Growing up, most of us spent a lot of time trying to fit in and hiding big parts of ourselves. It’s exhausting, we’re always in a state of vigilance and spend far too much time overthinking the moments that felt like it all slipped.
Telling people that we’re neurodivergent can be a big ask because the response can be so diverse. Over the years I’ve heard; “Oh everyone is neurodivergent these days”, “Do you really want a label”, or my personal favourite, “You don’t look disabled”.
The best responses have been when the person hearing my disclosure has learned into their curiosity. Chasing understanding to clarify what I personally need in the situation we find ourselves.
Disclosing has lost me jobs, and it’s also helped me keep them. I’ve learnt that that disclosing doesn’t have to be binary and that there’s a place in the middle that can enable protective disclosure.
What is protective disclosure?
Most neurodivergent people see the patterns, path, or the big picture but we don’t need to share it all in one go. It’s ok to share small relevant parts of our medicine experience at different times, in different environments, to different people at different times. In essence it’s OK to be different. Protective disclosure is considered, curated and pertinent.
How to do it.
The key is assessing the risk and then choosing your response. Risk assessments have acquired a bad repetition in recent years but they’re a terrific way of working out how to navigate difficult situations.
There are two parts to a risk assessment:
A) Identify the risks.
B) Create ways to minimise the risks.
First spend time observing your situation, what are the potential risks, is it the people, the place? Maybe it’s the pace or even the permissions that are inherent in the circumstances. It’s ok to watch and learn, in fact I’d say it’s necessary.
Next, once you know what the potential risks could be, have a think about how those possible risks could be minimised.
Is there a particular person you could share part of your story with?
Can you curate a part of the environment to help support you?
Or, can you orchestrate the pace of the day, week or month?
And lastly, can you accommodate permission? Are you allowed to work like a hare, rather than a tortoise or can you allow accountability to be structured in.
Final thoughts.
It’s not really a question of to disclose or not, rather, it’s about the channels you allow parts of your disclose to travel.
The last aspect to highlight is finding your safe people. Disclosure is easier when you have people behind you, supporting, cheerleading, helping problem solve and above all accepting.
So rather than thinking in terms of full disclosure, think which parts am I willing to share, why and to whom?