Elyssa Hunter

About Me

I’m a neurodivergent MSW student offering care grounded in curiosity about the assumptions behind how we make sense of ourselves in/and the world. I’m drawn to the power of re-authoring our stories – transforming the words told about us into narratives that are more authentic and meaningful. I offer collaborative care that honours your knowledge and goals in our time together.

Many of us carry stories that were never ours to begin with. These stories may have been shaped by ableism, cultural pressures, systemic exclusion, and may have been expressed through a lifetime (so far) of masking to survive. Therapy, for me, is an invitation to pause, reflect, and question our inherited narratives. It’s also a space to imagine and name new possibilities aligned with your values, needs, and ways of being.

My approach to care strives to be collaborative and anti-oppressive. I honour your knowledge of your own life and centre your goals for what you’re seeking in our work together. I’m particularly attuned to the unique needs of neurodivergent folx (as we all are at Scattergram), including those who are later-identified*, multiply marginalized, navigating identity questions, complexities around unmasking, or feeling unseen by dominant neurodiversity representation. I strive to hold space for nuance, complexity and uncertainty, grounded in a both/and approach.

My therapeutic orientation is grounded in disability justice, narrative therapy, and anti-oppressive practice. I see each person as an expert in their own experience and aim to create a space that feels relational, flexible, and non-pathologizing. My lens is always evolving, and I’m committed to learning, unlearning, and the in-between-ness of these seemingly opposing processes.

Outside of practice, I find joy in baking, writing, dancing, and walking/running/cycling while reflecting in nature and/or blasting music in my headphones (when it’s safe). As a student, my thesis focuses on how time norms marginalize neurodivergent student experiences, and how we, as neurodivergent students, may critically imagine time otherwise.

*I use “identified” because I believe medical authority need not be centred in our discourses on this topic. At the same time, I hold that people may feel validation with diagnosis, and I welcome how others want to identify themselves.