If you have multiple interests, realistically you probably don't have enough time to develop all of them to the degree that you'd like. And even with more targeted pursuits, many of us are busy because of real life and capitalism.

What this means is that we have to make tough choices. I talk about some of the ways I've worked through this, where I'm at with it currently, and some questions to ask yourself to guide your own process.

Also, it's the 100th episode!

I'm committed to not running ads on this podcast (for a lot of reasons).

If you'd like to support the podcast, the best ways to do so...

1. One-time donation on Venmo (email [email protected] for other methods)
2. Wish list items
3. Patreon podcast support tier

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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To change something, I've been playing with telling myself I'll do "a little more or less." It is less exciting than a huge plan... but also easier on my nervous system!

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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This year I've been trying to meet my intensity needs in more "healthy" ways, while also recognizing that sometimes that doesn't feel possible. And that's okay!

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Vanessa Gorelkin is an Occupational Therapist who often works with ND folks. She shares about compassionate approaches to daily life tasks.

The main tool she shared is creating a crisis kit to use when experiencing distress in public, at work, or anywhere that you can't be fully unmasked. List of suggested items below.

Crisis kit items suggested in episode:

1. alcohol swabs (to smell for state change)
2. instant ice packs
3. extreme sour candies
4. lemon juice packet
5. hot sauce packet (mustard is Mattia's)
6. distress card requesting using the bathroom (or whatever's helpful for you)

1. Her website, vanessagorelkin.com
2. @otwhisperer on TikTok

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Reflecting on the interview with Anna, who shared about accommodations for her students and herself.

Learning how to build our own systems/structures is often more useful than being handed a system. Because no matter how much dopamine we get initially from a new tool or system, it inevitably becomes stale.

Instead of throwing the whole thing out the window every time, I've learned how to pull forward elements that are still working. This continuous process of experimenting and tweaking (with rest/recovery interspersed, of course!) has made my life so much easier.

Last 10m of the episode is about why I'm doing the work I'm doing, and the live round of LYB:

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Anna is an educator who has developed an incredible approach with accommodations at the core (for the student AND herself!). It makes sense pedagogically, and it's working! With a core of psychological safety, students are able to explore writing and language with their own goals in mind.

We've also known each other since I was 15... so we talk a bit about the mysterious backstory of living in a Christian sorority ;)

1. Her English 101 Online Textbook
2. Workshopping: Liz Lerman's Critical Response Process
3. All My Relations podcast

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Coping mechanisms can be a pathologizing term. What's the difference between coping mechanisms and intensity or interests?

This episode also touches back to the interview on sobriety with Amy in ep. 92. As well as this note on a positive AA experience from a listener.

Resources:

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Thanks Eric Tivers for interviewing me & allowing me to share the full episode here as well.

His show notes:

In this episode of ADHD reWired, Eric Tivers is joined by Mattia Maurée, an award-winning composer, poet, and host of the AuDHD Flourishing Podcast. Mattia shares their insights into the unique challenges faced by neurodivergent (ND) individuals, particularly those with ADHD and autism, as they navigate trauma, self-expression, and what they describe as “attention tunnels.”

Mattia opens up about their personal journey, discussing the impact of complex PTSD, disordered eating, and their late diagnoses of ADHD and autism. They explain how monotropism—having a narrower field of focus—shapes their experience as a ND person. Through the lens of monotropism, Mattia explores how being stuck in an attention tunnel can make transitioning to different tasks or social situations feel overwhelming and distressing.

Eric and Mattia dive deep into the intersections of trauma and neurodivergence, examining how ND brains may be more easily traumatized, especially in environments that fail to meet their unique needs. They discuss the profound impact of ND parents raising ND children and the challenges of navigating systems that don’t support their differences.

This conversation also highlights the importance of self-expression in healing and flourishing. Mattia explains how self-expression, rather than achievement, has become central to their definition of success, emphasizing the importance of creating work that resonates emotionally, even if it doesn’t fit the traditional metrics of success.

Other topics discussed include:

• The connection between hyperfocus and monotropism in ADHD and autism
• How Mattia balances creativity, self-care, and flourishing as a ND individual
• The complexity of navigating trauma in ND families
• The importance of community and support systems for ND creatives and entrepreneurs

This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in understanding the complex interplay of trauma, neurodivergence, and flourishing. Whether you identify as ND or are simply curious about these experiences, this conversation offers valuable insights into the importance of creating space for self-expression, healing, and growth.

Resources:

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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Thank you to guest Amy Knott Parrish for sharing about her unusual journey with sobriety. When she realized what her future was going to look like, she... stopped drinking. Because it wasn't about the drinking, it was about the problem that the drinking was self-medicating.

After nine years of continuous sobriety, her therapist insisted that she try AA, but it wasn't the right fit.

As with many institutions, it wasn't built for her!

The giftedness/intensity piece adds another layer—we talk about how we sometimes just need the psychoeducation on certain topics, not necessarily the emotional excavation approach. (I could talk about that for hours.)

Find Amy:

1. https://www.rebelling.me/
2. Sobriety blog

A pro-AA AuDHD story (anonymously shared by a listener)

Resources:

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

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(Part 2 of 2. Part 1 here)

Being AuDHD + gifted is being an outlier of outliers. I'd guess most of us feel like aliens.

And even when we start to understand the shape of our experiences, it can feel overwhelming to even begin to order our understanding in a satisfying way. (Autoethnography, anyone?)

Our depth and intensity needs can be quite challenging to meet, especially if we have lower physiological capacity due to trauma/CPTSD, and other intersectional identities that are often marginalized/mistreated.

Mentioned in episode:

1. Some giftedness models:

• Rainforest mind
• Ruf's 5 levels
• InterGifted & HEPG
• "Dabrowski’s Theory and Existential Depression in Gifted Children and Adults"

2. Living With Intensity book*

3. Neurocomplexity & PDA as existential intelligence

4. Autism/ADHD/Gifted Venn Diagram

5. Overexcitabilities & being "too much"

6. Ember Green's quick IQ doesn't exist overview + Aspie Supremacy deep dive (p.s. this video is 2 hrs long and made me cry a LOT bc of historical horrors... still worth it if/when you have the spoons)

Resources:

1. Transcript Doc
2. Email Newsletter: Nothing Wrong With Us
3. Like Your Brain community space (Patreon)

*affiliate link

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