Life is like a Rubik's Cube. The answer only serves to prompt the questions..

There are certain moments in life where something seminal occurs. A defining experience becomes a turning point - a marker in time from which everything can be measured in terms of before and after.

The discovery, somewhat later in life, that my cranial storage unit is occupied by what modern parlance dubs a “neurodivergent” brain, was one of those such moments.

Actually that’s not strictly true, because the arrival at this clinical determination was the product of an almost two year diagnostic process, uncovering knowledge bit by bit. A process which, itself, arose through various hunches and incidentally observed data points, each of which wove themselves gradually into a tapestry of ever greater clarity and were initially kindled at various points in my life (some as far back as early childhood), often by the most random, unfathomable, innocuous and seemingly unrelated occurrences.

It was like watching an Agatha Christie whodunit in reverse, starting at the end of the movie (i.e. the present) and working back through the clues to the opening credits!

While, for me, it remains crucial to avoid being defined by any one particular trait (regardless of how intrusive it may be), the arrival at this realisation proved to be a revelatory moment of validation and insight. The slew of challenges I’d experienced with distraction, impulsivity, restlessness, forgetfulness, boredom, self doubt, disorganisation, loss, shame, emotional dysregulation and numerous other manifestations finally had some context and started to make sense.

While all of these phenomena occur in the spectrum of human experience, the best way I can describe it is that they exist on a continuum and, for some parts of the species, they exert levels of influence which can (and do) have a tangible impact on peoples’ complex, modern lives. From relationships, to education and the world of work, to mental health, finances and general wellbeing, all of these aspects can be touched - a challenge compounded by the invisible nature of these cognitive anomalies and people’s innate tendency to judge superficially, writing off as inadequate, wrong or defective in some way.

Finally understanding all of this meant that, for the first time, I had some words, a voice, some language with which to describe (and be understood) and thus formulate the beginnings of a toolkit. Once I finally understood the problem I could, at last, set about work on the solution/s. That is a key part of my mission going forward.