Category: Blog Posts

Today, we’re uncovering a myth that’s rarely talked about—how autistic women often mask so well that they end up over-accommodating others to the detriment of their health.

One woman on the Autistic Culture Podcast recently said something that stopped me in my tracks. She claimed that if a male boss offered her a 15-hour-a-day job where she got no credit for her work, she’d jump at the opportunity. She thought this was a gender-only issue, when in fact, it is both a gender and autism issue—but I see the tragedy of this pattern all the time.

The Double Standard in Masking: Autistic Women vs. Autistic Men

Women in general are better at masking than men, but for autistic women, this ability often backfires. While little autistic boys may be allowed to be goofy—especially if they excel at math, video games, or rebuilding engines—autistic girls are often shunned for not “looking” or behaving like NT girls.

One of my high school friends carried a man’s leather briefcase to class instead of a purse, and it made her a social outcast. Another woman I knew earned a Ph.D. in paleontology and actually fit in fairly well because she was brilliant—but she spoke too loudly and had no friends. Autistic women are often overlooked or dismissed in professional and social spaces, not because they lack intelligence or skill, but because they fail to match NT expectations.

The Hidden Struggles of Autistic Women

Many autistic women experience profound challenges in connecting with others, even within their own families. One young woman on the Autism Spectrum told me that she tried to tell her mother about her autism by sending her TikTok videos. But her mother, who was in the midst of divorcing her autistic father, still didn’t understand. This same 22-year-old described how she would memorize five topics before going to a party so she would have something to talk about—as if conversation was just talking rather than a dynamic exchange.

She also spoke about the fatigue of masking all day at school as a child. While other kids played outside after school, she went home to take a nap. In her desperation to connect with her mother, she remembers making the decision to invent a thought when her mother asked what she was thinking. She knew she couldn’t tell her mother that she was mesmerized by the serrations of a leaf lying on the ground by the picnic table and wasn’t actually engaging in conversation.

Real Stories of Over-Accommodation

• Autistic women often experience hormonal imbalances that lead to PMDD (premenstrual dysphoric disorder). My daughter, Bianca, would faint and have to sleep in the nurse’s office until I could pick her up and bring her home. This connection between autism and hormonal regulation is rarely discussed but has a significant impact on quality of life. I’ll be exploring this topic in more depth in a future episode, as it’s an essential part of understanding the unique challenges faced by autistic women.
• A woman who would call in sick to help her boyfriend get to work on time, even though he lived across town and routinely overslept.
• A woman who suffered severe hair loss and digestive problems trying to accommodate a demanding boss. She only realized she was autistic at age 45—when she came to my office for hypnosis and finally got a proper diagnosis.

Autistic women, particularly those who mask well, often become people-pleasers to their own detriment. Liane Holliday Willey, in her book Pretending to Be Normal, describes this experience—how masking allows autistic women to blend in but at a profound personal cost. They comply so thoroughly with societal expectations that they don’t recognize when their own needs aren’t being met, leading to emotional exhaustion and burnout.

Breaking Free from the Over-Accommodation Trap

The solution isn’t to tell autistic women to stop caring—it’s about helping them set boundaries, recognize their needs, and advocate for themselves without guilt.

Today, we’re diving into a harsh reality: when standing up for the truth doesn’t just cost you relationships—it makes you a target.

What happens when people don’t just dismiss you, but actively try to destroy you? What happens when exposing wrongdoing leads to retaliation?

The Backlash of Speaking the Truth

Years ago, I stood behind a client who had discovered child pornography on her husband’s computer. Worse, she found a hidden drive behind a ceiling tile, under a gun, with even more child pornography—including photos of their own four-year-old daughter.

The FBI got involved, but through a legal technicality, this man was never charged. Furious and determined to get even, he decided to ruin me. He created a website in my name, posting lies and derogatory information about me, twisting my divorce and the estrangement from my daughters into a weapon against me. He kept this up for ten years—until he finally stopped paying for the domain.

This is the price of standing up to powerful, manipulative people. And it’s a price too many of us are forced to pay.

The True Cost of Truth

• Exposing the truth doesn’t always mean people will thank you—it often means they’ll come after you.
• People in power will do anything to protect their status, even if that means silencing you.
• Retaliation can take many forms: smear campaigns, online harassment, legal threats, and even character assassination.

The Full-Scale Retaliation

Howard didn’t just lie to the children—he enlisted the legal community to work against me. He spoke privately to City Prosecutor Josephine Townsend, telling her that I was a narcissist who had no respect for authority. This made her all the more determined to punish me.

His divorce attorney, Danni Liebman, was so convinced that I was evil that she called my attorney, Bob Yoseph, and screamed at him, ‘How can you represent that Bitch!?’

Howard was so influential that even 20 years later, his former law partner, Mike Roe, told one of my clients that I was ‘bat-shit crazy.’

But he didn’t stop there. Howard filed complaints with my licensing board, trying to destroy my professional reputation and career. Then, in his annulment petition with the Catholic Church—despite not being Catholic himself—he described me as:

• An unfit mother who alienated her own children.
• A narcissist with undiagnosed mental disorders.
• Someone totally incapable of a loving relationship.

He was so convincing that the local Archdiocese planned to hold a Catholic trial, with witnesses lined up to testify against me.

It didn’t seem to matter how outrageous the complaints against me were—people ran with the gossip, and Howard capitalized on it. Once a rumor takes hold, people will believe what they want to believe, no matter how absurd.

This was not just about revenge—it was about erasing my credibility, my work, and my identity. Retaliation can escalate beyond gossip—it can infiltrate legal, professional, and religious institutions. When an abuser is highly persuasive, they enlist others to attack their target.

How to Survive Retaliation

For ten years, I had to endure a man publicly smearing my name, distorting my life story, and trying to turn my pain into his entertainment. But over time, something surprising happened. People started calling me—not to harass me, but to book appointments. They saw what I had survived and wanted to work with a therapist who had that kind of resilience.

The truth has a way of resurfacing—even when people try to bury it.

Retaliation can feel overwhelming, but it’s designed to break you—don’t let it. The people who attack you want you to react emotionally and impulsively. Instead of fighting fire with fire, step back and choose a response that protects your dignity and your future.

Key Lessons

• Document Everything: Keep records of harassment, threats, or false accusations.
• Stay the Course: The more you live your truth, the more their lies will lose power over you.
• Find Your Support System: Isolation makes retaliation more effective—don’t face it alone.
• Recognize the Long Game: Retaliation isn’t just about hurting you in the moment—it’s about making you quit. Refuse to quit.

Reclaiming Your Power

The ultimate revenge is not winning a battle—it’s living well despite the war. You don’t have to clear your name to move forward—you only have to be true to yourself.

The best way to silence your enemies isn’t to fight them. It’s to thrive so loudly that their lies become irrelevant.

People will try to rewrite your story. They will twist your words, turn your past into a weapon, and make you the villain in their own narrative. But here’s what they don’t realize: They don’t get to write your ending.

You do.

In this blog, we will talk about what happens when the truth doesn’t set you free—when gossip spreads, when you lose the people you love, and when the only way forward is to let go.

It’s unfortunate, but there is something many of us have faced: gossip that takes on a life of its own. Rumors don’t just fade—they spread, they grow, and sometimes, no matter how much truth you present, people believe what they want to believe. But here’s the real question: Does that mean you stop living your life? Or do you rise above it?

The Nature of Gossip

Years ago, I had a client who was trapped in an abusive marriage. She finally got the courage to seek out an attorney. But when she met with him, she was blindsided. He told her, ‘Oh no, you’re seeing her? She’s bat-shit crazy.’

That lawyer was Mike Roe—a former law partner of my ex-husband Howard. And he had been feeding off the same gossip Howard spread about me for years. This woman sat across from him, looking for help, looking for someone to fight for her, and instead, she was met with a wall of bias, built from rumors that had nothing to do with her.

Why does this matter?

• Gossip isn’t just words—it’s a tool. A way for people to control a narrative. A way to keep you in a box of their choosing.
• Some people thrive on gossip because it makes them feel powerful. It creates a social order where they get to decide who is ‘good’ and who is ‘bad.’
• And when you challenge that order, when you break free from their expectations, they don’t just let you go—they try to pull you back down.

Questions for Reflection

• How many times have people judged you based on what they’ve heard, rather than who you actually are?
• How many times have you fought to prove yourself to people who have already made up their minds?

The truth is—when gossip is set in motion, it’s nearly impossible to stop. So what do you do? You stop trying to prove yourself to people who refuse to see you.

The Cost of Gossip & the Decision to Rise Above

Howard didn’t just gossip about me to friends or lawyers—he took it into the courtroom. He told the judge I was just trying to get more money. He denied that our daughters had special needs. I cried in that courtroom, fighting for them. I had to bring in doctors, specialists, educators—all to prove what I had known all along.

The judge was stunned. But it didn’t matter. The damage was done. Howard kept up the smear campaign, and my daughters—my own daughters—turned away from me.

That’s the price of gossip. It doesn’t just hurt your reputation. It can take away the people you love most.

But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this: If you need people to see the truth in order to feel free, you will never be free.

Why gossip can be dangerous

• Gossip can cost you friendships, jobs, even relationships with your own family.
• But the real danger isn’t just what people say about you—it’s what you let it do to you.
• If you spend your life trying to erase lies, you’ll never have time to build the truth.

The Decision to Move Forward

Maybe you’ve been lied about. Maybe you’ve been smeared, abandoned, or betrayed. And maybe—just maybe—you’re still waiting for people to come around, to finally see you for who you are. But what if that never happens? Can you still live a full life? Can you still rise? The answer is yes. But only if you stop chasing the truth and start building your own path forward.

At some point, you have to decide: Do you keep fighting to be understood, or do you start living the life you were meant to live? You can’t control what others say, but you can control how much of your energy you give to it. The moment you stop needing people to see the truth, you take your power back.

Today, we’re revisiting an old blog post from March 2021, titled Why is it so hard for my ASD partner to take responsibility for their actions? This blog continues to receive comments and responses—93 so far—showing how relevant this issue remains.

Back in 2021, when I wrote that blog, I was in the midst of a major life transition—searching for a new home after once again being dislodged from a place I loved. That sense of loss and instability mirrored the struggles many NT partners feel when their ASD partners seem unwilling to take responsibility—like they feel all alone in life instead of having a partner.

Yet, over time, my perspective has evolved. Thanks to voices like Richard’s and Rob’s, we now have Empathy Triad Engaged as a new way of thinking about this. Both of these ASD men credit their NT wives for their patience, love, and guidance, exemplifying Radiant Empathy by taking action rather than avoiding conflict. I learned from Richard and Rob that I am not alone in this search to improve NeuroDivergent relationships. This isn’t just about blaming ASD partners for being emotionally unaware—it’s about engagement.

Richard and the Empathy Triad

First, let me remind you of how Richard redefined the Empathy Triad. In previous discussions, we’ve explored the concepts of Empathy Triad Sensitive and Empathy Triad Blind to describe varying levels of empathy in individuals. However, Richard, an individual on the Autism Spectrum, found this dichotomy limiting and introduced the concept of Empathy Triad Engaged. This term emphasizes the active participation and commitment required from both partners in a NeuroDivergent relationship to foster mutual understanding and growth.

Richard’s perspective highlights that empathy isn’t a static trait but a dynamic process that can be cultivated through conscious effort and engagement. By moving beyond passive awareness (Empathy Triad Sensitive) or lack of awareness (Empathy Triad Blind), Empathy Triad Engaged focuses on the deliberate actions taken to bridge the empathy gap. This approach encourages both partners to actively work together, fostering a deeper connection and more fulfilling relationship.

This evolution in understanding underscores the importance of moving forward and embracing new perspectives in NeuroDivergent relationships. It challenges both partners to engage actively, promoting personal growth and mutual empathy.

Rob is Committed to Growth

We’ll also highlight Rob’s responses to common criticisms, as he directly addresses concerns raised by other ASD individuals who feel misunderstood. Rob, like Richard, acknowledges his past struggles but is committed to growth. He states:

“When I was younger, I didn’t know how to have a healthy relationship or even true friends. I was callous and indifferent to so many situations and people because I didn’t know better. My NT wife has helped me a lot with this condition and has shown incredible levels of compassion. We (ASDs) are wired differently, and more often than not, we are way too focused on ourselves. It took me a long time to see this.”

He also shared another key realization:

“Took me a long time to see this… People on the spectrum who really want to improve will seek help and learn to be better and don’t let a disorder define who they are; the rest will remain in their bubble thinking that there’s nothing wrong with them.”

His wife’s unwavering support helped him recognize the impact of his behavior, a theme echoed by Richard. Rob further explained:

“Even before meeting my wife, I knew I was different, that there was something wrong with me. Now I am brave enough to admit it instead of using it as an excuse to hold me back in life. I am tired of people telling me that being ASD is like having a superpower—it is NOT. This condition has caused me a lot of trouble, and I wish I had known better when I was growing up.”

These NT wives exemplify Radiant Empathy by standing firm in their love while demanding engagement and accountability from their partners.

Finally, here’s a question to ponder: How can embracing the concept of Empathy Triad Engaged transform your relationship dynamics?

When someone asks me how children fare being raised by a parent on the Autism Spectrum, I think about my own childhood with a strong, smart, practical ‘Aspie’ mom and tell them that it wasn’t easy. As a child, and a NeuroTypical child at that, I longed for my mother’s love—a hug, a smile, a special secret only we shared—but instead, I got healthy food and dental checkups.

Today’s article takes a nostalgic and slightly humorous journey into my childhood, reflecting on life with a mother who, in hindsight, was likely on the Autism Spectrum—though never diagnosed. My mother, Irene, was a fiercely practical woman, shaped by her early years on the North Dakota prairie and the hardships she endured as the daughter of Ukrainian/German immigrants.

A Prairie Childhood

Mom really did walk miles through the snow to get to her one-room schoolhouse, and she didn’t speak English when she started because her family spoke a mashup of Ukrainian and German at home. Oddly, my grandfather listed himself as Hungarian on the U.S. Census when Mom was 11—perhaps an effort to protect his family during WWII, given that he had fled Ukraine as a teenager due to Russian pogroms. Mom lost her mother, Emilie, to diabetes when she was only two, a loss that shaped much of her life. She grew up “dirt poor,” as she used to say, sleeping on a mattress filled with corn husks and wearing dresses made from bleached flour sacks. She rode plow horses bareback for fun—because, yes, they had plow horses on the farm.

The Transition to Oregon

Mom and her father eventually left North Dakota for Oregon, where he worked in the shipyards building warships. As a teenager, Mom was expected to work, so she found jobs in cafes and later bars. She was beautiful, which helped her secure jobs in public service, but even as a child, I knew she was different from other mothers. She never hugged me, rarely spoke to me, and treated my sister and I as if we were livestock—feeding, clothing, and sheltering us, but without emotional connection.

A Life of Practicality

Mom was ahead of her time in some ways—she had a compost pile and a backyard vegetable garden in the city suburbs when no one else did. She grew herbs on the windowsill and snipped them into salads and stews. My toothbrush had natural boar bristles, which would break off in my mouth as I brushed with baking soda. She made sure I brushed my hair with a boar bristle brush, too, to distribute the natural oils.

She burned paper and cardboard in the fireplace and used the ashes in the garden. Everything was made from “scratch”—bread, pasta, even meals “stretched” with cottage cheese, beans, and tuna. Sugar was rare; a “dollop” of honey was her sweetener of choice. My after-school snacks consisted of apple slices and celery sticks, with an occasional whole-wheat fig cookie from the city’s only health food store. Every Wednesday, we had liver and onions, which I still detest.

Mom read voraciously, absorbing everything about nutrition and child-rearing—at least the physical aspects. She knew smoking was harmful when she was pregnant with us, even though people claim no one knew in the 1950s. But once we were born, she resumed smoking, unaware of secondhand smoke dangers. She was thrifty about her cigarette habit, not wanting waste money. She rolled her own cigarettes, and sometimes I helped, pinching the tobacco into the rolling machine.

Speaking of Frugality

Our dishes were Melmac—practical and unbreakable. If I got sick, I was sent to bed early to “sweat it out.” She gleaned fields for fruits and vegetables and canned everything, though I always found the pale peaches and gray cherries unsettling. She repaired almost anything with twine and bailing wire, a skill I’ve inherited. No fitted sheets back then—when our cotton sheets wore thin in the middle, she’d cut them in half and sew the outer edges together. Can you imagine sleeping on a seam?

She hated synthetic fabrics, convinced they caused cancer, so our pajamas and clothing were always cotton. She could replace the toilet seal, wash clothes with a wringer washer long after others had modern machines, and used Bluing instead of bleach. There was never a dishwasher—except for my sister and me.

Unsentimental but Brilliant

Mom never decorated the house, save for a patchwork of throw rugs sewn together for carpeting. She repurposed my dad’s dress shirts by removing the collars and cuffs to wear them for sun protection. She was a minimalist traveler—our entire family could pack into two small suitcases for a long road trip. Shoes were optional for her; she preferred sandals year-round so her feet could “breathe.”

The one time she volunteered at school, she took over the Safety Patrol equipment, using PTA funds to buy new reflective belts and flags. The annual Safety Patrollers party? — I hardly remember that.

Mom had opinions about everything—such as believing that if you didn’t use half-and-half in your coffee, you didn’t really like coffee. Or that the only reason her teenagers had acne was because they didn’t bathe properly.

A Life Cut Short

My mother died when I was 25. I had just started my first professional job after earning my Master’s in Social Work degree. Clearly, I had started the journey to find myself by helping others—a practical solution like Mom taught me. I sought out a therapist to help me with all the emotion bubbling up when I learned of her diagnosis. I still remember the phone call I got from her when she told me she had lung cancer. She called me at work—odd—she never called me at work or at home. So this call really sticks in my memory. I asked the therapist to help me process all of this, but all he offered was kindness and support. Years later, I realized when I was writing my first book that what I needed help with was that I was going to lose my mother before we ever connected.

Another distinctive memory is the day my mother made a surprise visit to my apartment. She brought a bouquet of flowers and a gift in a department store gift box. The gift was a beautiful tangerine-colored negligee. Odd gift from one’s mother, but I guess she thought it appropriate for her single daughter. I can’t remember any other gifts or surprise visits from Mom. It’s so ‘Aspie’-like to offer love once in a lifetime.

Mom died of lung cancer at 49, having tried countless ways to quit smoking. She was brilliant and pragmatic but emotionally distant. She would have defended me with her life, but I don’t have the warm, fuzzy memories that many daughters share. No bedtime stories, no cute mother-daughter moments. No albums filled with beautiful, shared memories. Instead she showed me how to work a sewing machine and then left me to figure out the rest.

My Mother’s Legacy

I had to grieve my life first. I was ashamed, always worried that I wouldn’t be loved. I had to be rejected by my own daughters and go through the anguish of losing them before I could come to terms with who I am—separate from the life I have lived. I am not a collection of experiences or memories but I am more about the meaning I have made of my life — the lessons, awareness, and values cultivated.

We often worry about how children fare in NeuroDivergent families, but if we focus too much on what is missing, we may overlook the gifts they receive from their NeuroDiverse parent. We have a lifetime to make sense of who we are, how we are shaped by our relationships and experiences. There are so many twists and turns that you are so much more than the way you were ‘raised.’ We humans make meaning out of life, and it is through that meaning we discover who we are and the mission we are destined to fulfill.

Despite the emotional detachment, I loved my mother deeply, and for years after she passed, I missed her.

I miss how clever she was and how sometimes she was outdone by her cleverness. For example, the time she bought bowling shoes for “cheap,” for my sister and I to wear to school. Even though she bought those bowling shoes on clearance for a dollar a pair, she didn’t count on them wearing out so quickly on our daily walks to and from school. Bowling shoes are designed for sliding, after all. She could entertain my cousins for hours with stories about the constellations, pointing out Orion’s Belt and the Milky Way, and yet forget that all of us kids were hungry.

But it was my quirky mother who introduced me to feminism, handing me books by Betty Friedan and others. She wanted to raise strong, resilient, independent young women—not held back by a patriarchy. ‘Girls can be anything they want!’ she would say.

Her practical, no-nonsense approach to life instilled in me an ability to adapt, to problem-solve, and to find creative solutions in unexpected ways. While I may not have warm, sentimental stories to pass down, I carry with me the strength, resourcefulness, and independence she modeled every day. In learning to navigate the world with her brand of love, I discovered resilience—a gift that continues to shape my life.

Others might remember their mothers through warmth, laughter, or the love that went into homemade cherry pies, but my memories are different. There were no bedtime stories or affectionate moments, yet I was shaped by her ‘Aspie’ love in a way that left its mark. She taught me resilience, ingenuity, and how to make the most of what I had—even if it came without sentimental flourishes.

Today, when I pick up my ball of twine to fix something, or look up at Orion and the Milky Way, I think of Mom—the practical, thrifty, and brilliant woman she was. I never got the bedtime kisses, but I inherited her ingenuity and resilience. That, in its own way, is a legacy too.

Have you ever had a conversation with someone who just couldn’t see beyond the rules, the logic, or the “right way” of doing things? No matter how much you tried to explain the human side of things, they just kept coming back to technical details and procedural correctness?

If so, you’ve experienced what it’s like to be in a NeuroDivergent relationship—or in an HOA meeting.

Today, we’re talking about what happens when rule-based thinking replaces human connection—whether in relationships, workplaces, or entire communities. We’ll explore why some people, especially those on the Autism Spectrum, tend to focus on transactional problem-solving rather than emotional engagement. And we’ll look at how this same rigid, rule-driven thinking leads to dysfunction in institutions like HOA Boards.

Why This Discussion Matters

People often assume that when a leader or partner refuses to acknowledge emotions, they’re being intentionally dismissive. But that’s not always the case.

In many cases, rigid, rule-driven minds simply don’t process emotional information the way NeuroTypical people do.

That’s why, in both NeuroDivergent relationships and bureaucratic institutions, we often see the same three major patterns of dysfunction:

• Rigid Rule Enforcement Over Common Sense
• Transactional Thinking Over Emotional Connection
• Mislabeling Assertiveness as Aggression

These patterns create serious misunderstandings in relationships, workplaces, and governance.

Let’s break them down.

Pattern #1: Rigid Rule Enforcement vs. Common Sense

Many NeuroDiverse individuals view the world in black-and-white terms. They follow rules literally because it gives them structure and predictability.

This can be helpful in certain fields—like engineering, software development, or law. But it becomes a problem when rules replace common sense and human connection.

This is exactly what happens in some NeuroDivergent relationships—and in some leadership positions.

For example, in my community, our HOA Board President is a software engineer who designs AI systems for a living. And he runs the HOA Board the same way he writes code—purely transactionally.

Here’s how it plays out:

• Instead of engaging in real conversations with homeowners, the Board only communicates through unsigned, anonymous emails.
• They refuse to take responsibility for past damage because they “didn’t know about it before.”
• They require homeowners to file formal complaints just to be heard, and ignore submissions that don’t cite a specific rule violation.

This isn’t just bad management. This is rule-based, transactional thinking at its worst.

And in relationships, this same pattern leads to emotional disconnects between NeuroDiverse and NeuroTypical partners.

A NeuroDiverse spouse might say:

• “I didn’t realize you were upset, so why are you bringing it up now?”
• “If you wanted me to do something differently, you should have told me at the time.”
• “I followed the plan exactly—what’s the problem?”

To a NeuroTypical partner, these responses feel dismissive. To a NeuroDiverse partner, these responses feel logical and fair.

And this is where Empathy Dysfunction (EmD) comes into play.

Pattern #2: Transactional Thinking vs. Emotional Connection

This is where the real disconnect happens.

People with Empathy Dysfunction (EmD) often struggle to:

• Recognize emotional cues in real time.
• Express their own emotions in a way that connects.
• Understand why people need emotional validation, not just solutions.

This is why some NeuroDiverse individuals—and some rigid, rules-based leaders—struggle to engage in meaningful emotional conversations.

This happened in my HOA when the Board finally acknowledged that runoff from their property had caused damage to mine.

Did they take responsibility? No.

The HOA President took an AI-driven approach:

• He agreed to fix the problem moving forward, but refused to compensate me for the damage already done.
• He claimed that because he was unaware of the issue for years, he had no responsibility for past harm.
• He treated the situation as a technical repair, not a human issue that had affected my home, my finances, and even my dog’s health.

His wife, Vikki, an IT manager for a government agency, took a similar approach:

• “I just found out about this problem three months ago, and I need time to process it.”
• “I don’t see why I have to pay for something that happened a long time ago. Can’t we just move forward?”

To them, only newly discovered problems are “real” problems. But to those of us living with the consequences, that logic is deeply frustrating.

This is Empathy Dysfunction at work.

This isn’t about malice or indifference. It’s about how some minds process responsibility.

Pattern #3: Mislabeling Assertiveness as Aggression

When NeuroTypical partners—or frustrated homeowners—push back against rigid, rule-based decisions, they are often misinterpreted as being hostile, aggressive, or unreasonable.

• HOA Example: Homeowners who demand transparency from the Board are labeled “difficult” or “troublemakers.”
• NeuroDivergent Relationship Example: A NeuroTypical partner tries to have an emotional conversation, but their intensity is perceived as an attack.

Why does this happen?

Because rigid thinkers struggle to process emotional nuance.

To them, all heightened emotions—frustration, urgency, sadness—feel like criticism or hostility.

This is why real conversations never happen in these systems.

And this is why we need to shift from transactional management to interactional leadership.

Final Reflection Question

“If someone only acknowledges problems once they become aware of them—but refuses to take responsibility for the emotional or financial harm caused before that—how does that affect trust?

And if empathy isn’t naturally there, how do we bridge that gap?”