differences you talk about being your affirmative moving away from expectations to parenting the way that your child who they are what they need so I suppose Lisa do you want to talk a little bit about your brand new book Parenting Your Autistic Child it's I suppose having permission to parent differently do you want to talk a little bit about your own I suppose where you started out as a parent and I suppose where you are today and all of the learnings that you've had along the way and how that has kind of influenced the incredible book that you've written.

Yeah, I mean, it's been quite a journey.

I had my first child when I was 18.

In fact, he was born on my 18th birthday.

So I was a baby, really.

And I think I started to realise that parenting wasn't what I expected it was going to be.

But of course, I had nothing to compare it to.

I

Can you share some of these challenges as well as the unexpected strengths that come with neurodiverse family dynamics?

Yeah, so I think for parents of autistic kids, we're kind of trying to parent against this backdrop of a society that generally favours one neurotype.

I think we pay lip service as a society that we value difference.

And I think we're going in that direction.

There is a big neurodiverse affirming movement.

But I think generally there is one neurotype that we cater for in society.

And I think as parents, it's so hard to try and parent your autistic kids against that backdrop because you're constantly advocating or explaining what your child needs.

okay um parent question now something that parents have asked understanding autism so do you have any information on understanding PDA that's pathological demand avoidance that's right yeah within autism and is it helpful to have it recognized in a child's diagnosis as a trait So, yes,

Yeah.

So communication, that's the second thing.

And then unpredictability.

So we know that our kids, many of our kids rely on routine to feel safe.

They need that predictability to keep their nervous system regulated.

And so when things change, you know, unexpectedly, like this time of year, their nervous system kind of, it goes into shock you know and i said before it doesn't sort of pause to say well is this a big problem or a small problem it just goes change reaction it's another thing i have to process yeah yeah this is danger so i'm gonna i'm gonna react to that um and so it flips into survival mode And often I think a meltdown can go into all three of those areas.

Yes.

kind of go with the first four at the moment as i've said many times on neuro shambles my kids each respond to meltdowns in a different way which you know same diagnosis completely different response to meltdowns i mean do you with your lot are they do they experience meltdowns differently yeah

So can you just kind of start us off by explaining a bit more about your background and how you learned that all three of your children are autistic? And just give us a little bit about you.

So, my background is that I'm a speech and language therapist by profession, really, and I left the NHS about eight years ago due to burnout, and I now work online as an autistic consultant.

It was purely accidental that I ended up doing this.

I just started an Instagram account, and it kind of grew from that need that you were talking about, really, that so many of our kids in school.

And, you know, even before school, parents are starting to realize that they are neurodivergent.

And there's such a backlog with diagnosis and getting that support that I think I kind of filled a bit of a need that was there.

And it's just, we've grown an amazing community since then.

And also, you know,