Decolonising Neurodivergence with Claire Johnston

The neurodivergent woman podcast acknowledges the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and the connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to elders past, present and emerging and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. Hello, this is the neurodivergent woman podcast. Hi, I'm Monique Michelson and I'm a clinical psychologist. Michelson and I'm a clinical neuropsychologist. Michelson and I met at work and bonded over a shared love of feminism and yoga. We both saw the need to provide a free resource to adult neurodivergent women and so the neurodivergent woman podcast was born. Michelson is neurotypical and Monique is neurodivergent. And we bring our clinical expertise and lived experience to the topics we explore. This is a podcast where we centre and showcase neurodivergent women from all walks of life. Covering autism to ADHD and everything in between, we aim to educate and inspire women who think differently. On our final episode for season four, we welcome Claire Johnston to the podcast. Claire is a citizen of the Red River Maytay Nation, who lives on the land of their ancestors in Treaty One territory, also known as Winnipeg Manitoba Canada. They are a maytie beadwork artist and a proud autistic person who finds immense joy in working with their hands. Claire is a founding member of a grassroots maytie collective called Red River Echoes, which works towards reclaiming sovereignty, land, culture and kinship across the maytie homeland. They are also a member of the two spirit-machiff local member of the Restoring Autism Project out of Brandon University, which works towards a liberated future for neurodivergent people through art, and challenges Western, Capitalist, Biomedical and Colonial understandings of people who think differently. [Music] So we're really excited to have Claire on with us today. So Claire, we always ask, what does neurodivergence mean to you? It means to me that I have a different way of thinking that I've been given gifts that I was given to share with the world and those might be different from other people's gifts. But yeah, generally that I have a different way of thinking and that I have, and that it is a gift. Yeah, great. Very succinct. I love it. So yeah, I mean, and we say all the time, like we always just like to ask everyone that question because we find that people have a different responses and sort of different perspectives. And what I really liked about your answer there is that idea of gift and gifts. And I'm sure we're going to talk a lot more about this in the episode today. But I generally find that any Indigenous perspective on things like neurodivergence or difference or things like this tends to have a lot more of that language flavour compared to say a Western perspective on it. But I don't want to jump the gun. I'm sure we're going to get into that. What has the impact of colonisation been on the understanding of neurodivergence in your community? And how has this affected neurodivergent people in your community? Yeah, super, super huge, huge question. I think I think generally about colonisation of these lands through policies in Canada that are similar to other experiences of colonisation around the world, including Australia. Like has a very similar experience of colonisation as we do. You know, impacts of residential schools, land, genocide, all of these measures that have been used to eradicate who we are as Indigenous people on our own lands. And so when I think about how colonisation has impacted the way that, you know, myself, my family and my community understand people who think differently are neurodivergents. It's not different from any other teachings or ways of being that we've had that have been disrupted. When I look at my own life, I'm 26 years old. I was, I received my autism and ADHD diagnosis less than a year ago. So I received quite a late diagnosis. And it's in the same time, only in like probably the past two years. Maybe three years. Have I also been able to understand who I am as a meetee person rooted in community and with my kin. Have I understood like my gender identity? I mean, I still don't understand my gender identity, my sexuality. And I think when I look at that and how little that I've understood myself until this point, I think it just goes to show how severed that connection has been and understanding myself as a very much a direct result of colonisation. And, you know, it's been through going to ceremony, connecting with elders and all the people in my own community, very intentionally that I'm just on like the cusp at 26 years old to start to understand who I am. So that's from my own very personal perspective. But I think generally when I received my diagnosis, I immediately thought, okay, like what are our own people? What do we need to know? How do we understand autism or ADHD? What have our roles been? What have our responsibilities been in community? You know, generally difference isn't seen. It isn't seen in the Western way where if you're different, you're subjugated and you're oppressed and you don't fit in here. You know, difference for us is, wow, your special creator made you this way for a reason. We need you. You have things to bring to us. That's such a great articulation of often what is the difference between saying Indigenous versus a very medicalised Western perspective on difference. And, you know, I feel like in the latter, exactly as you said, it's like anything that's different is a pathology or it's defective or it's something to be cured or fixed or even eradicated. Right? It's like, no, no, no, we don't want this. Whereas shifting that lens and kind of, I think it's even important for people who are non-indigenous to hear these different perspectives and realise that actually there is a different way of thinking about this as a different way of conceptualising this. And Claire, I just loved, again, your explanation of how, you know, over the last couple of years, so much identity shifts seem to have gone on for you. And that word severance, I thought was just really visceral. Like the effect for you of colonisation was being severed from those ties to identity. Yeah, I tend to think the ways that I think I've been exploring the way that I think has also been very connected to my sexuality. And I tend to think about being autistic from a meet-tee perspective in a lot of similar ways as I view myself being too spirit. And when I think about being autistic and, you know, having ADHD or being ADHD and wanting to very much revitalise or, you know, be part of the resurgence of understanding ourselves rooted in our own cultural understandings, I think about too spirit identity. The word too spirit is a term that was coined by Maira Laramie in Winnipeg here. And Maira was given this word too spirit in a dream and gifted it with the community. And it meant that she held two spirits within her, both the feminine and the masculine. And again, result of colonisation, anyone who didn't fit into, you know, gender binaries or having different sexualities for indigenous people that often just meant death, you know, in residential school or in society in general. So Maira was given this word too spirit and now the word too spirit is used by indigenous people globally to describe ourselves as having very specific roles, very specific spiritual roles and end responsibilities as well. And I've received the teaching that two spirit people are have like a very close and special connection to creator. And there's very specific knowledge that two spirit people hold that's meant to be shared. And so it's important that from a young age, people are connected in ceremony. They're taught who they are, they're acknowledged for who they are. And so there's been this mass of resurgence and people claiming their two spirit identity here in Turtle Island, but globally. And when I think about neurodivergence and being Métis, I think about also being two spirit in the same way, there's really specific gifts I have because of the way that I think. And so I view that as a gift, you know, I've held so much shame about the ways that I think and the ways that I behave. And so the more I speak with old people, the more I, you know, go to ceremony and I hear teachings, I'm like, oh, that sounds like, you know, these things that I've. been taught to be super shameful about and be quiet about are actually supposed to be like there they're supposed to exist there's supposed to be acknowledged supposed to be nurtured. I'm supposed to understand these things about myself so that I can I can contribute it to society. So I just wanted to mention you know the path of me understanding maybe my spirituality my sexuality and my neurology like is so so interconnected. Yeah you put it so well plan the interconnected part of all your different identities these things aren't siloed aspects of us right and you know having that sense of who you are but also the duality of then how does that serve my community and how can we have this kind of reciprocal by directional relationship you know between the individual and the community where it's like the individual is held and taught about who they are and honored for who they are their gifts are identified and nurtured and then it's about okay great now I can use these gifts and use these abilities to give back to that community. Yeah I think it's really important to well I think it's important in general that indigenous knowledge is respected as legitimate knowledge you know we've been here since before time is what elders and you know we'll say to me we've been here since before time and when you've been here since before time you probably know things. Yeah I really am hearing too that having that context having that connection to your own community and the knowledge that's passed down generationally in your community and your culture that would be so important for identity formation and I can see you know with that being severed how much more difficult it would be to connect with those various identities and in particular something I've noticed with autistic people is a lot of us have the need to know the why and we need to know all of the context all of the information to then form you know a sense of self and a sense of identity so I could imagine that it would be difficult if you were neurodivergent and autistic and you had that cultural context and all of that rich information be severed and not be there to guide you. I'll joke sometimes you know that I take an ADHD medication by Vance love it life changing I have energy wonderful but I joke like well I don't joke my dad he lives in the bush he's lived there for seven years he has no running water he logs all his own firewood bush guy anyway I look at my daddy lives alone in the bush and I like to think you know I think I probably what is the way to do it. I probably wouldn't need ADHD medication if I was like in the bush hunting I was picking berries I was doing my beadwork doing quill work I was in my element and I was on my traditional land doing the things that I was like born to do anyway I'd be thriving but one day I hope I will live like my dad. And not being alone as well do you know what I mean like even just like even if you live alone you're still part of that community and you're not expected to do every single role or every single like practical thing completely by yourself which I think is a very western expectation you know you have to do everything by yourself be completely independent from everyone and artists don't think that's really realistic. Yeah and I mean we've talked on a previous episodes about that concept of interdependence and actually how much more functional that is for everyone you know totally opposite ends of the spectrum we've got in the like complete independence and complete dependence neither of which are functional definitely as a western society we need to move more back to the dependence and the spectrum realize that it is. Actually completely functional to be interdependent so that's a great point when you're about having that kind of community around you even if you do like your solitude and you do want to be a bush man chopping wood. So Claire we've talked a bit about the effect of colonization on you know traditional indigenous understanding of neurodivergence and identity and all the factors that go into that i'm wondering for you what would decolonization of neurodivergence look like. Yeah I think there's some folks that are doing really great work on this i think one personal mention is grant Bruno in Alberta here who is a crere researcher and father of two autistic children and is doing the work from a naïve perspective of understanding autism you know that's you know it doesn't view neurodivergence from a deficit. That's why is it important oh my gosh I think I just think about. Again like bring it back to the gifts and not even for neurodivergence folk but also disabled folk generally of how little we are allowed and supported to contribute to society period. So I think the loss you know knowledge and beauty that hasn't come into this world because of you know really horrible violent systems is like very very sad it's very sad I even think about my own family and due to things like a class of them ableism racism i've had incredibly gifted. And intelligent generous beautiful ancestors and made amazing contributions that you know i'm not saying they didn't but you know i just to look at if we would be supported in the ways that we are meant to to bring what we have to this world like wow so when I think about decolonizing understandings of neurodivergence and the importance of that it's like. The untapped potential and not in like capitalist way whatsoever you know not like oh we could have a very productive workforce not just even in my own life I I have lots of gifts as a young person and I was pulled in many direction and I study politics I worked at the magical legislative assembly here then I worked at the House of Commons in Ottawa as a parliamentary assistant and you know as good at what I did very good at what I did it was very meaningful for me I have a very strong sense of justice you know very optimistic thing really good at research really good at writing I can like write super fast I have a lot of gifts that are like really great for this type of work thing is terribly ableist colonial racist terrible institution to work with that so a year a year and a half ago I had to go on a year long of sick leave I was so burnt out and like very mentally ill it was quite scary I was you know as a big an auto I was away from my community you know on the other east part of Canada and like having meltdowns every single day and like the energy that it takes first of all to have a meltdown and then also to like get myself out of that and then continue literally working wasn't this space where my needs were were honored and I think having to go on a year of sick leave in a snap second I was like oh my god I can't take this I move back home I lived with my aunt and I mean I'm very very fortunate my aunt Jill I love her to do she took me in for a whole year and was like this is a refuge you're going to stay with me I don't want you to worry about when you're waking up she wanted to take me in provide me like a very safe space I'm used to constantly highly monitoring my behaviors even with the people that I live with like hyper hyper aware with people that I live with right and so moving in with my aunt and her actually I think it was like one of the first times in my entire life where I was really given permission to just be and that allowed me to heal and like from burnout get well I got you know my diagnoses during that time I did therapy during that time I focused on artwork during that time I can't say enough about my aunt but we just talked about community right and how it's such a lot of work it's such a lie that we are meant to be so hyper independent and that it's shameful to you know I lived rent free with my aunt I should not be embarrassed about that my aunt wanted to do that for me and like I really pushed back on my aunt I was like no I'm going to pay rent and she's like no and I talked to my dad about it even and he said you need to honor that your aunt wants to do that for you and I was like oh okay you're right and so anyway all this is is to say that to having that year with her actually allowed me to find out like how I wanted to live the rest of well not the rest of my life but you know make really easy intense choices about how I want to move forward. So, you know, I decided to leave my job. I decided, I'm not working in politics anymore because I'm going to be ill. And if I don't have a job that allows me to have flexibility and autonomy and agency, I will be ill. So during that time, I focus on my artwork, on my beadwork. And, you know, through this part of my aunt and through this part of members of my own community, now I'm doing my beadwork practice full time and I would have like never, ever imagined that I would have been able to do that. That's amazing. Yeah, I love that you, you know, through this kind of period of almost enforced rest and being given like a safe place to land, you were able to have this space to actually recover from that burnout and make some, yeah, decisions about what you want to your next steps forward to be like, but knowing that it had to be sustainable for you and not doing things the way that everyone else is doing them, I guess. And I just love the idea as well of your aunt giving you that safe space and it sounds like it was with no demands, like no demands on when to get up or expectations on you to perform in a certain way. Being able to rest without those pressures and demands is so rare for people to find, but also so important for healing and recovery. I think, you know, something that we hear often, you know, from listeners and in our Patreon community and definitely something I've experienced too and I feel like Manique, you've probably experienced this as well, is this idea of, you know, to bring it back to identity, this idea in the west of your identity being tied to your productivity or your achievement or what you have to, you know, in a vertical miss show for your existence essentially. And so even thinking about being granted that space to heal, like you described, Clare, there can often be a bucket against that where it's like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I can't possibly do that. And ultimately, that's a friction internally around, well, what does this mean for my identity? Am I just as useless sacripotatoes that, you know, doesn't have a purpose on this up? And I think as with anything when we're trying to let go of maybe an unhealthy or unhelpful behavior that we're engaging in or a mindset or an identity framework, they can't just be a vacuum. You've got to have something to replace it with. And this is where I think Indigenous populations and Indigenous understandings of these things, everything that we've talked about already on the episode is so important for people to know. And as you said, Clare, to take it seriously and to value it as legitimate held knowledge, because I think that is an amazing identity shift for anyone. That it's like, actually crazy idea, maybe you are valuable just because you're a human being. Maybe you don't need to be producing constantly. So yeah, I think that's something for people to think about and getting to a place where you're okay to be held, right? Just held in that soft place. So I guess my other question on this too is, you know, we know, we talked about the importance of decolonizing. I'm wondering, Clare, what do you feel like the practical steps to that would be? Is it just kind of more education? Is it changing policy around how we educate young kids? What are the functional practical steps to doing that? Yeah, oh my gosh. It is a big question. I think for Indigenous peoples, we live in such a different reality from the rest of the population that those things very first step have to be addressed, you know, with your very basic human rights being violated, you know, not having access to clean drinking water, having a pipeline go through your territory and like, destroy all the salmon population that you rely on to sustain yourself. All of these things are colonization and action still. I believe that systems can't necessarily all be decolonized. Some of these systems are, you know, people say systems are broken. No, some systems are working really, really well because they're meant to be violent systems and they're meant to oppress people. And so you can't decolonize them. You have to destroy them and you have to create new institutions and Indigenous people we have to be supported to revitalize our own governing systems. In Canada, we have the Indian Act. So first nations in Canada, we have the three groups of Indigenous peoples, First Nations, Métis and Inuit First Nations people are still under a system of apartheid in Canada and it's called the Indian Act. And when South Africa was looking at a apartheid, they looked at Canada and they looked at our Indian Act system, which we still have. I mean, my people, the Métis nation, were currently negotiating a treaty with Canada. So there's all of these things that are necessary for autistic Indigenous people to be supported and be who we are. And some of those things are very directly related to our human rights. I'll mention the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. So there was a bill, Bill C-15, that passed last year in the House of Commons and received royal assent. And so I mean, I don't know how much Canada will hold itself accountable for its own human rights abuses. But I think Andrip provides a really good outline for the very minimum requirements of what needs to occur for Indigenous people to survive and have our rights realized. And there are very specific parts of the UN Declaration that have to deal with Indigenous people with disabilities. And so my people, our governance systems have really been impacted by colonization. Our politics and our community are really messy. So I don't even have support for my own nation as a disabled person. For me and where I'm at, the most concrete thing that I'm doing in my life is that I'm trying to build a network of autistic Indigenous people or Indigenous people who identify as thinking differently in my circle. And there's such little visibility and acknowledgement of who we are. And we attract one another. We like spending time with each other. So I've noticed in the past year, like, oh my god, I think, like most of my friends are autistic. And I think when we have spaces as autistic people to being community with one another, that's like so powerful, so so powerful because we have our own solutions, right? Yeah, there's like huge things that need to occur. But then there's like the really grassroots level things that also have to occur. And I think it's like a nice place to start in thinking about how we're relating to ourselves and then like people just in our own communities and our own networks. Yeah, I think that's a great sort of funnel approach there, you know, where it's like things need to happen on the macro scale, but then things can happen on the micro scale to, you know, in that kind of small, like what you're doing, like building a small community around you of people who have had similar experiences who think similarly. But I just wanted to touch quickly on one of your earlier points about some of the macro stuff because I think that that's really important for people to hear in that. Ultimately, this is going to sound like such a dumb and obvious statement, but I'm going to make it ultimately to decolonize neurodivergence. We need to treat Indigenous people as people as human beings that have valid thoughts and knowledge and ideas and are valuable and worthy people. And I think exactly as you said, Claire, like there's no way that we can actually ultimately get to a point of this sort of deep understanding mindset shift, framework shift, if we're still behaving in ways that are violent and oppressive. It boils down basically to your respect, like literally having respect for the person in front of you and having respect as someone from like a Western culture, having that respect of Indigenous ways and knowledge and people. I actually don't understand how it can be so hard for people to just respect others. I literally don't get why it's so hard for some people. I think that's an autistic thing, many. I think this is probably where there's that overlap, intersecting identities, right? Because we know autistic people are people who do change the status quo, who do say what the fuck are we doing? Because there's less kind of reliance, I guess, or dependence on social norms or just the way things have been done. So I would agree with you. I feel like that too, but I think lots of autistic people are often baffled by these huge injustices or weird ways that people behave that's violent towards other people. Like WTF people, like, I don't know. Often I'm the one that ends up giving people a reality bitch slap. I think that's why even me working in politics was, you know, I'm like, it's not that. hard. It is so obvious what like excuse me. So it's very frustrating, you know, when these things are so clear in my mind, I understand how all of these systems intersect to make a sick society. And it's like, okay, if we did these easy, easy things, it'd be great. You know, going back to like, oh, why don't people just act right? I think it has to do with like, people have to be willing to give up power and also adjust the ways that they're used to living and used to understanding about themselves. It's not an easy thing to do. And again, like, that's a systemic thing, but that's also like a personal one-on-one type of thing. But I've had like wonderful, wonderful friends in my life who are non-antistic and non-indigenous who have been like incredible friends and support people to me. And that requires my friends actually giving up some power and being very vulnerable and like, maybe making some hard decisions about about things. And I don't have a ton of folks in my life who are that dedicated or are dedicated in that way, but I do have some. And man, does that feel good that we're both on the path together, you know? I've noticed that it's not so much about power dynamics, you know, autistic culture or maintaining your status quo on the hierarchy. Like, if you have a higher power level over someone else being like, oh, I need to hoard this and I need to, you know, retain my power and do all the social maneuvering to kind of get higher on the social ladder. A lot of autistic people will often find that they might rise to positions of power potentially because of different gifts or abilities that they might have. But then they actually go, I don't like this. I don't like being in this higher position of power or I don't like playing the game. And a lot of them actually are quite happy to like sometimes eventually leave or give up that power because it never really meant that much to them in the first place or some people will stay and try to use their power, position of power in society for good, but all the stuff, the neurotypical stuff around that actually ends up burning them out. I mean, that is so true in my life. I started working at the House of Commons as a parliamentary assistant when I was 22 years old. Like, there was no one as young as me in that space. And, you know, by all external measures, that was like highly successful, the role that I had, right? I didn't view it that way at all. Like, I didn't care. I went to work in like very plain clothing. You know, it was a hyper professional and for me to leave in my mind, like it wasn't giving up power or prestige or anything. It wasn't part of my identity. But, uh, yeah, and then it was like exactly that. Like, I don't like playing the game. I found it really sick. I find it gross. People are going there, like, I'm going there because I am like, I live in Winnipeg, and I literally see people's human rights being violated on the street every single day. We have the highest percentage of indigenous people, um, living in Winnipeg in all of Canada. And so, with that, we're often seen as like the epicenter for human rights abuses. So I knew why I went to Ottawa to work at the House of Commons. And it wasn't about climbing a ladder and it wasn't about getting ahead. And it wasn't about playing games or manipulating people or it was like, oh, these are hard facts. And I'm going to say them and you're supposed to make the laws in the ways that make sense for this problem. But it's, no, I get there and it's, you know, it's about power. It's about, it's about winning elections period. And it was really sick to me. And even the way that other staff would speak to me, you know, I didn't have friends. I didn't have any friends because I didn't connect with people. I found it really disturbing how people were led to do this work. So, uh, good and to agree more. So, Claire, you should tell us that you have this sort of idea of collecting stories from your MAT community on neurodivergence. And you've talked a little bit already today on the episode about cultivating that community around you. Could you just tell us more about that and what that project is? And yeah, just kind of flesh that out for us. Yeah. So I am a team member of a research project called restoring autism and education out of Brandon University. The way I got involved with them is I was actually a research participant. They were doing research on autistic Indigenous people in Southern Manitoba. I saw the posting. I think my cousin posted it and I was like, oh, that's me. And that's like really oddly specific. And I was just preparing for my assessment at that point. And so it was a two-part research project that I'd be participating in. So the first one was an interview and then the second one was a storytelling workshop. And I would be supported with academics to support me in creating the video and to learn the software to create the video. And also supported by elders. So I did my interview. It was, I think it was only supposed to be 30 minutes. It was like two hours long. And it was my first time, I think, like having people witness my experience for what it is and having like autistic people witness and validate my experiences. It was absolutely radical to me. I left just being like, I don't know, I can't describe it. It was really incredible. So we did the interview and then I did the storytelling workshop and I got to create the short film. It was really supposed to be about the research was about, you know, my K to 12 education. I wanted to create a video that was all the positive things I love and not necessarily focused on the bad things about my educational experience. Yeah. So what I did was I created like a short video that was just a compilation of me making things and using my hands. I have really good dexterity. And that's again, like that's a gift I know I have for my dad and for my grandpa. I know that a lot of autistic people don't have good dexterity. So it's kind of, but we're very much the autistics that are like really good with the fingers. So I created this video. I was ported to do so. It ended up going on exhibit at a gallery called Tangled Arts in Toronto, which exclusively exhibits work of disabled artists. My participation in the in the research was incredible. I've reached I've participated in other research studies, but I so heavily benefited and opened up all these doors and resources for me. I think that when researchers are actually considering how research participants are benefiting and especially autistic people, like especially the context of autistic people and how awful and evil a lot of the research that is done on us is that it was really, really beautiful to me to participate in this research and to benefit from it so much. The founder director of the research project, her name is Dr. Patty Douglas. She is just so wonderful. I can't say enough about her, but I just I said to her, I met with her this summer and I said, you know, Patty, I have this. I need to know how many people like I need to know how my people view people who think differently. And you know, I'm asking, I'm going around and I'm asking community members and nobody knows. Like nobody knows what are people think about autism. I know that the knowledge is there and I know that some people must have these stories. And I have those stories too. It's just not said that they're autistic. I have my grandpa's memoir. So lucky that my grandpa left a memoir. I read it every, no, not every once in a while. I read it often because I feel very connected to my grandpa. There's so many stories in my grandpa's memoir. I'm like, oh my god, this is so autistic. And I like, I see myself in his stories. I listen to the stories that my aunties tell me that my dad tell me. And it's like, yeah, we are all this way. And we have for generations. And so I know the stories are there. I know other may T have the stories. These stories are out there across our our homeland as may T actually and and not, you know, I'm speaking about may T specifically because that's my people, right? But, you know, these stories are global and they exist. I think certain indigenous peoples have been impacted by colonization in different ways. And so for some nations, their understandings of autism are really strong. And they have like they know who autistic people are in their community. They they have words and they have names for them. But there's different experiences, right? And so in my context, that isn't the case. And so I, you know, was talking with community members about I really wanted a word for who I am like in our language in Maciff. And was asking people around and because we also like we have 900 Maciff speakers left. When you cut people off from their language that has such a ginormous massive impact on their whole understanding because the way that we understand the world around us is via language, right? What words for different things? How we can sexualize different concepts into word packages. So a lot of these indigenous communities where it's like the language itself is going extinct. You know, we're talking about violence before to me. That is one of the most extreme acts of violence that can be conducted against a society in a people's. - Yeah, it really is. Yeah, it really is. I don't have anyone in my family who speaks a language. I barely have anyone in my community generally who speak a language. It's been common for us to speak up to seven languages. And there still are some elders who speak a whole lot of languages. One of my elders speaks five languages and three of those are indigenous languages and then English and French. But yeah, like your whole worldview is rooted in your language and rooted in the land. One of my elders, his name is Bruceinclair. I was talking to him about this and he said, Claire, have you looked at, he's like, you need to go to our language. Or, you know, and he wasn't speaking about my chef, he was speaking about Cree, which is also what my ancestors spoke. And he said, you need to look at the Cree language and you need to look at how every single word that includes difference in it. That's gonna start to give you an idea of how to think about yourself. And so I was like, oh my God, like I never, I never thought about how language learning that can be part of like how I am decolonizing myself and how I understand myself as a meaty autistic person. So kind of within that same time period, I was speaking with a community member and I was expressing how I want a word that isn't autism to describe myself as part of that journey for myself. And so there is a Mitchiff language teacher, he's Heather Souter here at the University of Winnipeg and she was able to provide the word Pitochet Tatem, which means Ski-Shi, they, one who thinks differently. And so like as much as I can now, I'm trying to use that word to describe myself and I need to learn more of my language too. But I'm starting there and using that and language is a really important part of this all and so going back to gathering stories, we need visibility, we need stories for young people to look at to understand themselves. So you know, I'm thinking about we need to collect stories of autistic people, it doesn't have to be written, it can also be spoken or having different ways of recording people's experiences, whether that's the order, you know, whatever. But you know, that's something that I wanted when I found out about how my brain works and so I want that for other young people. And so Patty and I have been brainstorming since and she's been supporting me heavily to take the lead on ideas for us to do that in partnership with community. And one of the things that we're now doing together we're working on a neurodiversity module that will soon be published for teachers as resource for teachers. And within that module, I rate about my family and about our intergenerational experience of being people who think differently. We're now organizing a first-ever critical autism summit that's gonna happen here in Mattobon 2024. And we're gonna invite organizers, academics, community members globally. - Manique, should we go to Mentor the next year? - No, you're fine. (laughing) - It's gonna be out on the land too. Like I clearly, it's not gonna be an urban center. It's gonna be, yeah, it's gonna be super autistic friendly. Indigenous knowledge is going to be at the forefront. And I'm trying to get funds to enable autistic, Indigenous people to come in and be able to attend the summit. Because like I said before, I think just straight up, being able to gather in the same place together is so powerful and needed. So, North diversity module and the critical autism summit. And then one thing I'm very excited about that I'm working on with Patty or Patty, the recent autism project is a collaborator on is, I've applied for an arts grant with my dad. I kinda spoke a little bit before about having a very deep connection and working with my hands and doing that with my family members too. Since I was young, I always worked with my hands and my dad supported me to, my dad and I have like very, very similar neurotype. He is the person him and my aunts are the two people in the world who see me. Like they really see me. And they don't question me. Like they know my intent, they know me. So I'm also very connected to my grandpa. You know, I spoke about him before. But really, I feel this very deep connection between myself, my dad and my grandpa and these three generations. My grandpa ended up being an elevator mechanic with Otis elevators. He could wire an elevator like the fastest they ever had. He was a strong union member, one awards. Like he was just incredible at what he did. He also was, he would build fiddles. He could make his own guns. He, my grandpa made anything and everything and he was so generous, he never sold anything. It was always to help others. And you know, my dad is the same way. Super generous, really good at fixing building. My dad was also worked for Otis elevators and just very gifted in making and engineering. And both of them didn't have a high school education, didn't graduate. And so incredibly intelligent, but have been told like you're stupid, you're like all of these things. And I know, you know, I'm doing my artwork full time off of my artwork and I think about my dad and I think about my grandpa. And it's like, oh my god, they're a way better artist than me. And I carry that with me knowing that they didn't have those same opportunities, but they're with me and it's important for me to follow this path and really honor like these gifts that they've given me. So in collaboration with the Restoring Autism Project, we've applied to a grant, me and my dad to do this collaborative project together where I bead a really big, meaty style, we do flower, we mostly do flower bead work. And so I want to create this wall pocket. So like a wall pocket is sort of, like there's European wall pockets as well, but this will be a meaty style wall pocket. It was pretty common for us as meaty to have wall pockets in our homes because kind of different from other indigenous people, we were often literate, so we would often write letters. And so wall pockets were places where we would keep documents and that sort of thing. So they had really a practical use, but in us as a people, we were also the Dakota would call us the flower beadwork people because we were just like obsessed with our beadwork. We put it on our dogs, on our horses, like on our homes. So the idea is I create this huge, beautiful wall pocket. It has three pockets. One to represent my grandpa, one for my dad and one for myself. And the flower beadwork will tell the story of us being people who think differently, but are connected intergenerational to one another. And then the pocket itself will hold items and letters but are important to the three of us. And then so that's my role in the project and then my dad, incredible woodworker. He will be creating a frame, a wooden frame, like a really beautifully carved wooden frame for the wall pocket to sit in. And then again, coming back to collecting stories, the intention of with creating this piece is for, well, first of all, for it to stay in our family. So it's like, this is a material object that will really concretely say who we are for generations to come. And then the other thing is that, I want the opportunity for my dad to be acknowledged as an artist. He's had a lot of barriers in his life. My dad lives a good life and is happy where he's at, but he's had a lot of really intense struggles, being criminalized, experiencing homelessness, but incredibly resilient and flippin' brilliant. And so it's not important for him to have acknowledgement, but I want that for him. So we're gonna create this piece together and then we're going to, with restoring autism, together look for opportunities where my dad and I, we can exhibit this piece together and we can talk about our family. And use what we have made as a storytelling, as a way to tell stories. Thank you so much for sharing that with us because I think again, it's another moment where we need to think about how we conceptualize or think the format of a story should take, you know? And in a very literate, reliant society, it's like this idea that stories always have to be the written word. But there's actually so many other formats that storytelling can take. And I think, yeah, I love this project of expanding that definition of what is a story. How do we represent the story of our family, or the story of my life, or the story of our cultural community in all these different modalities? Yeah, I think that's quite freeing. Just listening to what you're saying, Claire, I think having Indigenous-led research is super important and just even further Indigenous-led research into neurodiversity, disability, people who think differently, super important. When I was doing a bit of a literature review for one of my trainings, I tried to look at what research there was available on autism, like on different Indigenous populations. And I could only find like six studies in the world that looked on autism and Indigenous populations. So there's not many and I don't know how many were actually in did. in this lead either. - Yeah, I do know, so I just found like two weeks ago, how is this first nation? They have an autism report that speaks specifically to their free understanding of autism, and I only found it two weeks ago, but it's beautiful, it has like five translations of autism in their language. So maybe that was one of like the seven that you found, but it's like, wow, we have part of it. - Yeah, so far to go. So for anybody listening to this episode of the podcast, if you identify as indigenous and neurodivergent, someone who thinks differently is autistic and ADHD, please reach out to Claire, and we will be posting their contact details on the episode show notes. (upbeat music) - So Claire, we've talked already a little bit about your work as a bead worker. I'd love to hear more though about how that kind of interacts with your neurodivergence and what role I guess you think your neurodivergence plays in that. - Yes, so for me, everything about bead work to me is who I am as an autistic work, like everything. When I first was taught how to bead, I've had a lot of special interests, but that like I tried this and I knew, I was like, I'm doing this for the rest of my life. It felt so good in my hands, and I just couldn't stop dreaming. Like I was, oh my God, I wanna make this and I wanna make it. It's just like, it has absolutely been the largest, most important, special interest in my life. And it's really beautiful because it intersects with so many parts of me that are important. And then, you know, now I'm doing my bead work as my job, which is insane. And so I just get to do my special interest all the time. And I've chosen and found ways to have no really intense demands on myself with that because the thing with bead work is it is slow. It is so, so, so slow. And so for me, like it's just, it's beautiful how it feels in my hands. I get to manipulate the thread, I get to feel the beads. I have like tension on the thread, the sensory aspect. I work with smoked moose hide. And so smelling that smoked moose hide when I'm working on it, you know, there's that. There's our matey bead work is very bright. It's floral, it's a very colorful, and it's very intricate. And so the colors of our bead work, my brain just loves it. I'll sit in bed, maybe instead of watching Netflix, sometimes. I'll just stare at an old piece of matey bead work. And I can look at that and study it and enjoy it for like 30 minutes. Just one image there, the tackedownness of it, the repetition, right? I'm it's stitch by stitch by stitch over and over again. And I can sit there. And before I was medicated, probably one of the most difficult things for me was like really intense remination. And when I found bead work, it was like something that I was focused on that like forcibly made by mind quiet. And that was incorporating my body and my mind with something I have to be so hyper focused. I'm working with like, you know, a quarter of a millimeter. That's what I'm looking at, right? So it's so fully involved that like my mind only, you know, it has to be focused on that one thing. I found out that other bead workers don't can't be for like the same duration that I do. Like I can almost go forever beating. I don't get bored of it. It is sometimes I'm like, I wish I didn't have to eat or go to the bathroom. I just want to bead. (laughs) And not have to do these other silly things. The really wonderful thing that bead work has brought me to is community. Going to a beating circle and getting together with friends and being able to bead is a safe, accessible way for me to socialize. And I think art in general is a really effective way for a lot of autistic people to socialize. You know, just like co-making together. And not having that pressure to have to perform, to have to engage in like this social game. So in addition to like doing my own bead work, I teach may-t bead work workshops in schools and with community organizations. And you know, I used to not be, I mean, I've only had my diagnosis for like less than a year. But I was pretty, I shared that really sparingly at the beginning, 'cause you know, it was like very much figuring things out and like trying to understand who might be safe to share that with, who not, what would the benefits be. And so, you know, I've come to a place now where you know, I'm teaching workshops and I'm like, oh, I have an opportunity to talk to kids who are neurodivergent and are queer and are indigenous and have never met another person. Like another adult who is, and said that they are. And I'm like, oh, I could say, I could say I am. And so I have been and like over the last, you know, since January I've done probably like 20 workshops and taught, oh wow, wow, you know, probably like hundreds of people. And I always tell folks that I'm autistic and that I have ADHD and that I'm queer. And I open it for anyone to speak to me about any of those things. And so I've had young people share with me that I've never had an adult tell me they're autistic. And like, oh my God, I didn't think that you would have existed like this. You know, I've had young people tell me about the medications they're on and how they're struggling with that or you know, how they're currently going through a transition and that they're struggling with that. And I've been able to connect young people with different resources and like that's been really, really meaningful for me. And yeah, for me, like I know it's meaningful for them, but it's also like builds my confidence and like brings me such joy to connect with young autistic people. And then also being able to talk to them about like, hey, use your, you have gifts, use your gifts. Find out what they are. I love teaching. I love beating. I'm teaching and I'm beating. But yeah, everything about my art practice is autistic. And it probably annoys people how much I talk about that. But yeah, the color, the repetition, it really calms my nervous system. And it's been really healing for me. And yeah, I just love it. (upbeat music) - So tell us a bit about what strengths and challenges has neurodivergence given you and what are your top tips for other people? - A lot of the strengths and challenges are like the same thing. So I think for one is having a really strong sense of justice and being like a truth teller. Like I often say things and name things that other people aren't willing to. And I have, I would say maybe it's perceived as courage. You said before money going off on someone. Yeah, like I'll do that on the street. If I see something happening, it's like, okay, I've got adrenaline pumping through my body and everything says go intervene and you need to like do something here. It's hard on my system to do that. But it is important to me to do those things. I mean, sometimes it actually can be unsafe. And it's like, why don't we have to be like this and like why don't we have to make a big deal about everything? - The social justice drive is so strong. Like I don't know if other people can understand it, but it's almost like you can't eat or sleep. And it's all you can think about. And you really are like driven to try to take action on it where you can. You can't like stop and rest. It's a compulsion. - Totally and it's so physical. It's bodily. My body will shake when I see something like this, right? And yeah, I think other things I really like about being autistic is like that I'm generous and I like being a helper, like helping people. And I think people know that they can come to me for help. And I like being, I like that. Yeah, I like that people will trust me enough to ask me for help in that that I will show up, with honesty and even if I can't help, I'll probably try to still find a way that you can find that help. I think I also, I wrote in my notes too, that I'm a connector. Like I love being able to be that conduit for people and connect them to different resources or friends or people in community. I like being someone who can help build connections for people. I think when I look at challenges, I think like the challenges I have are rooted in the gifts that I have not being honored. Like employment, I didn't have work for a whole year. I had trouble paying for vacations. I, you know, it was, luckily I had a roof over my head. I have family members. I had my aunt who could help me. But the reason why I decided like I think I need to work for myself and find a way to do that is because people are not going to give me the agency and respect required for me to live well. And so if there's a way for me to decide how I'm able to work, then I need to do that. So I actually grieved quite a lot this spring in realizing like since my diagnosis that you know, sensory stuff has gotten worse for me as I'm getting older, I'm having more meltdowns as I'm getting older. life will be like life will be hard, we live in a sick world. And so I kind of like grieved this idea that I had in my head about, you know, I didn't really understand all these challenges necessarily that I would have. And so yeah, really changing my life, then where I want to pursue my energy, my gifts, that's sort of been how I'm trying to address that challenge, you know, specifically with employment, but I don't know, self-esteem, like friendships I've had, I've been really traumatized by female friendships in particular, thinking I'm best friends with someone having these really meaningful, wonderful experiences. And in a moments notice, being like dead to this person, I've experienced that with three friends in my adulthood. And it takes quite a toll, I think, or it has taken quite a toll about how I view myself and understand myself, you know, like really inherently thinking I'm a really bad person. And I just don't know how to act right, I don't know how to treat people right. And so I just shouldn't go out, I shouldn't socialize, I shouldn't build relationships, I shouldn't talk to other people. And like I've had times like that for my whole life, where I've been like, it's too high risk for me to go to lunch with someone and then have to experience all this rejection, then I can just set a home in my peace. I think for me, the solution, or like a tip, whatever to the friendship aspect, and like having positive social interactions in my life has been reducing my circle. You know, I thought that because people wanted to see me and hang out with me that I had to, you know, but I would sit there and I like I would leave and I'm like, oh my god, I'm so drained, I didn't enjoy that. They seem to have a good time. So like I guess I should be doing that. And then, you know, realizing I had people in my life who would really like exploit my generosity and exploit my friendship. And yeah, so I've just, I've really minimized my circle. And and really intentionally pursued relationships with other neurodivergent people and other queer people and other indigenous people. Because it is like, I think powerful in life changing to be surrounded by, or at least having one person in your life who can understand your experience and can validate your experience. And to like just expressing like any time alone, or you know, I want friends who are okay with me canceling on them if I need to. And if you're not okay with that, then that's okay. I don't need to like invest time in you because I have to, like I just have to, right? Those are my challenges, but also like tips for those challenges has been like really investing in those particularly like those those neurodivergent friendships. So Claire, just to finish up today, we'd love to hear if you've got a favorite moment or story that just sort of exemplifies how your brain works or is a good example of you. Yeah, okay, so one pretty easily came to mind here for me. It makes me laugh a little bit, but okay, we've talked about, you know, that social justice. And so I'm an organizer. I do, you know, I'm part of some grassroots collective in Winnipeg. I mean, I just have to like, I have to be doing things about things. Sometimes I'll just take on, you know, hear about something. I'll just like take on like a smaller thing with like a friend or a couple of friends or something like that. In Canada, there's been like a really big like a lot of people claiming indigenous identity when they're just non-indigenous. And so, you know, like the word pretendian is a word we use here to describe those people. Yeah, we've had like major big people be revealed to not be indigenous, who have like taken tons of, you know, grants and money intended for indigenous people. It's really really sick. Anyway, my friend and I, my friend Nashwa is Punjabi and Moroccan and also worked in politics, but is also like an incredible researcher and journalist. And I mean, I love research worked in politics. We have connections. So, I was chatting with Nashwa and she said, "Clarat, like there's these, you know, there's these Punjabi sisters that, you know, people in our community are talking about these sisters saying that they're claiming to be a nook when they're not." And like, do you know anything about this? And so, we just began talking and then a week later, Nashwa and I have forgotten all of our responsibilities for the entire week and have come up with a 75 page research document with footnotes. So, we found out all of these things about these two women. We found that their family had a long history of defrauding people. So, we just deep-dough for a week came up with all of this stuff. For us, it was like, this is wrong. And these people are super privileged people. One of them was a lawyer. One of them was an engineer. They're young, you know, around my age. And they are actively doing really awful stuff and they're professionals. One is a lawyer and if you're an engineer, like you make really, you have a really serious code of ethics when you're in those positions. And if you're defrauding people and lying and stealing from Indigenous people, and two, they use disabled people to do this. And so, Nashwa and I were just like, oh, no, no, no, no. So, yeah, we came up with about a 75 page document. Mostly Nashwa, my assistants, she has like Punjabi community. I have, you know, a lot of folks in the Indigenous community that I'm connected with. And so, we were able to pass this story on to a journalist at APTN. And it became like a massive national news story. And there's now an RCMP investigation into their fraud. And so, like, I'm not saying that to like, like, to my own horn or like, I'm not sharing the story for that reason. I'm only saying this right now. I didn't really share with anyone actually at all. Like, Nashwa and I didn't share with anyone that we did this. And even the journalist was like, why did you do this? We were like, we're like, I don't know, it's the right thing to do. Like, what do you mean? That's such a great story because I think it exemplifies so many different threads of, you know, how your brain works and your neurotype. It's like the strong sense of justice. It's like the hyper fixation, the research ability, the sense of like, why would I do this for accolades or power or whatever I'm doing it because it's the right thing to do. I have never heard a better story that encapsulates all of these different things. I'm just leasing it over the fact that the journalist was like, why did you do this? Like, I don't know if I'm mere a difficult person. No. I didn't invest in that much in time. I don't know. No. So Claire, it's been such a pleasure to have you on the podcast today. We're so thankful to have you come on and share all of this knowledge and wisdom and information that's come from your Indigenous community and particularly your native community. I think the insights that you've shared, as we've said over the episode today, are going to be invaluable, not just for Indigenous folk, but for anyone that's looking to decolonise their thinking as well and their sense of identity and their approach to different things. So yeah, I can't thank you enough for your time today. Thanks for having me. It was very fun. Yeah, thank you so much. I just feel like hearing someone speak that is connected to their identities. It's just so powerful. So thank you for sharing. If you enjoyed this episode and want to support us further, you can do so by subscribing to our Patreon to become part of our Patreon community. You can buy us a coffee for five dollars per month or a wine for $10 per month. All of our Patreon subscribers receive access to a backlog of exclusive content and to a monthly live Zoom Hangout with us and our Patreon community. Our Zoom Hangouts are a place to ask questions, chat about your experiences and connect with other neurodivergent women. From this season onward, all Patreon will also receive basic episode transcripts, released each week after our episode airs. Patreon's shouting us to a monthly wine get all that plus one exclusive content post per month. We really appreciate your support as we aim to make quality mental health information accessible to everyone. Thanks for listening to this episode of the neurodivergent woman podcast. If you have a question or would like to contact us, you can do so through our Facebook and Instagram at the handle the neurodivergent woman podcast. Or our website, ndwomenpod.com. You can also email us directly at [email protected]. Bye for now.