The Flexible Mind Podcast

This episode focuses on five things that I wish every parent of a neurodivergent kid knew. Points of interest include understanding that different neurotypes experience the world fundamentally differently, that advice to "fake it til you make it" can be harmful, and that stressed and overwhelmed nervous systems function in service of survival

This podcast focuses on 5 things I wish every parent knew. Here I discuss concepts related to brain development, regulation, and repair of ruptures.

With the death of George Floyd, the need to acknowledge and heal the country's past and current racialized trauma is profound.  This podcast looks at this from an embodied standpoint, utilizing the Polyvagal Theory and Menakem's book “My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies.”

We are in a time of unprecedented disruption in our lives.  It can feel at times, like danger lurks everywhere.  Because of this, we are experiencing anxiety, stress, and disconnection.  This podcast will discuss how at a deep level, we need to feel connected to others, we need a sense of safety, to help us to feel like we are thriving, resilient and can deal with the stressors of these times.  We need connection and safety to help activate our immune system; and when we don't have them, our sense of danger will actually work against our immune system.

In this third podcast on Sexuality and ASD Exploitation and Victimization, we will discuss the first part of reducing risks of victimization which is training of Individuals with ASD.  This training goes far beyond just the sexual act, but rather goes into many of those aspects that individuals need to develop to be happy, healthy, and safe, including:  personal rights, healthy self-concept, options for healthy sexual identity/orientation/expression, options for healthy gender identity and expression, relationship training, and sex education (including discussions of ASD specific factors).

In the second part of our discussion on Exploitation and Victimization of Individuals with ASD, we will discuss signs and symptoms of victimization, as well as digital risks and signs and symptoms of exploitation and victimization.

Today's podcast is a little break from the extrinsic and intrinsic factors that affect relationship, sexuality, and gender identity development and expression in individuals with ASD.  Today, we will start a series of podcasts on Exploitation and Victimization of Individuals with ASD.  We will be looking at the prevalence and risk factors for exploitation and victimization in individuals with ASD during this podcast.  In the next podcast, we will look at the signs and symptoms of exploitation and victimization, as well as the digital risks and signs of exploitation and victimization.

I'm really excited for today's podcast.  It covers two areas:  Systemizing vs. Empathizing and Interpersonal Synchronization that I wasn't certain how I would fit in to this series of podcasts.  The second subject, Interpersonal Synchronization, is of particular interest because I feel it is under-discussed, and its impact is often unrecognized.

Today we are going to take a step back to the beginning of the podcasts on ASD and Sexual Development, to provide a bit of context and scope for this series of podcasts. I realized that I hadn't provided enough scope or context for either why I, as a speech-language pathologist, was interested in and discussing sociosexual development and individuals with ASD, as well as what was going to be discussed around approaches and strategies for addressing needs or areas of growth.  

In today's podcast, we will explore the Neuropsychological Frameworks that may explain the behavior of individuals with ASD.  These frameworks (Weak Central Coherence, Context Blindness, Theory of Mind, and Executive Functions) will then discussed within the context of sociosexual development and expression of individuals with ASD.