#neurodivergence

✨Neurodivergent Pines Twins✨ return at last!! This time, they battle the executive dysfunctions with the power of body doubling!

I feel like Dipper's neurodivergence presents super differently from Mabel's, where he tends to have the opposite problem as her, with finding schoolwork (almost too) easy, but struggling with daily tasks like cleaning. But this doesn't stop them from supporting each other!

Every time you add more detail, you're running the risk of tripping over a bad assumption on your part about the listener's prior knowledge, or hitting the tipping point where they become overwhelmed with new information (and remember that you don't know which parts of what you're saying will be new information for them), or making a leap of logic that isn't as self-evident as you think it is, or any of a dozen other potential snags which, by definition, you will not see coming until it's too late to correct course.

Basically, every piece of information you add multiplies the odds of you getting blindsided by some vector of misunderstanding you didn't anticipate, even as it addresses the ones you did anticipate. The point of diminishing returns where continuing to elaborate increases the odds of unexpected miscommunication more than it decreases the odds of expected miscommunication is much nearer than you'd like.

The most effective act of communication is not the one which contains the most possible information, but the one which contains the smallest amount of information it possibly can while still getting its point across. It sucks, but it's the reality of the situation. People far more autistic than you have been trying for hundreds of years to invent a way of communicating which doesn't work this way, without success.

If they don’t like jokes and teasing, they might like silly noises or yes-and improv.

If they don’t like playing a competitive or narrative game with toys, they might like to take apart a toy, or sort/stack/line toys up, or get buried under toys.

If they don’t like biking or walking a trail in the woods ‘properly,’ they might like to walk along fallen logs, stand in the creek or look under rocks and leaves for creatures.

If they don’t like hugs and cuddles, they might like to bump shoulders, touch fingers, hand hug, spin around together, or (if they like more intense input) wrestle, push faces together, squeeze each other hard or run into you.

If they don’t like putting on kids’ music in the car or to dance to, they might want to listen to a game or show soundtrack, nature noises, a podcast, binaural beats, house music or metal.

If they don’t like animated movies where sad or scary things happen, they might like younger kids’ gentler shows, or adults’ science and history shows, or live zoo and nature cams.

And so many of them would benefit so much from the adults just slowing down. Not scheduling so much in the day, not rushing them through an activity, not stopping them playing the same song or watching the same bug for an hour, letting them absorb everything their way. Seeing it as a meditation instead of a problem. Joining them there.