The Netmums Podcast - S13 Ep7: Ashley Blaker Unwrapped: Juggling Six Kids, Comedy, and Neurodiversity

Episode Date: May 28, 2024

Parenting is a journey with its own set of challenges. But when you add special educational needs into the mix, that journey takes a unique turn. This week on The Netmums Podcast, Wendy Gollage and Alison Perry are joined by comedy writer and producer Ashley Blaker, a father of six, three of whom have special educational needs. Ashley is not only a parent navigating this complex world but also the author of the book "Normal Schnormal" and is currently touring the UK with his show of the same name. Ashley opens up about the unconventional path that led him to adopt his daughter with Down Syndrome, the rigorous and sometimes bizarre adoption assessment process, and the joys and trials of raising neurodiverse children. From the innocence of his teenage daughter to the challenges of playdates and school systems, Ashley’s candid and often humorous insights offer a refreshing perspective on parenting SEND children. Stay connected with Netmums for more parenting tips, community support, engaging content: Website: netmums.com / Instagram: @netmums 

You're listening to the Netmums podcast with me, Wendy Gollich, and me, Alison Perry. Coming up on this week's show... No, but it was a question on everything. I mean, it was on everything. Yeah, but there were an inordinate number of sex-based questions like, when did you first discover about sex? Who taught you about sex? It was very strange. I'm sure they were just kind of taking a, let's say, prurient interest. Checking if you're a sexual deviant in your spare time. You wouldn't write that down, would you? I don't know.

I mean, they didn't take my hard drive. Welcome back, everyone. Alison, how are you today? I'm good today, Wendy. Tonight, I'm taking my 13-year-old to see Olivia Rodrigo in concert. So it's very, very exciting in this house today. But I'm a little bit concerned because I feel like I am going to feel very old and very uncool because I'm not going to know the lyrics and I'm going to be with all of these teenagers who are desperately cool. Have you done the concert thing yet with

them with either of your girls not yet my eldest wanted to go and see someone called becky hill last year in concert but there was an age restriction and she was fuming so we're hoping to do some sort of festival this summer but i bloody hate camping so I don't know I think it's going to be earplugs and a sheepy and a bottle of vodka and I might manage it. That's it that's it do you know what I can firmly recommend glamping at a festival we've done camp festival a few times and we've done it in a yurt with a proper bed and hot showers and it's a bit of a game changer. I wonder if our guest has been dragged to a concert or two given that he has six kids. Alison who are we talking to? Yes our guest today does indeed have six kids. We're joined today by

comedy writer and producer Ashley Blaker. Three of Ashley's kids have a special educational needs diagnosis and he is the author of the book normal normal which is part memoir and part guide to navigating the world of parenting send kids ashley is also touring the uk at the moment with his normal normal show goodness put my teeth back in i'm enjoying you saying this this is good normal normal show is quite a tricky one um and there are dates running until the end of June. Ashley, a massive welcome to the Netmumps podcast. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you for naming your book and your tour so trickily.

Yeah, people, it's normal schmormal. I don't know. Some people find it hard. Do you know what it is? I find some people want to replace. So the book and, well, I'm just plugging that, but the book is the book and well i'm just plugging out but the book and the tour are both called normal schmormal but people want to replace the m yeah the start of that second uh word with an n and i think that's that's what you did

but that's what a lot of people seem to want to do i don't know why it's obviously it's a an urge no no no it's very common so i'm saying it's very common and i think it's an urge that people have for some of this yeah yeah i'm not gonna say it that's what i'm not no i haven't been no so anyway to answer your question from uh before the introduction my third son um i took to see weird al yankovic in London at the Palladium. But no, I've not managed to. My youngest would love to go, I'm sure, to Olivia Rodrigo. So if you don't want to go tonight.

My 13-year-old would never talk to me again. No, no, I'm saying your 13-year-old can take my 10-year-old. That's what I'm suggesting. Hey, that's not a bad idea not a bad idea i'll just wait outside the or two great done yeah that's what i think yeah we'll just wait outside so does it get pretty tedious when people are like six children you've got six children? How, like, is that the reaction normally? A little bit. I mean, but it's not, I don't want to say it's tedious. I mean, so, yes, people are kind of sometimes surprised we have six children. But, you know, the thing that I suppose,

because I'm focused so much with the book and the tour and all the rest of it and my Radio 4 series is on the fact that we have children with special educational needs. That really has become, I suppose, much more the focus and the number of children. Yeah. Did you always want a big family? Was it kind of like something you knew? No, I didn't. We're going to have eight. That was the plan.

No, no, not at all. I didn't even want to have two kids. Something went wrong along the way there, Ashley. Well, I think, you know, I once suggested to Gemma that we take our relationship to the next level by adding an extra person. And she completely misunderstood what I was asking for. So we ended up with kids. So the thing as well is when you have children,

particularly like with neurodiversity, it's one thing if you have different kinds of medical needs or disabilities, but neurodiversity, it's not something that a midwife doesn't hand you your newborn and say your child has got autism. You know, these are things that get assessed at a snail's pace. So we were really kind of unaware of what we had in our midst when we decided to keep going. So maybe had we known, we might have stopped earlier. But there you go. And then we actually, so I can say as well, so we have five biological children. And then we adopted, we had four boys, and then we adopted a girl who is,

she's now, she'll be 16 in September. She was two when we adopted her. She has Down syndrome. And she accounts for like, yeah, a lot of the hospital appointments and a lot of the issues in our house revolve around her. And then we had another child thereafter. So you say that three of your boys have been diagnosed. No, two of your boys.

Two boys have been diagnosed with autism and ADHD, and we have our adopted daughter who has Down syndrome. So, yeah, that's so it's autism, ADHD, Down syndrome, heart and heart defects, hearing loss, mobility issues, gastroenterological problems, speaking language disorders, sensory processing disorder. You know, you've got a lot going on when Great Ormond Street gives you your own parking space. There's a lot, a lot going on when great ormond street gives you your own parking space there's a lot a lot going on and having spent much of my life at great ormond street those things are like gold dust so if you've got a parking space you've done well i have driven well we got a blue badge so uh so zoe has a blue badge so yes i can drive her in with the blue

badge but the trouble is even with a blue badge you're never going to find any parking, and it's such a pain. Also, I'll tell you the other good thing with the blue bag, you don't have to pay congestion as well. But no, I just go on the train. So, yes, you adopted Zoe when she was one or two. She was two, yeah. She was two. And we often think of adoption as being an alternative

to having a biological child. But you had three kids already. So what led to that decision for you and your wife? You had four kids. What kind of conversations did you and your wife have that led to you guys deciding to adopt Zoe? So it was just a very, very unusual story. So what happened was we saw this very unusual,

there are other words for it, bizarre advert in a local newspaper from the London borough of Hackney, which had a title, Opt to Adopt. Zoe is simply beautiful. Could you be the family for her? And for some strange reason, we both saw it independently and thought we could do this um you know a moment of madness and divine inspiration i don't know i so i called um

yeah i got straight onto the phone to the hackney adoption team i did first ask them to consider a past exchange for my eldest adam they. They wouldn't hear of it. So, yeah, and it's a very odd. I don't know if you've interviewed other people who've – I've not listened to every episode, so forgive me. Well, how dare you? I know. But I don't know if you've talked about, like, the adoption process. It's very full on.

It's really full on. I didn't realize until, like, we got involved in this. So I just thought it was a really full on. I didn't realize until we got involved in this. So I just thought it was a couple of meetings. I don't know. But no, it's like it was a year. It was the best part of a year of social workers around our house. But assessing us in the most bizarre way. I mean, so strange questions.

And it's a very odd thing because kind of, if you think about it, obviously, you know, don't get me wrong, it's obviously important that children, and particularly the most vulnerable children, which is often what adopted children are, go to the appropriate homes. But when you consider that, you know, two spotty teenagers could leave the Olivia Rodrigo show tonight and make a baby. You know, and without any bar to entry, as it were.

No pun intended. But, you know, without any barriers, again, no pun intended. You know what I'm saying. There's no assessment process. No one is assessing your aptitude to be a parent. It's just something that happens naturally. But with adoption, yes, they assess you with such rigor. But in the strangest ways.

There were questions like, remember once the social worker rang in an absolute panic? The panel are about to meet tomorrow, realised there's a big hole in the report about you. I said, what is it? He said, when you were at primary school, did you get invited to many birthday parties? That's what they wanted, isn't it? I know, strengths. They basically were concerned

whether 30 years ago I'd eaten enough jelly. I don't know. What was the reason behind that? I don't know. They also took an incredibly prurient interest Jerry, I don't know. What was the reason behind that? I don't know. They also took an incredibly prurient interest, I felt, in our sex life. There was a questionnaire. You had to fill in this questionnaire at the start.

No one needs to fill in a questionnaire about their sex life, quite frankly. No, but it was a questionnaire on everything. I mean, it was on everything. Yeah, but there were an inordinate number of sex-based questions like when did you first discover about sex? Who taught you about sex? It was very strange. I'm sure they were just kind of taking a, let's say,

prurient interest. Checking if you're a sexual deviant in your spare time. You wouldn't write that down, would you? I don't know. I mean, it's very real. They didn't take my hard drive. I mean would you? I don't know. I mean, they didn't take the hard drive. I mean, they,

I don't know. It's not, I don't think it was that. I think it's genuinely more about finding out what kind of parent you'd be. And are you, I mean, again, they're very interested in very politically correct.

This was quite a while ago, but, but you know, 10, 12 years ago, but, um, no, it was like 13 years ago now. But, uh, yes, a lot of it, you know 10 12 years ago but um no it's like 13 but uh yes a lot of it you know how many gay friends do you have how many friends do you have of you know how comfortable was this how comfortable

was that so yes anyway it was a very full-on experience don't know quite what possessed us very glad we did though uh you know it has been a a great thing for us and our family so anyway if any listeners ever consider it i would definitely urge people to even though there are a lot of hoops to jump through it's definitely something worth thinking about it's worth doing yeah um and you've said that parenting zoe is very different to most teenagers because of her down syndrome um and that she's got a wonderful innocence to her. Does that mean that she's not slamming doors and playing Taylor Swift at top volume?

Because that sounds quite blissful. Yeah, she's not making me go to Olivia Rodrigo tonight. I mean, it's the start. She would never tell you who Olivia Rodrigo was. Now, she does love Mr. Tumble, on the other hand, but she would probably take me to see Mr. Tumble on the other hand but he would probably say take me to see Mr. Tumble live yes so no I've never had the opportunity to see Harry Styles

she's got no, she's not on Snapchat she's not obsessed with her weight we've not had to have conversations about drugs yeah it's she does have exactly as I said an incredible innocence to her I mean she's going to be 16 this year.

And yeah, it's just, she's kind of more like a two-year-old. It's like, you know, I can buy her a present of, you know, some Peppa Pig books or I bought her a Mr. Tumble phone. You press and it doesn't literally phone. Justin Fletcher, that would be a stalking problem. You might get a bit fed up with that. Yeah, well, you know

what? I'm not mad. I've got mixed feelings on Justin Fletcher, right? So, I know his shows are good, I've given that, and the kids like him, and the children with special needs like him. But, you know, he got an M MBE, right, for his services to, like, special education and this.

You don't have any kids. You work in a TV studio. You go home and you can just enjoy all your money on your own in peace and quiet. I'm the one looking after these kids. As parents, I'm the one who's, when I'm changing Zoe's nappies, he's at home polishing his metal. Where's your MBE, Ashley? That is the question.

If Justin's like to get an MBE, fine, but I should get a peerage, I would say. As a comedy writer, what's your view on, like, giggle biz? Because, you know, as a parent, I find it quite enjoyable when it comes on, because it's actually quite funny. But as a comedy writer, what's your view? Oh, yeah, no as a parent, I find it quite enjoyable when it comes on because it's actually quite funny.

But as a comedy writer, what's your view? Oh, yeah. No, a lot of those shows are made by, you know, serious comedy writers, aren't they? You know, lots of children's shows are made by very, you know, renowned comedy writers and what have you. So you're not too snooty about it. You know, you're happy to embrace it in your household. Yeah.

Look, I know what we've kind of outgrown that apart from Zoe. So she's the only one where my youngest is 10 and she's like 10 going on 20. So, you know, she's only really interested in kind of YouTube videos on like makeup tutorials and Taylor Swift. She's a big Swiftie. Yeah. So, yeah. so I kind of see we've kind of grown but apart from Zoe she's got her own tablet and she

just watches yes it's Mr Tumble and honestly she likes watching videos of babies she likes just seeing babies gurgling who doesn't? I'm with her, it's good so is it really different now with six kids who are Baby's gurgling. Who doesn't? I'm with her. It's good.

So is it really different now with six kids who are kind of, if your youngest is 10, you're definitely well out of the kind of like bottles and toddler tantrum stage. How different is it parenting six kind of older kids compared to babies? Well, you know, the saying goes, little children, little problems, big children, big problems. And I don't know if that's entirely true. I mean, we've been fairly lucky, I would say, with our kids as well.

You know, they're good kids on the whole, and we've not had lots of issues I know other children have had. But obviously, again, we've got exam season at the moment. So my second son, Ollie, is doing A-levels. Dylan's doing GCSEs. So we have all those kind of things. My third son, Dylan, now, he's one of the – so I can say, by the way, so in the book – so the title that you couldn't pronounce suggests I don't like the word normal.

Right. So don't use that word. That's why the book's called Normal Shmum. So I use the terminology zappers and cold plays. So mainstream children are like cold play. Perfectly good, but rather boring. Right. Like Keir Starmer.

They're the mission... They're the missionary position of children. My special needs kids, though, are more like avant-garde musicians. They're like a Frank Zappa. Rebellious. Alternative. Sometimes

unspeakably crap, but they don't care. They don't care. They do their own thing. That's why I love them. One of my three zappers, Dylan, 16, he's actually my first of my children. He's

the third son, but he's the first of them who's really social. My oldest son just really, Adam, just wants to keep himself to himself. He's coming up 20. He really wants to be, when he's old enough, he wants to be a long-distance lorry driver. He loves the

solitude, wants to be on the road. Handily, he likes Yorkie bars, so it's fine. And he, now my third son, though though he's the first to be really social so the issue i've got as a parent now is he's always going to french he's the first my boys got a girlfriend i guess my whole life driving him around so those are the issues you've

got to look forward to if you're the parent of younger ones you know that yes you get out of the tantrums and the bottles and all those kind of things, but suddenly I'm just driving him around. Well, now I'm in my 40s, I'm the one having the tantrums, so I don't think it actually changes very much. Now, your three call play kids, Ashley, they haven't been diagnosed with autism or ADHD, but is it right that you suspect that they actually might be autistic

without a diagnosis? Well, mean yes i was gonna say they've all got the surname blaker which is a diagnosis in its own right uh in my children's schools if if that is actually now how they assess whether a child has special educational needs are you friends with one of my kids against the blaker benchmark no yeah no if your son is friends with one of my kids? Against the Blaker benchmark. No, yeah, no. If your son is friends with one of my boys, he'll get his own learning support system without even going to tribunal. I mean, that's just the way it works.

Yeah, so they, I mean, my fourth son, Edward, I mean, I would say he has more classic traits of autism I think, than either of the other two put together. But this is the crucial thing.

He doesn't have, I would say, any learning difficulty. He doesn't have any special education on it. Now, as a result of that, what I would say is, is there an enormous need to try and get him assessed, to try and get a label on him? No, probably not. Now, my third son, Dylan, as I say, he's going through GCSEs at the moment. He was diagnosed age six.

He unlocked quite a lot of help. And at the moment, he's reaping the benefits because he gets a 25-minute, half-an-hour extra on his exams. So that's great. What a great result that is. But if you don't have those needs, then I suppose going through all the waiting lists and all the meetings and all the assessments and what have you, I can understand why, as a parent, you might want to avoid that.

That could be, as an adult, he wants to get assessed and help him explain his life. That could be the case. But yes, for the time being, I didn't think it was necessary. Your book is absolutely brilliant for navigating and fighting for that extra support. How did you learn about that? Was it just because it's such a fight for a lot of people and it's so tricky to kind of figure out the system in i guess two questions is that

what prompted you to write the book and did you just learn as you went along well yeah so it's a good question so i i mean the reason i wrote the book is my oldest son is uh 19 nearly 20 in a few weeks time uh he was diagnosed with autism and adhd at three and to make it i would say i've written the book i wish i'd read 16 years ago because I read a lot of books at the time, a lot of, uh, stuff online. And a lot of it was very depressing. You know,

it focused on the challenges and on, it made me very worried about what the future, his future might look like and our future parents. And so I wanted to write a book, which while definitely doesn't shy away from the many challenges, um, whether it's eating and school and friendships and what have you, but focuses on the positive and on the funny. Obviously, being a comedian and comedy writer, that's my natural default mode.

But I wanted to write a book that's really positive and upbeat. But also shared a lot of my experiences, which, yes, some of them came through reading other books or articles or, you know, friendships you make and people tell you things. But, yes, a lot of it was just learning on the job. So, yes, I wanted to share some of that. So, yes, so it's a kind of part memoir but part guidebook. So it's written in the style of an a to z but appropriately for a book about children who might find learning more challenging it's all in the wrong order

so it starts with m is for meetings meetings meetings and goes on to d is for diagnosis and um uh covers hospital appointments and b is for battles over food and then N is for onwards and upwards. So, yes, so I suppose it's all our experiences, some of which and lessons that I've learned mostly through, yeah, 20 years of lived experience. On the meetings, meetings, meetings front, you see in the book that when you walk into a meeting about one of your children, you know how it's going to pan out based on whether there's a plate of biscuits

on the table or a box of tissues. Have you had many of the tissues kind of meeting? Oh, countless. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, that's right. If you just go into the meeting, if there's a plate of biscuits on the table, then, you know, this is probably going to be a good one. But, yeah, box of tissues. Yeah, it's like, oh, my the table, then, you know, this is probably going to be a good one. But, yeah, a box of tissues.

Yeah, it's like, oh, my God, this is, you know. I mean, yeah, I've gone into meetings, seen the tissues on the table, and just claimed that I left the oven on and have to go home and then turn my phone off and hope by the time the school finally get hold of me, my child will have done something biscuit worthy. It's an odd one. time the school finally get out of me my child will have done something biscuit worthy it's it's not and also one of the we have so many issues about children's eating and I always

saw the schools keep on the guilt by issuing a healthy eating policy which I'm convinced they only do it to really mess with us but those biscuits are against the school's healthy eating policy so I don't know why they're... They definitely are.

Exactly. We got told we weren't allowed cake sales at our school because it was against the healthy eating policy. How can you not have a cake sale? I know. Oh, it's awful. I mean, yes. I've had arguments with teachers about whether

Pringles qualifies as a vegetable. They don't. I've had arguments with teachers about whether Pringles qualifies as a vegetable. They don't. I've sent children to school with chocolate spread sandwiches and claimed it was, you know, shamed it was Marmite. You know, it's, yeah. So what changes would you like to see ashley to the education system i don't know if we have long enough on this podcast for your answer to this question it may be that you have you say none but are there changes you would like to see to help support children with additional needs

i think we have made great improvement and great strides for sure i I think the important thing is that, you know, and most teachers are great and do a wonderful job. And I feel sorry for a lot of educational professionals as well because their lives have been made so much harder with paperwork and bureaucracies that they didn't have many years ago. But obviously some are better than others. And I think ideally it would be great if schools were more open to offering, not just offering help, but offering support to parents and listening, listening to parents' concerns. You know, some parents I'm sure can be very annoying and can

you know want to see see issues aren't there but you know if you it's so important to listen to parents because parents know their kids better than anyone and i think you know as a parent your instinct about your child is usually right and i think that's why sometimes parents you know you have to just be bullshit sometimes and trust your own instinct and so yes so hopefully you know ideally schools but if you shouldn't be a battle i mean that's the key thing ideally we all work together um and and make children's lives better i mean that's you know we had a lot of issues with schools i talk about this a great length in the book but uh you know even afterwards we were able to kind of mend fences and actually really support each other.

And I think that's really, that's why our children were able to progress because we actually didn't see it as a battle, constantly trying to micromanage. You know, having fought hard to get our children into school would be crazy to then, like, micromanage the whole time. I think it's important to even trust your child to into school, it would be crazy to then micromanage the whole time. I think it's important to even trust your child to this school, to let them get on with doing

the job. You've mentioned that you've used your comedy and humour to deal with a lot of what life has thrown at you. What would you say have been the biggest challenges that you and your wife have faced throughout your parenting journey so far? I can't actually pick out the piece. I mean, there's so many, as I say, like, you know,

when you have children who have issues with friendships, or they have a chapter that's just about running an autistic playdate. I mean, you've not done anything, you think you've had a playdate and then you have two autistic boys. So half the time they kind of ignore each other, play completely separately like a couple going for a particularly acrimonious divorce and then the rest of the time they kind of

combine their destructive forces like kind of Antifa tag teaming with Extinction Rebellion. So, you know, it battles over food because it's awful as a parent. You don't want to think your child's not eating and to try and find

foods that they'll accept. Challenges over getting children into school once they're there. The realizations that some children just aren't made for school and that's a really hard thing to come to terms with and actually what do you do as a child who's just not't made for school. And that's a really hard thing to come to terms with. And actually, what do you do as a child who's just not really made for education?

So, yeah, I don't know if I could pick out one in particular. It's a constant stream of issues. You know, hospital appointments, just constantly having your – and, again, they do a wonderful job that the NHS obviously is on the whole some things that we should be proud of and support but

they're not always great at communication, hospital appointments can be cancelled or changed at no notice, letters get prescriptions get lost in the post, you know you have all kinds of issues to deal with so there's just there's always something is what i'll say as parents of a zapper there is always something so what would your advice be to parents of a zapper who are

struggling or who you know if you could sit down with someone who's further in on the journey than you, what would you say to them? Well, I mean, for a start, they need to buy the book. That's very clear. Obviously. So that, you know, and I think, but hopefully, and I have no promises, but hopefully things will get better. I mean, I think there's light at the end of the tunnel, and it can all seem very dark and very difficult,

but I think things do change and nothing's forever and things will improve. But it's one of the great things doing this show as well that I'm on tour doing at the moment. I also did it in Edinburgh last summer. And there's so many people came up to me after shows and said, not only did they really enjoy it from a comedic point of view but that it was so important to them to not feel alone people said the same thing with the book it's very lonely this even though we seem to have more and more children every year are diagnosed with uh different things particularly neurodiverse uh

neurodiversity um you know children who are diagnosed with ADHD or autism or what have you, it's amazing still how lonely it can feel. You can feel sometimes like you're the only person going through this. So the aim of all of this, of the book, the tour, all the things I've been doing is really about hopefully, I suppose, making you realize, no, you're not alone. And while you may not have had exactly the same anecdotes that I've been through, they'll be relatable.

They're things that you go, oh, God, it's not just my child who does that. And I think that's really helpful. Yeah. Now, we hear quite a lot these days about experts saying that share-in-ting isn't good. You know, us going onto social media social media um and talking about our children and our family experiences um how obviously you talk a lot whether it's your radio four show or your book there's a lot of content out there about your kids um how do they feel about that

are they are they totally on board with it has there ever been any kind of key moments uh well yes i mean there's a few things that I certainly I thought anecdotes I thought you know what that doesn't maybe paint you in the best light context

I'm not making that now they've also the Radio 4 show they actually play themselves on in the show so I did two shows of that

and I think the time has passed where we'll probably not do any more of that. They've grown up. They've now kind of become adults, really. But, yeah, I should say they are recompensed quite considerably every time.

You know, they don't do anything for free. We had, you know, when the book was like, obviously there are photos on the cover of the book or, I don't do anything for free we had, you know, when the book was like obviously there are photos on the cover of the book or we had the book was serialised by the Sunday Times they did a photo shoot so again, like

got to be paid for that, so yes, they drive a hard bargain cash takeaways, you know oh it is, I've made nothing because it all just goes to them. So as it should do, they play their role. So look, and they provided me with a lot of material, I'll say that. So, yes, so they've at least had, they've been recompensed.

So, you know, everyone's got a price. So they've participated. So finally, since you've written the book, you yourself have been diagnosed. Yes, that's right. What if you could teleport back and take Ashley back to talk to little Ashley? What would you say to little Ashley? Well, this again is what, that's a great question I mean this again is the I was

saying before but Edward saying about like does he need a label now no because he doesn't have any educational needs but maybe he would like to seek that in later life but it might explain a lot so I suppose it would explain a lot whether I would have understood that if I could go back in time and be kinder to myself about certain things at certain moments you just go this is why you feel a bit different so yes I was diagnosed with autism and ADHD so I wrote the book was thinking god this now sounds like me and um you know you're writing about my kids kind of sensory it's weird because I've never kind of thought about it in that context before but their their sensory needs and their hyperfixations and their social awkwardness.

And, yeah, I just thought this could be me. So, yes, I was diagnosed. Now, as I say, I didn't have any learning difficulties, so it's kind of thrown me off the scent a little bit. But, yes, I suppose in language, I don't know what age you're talking about, but if I could go back in time, I suppose for sure, I would try and explain to myself in appropriate language that it's, you know, it's okay to be different.

And, you know, this is explained in this way. Just give yourself a bit of a break, maybe. It's a hard one though. Yeah, it's a hard one though, because, you know, it's also, maybe it would be depressing to hear that because you kind of go oh so this is it like oh there's nothing i can do i don't know it's a it's it's it's a really it's a it's a you know it's a very good question um but you know i suppose it's all um academic as it were because i can't get back in time until someone inv't. Until someone invents a time machine, that's not possible. Yeah, so I have to live with, you know, and then that's fine.

I'm kind of cool with that. I don't need to go back and change the past. But it's sometimes good to understand the past and understand who you are and where you've come from and how you've arrived where you're at there will be so many parents who are grateful for the book that you've written and so many kids who will be benefiting from having parents who understand it all a bit better so you know brilliant that you've written this book and thank you so much for coming in to chat with me at netmoms it's been so great to chat to you. Thank you so much for having me. Enjoy Olivia Rodrigo.

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