Radio Hauraki host Angelina Grey shares her journey to discovering both she and her daughter are neurodivergent.
Radio Hauraki host Angelina Grey shares her journey to discovering both she and her daughter are neurodivergent.
Welcome to season four of the Herald’s parenting podcast: One Day You’ll Thank Me. Join parents and hosts Jenni Mortimer and Rebecca Haszard as they navigate the challenges and triumphs of parenting today with help from experts and well-known mums and dads from across Aotearoa.
Want to get in touch with the podcast? Email the team at odytm@nzme.co.nz.
There was always something “fascinating” about Angie Grey’s daughter, Elodie.
The Radio Hauraki host and mother-of-two tells the podcast as she watched her eldest child grow and develop from baby to toddler to school-aged, “I couldn’t quite work it out.”
Even for parents aware of nuerodivergent traits, it can be difficult to differentiate developmental behaviours, such as typical tantrums, from what might be a sign of something else going on.
“I thought her meltdowns were just normal,” recalls Grey. “I thought, okay, parenting style, I’m doing it wrong. Then you’ve got your outsiders and well-meaning family members. ‘Oh you just need to be more disciplined ... set boundaries.’ She had boundaries.”
Grey and her daughter, Elodie, 5.
Eventually, she decided her daughter wasn’t experiencing “regular tantrums. She was having a blimmin tough time. She wasn’t coping with certain things.”
Stepping outside of routines presented challenges and while Grey recalls people telling her, “that’s just kids. She’s just a toddler,” she felt like it was something “a little more” than that for her daughter.
But getting a child seen and diagnosed is “really, really hard work.”
“It’s such a vast, broad topic and I’ve been thrown into the deep end in the last couple of years,” she says.
“We were really lucky to have an incredible nanny who came from a family with ADHD in the family. She said, ‘Have you ever thought about ADHD because you know it presents totally differently in girls?’”
Grey says her daughter would “hyper-focus on things and line up all her toys in a row.” In some settings she was outspoken and extroverted, delighting adults with her adorable confidence and curiosity. But at other times, when she was anxious, she would “go mute”, says Grey.
The journey to a diagnosis for Grey’s little girl saw them visit a raft of specialists, from an ear, nose and throat doctor to a naturopath, a sleep specialist, a child psychologist to assess Grey and her husband’s parenting skills and an occupational therapist.
Meanwhile, as Grey read up on certain neurodivergent conditions, she said it felt like she was “reading a novel” about her own life.
To find out how Grey discovered her and her daughter’s neurodivergence and what she’s implemented to support her little girl listen to today’s episode of One Day You’ll Thank Me below.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes are out every Thursday.
