Pascale Doherty-Haigh is a Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying) with a background in behavioural neuroscience and lived experience as a late-diagnosed AuDHD adult. She facilitates the ACCEPT Adult Intensives series with Scattergram Counselling & Consulting. The virtual series consists of multiple pillars, each five weeks in length, for neurodivergent adults seeking knowledge and community. In this interview, Pascale talks about how she got involved with these groups, what makes them different, who they are for, and why she thinks it might be the thing you didn’t know you needed.

Can you tell us a little about who you are and what brought you to this work?

I’m Pascale, a Psychotherapist working with Scattergram, and I’m also autistic and ADHD (AuDHD). I originally did my education in behavioural neuroscience and conducted research on the brain before finding my way into therapy. When I got my own diagnosis, I went looking for support and kept running into the same wall: providers who just genuinely did not understand what it means to be neurodivergent. I’d spend half the session explaining how I experienced the world to someone who couldn’t quite follow. I’d intellectualize and mask without anyone noticing. I’d be given strategies that felt like they were built for a completely different brain, and when they didn’t work, I’d start to think I was bad at therapy. Or lazy. Or that something was just deeply wrong with me.

That’s a wild thing to feel in a space that’s supposed to support your mental health. And it’s incredibly common for neurodivergent people. That experience is a big reason I became a therapist, and it’s a big reason I believe so deeply in this group.

What does it mean to you to be a late-diagnosed AuDHD person facilitating a group specifically for neurodivergent adults?

It means everything, honestly. I first came to this group as a participant, then as an assistant facilitator, and eventually as the senior facilitator. And I have to say, it is often the best part of my week. 

There are many therapeutic groups out there, and that’s great, truly. But there’s very little out there for neurodivergent adults, especially late-diagnosed adults who have spent decades not having the language for their own experience. We need a space that’s just for us. A place where neurodivergence is the norm, not the exception. Where you can spend two hours learning about your own brain alongside people who truly get it, not just intellectually, but in their bones. The struggles and also the neurodivergent joys. That is such a rare and beautiful thing to have during your week.

Being able to offer that to people is a genuine breath of fresh air. It brings me so much joy.

What did you wish had existed for you when you first got your diagnosis?

Neurodivergent-affirming care from someone who actually gets it. A space where I could come in and start talking about sensory stuff right away, or about what the world feels like to me, the rejection sensitivity, the isolation, the exhaustion of burnout, but also the love of having such a rich internal world and the joy of hyperfixations. Someone to talk to who is on the same level. I wanted acceptance, understanding, and tools that worked for me. That’s it, really. That’s what I wished for, and that’s what I try to offer.

How is this group different from individual therapy and how is it different from a regular support group?

In individual therapy, we’re diving into you specifically: your history, your relationships, your day-to-day functioning, the deeper emotional work. It’s personal and can be wide-ranging.

This group is something different. I’d call it a mix between psychoeducation and community building. We have a theme for each session, a structured flow, real content, and then big, rich discussions where people share how a concept shows up in their own lives, what’s worked for them, and what hasn’t. As a neuroscience person, I love bringing in the actual brain science: this is what’s happening in your nervous system, here’s how we work with it instead of against it.

And the community piece is just huge. Every single group, someone will say “I thought I was the only one. I thought something was wrong with me.” That moment, hearing it reflected back by a room full of people who actually get it, is something individual therapy just can’t replicate.

What does a typical session feel like from the inside?

Pretty casual, honestly. Some people have their cameras on, some don’t. Some are sitting at a desk, some are curled up in a blanket. The expectation is that you accommodate yourself in whatever way works best for you. If you want to make art at the same time, amazing. If you need to have your camera off and zero eye contact, that is completely fine.

We talk. We go off on tangents when the group is interested in something. If we don’t finish the content one day, we finish it the next, because the sessions are supposed to work for the group, not the other way around.

What do you do to make the group feel safe for people who have been burned by clinical spaces before?

This is such an important question, because so many neurodivergent people have been burned. I do believe that this is usually not from malice, but from providers who just don’t understand, giving strategies that simply don’t work for our brains or letting ignorance come out in ways that feel dismissive or even insulting.

At Scattergram, we take a very strengths-based approach while also being honest about the ways mental health and medical systems have failed many neurodivergent people. I use self-disclosure when appropriate, but more importantly, I use a lot of validation. There is genuinely not enough validation out there for the experiences of systemic ableism.

Is this group right for someone who has never done any group work before?

Absolutely. We’ve had many people come in who have never done a group before. We’ve also had people who have done groups and hated them, because those groups were neurotypical-led and designed for a brain system that isn’t ours. There are no expectations of knowing how to “do” a group.

We send the full session structure in advance, along with the slides and materials, so you can read through everything beforehand, or after, or both. We also send recordings for people who want to review or who miss a session. It’s designed to be easy to jump into, with a genuinely welcoming community waiting for you.

Someone is interested but nervous. What would you say to them?

I’d say: give it a shot. As neurodivergent people, we put ourselves in uncomfortable situations for neurotypical people all the time. Do this for yourself, to give yourself the chance to find community, learn about your own brain, and find true joy in your neurotype.

There are so many ways to improve quality of life: eating well, getting outside, doing things you love. These are spoken about often. However, community is something so many neurodivergent people have written off as simply not available to them. And it is available! Each pillar is only five sessions, so if it’s not for you, you’re not locked in. But I think you’ll get something from it either way. 

What if someone doesn’t have an official diagnosis?

Totally fine. Self-diagnosis is incredibly valid. The pathway to a formal diagnosis can be extremely difficult and expensive to navigate, that’s just the reality of the current system. If neurodivergence feels like something you identify with, this is a space for you. And frankly, if it turns out you have subclinical traits, no harm done, the content and the community are still going to be meaningful. 

How neurodivergent-friendly is the format itself: the tech, the pacing, the structure?

I think extremely so. We use Zoom, which most people are comfortable with post-pandemic, and we offer private walkthroughs for anyone who has concerns about joining. We send materials in advance to support predictability. We do turn-taking to make sure everyone has space to speak, and people can tell us in advance if they don’t want to be called upon. All discussion questions are written out so people who process better visually don’t have to rely on auditory processing alone. There’s a body break every session at the half-way mark. Perhaps most importantly, the pacing follows the group. If something needs more time, we take it and if something isn’t landing, we move on.

What do you hope participants walk away with after all three pillars?

Fundamentally, this group is grounded in showing that neurodivergence is not a flaw to be corrected, it’s a difference. It is an evolutionary shift that comes with real challenges, yes, but also with real gifts.

From the first pillar, understanding. By that I mean an understanding of your neurodivergent operating system: what’s actually going on in your brain, how to make sense of your sensory world, and how to work with your own strengths and challenges.

From the second pillar, communication-based insight and skills. Here we focus on how to navigate cross-neurotype communication (between neurodivergent and neurotypical people), but also across different neurodivergences. We explore how to be powerful and loving and clear and how to stop taking on all the burden of translation.

From the third pillar, connection. For such a base human need, so much of our community is isolated and feels profoundly alone. The goal is for participants to walk away with tools and confidence to seek connection, with themselves and with others, and doing that with some of the shame stripped away, some of the ableist rhetoric loosened. 

What does “working with your brain, not against it” actually look like in practice?

For anyone who has tried a strategy they found online, or in a self-help book aimed at neurotypical people, you’ll recognize the feeling. It sounds good, you’re motivated, you try it, and it’s like pulling teeth. That’s what working against your brain feels like. Working with your brain begins with neurodivergent neuroscience, such as taking into account how the ADHD brain’s motivation system works, how the autistic nervous system processes sensory input, or how reward and novelty function differently for us. Then, we build strategies that are designed around those realities. If you’re motivated by novelty, a rigid daily routine is never going to stick. If you need predictability, a constantly changing system will exhaust you. The science gives us real insight into how to build a life that actually works for YOU. 

What’s a moment that made you think “this is why this work matters?”

Season after season, we have so many conversations where people are going between laughter and tears, realizing “I thought it was just me. I thought there was something wrong with me. And there’s not. I was just neurodivergent.” That is huge. That shift, that moment of recognition and relief, watching people find each other in that experience, that is what it’s all for. 

Why you, for this group, at this moment?

This group was one of the first places I began unmasking in front of other people and I get to watch it happen for others, too. Some people come in who have never really masked that heavily. For others, this is one of the first places they ever feel like they can take off the mask and just be themselves, this version that they had come to believe was too alien and too much to be seen and accepted by others.

Having actually lived that, having been through so many of these same things, I feel like I can genuinely meet people where they are. And then I can bring in my insights from my background in neuroscience and psychotherapy. We’re intense people, we feel a lot. There’s so much to work with, and I love working with it.

I also think the timing matters. So many people are getting late diagnoses right now, or discovering for the first time that neurodivergent-affirming care even exists. They find out that mental health support doesn’t have to be about making you more “palatable” or more neurotypical-passing. Instead it is genuinely about asking: how do you find happiness? How do you find joy and curiosity and connection in a world that hasn’t felt like it was built for you?

That’s what this group is for.