Angelina Grey On Raising A Neurodivergent Daughter

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.”

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?’”

To find out how Angie discovered her and her daughter’s neurodivergence and what she’s implemented to support her little girl, listen the below episode of One Day You’ll Thank Me.