I've got Kristy on here, invited her and she very kindly agreed to come and be part of this Instagram Live with me which we are going to turn into a podcast. And yeah, I'll just invite her because I came upon her. When my little one was really struggling. We were being told there was something wrong with her. She'd been diagnosed as autistic but we were being told that there was you know that she was not trying hard enough not being good at all this stuff and it felt very damaging and it didn't feel right. And I found out a little bit about PDA and then I started following Kristy I joined one of her courses which absolutely changed my life in tune with PDA. It was called. And then since then I discovered that my child was in autistic burnout. And that just Christie's teaching has helped so many people, but it really, really helped me. And I know that so many of our gang have either potentially be diagnosed or undiagnosed neurodivergent or have some trauma, or just by fact, being a woman, human. Our female assigned at birth human have had to suppress ourselves. Yeah.
Kristy Forbes 5:48
I'm so sorry. And there's no filters. This is this
Emma Gilmour 5:52
is wow. I know that. That's okay. We can do it feel to free?
Kristy Forbes 5:58
Lightly. Absolutely.
Emma Gilmour 6:01
That's what I love about you, Kristy. You're like, yeah, we can do it feel free? We're like, Yeah, I'm like, she's like the one who who is my inspiration? For like, not having to put on all these. Great record.
Kristy Forbes 6:18
Sorry, I'm just trying to that's okay.
Emma Gilmour 6:19
All right. I was just saying, How I came upon you, as,
Emma Gilmour 6:27
when I discovered my, my youngest child was autistic. And I couldn't quite everything didn't quite sit, right. And then I started finding out about PDA. And I got on to Kristy's in tune with PDA course. And it was truly transformational. And I've done it twice since then. Yeah, yeah, love it. And then we found out that Daisy, or through Kristy's work, I started to understand that Daisy had
Emma Gilmour 6:59
autistic burnout. And then everything started to make sense. And I changed, we changed our family way of parenting, and, and behaving, and it makes such a big difference to all of our lives. And then in addition, I was just saying to Christie, before I get her to introduce herself, and talk a little bit about the subject, that she what she's also done for me, and I know, this is probably a bit awkward, but I do want to share it, because I think it's important is as a leader, which she is in a space, she holds space for human beings, who are navigating their way in the world. And she has been very open about what she's able to do and what she's not able to do based on, you know, her physical condition, how she's feeling mentally, physically. And that has given me as a leader, such. It's almost like, I want to say permission, but it's not permission. It's like, you know, it's modeling of how we get to show up in our business as neurodivergent human beings, trying to do good work, but also being able to, you know, having to work within our own kind of ability to do things as well, and ability to push through. So I wanted to thank you on air, but also, you know, just acknowledge that as well, because I think it's a really big and beautiful thing that you give to us all.
Kristy Forbes 8:25
Thank you.
Emma Gilmour 8:26
No problem. And thank you for being able to receive that because it was can be quite uncomfortable, I think sometimes.
Emma Gilmour 8:35
But I just wanted to yes
Emma gilmour 8:43
that I will pass over to Kristy and ask her to introduce herself because she will do that much better than I will and then we can start having a bit of a chat about the subject that we wanted to talk about. Christie over to you.
Kristy Forbes 8:58
Thank you, thank you for having me. So it's been a long time since I've introduced myself actually. It can be uncomfortable to I'm Christie and I am a a late identified autistic PDA ADHD woman and parent of four autistic children with a background as an educator and I am passionate about reframing. I you know, I used to say I'm passionate about reframing autism, and positive autistic identity. I just find find I'm passionate about supporting people to understand their human experience and know that we're all individual. I feel that we pay a lot of lip service to that but we don't actually give ourselves the space to to live that and be who we are. Yes, so I support families raising neurodiverse neurodivergent children by facilitating closed spaces and I design programs that reframe neuro divergent experiences, mostly for parents who are raising your divergent children. How did I do Was that alright? Awesome.
Emma Gilmour 10:31
Incredibly succinct as well, whereas for me, I just
Emma Gilkmour 10:40
thank you so much in such a wonderful job, you do have it. I wanted to bring Kristy on particularly today, because one of the subjects that comes on up so much for me working with other human female assigned at birth generally people is this kind of notion of the conditioning that we have around, pushing through and suppressing and, and I know that Kristy, you've written a lot about this. And I just find it seems to be the running thread, in a lot of my work with human beings who are wanting to change their relationship with alcohol is that there's this and I am 100% there as well, like still trying to learn how to, like feel my feelings. My sensory, internal, my interoception isn't great. And that's something that a lot of us find. But also this like, often, you know, many of us are having children that are struggling in the schools diagnosed or I'm diagnosed neurodiverse or just humans who aren't finding the world is built to enable them to be safe, feel safe in it. And that's why I thought this kind of idea of pushing through and I'd love to get because Christie if you haven't read it, she did an amazing post. I think it was yesterday about autistic burnout that again, just rang so true to me. And I just wondered, Kristy, would you? What would you Is there anything particularly you'd like to say about what we've just what I've just taught me?
Kristy Forbes 12:28
I think it's really when I look at human suffering, when I look at most people I know who are in the space of really suffering. Usually, at the core, there is some kind of belief that they're not good enough, or they're not doing life, right. Or they're not people in the right way. And I feel very, very fortunate that I got to learn through my children that I Maltese stick. But before that, there was 33 really long years. Of You know, I mentioned to you before searching, I used to say that I was trying to figure out what was wrong, excuse me, what was wrong with me. Now I can see that I was searching for I density, I wanted to know who I was, why am I this way, and searching for a sense of belonging community. And you know, that's really hard to do when you have no idea who you are because you've spent your life trying to be what you think you're supposed to be. And we live in, we do live in a capitalist society that really values production, around that hierarchy of wealth that excludes the very people who are working the hardest, more often than not, and we lose ourselves in everything that's out there. You know, all of the things that were taught are really important. So yeah, it's, I find it heartbreaking that there are so many adults in the world that don't know who they are, or that think they're old enough. And they're finding ways to cope, or to medicate themselves because it is so incredibly painful. Yeah, it's just it's tragic.
Emma Gilmour 14:45
under percent, it's so it's so fascinating, isn't it? We I have a membership group and we talk a lot about this a lot. And a lot of the people that I work with, and myself included, we work have conditioned from quite a young age, bye, bye bye, you know, for whatever reason to believe that, that, you know, how we presented wasn't as it should be. And we internalize that at such young age that way. And we start to, you know, that's the lens through which we see the world and I see so many human beings coming into my world looking, like to fix themselves, you know? And it's like, you know, I just think, looking at
Emma Gilmour 15:40
the going from the
Emma gilmour 15:41
perspective that we're not broken, actually,
Emma Gilmour 15:45
is not a great place for human.
Kristy Forbes 15:50
And isn't it right? thing that when we do, if we have any kind of breakdown, even the language, even which that we've been conditioned to use, it's deficit based. And it's, it, it implies that there's something wrong or that there's a weakness, when people go through their entire lives doing what they think they should do, being who they think they should be. And then I feel like there is almost this spiritual aspect to it cannot go on anymore, cannot push through anymore. And so I believe for me for myself, you know, because I'm neurodivergent, my body carries a lot of my pain and my grief, and my emotional experiences. So I have a somatic wave being in the world. And so when I think, think, Oh, I'm okay. I think I should be feeling bad, but I'm not. I've really overlooked the fact that my body's taking that stuff on. And then, you know, when it's not working anymore, when I can't show up for work, or I can't go and have dinner with friends or I can't get out of bed, because it's different, everybody, then we've been conditioned to believe that there's something wrong with us, that it's us. Look at the world we live in, and the demand on the average human being. It is insidiously subtle, the way that we are almost trained to sacrifice our lives. And, and yeah, I just think I mean, I've it's lovely that you say that I'm almost modeling, not being able to show up, but there's no choice for me. Yes, I. And it's embarrassing to sing. And it's when you're in the public, when you have a public presence, and you're very transparent and open about constantly rescheduling things having to cancel not being able to show up. I feel a responsibility to do that as well. Because who How could I? How could I talk about things like demand avoidance, but I talk about things like burnout, and caribou burn out and then push through and just show up all the time. i Yeah, it'd be completely counterproductive, completely counterproductive. And I know that people like I said to you before, I'm not always met with I'm not always met with understanding and kindness. And yet, I'm not I'm not throwing in the towel. I worked hard to do what I do today and I'm passionate about it and I love it. And, and it's hard to be working. And I also personal life and so I'm not going to stop what I do just because I have a demand avoidant profile. And because I burned out, I mean, we need to normalize these people who are not neurodivergent burnout as well. We need to create space for those human experiences.
Emma Gilmour 19:50
It's it's really been interesting. I was talking recently based on experience I had with my young This person. And she said to me, and I felt Oh, this is very Christie inspired intelligence on from her perspective, and she was like when I can't go, when I can't do things, and when I can do things, both of those experiences are good. And she's dead. It's really interesting because the adults in my care team, we've moved care teams now but imply that when I wasn't able to do the things that they wanted me to be able to do that that was a bad day for me. And it's just like that reframing of language and just experience and being very authentic. Around, you know, yes, we have days where we can do things, yes, we have days where we can't, it's got no, it doesn't mean anything about us, you know, as human beings, our morality our Yes, it's
Kristy Forbes 21:10
already neutral. mean, isn't it? So? Like, it's pervasive, right? These is that, you know, as a parent, I was totally there, I still can be, you know, last my children, I'll tell you, that I will butt heads with them. And I will ignore their PDA sometimes and just be like, please just do it. Could you please just do this thing? Because that's my goodness. But isn't it interesting, again, that other people decide what is acceptable? And what is not? And especially silly for our children at all. It's dishonest, fighting, that a child who says no, yes. Or no. Okay. Yeah. If we, if we look at the situation there. We have adults who cannot accept that someone is telling them no. But I think the issue there is boundaries and respecting boundaries, and teaching our children that they're safe by honoring those boundaries and feeding back to how intelligent they are. And EDA is not a defect. It is this innate protective wisdom. Yes. For somebody who has a hypersensitive neuroception doesn't that make sense that our neuro biology would be so incredibly protective? When we go incredibly sensitive? That tells me that my brain and body is wise. But yes, 100% I don't always like it. Love their human experience every single month, single day?
Kristy Forbes 23:20
Yeah, that's exactly what might you say, to be able to identify what your own human experiences I mean, I went from age 11, to age 46, of literally being, like, almost a completely constructed human being performing. And, you know, it's only now now at 50 that I'm still putting together who was, you know, who did we leave behind, you know, back when I was little on how do we get to bring them back into the to the world and honor their experiences. It's just like what you're saying around being it's an it's that holding, allowing our people to be who they are. And not to have to pretend to be something else to be laughed.
Kristy Forbes 24:23
Yes. And Ferox and something really hard. At 44 I've just started practicing this Hey, Ally.
Emma Gilmour 24:39
There is That's lovely. We've got some really lovely people on here as well.
Kristy Forbes 24:45
It's really hard at 44 to sit with the discomfort of someone else's did that when I have a bound because pain train and To be a people pleaser. Part of that is familial, cultural, societal. And I think it's because of gender stereotypes in Well, being a young you know, a fab person. Yeah. We, I mean, I knew from a very young age, through magazines, through media, television conversations, roles that were assigned. I knew how I was expected to show up in the world. Yeah, I'm doing all of that. Yeah, the rest of my life, and then some love what you're getting out. Who did we leave behind? Who is who is still in here that we've left behind, need to bring that we need to bring back and provide safety for because for me, that there is a little person in here that is still learning about safety. And so yeah, that is a really important part of, of my pathway to working through all that really tough stuff.
Emma Gilmour 26:22
Yeah, 100%. And I just, I looked down, I think what it took me 46 years to work this shit out. And I'm still like, learning to buggery. I am, and I haven't even been in some of the situations that I look at my children having being in where people are, you know, telling them, you know, that they're, you know, that they're bad, or that they're wrong, and often inadvertently, but just kind of threw off, you know, you can just feel it the vibrations, perhaps of an older generation person who means well, but just doesn't know better. And the fear that they can bring into our world. And then, you know, the young person takes that on board, and makes it kinda like, you know, holds that inside themselves. It's, that's why I think the work that you're doing is so important. And I'm, I hold so much regard as well, for our small people, often, who certainly in my family are, you know, really saying that they can't do these things anymore. Don't worry about that. Yeah. Isn't it interesting, can't do anything? Yeah.
Kristy Forbes 27:41
And it's such a young as such a young age. I mean, I love, love that. I love it. But it's very sad. And it's heartbreaking. And it's distressing when our children, our children, are in burnout. I mean, yeah. Could you have ever imagined parenting a child in burnout? I did didn't. And, in many ways, it's distressing. And in many ways, I think, for it to happen, so young, and for us, to help them unpack that. And for us to be provided an opportunity from that experience to do differently. What an incredible gift. Because the alternative is the child masking and all lives and then getting to adulthood, and potentially be able to come out of burnout. Because, you know, really awful stories about what happens to
Kristy Forbes 28:55
you. Yeah. And I also picked up on what you were saying about the whole concept of consent and control and compliance. And I think that it's, it seems to be at the moment that in the world, you're rewarded for being compliant and being able and being and consenting to, to being, you know, to almost not being in touch with yourself, and what I think the work that you're doing is so important for is that giving people autonomy to start to notice and you know, even though it's hard for those of us who find it hard to notice what our human experiences sometimes, but giving that you know, that permission to as well parents to sort of say no, it's not okay for us. To be pushing our children to be compliant against what their body and their brains are telling them to do in whatever way they're telling them, you know?
Kristy Forbes 30:10
Absolutely. That way. And I think people really overlook the fact that I know this is I never liked talking about this, but this is a really reality. We take children and we teach them that they'll be rewarded for a yes, yeah. And they'll be intuitive measures for a no with the groom them or effective, teaching them that they know is not important. It's not as important as what an adult wants anyway. And it's interesting to me that we purge, checked all of this stuff onto chil dren where adults, swathe. I mean, I'm 44 years old, that means I've lived on this planet for 44 years. My child, I think about my youngest, who's nine, and I think, okay, they've been on the planet for nine years, that's not a long time. We constantly see adults projecting their own insecurities and their need for control onto children, and then labeling what's going on for them? In our children, and I think there's such an unwillingness to be open to new experiences, from a lot of people. And that's incredibly sad, because there are also a lot of people turning to things like alcohol, or whatever they're turning to, to feel better. If we have to find something that makes us feel better, what does that tell us about what it feels like to be a human being? Exactly. It's, it's painful for so many people.
Emma Gilmour 32:20
Yeah. It's so interesting, as I always say, when I'm working with humans, you know, if you have to get to a point, I think with something like birds, and it could be anything could be work. I mean, for me, it's work as well. I'm dreadful with that. But, you know, anything that you're using to kind of escape, it has to get to the point where it's starting to kind of cause you more problems, then it's, then it's relieving for you. And also, you know, there's always that safety part of it as well, that you know, I always say to people, just, sometimes it's safer to stay drinking, because the reality of actually having to sometimes especially for female assigned at birth, human beings, potentially with children, you know, the reality of some of the conversations and things that they might need to have, in order to be able to live in the world without having an escapement mechanism can feel very daunting as well, to be quite a little bit heavy, but
Kristy Forbes 33:31
I totally understand that. I mean, I shared with you before that I was sober for 10 years and identified as a Holic, because I was looking for it wherever I could find it and belonging wherever I could find it. And this was before I knew I was autistic. And I was very young. I was in my teens and 20s. And I remember this movie was called 48 hours or something with Sandra Bullock. There was a no. You mean? Yeah. I can't remember what it's named. I can't remember. But there's a line in there. And I've always remembered it. And someone said, if only people realized how wrong it feels to be in my own skin, so
Kristy Forbes 34:25
yeah. And
Kristy Forbes 34:28
even without, even without addiction, even without, I mean, yeah. Even without self medicating, just existing in the world for 40 for 33 years, not knowing I was autistic. felt so wrong. I felt completely wrong, but I think a lot of people put it down to trauma most of the time. And it's it's challenging to get through life. If you near diverged not have some form of trauma, but yeah, it felt very scary and very wrong. Being May. Yeah. Yeah.
Emma Gilmour 35:14
And I think that when you speak to most people who have had some kind of struggle with alcohol, you, there's always a story of, at some point, a number of different things have happened in their life, which made them feel that it wasn't that how they are, is not okay. And I have had my own experiences of those things. And pretty much every single human I speak to has the same. And I think this is one of the reasons that I think it's so important when we talk like this. And we say that it's a universal experience, you know, for so many of us. And that, you know, this construct of the patriarchal kind of capitalist productivity is unattainable and impossible for everybody. And giving people permission by listening to, you know, US and other people, other humans talking about the fact that we're not able to do it, because it's not doable. is really helpful.
Kristy Forbes 36:24
Yeah. It's scary, though, isn't it? It's scary. I mean, you were saying before, sometimes it's safer to stay drinking, sometimes it's safer to continue toeing the line. Yeah. And I think part of the challenge with a lot of the families that I sit in community with when they discover their children need something different, whether that be a different way of learning, so learning at home, or whether that be that they need more autonomy, that stuff is terrifying, because it invites it almost invites instant judgment and criticism. Because we also live in a world where we've been conditioned to pile on, you know, people who don't tow the line as though they're a threat to humanity. And some of the things that I see. I mean, in it, it's a real threat, people have CP, ds cold on them in some areas of the world if their children don't go to school. And there's certainly is more questions than there are answers for people who say, Well, how can I how can I be at home with my child? How can I work for myself? How can I leave my job? How, what will that look like? And there's so much there's so much risk involved in shifting away from what we've always known, and I don't think people give themselves enough credit for the courage it takes to step out, not knowing whether they're going to land on solid ground or not. I mean, that courage is phenomenal. Yeah. 100% 100%
Emma Gilmour 38:30
Thank you, Kristy. I just love talking with you. So it's just, it's just so much to learn in this area. And I think so much for us all, to just at least listen to have an open mind to in questioning the way that we approach our people when they're struggling ourselves when we're struggling. We're finding things hard and yeah, I just really want to honor them. Thank you for coming into
Kristy Forbes 39:10
Hey, thanks for having me and inviting me.
Emma Gilmour 39:14
It's been an absolute joy I've just given me so much and given our family, you know, the opportunity to repair after ignorant really sort of difficult period. And, and I think the words that you say around, you know that we need to work a lot of time it's the stuff we need to work on ourselves. It's not the children, children. It's us. As the parents, we have to understand why we're being triggered by what's happening. Try and find ways to to be the safe place in ourselves. Yeah, yeah, it's hard
Emma Gilmour 39:58
and giving us Have a break. Yeah, give yourselves a, like I just came off a call this morning and just reminded parents that even when, even when we know our children need so much of us, and we give so much of ourselves and we become tired and, and stressed, and I wish we could have more conversations about real parenting experiences, real human experience experiences, like someone said, you know, I don't enjoy playing with my children. And I'm like, that's cool. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But I know there'd be a world of people out there. That would be like, why it's
Kristy Forbes 40:49
Oh, yeah.
Kristy Forbes 40:50
You don't enjoy playing with the children? Oh, my gosh, yeah. I mean, I just that is that I think that's so normal. Yeah. And it would be common, and it's not anything to do with the children. We're I don't, we've been trained to not play, we get to a certain we are shamed for playing,
Kristy Forbes 41:15
I will play like rest, isn't it, we're not
Kristy Forbes 41:20
doing something productive. And we feel
Kristy Forbes 41:22
guilty. And we don't know how to do it anymore. Like, was so conditioned that we don't know how to rest? Yeah, sorry, condition, we don't know how to be kind to ourselves, I was so conditioned and trained from such a young age, that we feel bad. If we had self compassion, I do. Anyway, I struggle with it every day, every single. And I just think we, we have to allow that we have to allow ourselves to be human beings. And to not push through anymore, to push through.
Emma Gilmour 42:05
Pushing through and not because I even find myself knowing what I know now, which is still I still have so much to learn, but with my big child, because they are more able to mask and more able to push through that when they're having a hard time or how dare I kind of almost forget that they're actually in person as well. And that they need downtime to even that when they're telling me their experience that I need to listen to that as well as my other child who's more vocal about what they can and can't do.
Kristy Forbes 42:43
See, it's easy to do that, isn't it? And I think too. It's great that we're all talking about different experiences and being autistic or PDA or ADHD or you know it's one thing to write about it and speak about it. But demonstrating it as well demonstrating that and this is why I do say I have to reschedule because I can't I can't and I don't have any I don't have any control over that or choice and sometimes I wish yes 100% But I don't And imagine if we lived in a world where that was a normal human experiences when they just a PDA Ah yeah, that's fine. If you want some okay. All don't invite chris Christie invite us but valuing everybody drinks and being aware that they also have limitations because neurobiology and not shaping them or making it immoral to I was born like this. You were born like that. And yeah, actively Imagine. Imagine what we could Eve
Emma Gilmour 44:12
Imagine what we could achieve if we're able to just rest as well and we need not push through. Jeez. I'm so proud of all thank you. You're an absolute gem and I so love talking to you. It felt so lovely and so on authentic and warm Seth. Thank you for
Kristy Forbes 44:37
ICWAI is it's been really lovely and thank you for inviting
Emma Gilmour 44:42
no problem at all. And Kristy I know that people in my group would be very interested in your the work that you do so would you be happy to share how people can find you and I would obviously put everything in there. Next as well into the body.
Kristy Forbes 45:03
Yes, thank you for asking. So the website is www dot pristy forbes.com.au and ensuring part of ways on Facebook, Kristy Forbes on Instagram. That's it I think I'd love to meet you. So please reach out. You don't need a reason to contact just a hello is great. It will do that and yeah.
Emma Gilmour 45:39
Beautiful. Thank you so much. absolute gem.
Kristy Forbes 45:44
Thank you.
