The Misunderstood Mind: What We Got Wrong About Autism, ADHD, and Neurodivergence

The problem isn't the human mind.
It's how we've been taught to understand it.

For generations, autism, ADHD, dyslexia, and other forms of neurodivergence have been viewed through frameworks that emphasized deficits, pathology, and limitations. While many neurodivergent individuals experience very real disabilities and significant daily challenges, those frameworks have often overlooked the whole person, shaping systems that fail to recognize both differences and strengths.

The Misunderstood Mind examines how we arrived here—and why it's time for a new way of thinking about neurodiversity.

Drawing on decades of professional experience, research, history, and her own lived experience with ADHD, relationship expert, educator, and author Jodi Carlton challenges long-held assumptions about autism, ADHD, disability, intelligence, behavior, and human difference. Through compelling stories, scientific research, and historical context, she offers readers a compassionate, evidence-informed framework that replaces assumptions with understanding.

Inside you'll discover:

How our understanding of neurodiversity has evolved—and where it still falls short. Why strengths and challenges often arise from the same neurological wiring. How systems, environments, and expectations can either support or disable people with different neurotypes. Why many conflicts stem from differences in communication and perception rather than a lack of love or effort. How history, culture, medicine, education, and media have shaped the way we understand neurodivergent minds. Practical ways to build more supportive families, schools, workplaces, healthcare systems, and communities.

Praise for The Misunderstood Mind

"...guiding readers away from blame and toward the framework of double empathy."
—Eva A. Mendes, LPC
Author of Marriage and Lasting Relationships with Asperger's Syndrome and Armchair Conversations on Love and Autism

"The Misunderstood Mind will be especially useful for parents, teachers, and therapists to introduce them to the concept of neurodiversity."
—Temple Grandin, PhD
Author of Visual Thinking and The Autistic Brain

"...there is hope beyond despair, confusion, and struggle... Praise for Jodi's easy-reading style, lived experience examples, and the possibility it creates to expand the experience of being human rather than pathologise it."
—Natalie Roberts
Neurodiverse Relationship Coach and Co-host of the Mythbusting Neurodiverse Relationships Podcast

"Everybody in a neurodivergent person's life should read this book to try to see things through their eyes, especially those in the medical and therapeutic fields... I was surprised to read things like 'When the environment fits, the brain performs.' The stories helped me understand my husband in ways I never had before."
—Mabel S., Neurotypical Spouse

"Reading this book left me with two regrets: that I wasn't properly diagnosed as being neurodivergent while in my teens... and that I didn't have this book to help me understand myself when I first suspected that I was neurodivergent."
—Joe, Late-Diagnosed Autistic

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Whether you are neurodivergent yourself, love someone who is, are raising a neurodivergent child, work with neurodivergent individuals, or simply want a deeper understanding of the remarkable diversity of the human mind, The Misunderstood Mind offers a fresh perspective on one of the most important conversations of our time.

Because understanding changes everything.