Interesting question. I actually had a conversation about this with friends recently, one of the group had just gotten an ASD diagnosis and we realised we were all neurodivergent–except, did I count? We quickly concluded that that didn’t really matter, but now I’m curious what y’all think.

Due to a medical event years ago, I suffered brain damage. It didn’t really “break” functions, but since then I’ve had trouble with concentration, energy, mental planning, and perhaps most importantly I get overstimulated really easily. I can’t handle a conversation while the radio is on, I wear ear plugs when I need to go into a shop, I can’t watch busy/flashy tv shows, if someone is fiddling with something in their hands I get an urge to run away, etc. It might not sound like much to some, but it’s left me unable to work (there’s more than I described).

I realise that neurodivergence is mostly used for differently developed brains. But mine also don’t function “typically”. What do you think?

(And just to reiterate, it really doesn’t matter, I know how I am and how my brain works now and a label isn’t important to me, I’m just wondering if the general public would find it strange if I said I’m neurodivergent).

To me, my idea of neurodivergence is that it’s a more neutral term what we’d typically call neurodevelopmental disorders, and could potentially be extended to personality disorders. Neurodivergent people are those with (typically) lifelong differences in brain function. I think it’s a helpful concept at times but I also think it’s far too vague and more specific diagnoses exist for a reason.

I’m torn on including personality disorders because on one hand, they feel more squarely problematic (particularly as someone whose mother is Borderline), but on the other, it’s possible that “feeling squarely problematic” is influenced a whole lot by culture and personal opinion. I’ve experienced being judged by other people’s shitty personal opinions too often to feel comfortable doing it with other people.

There is currently no strict medical definition of neurodivergent, which means we have some control over the word ourselves, which is nice. I’m currently reading “Unmasking Autism” and this section taught me a little bit about what the term might mean.

Almost anyone can be viewed as defective or abnormal under our current medicalized model of mental illness—at least during particularly trying periods of their lives when they are depressed or their coping breaks down. In this way, neurotypicality is more of an oppressive cultural standard than it actually is a privileged identity a person has. Essentially no one lives up to neurotypical standards all of the time, and the rigidity of those standards harms everyone.[42] Much as heteronormativity harms straight and queer folks alike, neurotypicality hurts people no matter their mental health status.

Autism is just one source of neurodiversity in our world. The term neurodiverse refers to the wide spectrum of individuals whose thoughts, emotions, or behaviors have been stigmatized as unhealthy, abnormal, or dangerous. The term was coined in 1999 by sociologist Judy Singer. In her honor’s thesis, Singer wrote about the difficulty of making sense of her daughter’s disabilities, which closely resembled traits her own mother exhibited when Singer was growing up. At the point that Singer was writing, Autism was poorly understood, and adults with Autistic traits, such as Singer’s mother (and Singer herself) rarely received diagnoses. Singer’s daughter seemed to inhabit a space somewhere between Autism, ADHD, and a variety of other disabilities. All three women were difficult to neatly categorize, which only obscured just how marginalized and socially adrift they all were. Just because their challenges couldn’t be easily named didn’t mean they didn’t exist.

“My life as a parent was a battleground for various belief systems,” she writes,[43] “all of which had one thing in common: an inability to come to terms with human variability.” Singer and her family were disabled in a way that no one knew how to name, so she created a name for them: they were neurodiverse, and they suffered because the world demanded they be neurotypical. These terms would be popularized by journalist Harvey Blume and widely adopted by disability advocates a few years later. The label neurodiverse includes everyone from people with ADHD, to Down Syndrome, to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, to Borderline Personality Disorder. It also includes people with brain injuries or strokes, people who have been labeled “low intelligence,” and people who lack any formal diagnosis, but have been pathologized as “crazy” or “incompetent” throughout their lives. As Singer rightly observed, neurodiversity isn’t actually about having a specific, catalogued “defect” that the psychiatric establishment has an explanation for. It’s about being different in a way others struggle to understand or refuse to accept.

I like that neurodivergence is a great big broad category. Each individual type represents a very small population that is easy to ignore and scapegoat. Adding up the huge variety of neurodiversity, genetic and acquired, gives us enough numbers to get something done.

I am dyslexic, autistic and bipolar. Not one of these groups have enough numbers on there own to effect change. The same accommodations that I need to function with one issue are the same accommodations I need to deal with them all, adequate education, adequate health care, adequate tools & technology, adequate shelter, adequate nutrition, and an adequately civil society. Just like every other human on the planet.

We need to speak with one voice. How neurodivergence is dealt with is inadequate for all of us.