Celebrating Neurodiversity Week 2025!

This week is Neurodiversity Celebration Week 2025, a global initiative that challenges stereotypes and misconceptions about neurological differences. We want to help the world understand, value, and celebrate the talents of neurodivergent young people. That’s why we interviewed Hannah, Satellite’s Lead Facilitator, who identifies as neurodivergent. In this interview, she answers key questions to help you see neurodiversity through her lens.

Can you introduce yourself and share what you do in your role?

I’m Hannah. I use she/her pronouns, and I am a Lived Experience Lead Facilitator at Satellite. It’s a very long title, but I basically run a lot of our programs, our camps, our day workshops, and get to meet all the young people, which is really fun and exciting. I have my own lived experience of being a young person who has a family member with mental health challenges, and so being able to connect in that way is really great.

How do you identify as neurodivergent, and when did you first realise it?

I found out I was neurodivergent very recently. I grew up in a very neurodivergent household. Both my siblings were diagnosed quite young with ASD (Autism) and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), and so our house was always very accommodating of autistic traits and other neurodivergent things. Growing up, I think I was seen as the ‘normal child’, even though my mom would say “you do this weird stuff all the time”.
It wasn’t till quite recently, probably about three years ago, where I realised that all my friends that I’d made were also neurodivergent. And they’d started to assume that I was neurodivergent as well and just sort of say, “oh, Hannah’s autistic”, and I was like, “oh, I’m actually not autistic.” And then, the more I thought about it, and the more I started to, I guess, observe myself, I realised I had a lot of traits. I asked my psychologist and she was like, “oh, yeah, absolutely.”
So I got tested for Autism and ADHD and found out I have both, just like many other people in my family. It’s been a weird thing to come to terms with. I sometimes feel like it’s not a real diagnosis because I got it so late, I guess because most people are diagnosed when they’re really young. But it’s changed a lot of the way I look at things and how or why I do certain things.

What unique skills or talents do you bring to your work that you think are linked to your neurodivergence?

People always say I’m very organised at work, which I think is hilarious, because I’m the most disorganised person in my home life. But I find work to be very routine and has order to it in its own chaotic way.  I enjoy being able to put things in spreadsheets, find links to things, and have control over the way things run and what kind of things we do. Organising programs is a big part of my job so how the camp is going to run, what activities we do, how long they’re for, those sorts of things. And I think a lot of people get very overwhelmed by that, but I find it very satisfying to sort those things.
Another thing is that I’ve completely memorised our storage system! So when someone walks by and they’re like, “I wonder where this is”, I can tell them exactly where it is without needing to look into our spreadsheet.  I think a lot of the structure and being able to sort things in my brain is a big part of it.

How has being neurodivergent shaped the way you approach challenges and problem-solving?

I think the way I would have answered this question three years ago, would have been very different, I mean, I would have said I’m not neurodivergent for one. I would have probably said that I just deal with it and have to take a break from it and then come back to it and be like, okay, what are all the different parts of the problem? Which ones can I control? Which ones can I change? How do I sort them into order of how I deal with them? And then, yeah, I guess deal with it that way.
I’m learning now that a lot of that took so much energy that came from trying to shut out my panic. I always feel a need to be in control of things and losing that can lead to me shutting down.  That meltdown was something I tried to shut out for a very long time. And whilst it was very helpful for other people, it wasn’t very helpful for me. I would get home after that big thing had happened and I would just completely crash.
Whereas now, I allow myself to have that moment of panic and processing whether it’s a problem or something that’s changed, and then I go into that process of working out the things I can control and not control.

What’s a common misconception about neurodivergence that you’d like to challenge?

I was talking to you about this earlier. So, one thing that my psychologist loves to say, but is now my favourite phrase ever is: “Neurodiverse people are diverse in diverse ways”. I think up until quite recently, the understanding of what it means to be neurodivergent was very narrow. It was mainly just autistic people, but there’s dyslexia, Tourette Syndrome and even some mental health conditions are a part of being neurodivergent. As we’re broadening it, we’re realising that there’s no one way to look at people who are neurodivergent; even within the autistic spectrum. People are seeing that it presents in different ways.
All the studies of autistic people were done mostly on males in the past. But the way autism presents in male born people is very different to how it presents in some female born people. And so often females go undiagnosed because medical professionals say ”Oh, you don’t fit into the criteria”. We’re now seeing with more research and more exploration of what it means that often females have a more internal experience of being neurodivergent, so not everyone else can see it.

It’s also more socially acceptable for men to be autistic than it is for women, because often the things that come with autistic traits are things that people hate women doing. So things like being ‘antisocial’ because women are ‘supposed to be’ social, or being particular about things, being blunt, speaking up, and all those sorts of things. You think about the classic Sheldon from the Big Bang Theory. If he was a woman, people would probably hate him, but he’s a very loved character.
I think I got a diagnosis quite late because I am what people refer to as ‘high functioning’ and that’s in quotes because I don’t like the phrase. It comes from the idea that Autism is a spectrum of a line, and that you’re either ‘really autistic’ or ‘slightly autistic’. Now it’s more of a circle, and there’s different parts of the circle where people have different strengths.

Actually when they were first studying Autism and other people who are neurodivergent, the way they defined someone as neurodivergent was something called ‘Spiky Profile’, which is, when they tested people’s executive functioning, they would see neurodivergent people had really high points for some parts of their functioning and really low points for others. So, when you do an IQ test, you get the average score at the end. Often the average score didn’t show that discrepancy of someone who has really strong points in, say, memory, but really low social.

What defined someone as neurodivergent was someone who had really large disparities between different parts of their functioning. And the most common one is really high memory and really low social skills. But someone can have really high social skills and really low memory and still be neurodivergent. So yeah, I like looking at the ‘Spiky Profile’. I think that’s a really cool way to look at being neurodivergent.
Something that has come up a lot recently is the thing that people say where “everybody’s autistic these days” or ADHD, and it was a big reason why I didn’t want to get my diagnosis because I believed that I was one of those people that was just adding to the number.
But the thing is the concept of Autism, ADHD and many other things, those haven’t even existed for 100 years. I think the first man to ever be diagnosed autistic died only a few years ago. It’s just wild how little we know about it. And the more we learn about it, obviously, the more people are going to be able to say, “oh, that kind of relates to me”. I guess I am trying not to see it as “this is a disorder that I have to deal with”. It’s more “okay now I understand why my brain does these things, and I can do them now but with more understanding of where that behaviour is coming from”.

How can workplaces better support and include neurodivergent employees?

It’s such a tough thing to give broad advice on. One of the things is just being open to the fact that different people work in different ways, and that’s not just neurodivergent people. We saw it when COVID happened and people started working from home, we realised that actually is helpful for a lot of people. It’s the saying, “Accessibility for one is accessibility for all”. And so, the idea that people work better in different circumstances is a really good thing to be able to be open to.
When you do have a new employee, not assuming that a 9 to 5 in the office every day is going to be the only way to work. It could be that a person works five days, but they only work maybe like 10 till 4. Or it could be that they do hybrid which is what a lot of people do now. It could be that they are in the office but in a separate room. There are so many different ways to accommodate different needs, but they don’t happen unless the communication is there.

There’s a big expectation that neurodivergent people have to start that conversation. For me, I’ve been able to start that conversation because I tend to just say what I think, but a lot of people struggle with that. So they’re sitting there in silence, thinking, what can I do? Often people don’t know what they need straight away. So if someone asks “what do you need?”, it’s not always a helpful question.  Having people within the organisation who actually have an understanding of the different accommodations that are available and then being able to offer them to the people that they work with as an option is a great way to support, because like I said it’s not just neurodivergent people who benefit from it, it may benefit everyone.

Have you had any moments where you felt truly valued for your neurodivergence at work?

I feel like my role is pretty unique because I work with young people directly. I get very unique encounters. I’ve always felt that being neurodivergent is a really important thing for me when I am working with young people, because we get so many young people who present in different ways, and often we do get young people who are neurodivergent. I usually feel a connection with them and I’m able to understand where people sit in their comfort levels and be able to understand that even if their needs might be different to mine.
Another way is, I have sensory issues with sunscreen and we have to wear sunscreen on camps, so I always bring my own sunscreen. When kids with sensory issues come on camp they often say “I don’t want to wear sunscreen”, and other leaders are trying to get this kid to wear the sunscreen and they won’t wear it. So I share “I’ve got special sunscreen because I also don’t like the feeling”. And then they give it a go and then that kid’s wearing sunscreen now, which is pretty cool. Also at work, people like that I’m very organised and able to remember things and be on top of all of my work. So, I think that’s also something that comes with being neurodivergent.

What advice would you give to young neurodivergent people navigating school, work, or life?

I would say that our world is very rigid in the way we’re expected to go through it. The idea that, you go to high school, you do year 11 and 12, you do VCE, you go to university, you get a full-time job, you live the rest of your life, and then you retire. That doesn’t work for most people in the world but we’re told to follow it or else it leads to not getting your goals completed, or not getting a job you want.
That can be really scary for someone who already struggles to live in a world that’s not made for them. Especially at school when you know you’re getting into the tougher parts of school where you’re expected to really control your own learning. It can be really overwhelming to feel like if you fail or if you’re not good enough, there’s no other option.
But I learnt because I didn’t have the option of finishing high school that other things exist, and even though schools or teachers don’t talk about them, it is possible to still get a job that you enjoy without having to go through the traditional way. Often TAFE is really helpful for a lot of neurodivergent people, it’s a bit of a different learning setting and a bit more flexible. But also, TAFE isn’t for a lot of people.
School and study is a really hard thing because if you have different learning needs, people don’t talk about that or recognise it, and so you have to really speak up to  have accommodations, which is scary. So you might just not even want to try. But there are so many other ways to get jobs and try new things outside of studying. Oops that was a lot of words.
I guess what I’m trying to say is, the traditional path isn’t the only option. And you become more comfortable with yourself as you learn and you grow. But it’s not something that has to change.
I think I always tried to hide my weirdness for a long time, because sometimes other kids at school were mean. And so as I became an adult, lived on my own for a bit, and got out of that traditional learning setting, I realised that it’s okay for me to like weird things, to wear green every day, be weirdly obsessed with cats and birds, and know that doesn’t make me like less of a person.

How do you celebrate your neurodivergence and what makes you proud of it?

I’m still grappling with the identity that comes with it and where I sit in my own identity. But I think one of the ways I celebrate it is by reintroducing the things that I enjoy into my life and not letting other people tell me that’s wrong. I love K-pop and people thought that was weird, well it’s normal now, but it was weird when I was in high school. Letting myself do that and not feel guilty about it is sort of my own celebration.
The other way, more externally, is I do talk about it. I do tell people I’m autistic, I do wear my earplugs at work, I do hide a dark a room sometimes, I do use fidgets and I do get overwhelmed without trying to mask it. I’m trying not to hide those things anymore.
I hope that being open to talk about it like this means I can open up that conversation for other people. Even if they’re not ready to have that conversation, I can be there as someone that exists in a space that they might be exploring a little bit more themselves.