On Wednesday 26 March I had the pleasure of being invited to an event hosted at 10 Downing Street. It was a very surreal experience and one I feel very honored to have been a part of. The topic of conversation was neurodiversity and we got to listen to the experiences of a fantastic panel made up of:
My organisation has an amazing neurodiversity network that has been doing some truly inspiring work. Initiatives such as a ‘manual of me’, detailing the ways a person works best, their likes and dislikes and a small bit of personal information. Another is allowing interviewees to request questions in advance, making the interview process less intimidating for everyone, not just those who are neurodiverse.
It was a delightfully passionate panel, full of enlightening and inspiring stories of how each person had experienced and worked to overcome their challenges associated with neurodiversity. They were all very clear about how difficult it was, how it took a lot of self reflection and retrospection to learn healthy coping mechanisms. We learnt about the various reasonable adjustments each person had, and how they had developed over time.
Having someone as senior as a Secretary of State being very open about being dyslexic been a very refreshing change of pace. It’s only one facet of Minister Kyle’s person but it makes our community feel very seen. It was also incredibly reassuring to see Helen being so candid about her experiences as both an autistic person and deputy director. She is a new source of inspiration and I hope to learn a lot from her, through her writings.
On a separate note, no visit to Number 10 would be seeing the most famous resident, Larry the Cat! As a self described cat lady, I was very honoured to see him taking a quick cat nap and learn a little about him. It was an absolute delight to hear about his antics and I will continue to keep an eye out for him on the news!