 Let us get started. I will close all my many windows and there you go. Hi everybody! There's a lot more people that you were here in the last one I looked at the screen. Amazing! Hi! I will start off by introducing myself, especially for those watching on recording. I'm Mel. I use she, they pronouns and I'm an executive director here at AllBrain's Belong Vermont and welcome to Brain Club. What I will do is I'm going to share screen to orient us to our topic. Oh man, hold on, hold on. There was a thing I was supposed to do and I didn't do a thing. Obviously I was working on slides with, you know, as we're starting Brain Club. So hang on, one more thing. Life with a dopamine bound brain. It's a good meta lesson for Brain Oh yeah! We're talking about workplace access needs. Because I would not say that from this, so all month of course we've been talking about spring cleaning, what you're going to let go of that no longer serves you. I actually would not say, Sarah Wilkins, that doing things at the 11th hour no longer serves me. I'm going to keep that one. I think it serves me quite well. All right, here we go. Jay, did your hair get purple? I love it. Pinkish purple? It looks different in some way. It may have, I don't know, a little bit. I got to die a while ago though. Sorry for not noticing till right now. So it looks lovely. All right, here we go. So Kelly is sharing that I need a near deadline or I'll work on a one hour project for seven hours. Yeah, no, right. That's, I think that's how that goes for a lot of people. All right, here we go. Letting go of what no longer serves you at work. As always, our community agreement, all forms of participation are okay. You can have your video on or off and if it's on, we certainly don't expect anything of you. You don't need to look at the camera. You don't need to sit still. You can eat. You can walk. You can stim. You can fidget. You can, did I say eat already? If I didn't eat, everyone is welcome here and you can communicate however you'd like to. You can unmute and use mouth words. You can type in the chat. You can communicate however you're comfortable. Safety comes first year. So in addition to affirming all aspects of identity, we endeavor to respect and protect one another's access needs and we'll talk more about access needs in a minute and related to that. Today is an educational program. It is not medical advice and we just ask that since individual traumatic experiences are best processed in a therapeutic setting, not a brain club, we want to keep that in mind. However, I will also note that when we talk about workplace stuff, people have a lot of workplace trauma and there may be some general trends or general themes that we talk about here at Brain Club. So just if there's something that you experienced that you personally experience as traumatic, we just ask that you just think about the educational piece. Think about the audiences of kids of all ages, etc. Just and we can go from there. All right. Other bit of access to cue safety for a broad range of communication-related access needs. We will pause several times at Brain Club to give people space and time to enter the conversation. However, they would like to. And of course, there is never any pressure to directly type something or say something at Brain Club. Observation is a completely valid form of participation. And it is also the case that for many people who may want to directly interact, sometimes if the conversation goes so fast like ping-pong, it's hard to insert yourself into conversation. So we will pause to give space. Last bit of access. Close captioning is enabled. You just need to toggle it on if you'd like to use it. So depending on your version of Zoom, you can click either the live transcript CC icon or the more dot, dot, dot and choose show subtitles or hide subtitles if you want to turn them off. Okay. As I said, continuing our theme, what no longer serves you and letting it go work so many things. So thank you, Lizzie and Sarah for finding this beautiful quote. Independency is a myth. Truth is interdependency. All right. I think that often, so of the many themes that we'll hear about tonight and think about tonight, I think one thing that no longer serves many people, not just at work, but in life is the idea of needing to do things completely independent because that is glorified from the time you're a little kid and people clap for you for all the things you do by yourself. And when the truth is, autonomy is really important, but independence, doing something entirely by yourself, oh no, interdependence, being connected to and relying on other people in community, that's what we need. So I am going to play for you. We're going to jump right into our panelists and I know that since our monthly, so for those who are new-ish to Bringlub, our third week of the month is usually our monthly neuro-inclusive employment-related brain club and there's often lots, lots of conversations, so we're going to leak lots and lots of time for discussion. I'm going to play a brief video clip, an interview with Sarah and Lizzie from our staff here at All Brains Belong. These are some of the themes you're going to be hearing them speak about. Opting out of urgency culture, which was our theme of February Bringlub, creating a culture where it is okay to be vulnerable or it's safe to be vulnerable, creating a culture of interdependence, as I said before, and being transparent around access needs. Just reading in the chat, Mia's speaking about a video. Yeah, I don't like the term codependent either. That's different, different. Interdependence is healthy connections relying on other people. This is my last minute edition. We were a group last night, we were talking about communicating or just about like how do you access needs at work, access needs in daily life. What's a framework for thinking about that? So access needs when we use that term, thinking about anything that anyone needs to fully and meaningfully participate in their experience and we all have access needs. It might be something in the physical environment, it might be an emotional access need, a communication related access need, a physical mobility related access need, we all have access needs. It's just that for many of us, we are less likely to have our access needs met by the defaults of society. So one framework for thinking about communicating around access needs. You might not, I often quote a member of our ABB village who once said, I don't know what my needs are. I just know they're not being met. So if I were to say, hey, what are your access needs, you may not know. But sometimes thinking about it in terms of, well, what's stressful, or what's fatiguing, what's exhausting, what's not working, or when do I feel terrible, and what just happened before that? And then maybe having some hypotheses, some guesses about why that was stressful, or exhausting, or dysregulating, or whatever, of just some possibilities of why that might be. And then and only then can we then problem solve about what would maybe make it less stressful or less fatiguing. And then lastly, how do I tell people? And some considerations there, what's the objective in telling people? Is the objective to get something changed? Is the objective to be understood? Is the objective to change minds? Is the objective to forge a relationship? That's all going to depend on how you tell the people. And of course, the audience. Oh, sorry, I did not scroll up far enough to see Kat's comment about I do think that people get independence mixed up with autonomy. Absolutely. Yes. All right. So I'm going to play for you an interview with Sarah Wilkins, our community programs coordinator and Lizzie Pratt, our education programs coordinator. And to show them how much I trust them. I have not watched this video yet. Mel, I don't know if you're seeing in the chat, we're not sure recording is happening. Oh, thanks. Culture of interdependence right there. Recording in progress. Thank you. Thanks, Lauren. Thanks, Kelly. Okay, let me get video going and share with sound. So today we're talking about spring cleaning at work. And I thought it would be helpful to record a conversation between myself and Lizzie. Lizzie, do you want to introduce yourself? Hi, I'm Lizzie. And I'm the education programs coordinator. And I use she her. And I'm Sarah Wilkins. I use she they and I'm the community programs coordinator for all brains alive. So today we're talking about spring cleaning at work and we're brainstorming kind of letting go of past beliefs and kind of figuring out how to make our days and our weeks flow as best as we can. And one of the things that we were just talking about was the logistics of day to day work that we do. And one of the things and just trying to identify sort of what's stressful and how can we reduce that or eliminate that or reallocate that that role. And so even though something might seem small, Lizzie and I were just talking about how like it can be sort of a low level stress that can be really sometimes not even noticeable just sort of there. But if we can eliminate those things and find different ways to do them, it can really make a difference. So Lizzie, do you want to talk about the ethernet cable a little bit and what that means? Yes. So when I looked at my week, I realized that the ethernet cable that I use for the brain club videos, I'm usually in charge of having the ethernet cord for the videos for them to run smoothly. And I realized that the timetable of making sure that I'm ready to go at brain club with the cord and getting my kids settled right after school is a little challenging. And I realized that because it's important to me that I'm not pushing urgency culture on my kids. We do school pickup right before brain club. So I'm trying really hard not to have my kids be in the urgency culture mindset when we try to get home and that I'm getting them settled. And then I go straight into brain club. So I realized that I probably need to have a little bit more buffer time in my schedule. And I was hoping that we could brainstorm together about the ethernet cable. Yeah. No, I think that's it's a great example because it's something that somebody could say like, oh, this this is just one thing that needs to happen, the ethernet cable. But that how the cat has a cascade effect on your life and on your life as a parent outside of your role and work. And and if we can figure out a different way to do it, then we should, you know, because, you know, there's no reason that it has to be you that screams the videos. So, you know, we led to a conversation where we're kind of brainstorming, is there a volunteer that could do this? Or could we, you know, find someone that would be willing to take this on or sign up for this task. And I think that that's totally doable. And so that's why, you know, I love our culture at ABB, we talk a lot openly and transparently about the things that are challenging for us, so that we can body double with each other if it's something that's maybe just we haven't a task that we could use support on. And we can, you know, just be open about the things that are hard, so that we can spring clean them and kind of figure out how to to feel as good as we can feel and, you know, be able to productively do the things that we need to get done. So, yeah, we talk about that and I love how you talked about buffer time. You know, I think that it's so easy to just like go, go, go, and building in time to give ourselves space to take care of ourselves, even if it's just 10 or 15 minutes in between the go, go, go, is such a critical thing with urgency culture, you know, like you were saying, you don't want to have that for your kids, but not having it for yourself too. Yep, and that's why I realized when I was thinking about spring cleaning during my week that, okay, let's bring up the Ethernet cable that it's okay to bring it up, you know, even though it seems so small that I don't have to put urgency culture on myself. And that, you know, my team's going to be there for me and that we're interdependent and we can problem solve together. Yeah, yeah, and another way that I think of our spring cleaning has been taking all the different buckets that make up ABB and creating task analysis for each of the things that need to happen, so that we can identify like who's the best person to do this task. We don't have to hold it all in our head of all the things that need to happen. And everything that we're doing, we're trying to document and put into, you know, Google Docs or the links. And so everything is kind of cleanly organized. And I think that that's been really helpful for everybody to know where everything lives and how to access it and how to document it so that the next time we go to do an event, we did an event recently. And it went really well. And there wasn't really a lot that I would change, but there were a few things. And so, you know, making a point of, you know, noting that and putting it into a doc so that next time we go to do an event, we don't have to think about the things or find the, you know, the legal pad that had its chicken scratched on there, but we have it actually in a doc, you know, our event, our event document, you know, so I think having having the task analysis stuff that we've been doing, that's been really helpful as well. Yeah. And I think another thing that, you know, comes out of the discussion around like spring cleaning is being just realistic about what we can expect of ourselves in an eight-hour day. And I think it's, we all have really strong work ethics, which is really good, but it also can be challenging because you can tend to over exert yourself and, you know, that has implications for your health. And so being realistic about, you know, again, it ties into urgency culture, right? Like not feeling like everything has to happen exactly when it's on a to-do list. It's okay if it waits a day or two, it'll be okay. This is a work in progress for me. I know it's a work in progress for you because it's a balance like between family and work and finding, you know, enough hours in the day. And we were just saying like it's messy, like we're in the middle of the messiness still. You don't have it that way. No, we don't. And I think, I think just how we've created the systems and the visual supports and the task analyses, that's really helped me just have a smoother day and also helped me feel less overwhelmed when I am going through the messy and reorganizing my to-do list or reprioritizing. It just takes a lot of the cognitive load off of my mind having those systems and visual supports. Definitely. Definitely. Yeah, I think having containers for stuff is really helpful because I think it can be easy to just chase after all these different things that, you know, that it's kind of unrelated, but having a sense of the bigger picture of kind of what your theme is for your week or your theme for your month, you know, that's a really helpful piece of things. And I think just, again, the culture of interdependence in my mind is the ultimate spring cleaning. Coming back to the idea that we, you know, we rely on one another and that's not only okay, it's encouraged. And I think that that is a spring cleaning kind of thing when you're talking about a workplace because that's unusual. I think in my experience, it's fairly unusual to be quite so transparent about, you know, areas that are challenging and asking support and figuring out if there's another way to do something. So I think that concludes our conversation. And thank you, everybody. Thank you, Lizzie, for chatting with me about this topic and all for now. Lovely. Thank you both so much. And it's just really, it's interesting because at the beginning when Lizzie shared the example of a seemingly small thing, and she was talking about the Ethernet people and the rushing before Brink Club, Lizzie, you call it small, but it wasn't small to you. And I think so many people get the message growing up their whole lives that having needs is bad. And like just the feeling apologetic for having needs. And many of the people who work here have, when they've shared various access needs things along the way, they've all used this phrase that's so interesting. And it's a phrase that's used commonly is that I don't want anyone to think that I'm not a team player. That is a spring cleaning leave that one behind. Because I think that you actually can be part of an interdependent team and have needs, you can do both, you can. And that's not the messaging out there in neuro normative life. And scrolling up, Kelly says, I use the shopping list feature on Alexa to cognitively unload through the day. And then I sort through it when I have the time. Oh, like on the app, you mean? Yeah. So I have an Alexa in my room, and she's got a shopping list feature. So you can say add blah, blah, blah to my shopping list. Well, I do that with things that I don't want to forget. So it's like, add call so and so to my shopping list, add, don't forget to feed the fish to my shopping list. And then I'll go through later on. So the back of my mind. This is amazing. Also, how do you review it? Are you reviewing the visual, like on the app of what it took from you? Or are you having it play it back to you? You can do either I look on the app, I have a spot that says shopping list, and it will have everything. And if you click on it, like you've done it, it disappears, but it will leave everything you haven't clicked on. So you can kind of go through and do them as you want. And still, I just find when I'm so focused on trying not to forget things, it slows my cognitive processing so much through the day. Yep. Absolutely. I think I'm at any given time using like 75% of my brain power to remember something, rehearse it over and over. And then I forget it anyway. So I love that. I love that idea. Kat says in the chat, you don't want to be needy. Right. And you get feedback works well with others like that generic, that generic feedback. Right. And at our staff retreat in the fall, we talked about, maybe I've shared the sipper and club before, I don't know, sorry, if you can become a person who tells the same story over and over again. But we talked about in an access needs framework, talking about core values of how it's important to us to be perceived. And core values like core anti values of how it's important to not be perceived. And so often, those things guide so much of our interpersonal interactions. So if I have a core value of being perceived as a team player, there are going to be situations I find myself in that I like stuff something or a quarterly override my limbic system in order to make sure that that value being perceived this way happens. And, you know, on the flip side, if someone gives feedback or something happens that implies feedback of the core anti value, like for me, it's really important to me to not be perceived as a hypocrite, really important to me to not be perceived as a micromanager, not be perceived as rigid and inflexible. These are like all the things that I've been told my whole life that I am. So like these, these, these, these stories, these narratives get like laid down really early in life. And that's they often result in things that we work really hard to not project to the world. And there is some truth to a lot of them. And so, so when that nearer happens, those are the conflicts I get myself into, because I'm dysregulated by those things. And knowing that is an important part of access needs. I wonder. Oh, yeah. So Kat says, hitting, hitting on building a mask and even rejection sense of dysphoria, right? Feeling rejected when being misperceived. And Kelly says, the thing is jumping. I thought I had grown so much, right? Because, because then the message is that to grow up means to like no longer have access to me. Like it just, yes, right. So I love your quotes there. But then someone tried to help me to need last weekend and I mentally freaked. They wanted to send me to a conference in person. Much more money rather than online because it is easier for me to be in person than more rigid corporate zooms. I freaked out about the kindness. I don't know why or how to be better about it. And, and I wonder if, and you know, I think a lot of people spend a lot of cognitive power trying to fix something as opposed to just naming it and noticing it. Like, hey, I'm having a hard time when people are kind or I'm having a hard time when people make changes on my behalf or I'm just, I'm finding that uncomfortable. And maybe you don't need to be better about it. I mean, maybe just, it's not just you. It's like everyone. I just think there's a lot of cognitive effort that goes into fixing and changing and continuously self-improving that might be better spent in other ways. I wonder for others, are there other things that you've been thinking about maybe letting go of thoughts, attitudes, narratives? Kelly says, I hid my autism for 35 years. I became open to help the cause, meaning you became open about being autistic to help the cause. Yeah, reduce the stigma. But you quote still freak out randomly. Is it random or is it related to your access needs not being met? Even if not in that moment, like, but, you know, if you spend a whole day not having your access needs met and then you, you know, you flipped your lid, you know, later that day, like, that's potentially still related to all the things that you endured all day long, for example. Well, I think it's that I'm so used to hiding my access needs and not wanting anyone to figure it out that now when people try to meet my needs, I feel like I don't know. I just sometimes I freak out about that, like, when I'm so used to working in really non-inclusive places and I'm not saying my workplace is great yet, but they're trying to be better every day. And when someone tries to help me or tries to meet my needs, it feels like it sounds ridiculous, but it feels like somehow I'm not as strong as I used to be or, like, I'm giving in or, you know, all those cultural stereotypes of what it means to be like a hard worker or a good person. Yep. Has anyone else experienced that? Oh, yep. Cat has. I think I feel that, Kelly, when someone tries to help me, it feels infantilizing. It's not, but that's the feeling. Yeah, I think I, and it may, I mean, there may be some, you know, energetic vibe thing that you're picking up on about the helper. I agree. Definitely not ridiculous. Definitely relatable. So Sierra shares something very interesting there that PDA plays a part two. Can you say more about that? Yeah, I think I, for instance, I'm feeling very anxious and my wife is like, oh, why don't you go for a walk? That always makes you feel better. Why don't you do this? That always makes you feel better. And I'm like, no, you don't know me. Put up on my walls. Absolutely no. You're putting a demand on my autonomy. And I'm going to say no. And so I think that somebody helping can sometimes be, at least for me, perceived as somebody putting a demand on me, even if the demand is you should feel better because you look like you're really anxious. Yep. And I think the one, one of the things that that, and, and, and, and CD says something that I was really about, about to think about. So thanks for, thanks for connecting that. Sometimes unconsciously I worry I will owe in return if someone meets my needs. So that doesn't come from nowhere. That's what goes on. And when you, when it happens even once that stays in your limbic system. So there's all kinds of things around that. Or, or even, you know, Sierra in Sierra's example, I mean, many people who make a suggestion about how someone could feel better. The vibe of those experiences in the past that stays with you too. And then it's, you know, even if it's a safe bucket person who says it now, it reminds your limbic system of the time that an unsafe bucket person said that. Or it says I feel like I distance myself from friends sometimes for this reason. Like I feel like I don't have the bandwidth to be what I view as a good friend. Or what you've been, what you've been told equals good friend. So I don't want them to treat me that way. So I don't feel bad for not being able to reciprocate that is real. Yes. And Kat says, I was thinking that too. So many people have been that way only doing it for me in order to have something to hold over me so that I can be expected to turn the favor someday, right? That's how a lot of people live their lives. Jade says, sometimes I just want to be mad without people feeling like they should need to cheer me up. Yup. Yeah. And, you know, I think, you know, it's interesting. Sometimes, when Luna flips her lid, and I try to quote support her, but I'm really actually invalidating her by trying to fix a problem that she, anyway, later on, when we're recovering and we're debriefing, and I'll be like next time, what do you want me to do? Nothing. What do you want? You just sit here and do nothing? Yes. Okay. And being transparent around my access needs around that, even with a very young child, I worry that if you fall on a trip and I don't come over to you, I worry that you're going to think that I don't love you or I don't want to help you or I don't want to be there for you. I worry you're going to think that. I'm going to think that. You would just be actually respecting my autonomy, Mama, she says. So it's, I think it's just transparency is the way out of chaos. Kelly says, I try to ask now when someone's mad, try to help, do you want a listener or a helper? Yeah. Asking people what role that they want you to play is really, it's basically asking them what their access needs are. It's a very thoughtful question. Kelly says, I've noticed part of the masking process for a lot of us is almost going purposely against our needs. So we show, quote, no weakness. In fact, with the teams I work with, that's a huge red flag that people aren't okay. But I think many of us do it. Yes. Yes. Travis, I love that book. So Travis has a book posted the rabbit listened. That is such a beautiful book. Yes. Stevie says, sometimes unconsciously I worry I will owe in return if someone, oh, I just read that it hops when we're doing the commenting thing, it like keeps the thread together and then, yeah, sorry. So Laura said, I had a friend group call themselves the 2am friends group that we could count on each other to be there even in the middle of the night. And I couldn't. I turned off my ringer at bedtime. I left that group. I couldn't even tell them why because I felt like such a horrible friend. Yeah. So related to that, I remember in early COVID, I remember healthcare providers talking about, you know, this is my calling. This is what I was trained for. Like this is, you know, I'm here to sacrifice myself for the greater good. I remember being like, I don't feel that way. This feels so unsafe. But like the narrative like this, the self shame around like, I'm a terrible person who like wants to stay alive. I'm a terrible person. So like, but that's, that's, that's what goes on. It's the narratives of like what a good person is, as though there's one right way to be that. Thanks for the solidarity, Laura. Thank you, Sarah. Sarah says I can't even imagine. Yeah. But that's like, and this is what this is what people talk about. And I don't know who knows who knows if it's what Kelly said, which is the, I'm scared out of my mind. So I'm going to tell the story about how I'm going to, I'm going to address my cognitive dissonance by this is the thing and like tapping into whatever to get through that. I mean, there's probably is, is a component of that for some people, maybe not for others. But yes. So, you know, I wonder, because, you know, many people have, have described that, you know, there's access needs that you, you know, you've not been able to communicate and it the that that dissonance is so uncomfortable that you have to leave leave relationships art. Has anyone had the experience of how do you know when, when it's okay to communicate your access needs? And, you know, for many people, they don't they don't have environments like that, or relationships like that. And it may not be something you know, it might be something you feel. Kelly says, teachers have that same superhero martyr thing sometimes movies, movies with with with cancer patients creating papers from the hospital bed society puts a lot on us. Yeah, we all have to juggle so many hats. And there's a lot of guilt. Cat says it's how healthcare professionals are expected to answer messages 24 seven for free. And I remember at brain club once, there was a participant who shared a story about how awesome one of their healthcare providers was for dropping everything and coming in to evaluate a problem like on a Sunday night in the middle of the night or something. I remember being like, No, no. And Sierra and I, we debriefed afterwards because I so I did the thing I did the Brené Brown thing or I was like, I feel shame right now. So I'm gonna call Sierra and be like, Sierra, I feel shame, shame. And, and, and, and it was so helpful. Because what Sierra said was like, Yeah, that story. No. And so that was I remember, I remember that that was really, I mean, I really felt I felt shamed or brain club. Yep. Kelly says, I love your auto email reply. Good example of communicating accesses. Oh, yeah, my auto reply that says I'm never responding to an email ever because I can't read them because I have 771 unread emails right now. Yeah, that. Yes. No, I mean, I was very, it's very interesting that you say that because I remember when I first put that up many months ago. I, I was so anxious about again, related to core anti values. It is really important to me to be perceived as approachable and accessible and flexible and available in all of those things. And like, yeah, if I wasn't doing 50,000 things, I might be those things. But I worried that the email auto reply, like would send this, this signal of like, I'm a rigid person who is not prioritizing you. But over time, I think it really became like when you zoom out and you say like, like what Sarah said in the in the video around like being realistic about what is a human actually able to do in a single day. And that there's a finite capacity to that. I mean, that's my thinking around that shifted. Laura, Mel, I feel like you've modeled that so well for so many of us, like I'm thinking of doing research with community members and being really, it being really important to me to meet people's access needs. And it being beyond my capabilities to feel like I could do all the things I had to do to meet other people's access needs. And I feel like being able to model and share my own and be transparent about what my needs are was actually a better process than trying to ignore my own needs to meet the needs of others. And I feel like that's a skill you walk the walk of and helped a lot of us understand, I think. Thank you, Laura. And I think, you know, in the in the example, since, you know, since like I collaborate on projects with you, I think that what you model for the people you work with is transparency. I think when people are transparent about your access needs and you frame it around access needs, I have an access need that X, I have the kind of brain that needs Y, like what are people going to do? No, I don't care about your access. I don't care that you actually don't have what you need to meaningfully and fully participate in your life. Like, who's going to see that? And if they do, like that is so reflective on them, not you. Reading in the chat, Kelly says, we need to accept that we all have different brains that healthcare worker might be actually cool with the Sunday. However, it's also also okay to not be okay with that. And we need to get over the guilt of our needs because there are things that we are more comfortable with than others would be. Yeah. CV says, thank you for touching on this. I've been experiencing shame and anxiety as I explore boundaries more and saying no categories. Yes, that's nailing it on the head. You know, I think that that that setting boundaries is going to piss people off. And this is about access. If setting a boundary is saying, I don't care about you and your access needs, well, then that's, you know, then yeah, but that's not what you said. You said, I have access and here's what they offer. If someone's going to shame that says you find out who people are when you set boundaries. Yeah. Sarah, that's like when we met with Chris Dorman, and he said, boundaries are an opportunity for an exchange of information of really if a if a boundary is around an access need, we're going to learn we're going to learn what that access need is. And a lot of times when I mean, it's kind of like when we we've talked about the Supreme Club, where we say that if my goal is to meet have my access needs met without infringing upon the access needs of someone else, often when someone flips their lid when a boundary is said, it may be because their own access need was not met, but they didn't know about it that way. And rather than just zooming out and saying, we have conflicting access needs here, it's the shame thing of like, there's something about you that is wrong because you because you told me you had needs. Kelly says there's also the issue of positive reinforcement. That's what gets me when people compliment me for doing so much. It makes it harder to set boundaries because I chase the endorphin rush of the compliments. It's also okay to have an access need for external validation. And so to make to name that for people, actually, when we somebody that a consultant of ours who when we started a framework of asking everyone we work with even if you're not an employee, we started the process of asking like, anyone, even our independent contractors, like what about their access needs. And we asked people, we asked this one person about access needs related to like, not just task assignment or like communication during a task, but access needs around after a project. And they shared that they really are, they have an access need to know that they had an impact to know that the effort they made had meaning. And what a beautiful thing to share. And we kept that in mind. I mean, we were going to we would have, you know, made a made a big deal about the thing when the project was done anyway, but like, but, but, but we, it was such an easy thing to do to meet that need once we knew about it. And it's me that so many people have and they can't name and they're shamed for having. I certainly like it, like, you know, if, if, if I, if I say something, you know, my, my, anything, my husband will often be like, here's a pat on the head and like a kind of like a, like a, you know, a mocking kind of way, but I've had an extra, I've had a need for, I've had a need for external validation like my whole life. And it's just, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's not external validation. It's like, I need to know where I stand. Because if I don't, I'm going to spend, I'm actually going to spend my cognitive resources spinning around to wonder whether I'm safe, safe or not safe. I can't tell. And when you tell me you like me, I feel a little bit safer right now or something like that. I think, I think there's a lot, Sarah says, same Kelly says, I started asking my students about access needs after coming to brain club. That's awesome. I tried to do it before, but this has helped me have a smoother and more clear conversation and employer training and stuff to learn this too. Yeah, so, so most of our, you know, to date, most of our, you know, neurodiversity and inclusion trainings that we do are neuroplastic employment. And when access needs for staff comes up, staff, the 10 D is tend to really engage with that of like, Oh yeah, they're not really having a framework for talking about that. Cool. And it's really, it's like, when you think about how, you know, there's, in all different industries and all different fields, there's, it's, it's, it's, it's just, it's so common that people are like, quitting their jobs or if they're in a job, they're so aware of the mismatch between either the culture or the tasks and the way their, their brain works or the way they, you know, their, their priorities are, and it's, it's some access needs play out into all of it. Amy says, validation helps me know where I am in space and time safety. Yep, yep. Kelly says, I love that you normalize that it's something that everyone needs to think about, not just our divergent people. Oh, absolutely. It's all people. We all have access needs. We all have to think about it. It's just that depending on what you're, you know, if, if, if, if, if, if you're the one in five people who learns things under communicates in a way that significantly departs from like the, the, the pretend typical brain or the pretend default brain, there is no default brain, but the way that like the defaults that society caters to, um, yeah, you're less likely to have your access needs met by default without intentional design or thinking about this. Kat says, when being praised for something, I used to have a really negative reaction. What do I do with that praise? Um, yeah, like what are you expecting of me? Um, I've learned about praise and PDA. Now I say I both hate praise and need it. Yes. Um, I hate that it feels demanding. And then I kind of know I kind of like the validation of how I'm pleasing people. And if my unmasked self is doing the pleasing, like, I'm getting, I'm, I'm getting praise for authentically me as opposed to praise for my mask. Yeah. Luna says, and actually, um, I heard Christy Forbes say this. So, uh, Christy Forbes, who don't know is a, is a, is a PDA educator and advocate. Um, there was a lot of amazing, um, uh, materials out there. Um, but I heard Christy Forbes say on a, on a YouTube video, um, around when you praise me, I feel pressure to do that thing again. And that's the demand. So I said, Hey, Luna, I heard Christy Forbes say this thing. And, you know, just stopped. I didn't ask a question. Just stopped. She thought about, she's like, Oh yeah. That's how it is for my brain too, mama. Good information. Yeah. I guess that's where I got it. Christy Forbes. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, it's, um, it's, it's, uh, and there's a, there's a term for this. Um, I always forget what the term is. It's a social penetration theory. I understand my experience better when I hear it from someone else. So like I hear someone say something, I read someone writing something. Now I understand my own life experience better. LA says validation is so important for people that can't always pick up on micro expressions or body language. Right. It's the, um, it's, it's, uh, it's kind of like, um, no, um, I have the kind of brain that doesn't, I mean, it's a lot of autistic people are hypermobile and, um, and, and, uh, proprioception feedback from your muscles, joints, ligaments of where your body is in space since back to the brain. If you're extra, if you're, if you have joint hypermobility, um, you don't get that signal until you're in a more extreme position. So if you're not in that position, you don't, your brain doesn't actually get the signal. So let's, let's, let's, and that's, um, that hypermobility is more common in, in neurodivergent people. And so there's a lot of like, well, I'm always moving because that's how I feel my body, or if not, that's maybe why I'm walking into the wall or why I knock stuff over all the time, because I have no idea where my limbs are, um, until I, until I hit the thing. Um, and, and I think that there's emotional, it's like, it's, it's, it's, it's emotional feedback. It's relational feedback as opposed to physical feedback. Kelly says, is that where I don't know where my limbs are? Yes. Yes. Um, uh, Laura says, I have learned that one of my access needs in the workplaces, external validation. Right. You need to know you're doing a good job. You need to know that, you know, you're especially, you know, it's interesting. Um, I think a lot of people also never like you, you, you, you can't tell whether, whether someone's pleased with your work and if it feels unsafe to, for someone to be displeased with your work, if that feels unsafe, or if even like I've worked in places where I don't give you back at all and neutral feedback is like it may as well be like you're displeased with me. Um, and, and there's that narrative around like you should be self-sufficient. You should be self-praising. It's like, no. Um, and I think about like, you know, it's just, it's, you shouldn't need that. Who are you gonna tell me what you should, you should not need? This was hard. Um, uh, Kat said, so that's autistic communication, finding how it resonates, connection with others through shared experiences, deeply understanding something you're saying because I have experienced something similar. Oh, you're going back to the social penetration theory. Yeah. Um, or if not some similar, you can tell me that I didn't quite get it right and get feedback that way. Yeah. So as we, as we wrap up today, I wonder, especially just to create some space for anyone who has not had a chance, um, to, to share, and again, no pressure to do so. I just wanted to make, give that space. Laura says, I have a boss who really focuses on areas in need of growth without recognizing areas where I'm doing well. And I had a really hard time with that until I just named it for myself and stopped internalizing that as her being unhappy with my work. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think there's a balance, right? Like I think there's a, there's, um, you know, it's all about access needs, right? So the balance is, you know, your, you know, if, if, if, if, if, if we're saying that in a given workplace, I recognize I have access needs in the workplace. My supervisor, my employer has access needs in the workplace. They may not know that or they may not have that framework. The organization I work for also has access needs and all of those things need to be balanced. Um, and in a world of, of a world of goodness of fit, those, those things can be talked about and negotiated. And if not, then maybe the person recognizes, Hey, this is, this is actually not, this is not working for me. This is not, but again, that's a layer of privilege, right? A layer of privilege to be like, I have, I have the privilege of actually getting to pick where I work or what, what work I'm doing. Um, and, and, and that's, that's also very hard about this. So it's like, how do I, how do I potentially meet my own access needs without, without requiring or without, you know, with, without requiring chain or we're not, we're not, not, not requiring someone to not have their access needs not met. Like that's the, that's the balance. Kelly says, I expect many of us experienced a lot of hyper micro criticism as youngsters. And maybe that plays into needing constant dialogue of how well we're doing, getting over that trauma. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and, and also, you know, for, I can say as, as a former child who received that, that I find that inadvertently I am repeating it with my own child. Because I either want to, I'm afraid I am wanting to protect her from negative social emotional experiences that I had. Or I'm as a PDA or I, when I see autonomy violated in it, when I flip my lid, it feels unsee. So that's, it's, it's, you know, if I, if I just, for example, at, at, at Aubrey's Belong Kids Group yesterday, Luna was powering over someone else. And Hannah Bloom, OT on our board of directors, she, she asked Luna, she said, do you have an access need to control someone right now? And I was like, what are you doing? And then Luna like, I mean, she thought about it. She was like, yes, that is my access need. And it, it, it was, it was amazing. Because then Hannah was like, yeah, I'll play the game. I, I, I give consent to the game you're trying to play. I will play your game. Those folks, they have not given consent to that game. And it was like, it was truly navigating access needs. It was, it was beautiful. And Kat says, not everything has to be teachable moment. Yeah, I'm trying to like teach constantly, right? So that, so thanks for naming that. Yes. So we spoke a lot about safety tonight. And as we, as we often do, and which reminds me to tell you that next week is, it's, I don't know how this happened, but it's already the end of March. And we will be having our next book chat. We will be chatting about the book Unmasking Autism by Dr. Devin Price. And again, no pressure to read the book. I have not read the book yet. I'm going to be facilitating the talk. And I think I actually, I mean, I really actually want to read this book. I've been wanting to read this book for a year. It's been like on my shelf for a year. Anyway, but I'm still going to come. I'm going to come to the book, even if I don't read the book. So I hope you do too. So I will hope to see you next week. Thanks, everyone. Bye.