By Emily Linder, LPCC-S | Calibrations Counseling & Consultation I was sitting in a coffee shop when I overheard two women at the next table talking about executive dysfunction. One was describing how she'd spent forty-five minutes trying to make herself start a simple task, not because she didn't want to do it, but because her brain just wouldn't initiate the action. The other woman nodded. "Oh, the wall," she said. "I hit that constantly." They kept talking, trading strateg

By Emily Linder, LPCC-S | Calibrations Counseling & Consultation I was lying on my couch at 2 PM on a Tuesday, unable to get up. Not because I was physically ill. My brain had simply stopped cooperating. I'd been pushing through burnout for months, and my body had finally staged a full rebellion. Work emails were piling up. Projects had deadlines. Clients needed me. And I couldn't make myself move. All I could think was: if I'm not producing, what's the point of me? That thou

By Emily Linder, LPCC-S | Calibrations Counseling & Consultation I was sitting in my therapist's office staring at a blank piece of paper with colored pencils in front of me. She'd asked me to draw myself. Not a portrait, just a visual representation of how I saw myself after my autism and ADHD diagnoses. I couldn't do it. I had no idea how to represent myself visually anymore. The old image, competent, neurotypical-passing, socially skilled, didn't fit. But I hadn't built a