Wagtail Therapy

A great summary of neurodiversity affirming parenting from

If you are finding yourself stuck in that parenting algorithm on your social media and none of the advice is working, remember that "parenting experts" are just people who have found a parenting technique that works for one subset of people.

Different parenting experts have different desired outcomes as well. Some are purely trying to achieve a compliant child and some are trying to achieve a safe and supportive relationship so think about whether your desired outcomes align before following anyone's advice.

Different brains = different parenting.

Love this one from . Just focus on loving your kids and the rest will sort itself out, because your child is feeling loved and safe. Trying to meet all these points above will cause resentment and fatigue, and thats when loving and liking becomes harder. 💔

When arriving at therapy goals, these things mentioned in the image are often our starting point. With some reframing of parent responsibilities and some acceptance that all emotions are okay, we arrive at something that is much more healthy and realistic for already burnt out parents.

My secret additional goal (is that okay? 😂) in the back of my mind is always to create a relationship where families love and like each other. Going to put my favourite video in our stories of a poem for parents who love and like their kids. ❤️

Ageism is something that teenagers experience every day. I think people typically think of ageism only affecting older people. A report released by the Australian Human Rights Commission actually suggests that young adults are the most likely to experience ageism.

Think about the way people talk about teenagers, the words used to typically describe them and the stereotypes placed on them. This is ageism and it is not okay. If they are inside they are described as lazy, grumpy, obsessed with their phone. If they are outside they are described as hooligans, up to mischief and glared at by people.

If we don't start to explore and break down our own ageism, then teenagers will continue to feel misunderstood, not heard and judged during what is one of the most difficult times in their lives.

We used to be (and sometimes still are) told that it's okay that your kids don't like you because it's your job to be their parent and not their best friend. I strongly disagree with this sentiment.

As a parent, you get the honour of being your kids first best friend. Your relationship with your child is the relationship that they will model all future relationships off of. How you treat your child is how they will expect to be treated by others. How you make your child feel about themselves is how they allow others to make them feel. It's so important that you set up your child to build relationships with people who treat them with kindness, respect and make them feel loved and appreciated.

Treat your child the way you want them to be treated by their best friends. This means, in the future, that if someone is mean to them it will feel so unusual and foreign that they know they need to walk away. Connection over correction always.

Instead of our usual supervision this fortnight we went to see Inside Out 2 which turned out to be a group of psychologists all sitting in a dark room, watching a kids movie crying, and processing trauma. 🤣

This movie gives me hope about the way we talk to our kids about emotions though. Some of my favourite take-aways from the movie.
* Anxiety can be a part of us, as long as we don't let them completely run the show.
* Anxiety is very smart and helps us get a lot done in small doses.
* Your emotions become more and more complex in your teen years.
* It's okay for your sense of self to change over time and you need to feel all your emotions safely to truly gain your sense of self.
* The main take away - be kind and patient with our pre-teens and teens. They are going through such a tough time.

I may have gone slightly overboard in my book spending this week but no regrets. 📚♾️

These are all in our waiting area if you want to have a read while you wait. I'm also going to get some bookmarks so you can save your spot between visits.

From that first moment we hold our little baby in our arms we receive a lot of advice about sleep. “Make sure you sleep when they sleep” and “make sure you look after yourself and get enough sleep”. This advice tends to quickly get put on the back burner for the never ending parent duties like bottles, washing, cooking, more bottles, more washing, more cooking and then this routine just slightly modifies until your child is an adult (maybe) and you remember “oh yeah I was supposed to sleep”.

This pattern of putting the need for sleep last on your priority list can make other parts of your life more difficult as the sleep deprivation truely kicks in. Everything feels different without sleep. Small mistakes seem devastating, small noises seem unmanageable and the constant requests seem irritating beyond belief.

For this reason, when working with families I will always ask how you are sleeping. It is hard for me to truly suggest strategies such as co-regulation and lowering demands when I know that the family is not sleeping well. Sometimes this needs to be considered before moving on to other unsolved problems.

Please use this as a reminder to prioritise your sleep and also a reminder that you deserve sleep, even if there is a pile of washing sitting on your bed.

June is Pride Month which is all about celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community. At Wagtail, we celebrate all people all year around but I really wanted to take this opportunity to recommend one of my favourite children's books. Julian Is a Mermaid is a story about Julian becoming his beautiful mermaid self, being embraced by his family and finding his people.

There is a moment in this book that makes me cry every single time. Julian gets all dressed up in his mermaid ensemble while his Nanna is in the bath and when his Nanna comes out of the bath she looks a little annoyed and leaves the room. My heart drops every single time, worried that Julian will be made to feel bad for embracing his inner mermaid. Then his Nanna returns with a long pearl necklace perfect to truly complete his mermaid evolution. Cue tears. 🥹😭

This book is an amazing addition to any child's library with its beautiful illustrations and its message of following your heart. It is hard to find books (or anything for that matter) that don't follow gender stereotypes for kids which is another reason why books like this are so important. Push against the stereotype that boys wear clothes that say "be tough" and read books about rocket ships while girls wear clothes that say "smile" (😡) and read books about mermaids. It's a harder push than you would expect.

We have a few spaces left for some interviews next week. Please contact me if you have any questions at all.

We are looking for a Registered or Provisional Psychologist to start with us towards the end of July. Please email me if you think we might be the right fit. Wagtail Therapy provides psychology and positive behaviour support using a neurodiversity affirming approach. This means that we offer individualised therapy that delights in the quirks and interests of each person.

Some prerequisites are being able to feign interest when I show you photos of my kids constantly, always email me or message me unless it absolutely has to be a phonecall, send funny memes in our group chat occasionally and believe that neurodivergent people (or people in general) should never have to change themselves to fit someone else's ideals. ♾️🌈

Email me at [email protected] or phone me on 0493289734 if absolutely necessary. 😂

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PMDD OR Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder is the bigger badder version of PMS (as if it wasn't bad enough already). 

PMDD affects about 5% of women who are of reproductive age. There hasn't been enough research on neurodivergent women for me to reliably say the statistics for this population but some studies have suggested a much much larger percentage of autistic and ADHD women experience PMDD. This aligns with my experience working with neurodivergent girls, women and families who find that luteal phase of their cycles debilitating. 

Undiagnosed PMDD can be dangerous because of the high risk of su***de during this time and the impact it has on relationships. If you think you or someone in your family has PMDD follow the link to IAPMD (International Association of Premenstrual Disorders) to look at the screeners and get some advice on how to manage this difficult time. Just being aware of what is going on for you or your person is going to help so much by bringing increased understanding and patience. PMS sucks, periods suck and PMDD is beyond that. 

Side note - how are there no menstruation emojis??!!! 🙄

The pressure placed on families to have kids sleep in their own beds is one of those things that makes less sense the more you think about it.

- How come as adults we sleep with a partner but as kids we are supposed to sleep on our own?
- How come we spend our entire childhood and adolescence learning to self soothe at night and then as an adult we unlearn all that to sleep with a partner?
- How come as a kid we are shamed for wanting to cosleep and then as an adult we are shamed if we want to sleep on our own?
- Why does a child need to learn to self soothe when they have parents there to soothe them?
- Why do we insist on self soothing when kids are not yet able to do this developmentally?

Do not let anyone make you feel that there is anything wrong with you or child seeking connection at any time, including at night time. There is nothing more human than a child seeking comfort from their parents.

In saying that, there are also times where you might want to sleep on your own, for your sanity or for reasons related to risk and this is also okay. You might want to have a night where you can actually sleep longer than 3 hours at a time, or a night without a knee in your back or you might just want some time to yourself after being surrounded by people all day. This is also fine.

Make your decisions around cosleeping based on your needs and the needs of your child, not on what society has decided is “appropriate”. If cosleeping feels right to you, then don’t let anyone convince you that it is wrong.

If your child is under 12 months look at Red Nose Australia for safe sleeping advice.

Sometimes I forget that I'm in a bubble of neurodiversity affirming and trauma informed practices. My bubble bursts every time I hear of or see time-out being used though. I completely understand why people use time-out because it's been recommended by so many professionals, popularised by the Super Nanny which we all watched growing up and it is evidence based.

I think the term "evidence based" can be a dangerous one because the most evidence based approach for "behaviour" is ABA or Applied Behaviour Analysis which we now know is associated with negative long term outcomes for those who are the "subjects". Just because something has evidence to support that it works doesn't mean that it should be used. Time-out is based on operant conditioning which is basically where B.F. Skinner did some experiments on rats and pigeons to show we can modify behaviour through rewards and punishments but just because we know we can doesn't mean we should! Our children are not subjects to be molded into our ideal form. They are little humans with a whole heap of emotions and thoughts that they need support and reassurance for. They are also not pigeons or rats so a lot more conditioning is required to achieve the "desired" outcome, hence trauma.

I'm starting to see time-out be rebranded into different things by people but remember if you are removing something that a person likes or imposing something on them to modify their behaviour then it is the same thing. Telling a dysregulated child to go to their sensory space is just time-out with a wig and glasses on. Don't be fooled.

Although your child can technically be molded to fit society's "ideal child", they shouldn't be. Molding the "perfect" child now is likely to result in trauma and an insecure attachment which then leads to an adult that really struggles with their self worth, their emotions and their relationships. Your child is perfect with all their big emotions and reactions. That's how children are supposed to act and that's how they learn to become emotionally mature and emotionally safe adults. Use these challenging moments to practice your own regulation because that's the best thing you can ever do for them

I read a lot of books, mostly fiction, so it doesn't often align with my work, but every now and then I find a gem that brings two of my passions together. I was in two minds about recommending this book because, from what I can gather, the author is not neurodivergent herself and is writing from the perspective of a boy who seems to be neurodivergent.

The thing I love about this book is that it invites you into the mind of a boy who sees the world in a very different and beautiful way. This helps him to be the amazing person he is but it also presents struggles for him as he tries to fit into a neurotypical world.

Above all, this book is a love story. A story of the love between a Mum and her son who have unconditional positive regard for each other no matter how differently they each see the world. This love then transfers into people surrounding this young boy as every one grows to adore him. ,🥰❤️

It's National Reconciliation Week and I want to support reconciliation attempts, bring awareness to why being sorry is important and acknowledge all the amazing work First Nations left organisations are doing. Some of the things I did in an attempt to do this is:

- Found an Aboriginal owned and led publishing company to buy some children's books from so we have some representation in our books - https://magabala.com.au/
- Watched The Apology (https://youtu.be/_Dild-xAzJ0?si=MUS6WTp_rIkhHAB4) and listened to Took the Children Away (https://youtu.be/IL_DBNkkcSE?si=U1StrPNuXhC80oF1) to remind myself of why this week is so important.
- Donated to Change the Record which are a First Nations led organisation that campaigns to end family violence against and incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. https://www.changetherecord.org.au/

Please comment if you have other ideas of how to support reconciliation or know of any First Nations led businesses people can donate to, if they are able.

After completing the neurodiversity affirming practice training on Monday with , I have been processing all the information and have really tried to sum up what being neurodiversity affirming means for us at Wagtail. I have updated a lot of our forms to reflect our approach more consistently and am also aiming to communicate this approach more clearly going forward for the people we support. This is one part of what I have been working on which hopefully sums up some of the differences you will notice when working with a neurodiversity affirming therapist.

We sponged so much knowledge about neurodiversity affirming practice yesterday from Sandhya and Romi . As an introvert, smaller training days are always tiring for me but this one was worth it for sure. My brain in the brain forest is now the one that only has a few leaves left but I'll come back leafier than ever after some time to process everything we learned. 🍃🌳🌳 Also a little Willie Wagtail joined Jade for her coffee before the training just to let us know we were in the right place.

Words are important. Adults should never ask kids to keep a secret.

Keep this in mind when talking about our amazing mother's day surprises for tomorrow. Surprises are fun and time limited. 🥳

Secrets can hurt people and there is no time frame usually. Teach our kids that adults should not be asking kids to keep a secret. Families don't keep secrets from each other and that keeps us safe.

My brain likes to spend at least some time each day over-thinking things people have said and most recently my over-thinking has been focused on the Ross Greene training and the questions people asked him. The questions being asked have made me think that there is a step missing in the Collaborative and Proactive Solutions (CPS) approach or a step that needs to occur before attempting this approach.

For context, the CPS approach talks about using a Plan B approach when a child is struggling instead of Plan A. Plan A is when the adult decides on a solution and then tells a child what to do e.g. "you have to", "you must listen to me" and this is the approach that a lot of people parenting now were raised with. Plan B is a collaborative problem solving process where you understand your child's concerns, they hear your concerns and you agree on a mutually beneficial solution.

Back to my over thinking - I wonder if the gap between plan A and plan B is just too big for some people to jump over on their own and this is where a lot of issues with implementation of the approach arise. This generation of parents are the ones that have to jump over that massive gap because they are changing styles of parenting from the generation before and it's such a massive responsibility and such hard work that involves so much self reflection and learning.

A lot of the questions being asked during the training day almost felt like they were being asked by kids trying to justify the parenting styles that were used when they were growing up and the values that have been internalised as a result of this. There is so much to unpack there before someone can look at truly integrating the change for their own kids.

Maybe we need to nurture and problem solve with our internalised child before moving on to doing this successfully with our children. For those parents attempting the Plan B conversations this week be brave, be strong and know you are doing the absolute best that you can. ❤️

Feeling very lucky to be refreshing myself on Collaborative and Proactive Solutions approach with Dr Ross Greene in person. The location is a bit better than my office desk too!

This day has given me some great ideas of changes to make to our positive behaviour support process and some amazing reminders of why we are doing our PBS the way that we are.

Sorry to my team who is always putting up with my ideas and changes to our plans. 😂 And thanks The Kidd Clinic for creating a comfortable and affirming space to learn in. Love the fidgets and spaces to stretch out. ❤️

Wagtail has recently developed a very scientific way to determine family dynamics as part of our positive behaviour support process. It's called the Bluey assessment tool and I feel very disappointed if I don't get at least one Muffin per family. 😂

Learning about your family is an important part of developing tools and strategies that will actually work in your home and we think this is a really fun way to do that.

Also, it helps us identify the people that don't watch Bluey and will require much more intensive intervention to support with this!

Feeding on demand isn't just for babies.

We see a lot of concerns around eating habits for our ADHDers or AuDHDers and this is at least partially due to the effects of stimulant medication on appetite and dopamine seeking. If your child is taking medication for ADHD it is most likely that they will not be hungry for long periods of the day and then they will be very hungry and seek foods that give a dopamine hit which are snacky, high sugar, high salt foods.

Your child is not likely to fit the traditional breakfast, lunch, dinner eating style and this is okay. Who decided those are the times we eat anyway? Sometimes it is about dropping your own expectations of what meal times should look like rather than trying to push your child's appetite into that expectation. If you push a child to sit at a dinner table or eat a non preferred food when they are already dysregulated because they are hungry and their medication is wearing off then we are likely to end up with an even more dysregulated little human. Think of your child's appetite as a hibernating bear that sleeps all day and then comes out in the afternoon. Just let the bear forage. 🐻🍓🥐🍪🍿🥪🍌

created this amazing visual to show how you can get some food into your child while taking into account their appetite at that time day. The times they will consume the most calories is early morning and later at night so take advantage of these times and during low appetite times offer favourite foods so they might eat something. Also consider their foraging behaviours and have food lying around and easily accessible that you would like them to eat. I find a compartment lunch box just left open on the couch or table with an iPad to be a really great option for ADHD and PDA because it is low demand and you can put a combination of their safe foods and a variety of other foods they might want to try.

I recently saw a post from talking about what acceptance is and it made me realise that this is the same concept we use when talking about co-regulation during meltdowns or dysregulation.

To co-regulate you need to first truly attune to your kids emotions. This means that you first need to accept that the emotions are there and accept the emotions are valid without trying to change them.

This means just sitting with the big emotions that accompany a meltdown in a calm way rather than trying to control them, get rid of them or change them.

This is harder than it seems because our desire to solve all our kids problems and protect them from any hurt or upset is so strong. Remember kids can't learn to regulate emotions that we don't allow them to feel fully.

I feel this so deeply. If a child is hurting our initial instinct is usually to comfort and we need to follow that instinct as parents instead of worrying about the expected behaviours and trying to control their emotions. Connection over correction.

Sometimes a child's hurt looks like crying and being quiet and this makes comfort and connection easy. Other times a child's hurt looks like yelling and throwing things and this makes comfort or connection less instinctual and more difficult. But remember that whether they are quiet or screaming, the feelings are the same and their needs are the same.

When your child is expressing their emotions through physical means comfort and connection might look different. Instead of a hug it might be just sitting near them and letting them feed off your calm. Instead of helping them breathe it might be just saying comforting words occasionally. Instead of drying their tears it might be calmly picking up the broken pieces of the bowl they just threw so they know it's going to be okay.

I promise if you approach a child with comfort and connection you will get through the storm soon and your relationship will be stronger at the end of it.

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I had a little friend helping me to write my behaviour support plan yesterday afternoon. He started off with gentle encouragement but after an hour or so started to get a little pushy. He obviously isn't on board with using low demand styles of support.

PBS (Positive Behaviour Support) often gets mistaken for a behaviour modification program which aims to create children that act a "desired way". There is definitely PBS out there with this aim but that's not what the goal of good PBS should be. PBS is about supporting the environment around a child to help them be themselves and have their needs met in the way that they need.

If we manage to achieve all those actual goals of PBS then the natural result of that is a child that feels secure and calm and is not feeling the need to use big behaviours to communicate. The result is also a family that no longer feels the pressure to have their child act in a certain way or to fit the mould of what they might have initially envisioned for them.

My sincere apologies that I could not be more helpful during these difficult times. You can do this!!

I think the overwhelming majority of places providing NDIS supports are amazing and provide a really valuable service. However, I do also think it's hard for people to be able to know which ones are amazing and which are that minority of providers who are providing a service that will potentially do more harm than good. Typically providers have nice flashy websites with only positive examples of their work regardless of how evidence based their work is or whether their work actually results in long term outcomes. I have created the below resource to help people looking for NDIS supports to identify red flags when searching for a provider. The screenshots provided as examples are from an Australian based bootcamp program who claims to be able to provide NDIS supports for teens with low self esteem and is a great example of a place that has all the red flags!

I've seen lots of posts as part of Neurodiversity Celebration Week that are using the wrong terminology. No judgement because the terminology can be a bit confusing. Here is a guide to the language of neurodiversity that also celebrates our beautiful neurodiverse team at Wagtail Therapy. 🌈♾️

We are looking for an admin assistant to join our team! Please pm me or email me if you are interested.