Mental Health &
Suicide Prevention

Gabrie’le has been working with various NAMI chapters to speak about autism, ADHD, neurodiversity, mental health, and the experiences that can exist where these areas intersect.

Rather than discussing neurodiversity as an isolated subject, her presentations examine how neurological differences may intersect with a person’s emotional well-being, identity, relationships, healthcare experiences, self-advocacy, and sense of belonging.

These conversations create space to discuss not only neurodivergent differences and strengths, but also what can happen when people spend years feeling misunderstood, unsupported, excluded, or pressured to hide natural parts of themselves.

The goal is not to suggest that neurodivergence automatically causes a mental health crisis. Instead, the work explores how environments, stigma, barriers to care, isolation, rejection, and lack of appropriate support can affect emotional well-being.

Autism and ADHD influence far more than a diagnostic label. They may affect communication, sensory processing, attention, executive functioning, emotional regulation, relationships, education, employment, healthcare experiences, and everyday life.

When those differences are misunderstood, people may repeatedly hear that they are too sensitive, difficult, lazy, dramatic, distracted, antisocial, disruptive, or simply not trying hard enough.

Some people respond by learning to mask—carefully monitoring their movements, communication, emotions, interests, sensory needs, or personality in an effort to appear more acceptable to the people around them.

Someone may appear outwardly calm, successful, independent, or highly capable while privately experiencing exhaustion, loneliness, overwhelm, anxiety, depression, or significant emotional distress.

This is one reason Gabrie’le believes mental health must remain part of the larger neurodiversity conversation.

Suicide prevention includes emergency intervention, but prevention can also begin much earlier.

It can begin when someone is believed instead of dismissed. It can begin when accommodations are provided without humiliation. It can begin when a person has somewhere safe to belong, someone willing to listen, access to appropriate mental health support, and the ability to exist without constantly defending who they are.

Prevention can look like accessible healthcare, affordable evaluations, supportive schools, compassionate workplaces, strong communities, reduced stigma, appropriate mental health services, and conversations where people do not have to pretend they are okay in order to be accepted.

Gabrie’le’s advocacy encourages people to recognize that belonging can be an important protective factor. Creating environments where people know they matter is part of creating healthier and more supportive communities.

This work is personal to Gabrie’le.

Her advocacy is informed not only by professional experience and education, but by her own experiences navigating autism, ADHD, mental health challenges, misunderstanding, and moments when meaningful support made a profound difference in her life.

Sharing those experiences allows her to speak about these subjects as human experiences rather than statistics alone.

She wants people who may feel different, overwhelmed, misunderstood, or alone to know that needing support does not diminish their value and that a difficult chapter does not represent the entirety of their story.