understand the reasons behind certain nuances in language or how ADHD affects people on a day to day basis that change happens.
This can be uncomfortable and awkward and painful, but it's all part of being human. These conversations are best to happen in the real world, not on social media where comments can be easily misunderstood or taken out of context.
Joe Wicks received a lot of criticism this week for commenting on ADHD and diet, then posted an apology, sharing his belief that people are being misdiagnosed, which has received even more criticism.
Last time I checked, he's not a psychiatrist, but he is a human being entitled to have that opinion. Just because he has a large platform and does things that helps people, doesn't make him all-knowing in all areas. I don't see articles or posts tearing down Andrew Tate or Donald Trump for the terrible things they say on a daily basis.
This is because we place expectations on people who should 'know better'. To work in this world gives you a bewildering set of expectations to be everything to everyone. Having a 'platform' seems to give us a set of standards to uphold, but these are constantly changing - and everybody has influence, whether they have 'followers' or not.
The neurodiversity 'movement' is increasingly feeling very toxic. It's ironic to see people who are so passionate and determined to make the world a better and more inclusive place for others, fight with each other so ferociously - it divides us all.
This is all down to capitalism.
Depressingly, outrage about ADHD is a trend. Every time a national media outlet publishes an article stigmatising ADHD, it's sure to receive a lot of attention. Every time a celebrity mentions ADHD in a 60 minute podcast, it's sure to be the comment picked out and splashed across newspapers. Every controversial post on social media is the one people will comment on.
This has led to a very confusing culture based on fear and shame. The fear of saying the 'wrong' thing means people are more inclined to say nothing at all, and important conversations for individuals, such as about the help they need at work, don't happen or are shut down.
The fear of being cancelled on social media leads us to cancel ourselves first. Shame is contagious - when one person is bullied, the rest of us feel that too, in one way or another.
We're now seeing the results of this: a backlash against diversity, equality, and inclusion.
This is a huge part of why I published ADHD: an A to Z, because I realised it was better to have something than nothing. It's why I created programmes like ADHD Champions for businesses like Disney, because giving people the tools to have these conversations wider than just HR is so important. It's why I decided to train ADHD Coaches, because giving people the tools to empower and support others in a non-judgemental way, without gate-keeping this behind tickboxes, is so needed.
This work is not easy, because it happens within a broken world. It happens within a society where the reality is that the 'label' of an ADHD diagnosis is often necessary for people to feel confident enough be able to enforce their legal rights. It happens within spaces where people feel entitled to judge this work and project their own opinions on it, because that is their right - but it's still not easy to deal with.
It happens within a world with years-long waiting lists for assessments and overwhelmed professionals who are as desperate as the people seeking support from them.
It happens largely on platforms like this one, where we are all being manipulated by algorithms. When I've taken breaks from LinkedIn after especially stressful conversations, I'll log back in to see these exact topics at the top of my feed, even though they were from days or even weeks ago.
Social media feed us our own personal menu of insecurities and vulnerabilities. It can give us a community of people who share our opinions, but this isn't necessarily a reflection of reality. In reality, there are people who think differently to us, and that's okay - it's what drives our species forward to grow.
When I tell people I'm an ADHD Coach, I brace myself for the inevitable conversations of 'everyone seems to have ADHD these days'. From years of doing this, I now have a toolkit of understanding how to have these conversations without getting too emotionally involved and projecting my pain.
The fact is that we are all living a world that's deliberately designed to hack our attention. We have all experienced collective trauma of a global pandemic that killed millions of people, which isn't being talked about. We're all scrolling the internet in search of answers, which are all conflicting.
We are all struggling, in our own way.
If you can take something from this, please remember that everyone is a human being trying their best with what they have available to them.
The only way the change everybody wants to happen - that people are supported - is through co-operation, compassion, and empathy. Collective change needs people to work together in common pursuit of a goal, not against each other. It needs a community of people who support each other, not compete with one another.
There's obviously more than enough people who need help to go around. The most important thing is that they can feel able to seek out and engage with this support from the people that resonate with them without feeling ashamed to do so.
Whether these people who need help are neurodivergent themselves or not, is largely irrelevant - parents, partners, HR professionals, managers, friends, doctors, teachers, employees, children, and anybody else - they are still as deserving of compassion as anybody else.
When we can see, understand, and relate to each other as human beings, we can access the quality that makes us all individually unique and yet the same - humanity.