This episode dives into the specific needs of AuDHD-ers – that’s kids who are Autistic and have ADHD - tying in executive functioning, social-emotional well-being, and so much more. Vanessa’s take is detailed, creative, and deeply practical. You’re going to want to take notes! Vanessa Castañeda Gill is an AuDHDer and the cofounder and CEO of Social Cipher, where she and her team create social-emotional learning video games and curriculum for neurodivergent youth.

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"Because therapy should feel like a collaboration and becoming, not a rehearsal and being less yourself in order to survive." - Chenai Mupotsa-Russell

In this short episode, you get a sneak peek into the audio from one of our most poetic and transformative summit talks. Our continuing education summit is now $100 off and available on-demand at learnplaythrive.com/summit

Selected Transcript:

"Normal is not a neutral baseline. It is a construct, a fiction, a colonizing force. Normativities function to flatten difference, discipline the body, decide who gets to be seen as competent, coherent, and worthy. So, when we center neurodivergent and gender diverse lives, we're not offering inclusion into a category of 'normal', we are refusing the category altogether. Divergence in whatever form is not a problem to solve. It is a truth. They are the most natural, beautiful, diverse, amazing ways of being rooted in sensation, relationship, rhythm, self-determination, expression. The problem has never been the child, the adult, the human. It's in the systems that punish difference in the name of order.

And so, the therapeutic task is not to bring the client closer to functioning - a functioning built on an idea of a human that is so far from them and so many other people. The idea is to undo the harm that normativity has caused. It's to let go of those normativities and start to reimagine what the world could be like if we allowed for the full spectrum of human experiencing, to make space for becoming on one's own terms, however they present or move through the world. Creative practice becomes essential here. Not decorative, not soft, but radical and necessary. Sensory-based creative engagement reaches the brain, the body, the heart, the soul in ways words can't. And for those constantly coerced into verbal or behavioral conformity, art, creativity, movement becomes a language of refusal, regulation, and reclamation. The work isn't to help the client survive unjust conditions. It's to help deconstruct the conditions that made survival feel like the only option. Because therapy should feel like a collaboration and becoming, not a rehearsal in being less yourself in order to survive."

From Colour Outside the Lines: Exploring Art, Gender, and Neurodivergence Beyond the Binary with Chenai Mupotsa-Russell MTAP, AThR in the Learn Play Thrive 2026 Continuing Education Summit

View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

Dr. Devon Price’s work sits at the intersection of trauma-informed care and Autistic unmasking. In this interview, he walks us through five core practices for unmasking, and shares how to approach them thoughtfully with Autistic clients who have experienced trauma - which is most of the Autistic community.

We explore practices such as learning your preferences and disentangling them from social norms, building resilience, cultivating distress tolerance, and shaping your life - both in big, structural ways and in the small, everyday details. A lot has been said about unmasking, but very few approaches hold the work with this level of care.

Dr. Devon Price is a social psychologist, clinical associate professor at Loyola University Chicago, and an Autistic person. His books include Laziness Does Not Exist, Unlearning Shame, Unmasking Autism, and his newest release, Unmasking for Life.

Want MORE EPISODES of Two Sides of the Spectrum, recorded Q&As with our guests, and a listener chat forum? We just launched our Patreon and we need your support! Join our community at patreon.com/learnplaythrive

View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast