Masking, Over-Functioning and the Shame That Keeps You Stuck

If you've always felt like everyone else got an unwritten handbook about how to behave at work - and you've had to figure it out yourself, one interaction at a time - this episode is for you.

This week, Rachel’s in conversation with Kirstie Pickles: vet, autistic ADHD professional, and EDI advocate. Kirstie was diagnosed as an adult - after years of masking in a high-stakes clinical role, performing competence while running on empty underneath.

We talk about:

• What masking really costs - not just after one hard day, but across a career
• Neurodivergent burnout: why it is different from regular burnout, and why the usual advice doesn't work
• The shame of late diagnosis - and what it means to finally have a name for it
• What colleagues and leaders can do to make workplaces work for everyone

You don't need a diagnosis to recognise yourself here. A lot of us in high-achieving, high-pressure roles have neurodivergent traits we have never had a name for. We just learned to mask through it.

Our ingrained programming tells us to keep performing, keep adapting, keep looking like we're coping fine. But that performance has a cost - and it will affect your next decision, and the one after that.

Different is not defective.

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