Breaking Barriers: Maria Davis-Pierre on Race, Autism, and Advocacy in the Black Community

Mark (: 00:00

Hi Maria.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 00:00

Hello.

Hi, how are you doing? Doing well.

Mark (: 00:03

Good, how are

Welcome to the show.

That's usually your line, right? Yes. ⁓ Yeah, you're on the other side, which is great though, because there's so much to share.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 00:12

Yes, usually. A little different today.

Mark (: 00:23

I've been diving into your background and your credentials for two days now. it's just like, just one thing keeps leading me to another thing, to another thing. There's about 50 to 55 questions at least that I want to ask you, but we can't get to all of them today. It's incredible. I'm so, really excited to have you on the show today. And thank you for reaching out to be a part of this and to allow me to be a part of your story.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 00:39

you ⁓

Mark (: 00:49

It's what I hope to be able to do for people. so you do this for others and I want to give it back to you. So here we are.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 00:58

Thank you, I'm very excited. whatever you want to ask, I'm game. I'm an open book, so.

Mark (: 01:05

Okay, what's your favorite color?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 01:08

Pink

is my, I like to say my color of choice. My signature color, my kids say favorite, like, you know, I think I like signature color, but it's

Mark (: 01:23

because it's what's associated with you so much. It's not necessarily your favorite.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 01:27

And green is associated with everything I do because of the business, but pink is my signature.

Mark (: 01:34

Okay,

that's interesting, I like that. See, this is why I love to meet people and talk to them. It's a whole other perspective. I would just say my favorite is orange and I would have left it there, but I love that perspective, it's really great. It's a lot more thought that went into it. Well, so happy to have you here today and there's so much to talk about. And I think what I really want to focus on is the idea of like the...

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 01:38

Thank

Yeah.

Mark (: 02:00

The intersection of race, autism, and advocacy

⁓ I wanna hear about your background and what brought you to this place. And I know that you have your own personal experiences with autism and maybe you could speak a little bit about that as well, but maybe just start with your background. Great.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 02:22

For me and my background, so I'm going to try to keep the story concise because I can be long-winded, but I am a licensed therapist. That is my professional background. had no specific niche in autism ⁓ early on in my career until we had our first child. And then around six months, I noticed

signs and characteristics that I believe to be related to autism. I think my background as a clinician really helped me with those characteristics. I brought it to my husband. My husband was like, go diagnose your clients, not my kid type of deal. So I put a pause on it for that time. But then in months, she actually started regressing. So she stopped speaking.

All of the words that she was saying, she wasn't saying them anymore and that was a high alert for me. And we started the process of trying to get her diagnosis. And in the eight months it took to get her diagnosis, we went to her pediatrician, which led us to early steps. It could be called something different depending on the state you're in, but it is the government ran program that you go to and they...

Mark (: 03:20

Sure.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 03:42

have all the professionals in there looking at developmental milestones. They said, yes, we do think she's autistic, but she's too young. So you need to go see a pediatric neurologist. Went to the pediatric neurologist. He did all this testing on her to the point where she had to be put to sleep for an MRI for a scan of her brain. And he said, yes, I do think she's autistic, but I want to wait until she is three to give her a diagnosis.

And at that point, I was like, no, we're not going to do that. I'm not going wait another year and a half. Everybody's agreeing that we do believe she is autistic. She's not going to not be autistic in a year and a half. And at that point, she'll be out of early intervention phase. So I'm not doing it. So it led to me actually boycotting in his office for a week.

Mark (: 04:28

Mm-hmm. Right.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 04:36

I went there every single day and just sat in his office to get that paperwork. It got to the point that he actually started taking a different route to come in his office. He started taking the back door. And it wasn't until his other patients started questioning while I was in there, because I didn't have a child with me. in a pediatric neurologist office. I don't have a kid with me. They're asking, and I'm telling them, I'm just waiting for

diagnosis paperwork so I can start the process of getting services for my kid. When I started talking to other parents, he went and got the paperwork, gave it to me, and told me to go on my way. So after about five days, yeah, he gave me the paperwork. And that is what really started the process of getting into advocacy work, niching down into autism, and then niching down to autism in black.

Mark (: 05:17

Good for you, that's awesome.

it's really so disturbing to think that it would take him five full days of you sitting there. And it points to, statistics that say, black children are diagnosed later with autism and services are, are not provided in the same way that they are for white people. And I definitely want to get into that discussion with you and

And I thought we could, we would get there, but I almost feel like I want to start there with you since this is of where we are at this point. it obviously, as you were implying it, was going to impact early intervention. You were going to miss the early intervention years. And those are critical, in your work, how common is this, you're coming across these experiences in these cases?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 06:13

very common when it comes to my daughter getting her, so she actually got her diagnosis at a year and a half, which is very early in the black community. So she is considered, you know, a unicorn, right? But the process by which I had to go through to get that diagnosis is not uncommon. Every single...

Mark (: 06:23

Right. Okay.

Yeah.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 06:37

person who I have impacted through autism in black has a very similar story to mine. It may not end with them boycotting in the office, but it does go through all of the channels of trying to get a diagnosis. Most of my clients are receiving diagnosis in elementary school and higher. And we know by that time, early intervention is long gone and we're not getting those years back. And most of the time it's the school

⁓

flagging the client.

as, we need to go and start the process of special education. The parents have been to the medical side of it many, and many, and many times. But as the research also shows, it can take up to two years after a Black parent goes to their health care ⁓ professional and states that, hey, I think something is going on here for that health care professional to take them serious. So this is very common in the work that I do. It's very rare for me to actually have a client

whose child was diagnosed as early as mine.

Mark (: 07:46

brings up many, questions for me. Initially, when you said that you were getting your child evaluated so young, it did stick out to me like, wow, what was your privilege, right? How did you get so lucky? so how did that happen, number one? And then number two, why did these delays persist, you think? And I mean, we're gonna get into

discussing implicit biases and it obviously already comes into the conversation right now. So I mean I'm going to let you just kind of go off on this because I really feel like this is a really the message that needs to get out there and the thing that's impacting your community so much.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 08:22

Thank you. I think the difference, the main difference from my family and many others is that I am a licensed clinician and my husband is a physician. So we are talking to our colleagues. We know the back end of what is going on when we're coming in these rooms. So yes, we are talking to a professional, but we're also talking to a peer at that point. So we know, we know the research, we know what's going on.

Mark (: 08:35

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 08:51

I knew the characteristics of autism. So I knew what I was seeing very early on, which led me to start that process very early. A lot of other parents, especially in the black community, may see it early and they start the process and they're hit with the first, let's wait. And they will wait because they are respecting.

that professional. There's a lot of in the Black community we're taught to, okay, if the professional is saying this, I'm not going to challenge that. But for me, I knew what I was seeing and you're telling me to wait, I'm not going to wait. So I think that was the main difference between me and a lot of the community is my educational privilege of knowing what is going on. So that is the one main difference. And then again,

Parents who do see it early and do try to talk to their health care professional are constantly hit with nos nos nos I was hit with five nos before I got to a yes. So I was hit with five professionals who kept saying no buts, no buts, no buts, and I kept pushing it, pushing it, pushing it, pushing it. I had the perfect. Exactly.

Mark (: 10:02

And that's you, someone on the inside who knows that's you. okay,

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 10:07

Exactly. And

Mark (: 10:07

continue. I'm sorry.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 10:08

you know, I also had the privilege of being able to sit in an office for five days and not worry about, I got to go to work. I got to do this and that and the other. So I had a lot of privileges that I utilized to get.

the diagnosis process. A lot of parents are not gonna be able to, a lot of black parents are not gonna be able to do that. They're gonna be like, okay, well, we'll just come back in a year and a half and see what happens, you know? And then that places their child outside, yeah, outside of that early intervention phase. So it's a lot of the bias and a lot of the no's that are going to hinder, especially when you're already dealing with stigma within, inside the community of.

Mark (: 10:36

Let's go far behind. Yeah.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 10:50

Well, I don't want my child to get this autism diagnosis. I see what people are saying. I see how people feel about the diagnosis. So yeah, let's wait a year and a half because I don't want them to have this diagnosis anyway. So let's see what happens, right? it's so complicated, just the diagnosis in itself. mm-hmm.

Mark (: 11:13

In itself, right? Yeah,

the social stigmas that go along with it. already there's a deficit in the community because in so many ways with this implicit bias in so many areas that you're already behind the eight ball, right? And so I can understand that not wanting to put your child in that place. But you're also then hurting your child in the end because

if it proves to be true, then they've already missed these really important years. And you can't catch that up. ⁓ And a lot of the families are just not, they're not prepared or they're not financially in position or they work several jobs or whatever it is, you know, they just don't have the time and raising their other children is just so much that goes into it. I let, I can't answer this question. It's historic, right? Why, why this bias?

Go ahead, Maria, just solve this centuries long. Yeah.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 12:08

Listen, if I had the answer, I tell you, I would definitely be rolling in the dough. I don't. And it's so frustrating, know, when in med school, they're still teaching things that just are not true about Black individuals, right? That we have a higher pain tolerance at the...

Mark (: 12:14

Yep.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 12:32

these things are being taught, right? There's no kind of, you know.

Mark (: 12:36

Really?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 12:38

Yeah, you know, my husband's a physician and you know this is me. I have a, I'm trying to use my words carefully because we have this talk all the time, but when it comes to his colleagues, I get so frustrated because they do not understand that it is life or death when it comes to black people as we see the maternity mortality rate for black women, right?

Mark (: 12:38

That's still being taught.

I know.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 13:08

when all the research is showing that you don't take black parents serious, when we're coming to you and you don't even want to be bothered with a black mom because you see she is a black mom, haven't heard her story or anything else, and you don't want to be bothered, so you push her away. All of these implicit biases that we are seeing in the research is just not being checked. And why is that? Why are we not having true cultural

humility, cultural responsivity courses in school. Therapists aren't getting it either. We get one class on cultural competence and we're supposed to go out and change the world. That's just not a reality there. I'm a black woman. I don't know all things black women. That's just not the reality. So not making sure that healthcare professionals or professionals in general really understand

that that is a learning process and that they have to pair their educational expertise with that person's lived experience is just baffling to me because it's something that we constantly have to face in healthcare settings, in educational settings, in society in general, the bias is always there and it's historic.

Mark (: 14:27

And this bias is based on these people staring at a black looking at a black person and considering them inferior and so they don't deserve the same kind of treatment and It boggles my mind I as you said you're trying to be careful the words my brain is blowing up and I I'm trying to stay focused because the I Haven't had to live this life But knowing it exists for so many people is so

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 14:34

Thanks,

Exactly.

Thanks.

Hmm.

Mark (: 14:55

difficult for me as a human being who cares about humans. And when I, as a teacher, you love all your children, you want them all treated the same. I don't see color when I see my children. And the fact that these kids are looked upon that way, just it's so emotionally upsetting to me. And I don't even have to live it, right? Imagine what.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 15:19

Mm-hmm.

Mark (: 15:21

these families have to go through. And you're in a sense more privileged than some of the other families, right? Because you've got the degree and all this and the knowledge and you still get treated that way. what, I want to say what the is going on. And my real concern now is if we were talking about this, having the same conversation two years ago, you would almost try to look for hope and some answers Today, it's a different conversation.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 15:29

Bye.

It's really...

Yeah.

Mark (: 15:50

And we need to have that conversation because these conversations are being repressed. And it's hard to even, believe that I'm even saying that. history is being wiped, right? One of my favorite places to go in DC is ⁓ the National Museum of African American History and what they want to do there and literally whitewash, you know, history. And so,

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 15:55

Right.

Mark (: 16:12

For many reasons, I'm excited to have you here today because I want to be able to be part of getting this message out to people. And you're obviously so well-spoken and so educated in all this that I want to make this really impactful. So I want to utilize this time for you to be able to get your message out as best you can. And I know you have your own show, and you can shout it out there. And it's great.

I'm proud to have you here today and I want to have something to do with this. So let's talk about some of the specifics then. Let's go into ⁓ how you actually then try to help these families, okay? Because now we've set up the situation, we know the reality. What do you do to then try to help these families overcome these implicit biases?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 16:59

We are really about community. So community is one of the foundational aspects of Autism in Black. I think what really helps me is that I stand on my platform and I am a representation of the families that I serve. have...

three neurodivergent children. I am neurodivergent myself. have autism and ADHD diagnosis. Our oldest is autistic. We have twins. One of our twins is autistic and ADHD. The other one has ADHD, right? And then I am a professional. So every area that I speak on, I am also living it. ⁓ And I think when it comes to the black community, when they see the representation of

There's no shame when she's talking about she is a parent to neurodivergent children. There's no shame when she's talking about her diagnosis from her own perspective. That really helps because there is so much shame associated in our community with disability. So I think that's one of the things that ⁓ gives me kind of a leverage. And then we start with the awareness and education because we know that

it doesn't get to our community. There is a gap in that information getting to our community.

Parents oftentimes don't understand that I can push with my health care professional. I don't I can go and get another health care professional, right? I can get another opinion. I can make sure that they understand that no, this is important. Here are some facts. Here's how I can go into that room ready and talk to you, right? We have scripts that we give parents that they can utilize in talking to professionals, health care professionals or educators, right? Because the IEP and getting that categorization is a different beast as well.

So we really bridge that gap with that education piece and the representation piece to give the awareness. I know there's a lot of moving on to acceptance and things of that nature, but in the black community, we have to start with the awareness because I can go to my family's small hometown in Brundage, Alabama, that I'm sure a lot of you have never heard of and they have not heard of autism. They don't understand the actual.

diagnosis and what that means. They may say, ⁓ Tommy's just weird. Tommy's just who he is. Tommy's a little bit, you know, he got to catch up. But they don't know there's an actual diagnosis that Tommy needs. And then he can go and get supports and services. So that's why we have to make a focal point on awareness.

Mark (: 19:31

Mm-hmm.

Well, when you talk about the services too now with this big ugly bill that's been passed, you know, yeah, exactly. I mean, what are the chances now? mean, especially for families in these rural communities too. Really, I mean, these hospitals may be closing, healthcare is not gonna be there for these kids the services are gonna be few and far between. I mean, the fight is gonna be massive at this point.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 20:02

Mm-hmm.

Mark (: 20:12

What is your feeling about that, the auspice of that, looking at that compared to what you're experiencing now, where you have somewhat of the system to work with. What are your thoughts about the future and the potential that this system will not be there to help you out?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 20:28

I'm gonna be, because I only know how to be honest, I'm gonna be extremely honest with you. I am so fearful of what the future years will look like. Like you were saying two years ago, was some hope. was, we're seeing changes. We're seeing those statistics. We're catching up now. We just had the CDC release their report. We're catching up in closing that gap.

Mark (: 20:32

Please.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 20:57

My fear with the way things have been handled these last eight months, with the stigmas that have been placed on autism, with the bills that are coming out, is that the next report will see that gap will not be catching up again. It will be widening. we will be regressing. We have a lot of work that we have to...

Mark (: 21:17

widening.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 21:23

fight against now. So we were already fighting against things, but now we're fighting against the fact that it is scary to get a diagnosis because am I going to a farm? Am I going to a camp? Is something going to happen to my kid now? Right? Teachers are, pigeonholed on what they can do. Health care professionals are pigeonholed on what they can do. I live in Florida.

And I'm sure if you watch the news or on social media, you understand that Florida, ⁓ they just be doing stuff out here, right? So, and it's ridiculous, know, just two weeks ago, was, professionals were calling me saying, something's going on with Medicaid and they've taken services away from these children. They just woke up and didn't have services today. The parents do not know what to do.

Do you know anything about this? Is it impacted because of the bill and things? So every day I'm waking up to fires and kids not having services. And what does that mean? And is my child going to regress? It is a mess out here right now. So for the future, it's to me, it's just going to be, we're regressed and now we're having to play catch up double time, triple time now.

Mark (: 22:41

Right, because Florida in a sense is a template for other states in the future, right? They're doing, they're removing all these services for people across the board. The biases are so blatant there. How do you hold out hope? I mean, how do you continue to do this work when now you're, know, butting up against, really it's just a wall of rejection.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 22:45

It is. is.

Mark (: 23:04

How do you, what do you do for yourself to keep going like that?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 23:04

from

Well, one, I do a lot of self care. ⁓ do this, as you know, the work is heavy. And if you are only focused on that, you lose hope. Cause it's like, I'm always trying to fight another fight, right? So for me, I have to actually practice what I preach as a therapist. I have to really have a good support system. I have to really have self care where I have to get away from.

what is my life. I have to be able to watch some silly TikToks or watch some TV. And then I look to my kids because I know that what I'm doing is going to impact them. So I'm constantly looking like, okay, no, I don't want to get up out of the bed and do this work today. But I know I have three black children who are neurodivergent and they are...

Mark (: 23:42

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 24:04

navigating society and if my little spot with autism in black makes it even a little bit easier, then I need to get out of this bed and do this work. So that's what I hold on day to day.

Mark (: 24:14

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, that's your motivation. You're doing the work. you think that like strength in numbers, you, do you galvanize groups together? Do you get families together in larger groups, not just individual families themselves? Do you work like that? I you do a lot of workshops and you're speaking all over the place. Do you have that component to you where you get families together?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 24:18

Mm-hmm.

Thank you.

Yes, we do. have our huge annual conference that we do in April and with the way things have shifted, we are now advancing our policy leg. So we are planning a day on the hill. We're advocacy in that manner of continuing the fight. But then we have our ⁓ conference to where we do learn things, but we also

Mark (: 24:48

Thank

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 24:59

meet as community and have that downtime and self-care as well because I try to make it a balance. We're not just constantly having to fight for something, but we need that downtime to where we can just be us and be free. So we do things in that nature with our events. of course, now, we're it.

Mark (: 25:20

Okay,

so when you're serving families, you're usually doing it individual families.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 25:25

I have moved from individual to group on a whole because ⁓ I want to make a bigger impact. I now work within the schools or things of that nature. One to one, it has to be maybe somebody who's a part of my community that I'll go ahead and do it. But I have gotten away from it because I'm still advocating one-on-one for my kids. So it's a trigger for me sometimes.

Mark (: 25:32

Yeah, that's I was thinking. ⁓

Sure.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 25:51

to be

in this room. So now I am creating curriculum, right? I go into the schools, we talk ⁓ government officials. I'm finishing my PhD to get my curricular peer reviewed. So we're grand scaling it because I am just one person within our company. So we are grand scaling so the impact can be greater in the sense.

Mark (: 26:10

Mm-hmm.

Wow, congratulations. I mean, you're a soldier in the fight. I mean, you're really taking it to it. You're getting out of that bed every day and doing something huge. So thank you for that. And I know a lot of people thank you for what you're doing. And I hope that you're inspiring. You're inspiring me right now. And I hope you inspire other people to get up and do more. ⁓ Are you seeing any of the fallout since RFK's come out with some of his... ⁓

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 26:30

Thank you.

Yeah

Mark (: 26:39

new definitions of what autism is as an epidemic and preventable disease and that people with autism can't hold a job or write or anything like that. I mean you're an autistic individual it's hard for you to write probably right?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 26:42

⁓ thank you.

You know, it's hard for me to

do it. I'm surprised I'm married with kids at this point. You know, he would make it seem like I wouldn't be able to do anything. ⁓

Mark (: 26:59

I can't even believe you're able to talk to me right now. How is that?

I mean, it must be such an affront to you personally and then for the community. It's be so hurtful.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 27:12

It is. When

you see people who are so ignorant to what a disability is and they have such a privilege to be so far away from actual boots on the ground community and they just spill this kind of harmful rhetoric, it is disheartening to see that platform such as the White House.

presidential platform used in that manner. is, you know, seeing the whole, I call it a circus of individuals who are not qualified to be in any of the positions that they're in, making decisions that impact my day to day is very scary. He's just, me and my husband have this, it's impacting my husband too, cause you know, he's a physician. Just day to day, we have to sit and have a little powwow of,

Mark (: 27:41

Yes.

I agree.

Mm-hmm.

course.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 28:10

This is what was said and this is now how we have to go and fight the fight. I have to make videos now of, I know this man said this. However, don't listen to it because nothing he said is true. He's quoting articles that have been debunked. He's quoting research that is just unethical, right? I have to constantly go out and fight the fight of what he's saying. But there are people who believe it, right?

Mark (: 28:15

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Thank

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 28:36

There are parents who are so burnt out. They don't have supports. So when he's saying what he's saying, some of it sounds good to them because they don't have a community support. They don't have respite care. They don't have healthcare professionals who are trying to help them figure out what the next step is. And they're isolated and lonely. So when he's fear mongering some people,

Mark (: 28:36

Right.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 29:03

That sounds good when you don't have the supports, right? So there are people who are now scared to get diagnosis because if he's saying this, I don't want to be associated with that. So I'm not going to get the diagnosis. I'm not going to go and get the categorization in schools. We're just going to tough it out. We're just going to raw dog it out for the rest of the time because I don't want to be associated with that. So when I see those comments, that makes me think of the fact that in a few years, those numbers are just going to be.

Mark (: 29:16

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 29:34

so wide because people are absolutely terrified right now.

Mark (: 29:38

One of the things you mentioned earlier when you said, know, farming individuals out, you know, they want to, they want to have a data collection site. I mean, how terrifying is that?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 29:48

It is extremely terrifying. mean, one, my husband keeps telling me that it's, they can't do it. It's against HIPAA laws. And I'm like, well, these people they don't care about doing anything that's exactly, they're above the law. don't, they don't care, you know? So exactly. And then to me, it's even scarier because what does that mean for black autistic individuals? what are you, cause we already know how you feel about.

Mark (: 30:00

care about the law. HIPAA means nothing to them.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 30:15

the black community and now we know how you feel about the disability community. And when I'm a part of both, what does that mean for me? It's very scary to think that I could be on some list, that my kids could be on some list, that they could be saying that, because you're autistic, you can't make decisions for yourself anymore. It's so scary and it's like...

Mark (: 30:34

Yeah.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 30:39

I don't have the answer. don't know what to do. I guess we have to figure out if it gets to that point type of deal, which is even scarier.

Mark (: 30:46

right and they don't care about evidence. There's no evidence or facts that support anything they say. They just say things and so that's what it is and people believe it and one of the things I wanted to say before is that people also led down a path to thinking there's a cure for autism and then they hold out this hope and they

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 30:53

Mm-hmm.

Mark (: 31:05

want to buy in because she said, okay, it sounds good to them. Another horribly misleading statement to make. The damage that's being done is, it's untold at this point because we don't even know. It's still down the line. There's a lot of things already happening, obviously, it's down the line. We'll really see what it's gonna be. I'm so sorry for you because I hadn't thought about, you're living in both worlds. And I mean, we know how authoritarian,

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 31:08

huh.

Mark (: 31:33

regimes and fascist regimes have worked in the past and where the people with disabilities or the broken people are put to the side. And so, I don't know if we'll ever get to that place, but it's daunting because it feels like it's moving in that direction. And, I'm not gonna hold back my thoughts on it because if we don't speak up, I mean, you know, maybe it comes back eventually at some point.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 31:38

Yes.

You know, somebody who exactly.

Mark (: 31:54

But you know,

if we don't speak up about this stuff, then it's allowed to happen and we need to fight. ⁓

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 31:58

It is. I'll take

the hit for who, because I work for me. I mean, unless I'm firing myself out here, you know, it's not going to have an impact on my job. But I'm going to speak up because it's necessary. And I will be the villain if that's what the administration wants to say. You know, I don't care because you're not going to continue to do harm to my community.

Mark (: 32:19

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah, how dare you speak up, right? Yeah. we need more people to stand up and be strong. I know there's a lot of people out there fighting. And for this cause, I want to become a platform for people in your position to come on and be able to speak out because I want to start try to unify people in the disabled world and those that are working for them to have this platform.

Let's talk a little bit about some of the other specifics if it's okay. Because I know we could continue to talk about this, it's very frustrating and I know we don't have the answers. I wanted to use it as an opportunity also just kind of get it out a little bit because it is something that needs to be talked about and people need to be aware that these things are actually happening This is real life for so many people.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 33:05

you

Mark (: 33:06

You know, when we talk about the poverty levels and the inability for families to get services and healthcare in and of itself, how do you deal with families that don't have healthcare at this point, and so the services they can't get them. Do you come across these situations a lot?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 33:21

do, we have a nonprofit leg to Autism in Black as well. So with that nonprofit leg, we service families in trying to match them with services that are low cost or free. It's hard.

right now because there's not, I mean, there's already a list for people who have insurance and who are paying, right? So finding services for those who don't have the financial means is even harder because people aren't, they don't have the space to service everybody who needs to be serviced out here.

Mark (: 33:52

Sure, of course.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 34:01

wait lists are so ridiculous. But yeah, we do try to match that. We have an autism and black directory of people that we can use and utilize in that manner. But it is difficult. It's very difficult.

Mark (: 34:15

Do you deal with families while their children are in school dealing with disciplinary situations where the black community tend to have more behavior issues or at least identified as more behavior issues. Because autism is later diagnosed they're not seeing it as such. Inclusion into the schools, expectations are different.

What are some of the struggles that you're seeing in those areas?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 34:39

A lot of the disciplinary actions or how they perceive the behavior of Black students is subjective. So that's what we're dealing with a lot of times is your perception of it being something disrespectful, your perception of it being a behavior problem because of your biases that you have, right? I'll use my child for an example because I have the right to do so. ⁓

Mark (: 35:08

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 35:10

But my daughter is the type that we've taught her to question. Like, know, if something doesn't seem right, you have the right to question it, right? And she could be asking a question because she wants to know the answer. It's confusing. And she's being perceived as sassy, as disrespectful. And how dare you ask a question?

how dare you little black girl ask this question to me and make me feel embarrassed. So now, disciplinary action, right? And that's oftentimes what we see with black students because black students are oftentimes adultified. Boys are seen as aggressive. They're seen as, ⁓ he's gonna do something. And our black girls are seen as...

they are so knowledgeable about sex, they don't need nurturing, they're adultifying our children in manners when they're just five years old, six years old, and you're trying to hold them up to standards of adults that you don't even meet day to day, but you want these five and six year olds to be held to these standards. So a lot of it is going back into...

The training with educators, because these are the actual cases that I will take, is when it's a disciplinary action that is just out of pocket. And it's training them to understand that your biases are play here. You are adultifying this child, you're being subjective. What does this actually mean that this behavior that you're putting? I've seen them put terrorist in an ⁓ IEP to describe a student. This child is a terrorist.

Mark (: 36:50

my goodness. my gosh.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 36:50

Why would you write that?

Yeah. And what do you mean by that? Why are you writing this in paperwork and you think that's okay?

Mark (: 36:55

Yeah.

They write

it in the paperwork, they put the word terrorist in the paperwork. ⁓

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 37:02

terrorist. This child

said child's name is a terrorist. What do you mean by that? And why do you think you can can write that and it be okay? So it's a lot of training and training parents to understand that you need to read every line. And if there is something in there, they need to change that because that will follow your child. Imagine nobody said anything and this child went to the next grade, the next teacher read it.

Mark (: 37:08

What does that mean?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 37:29

And now they're already, I need to keep my eye on this child because it's already a problem. And anything that child then does is seen in a negative light. So it just follows them. And that's how the school to prison pipeline works for black students because of these things.

Mark (: 37:33

it's already, yeah, it's a done deal. Right.

Mm-hmm, because the expectations are what they are through that throughout the scaffolding of the years They don't have a chance to break out of that and redefine themselves when I was a teacher and I had kids that had behavior issues coming to me, What I thought was critical was to meet them as an individual first and to see who they were and how they presented before I started treating them like the paperwork says they are and obviously

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 37:51

They don't.

Mark (: 38:10

That's not the way it works for the majority. you find that parents are resistant because they feel defeated by the system? How do you pick them up to fight the fight?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 38:22

I think a lot of parents are exhausted. I'm exhausted myself, right? My oldest is in eighth grade now and it is exhausting doing this every year and being like, this is what it is and you need to read or write. It gets to the point where it's just like, don't wanna do this anymore. I'm tired of having to explain year after year. I'm tired of having to get you to understand that this

Mark (: 38:26

Be sure.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 38:51

truly means something, right? So it's a lot of, hey, we have to do it because we don't want them to be impacted. Parents, Black parents are exhausted, but they still want to fight. They still want to go in there and challenge. It gets scary and intimidating for them, though, when I go in there and it's 10 white professionals and me.

And I think that's where for them it can be a little intimidating and then they want, community and they don't want to say too much because they don't want any kind of, retaliation on child. That's where it gets ⁓ a little murky for Black parents. They're tired, but they're going to still fight. But at the same time, I can only do so much because I don't want you to make it worse for my child in this situation.

Mark (: 39:29

Yeah, a backlash on it.

I was going to say you don't want to go in and then aggravate the situation. So you have to walk with tender foot sometimes and that's going to be really difficult to restrain. Yeah.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 39:48

Yeah, you heard him.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It is. It is. And a

lot of times what then happens is then they place the pressure on the child. Well, just do this so that they won't put you on a spotlight. Just try to do this so that we can get through the rest of these years and not trying to understand that the system needs to be the one that is accommodating the child, not the child accommodating the system.

Mark (: 40:01

Mm-hmm.

Yeah! ⁓

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 40:21

easier for the parents to be like, you could just do it like this, then we don't have to worry about them, you know.

Mark (: 40:30

And really

that to me would only inflate the behaviors because the stress and pressure on these child to be a certain thing has got to be overwhelming. how as a child do you manage those thoughts? You're not an adult, much as they want to adultify you, you're not an adult. Do you have a...

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 40:34

Exactly.

Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

Mark (: 40:50

staff that you work with or is it basically, do you have a few people? Because I would think this would be an opportunity to kind of have an army of advocates, right? To go out if it were possible to have, you know, because obviously you can only represent so many people. So there's so many people out there fending themselves and getting eaten up by the system, which kind of works in a way, not everybody, but to exhaust you so you don't have any more fight in you, right?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 41:06

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Exactly.

⁓ So it is just me and my assistants, but we've actually rolled out a certification program so people can be trained the Autism Black Way and then they can go out and do what they need to do in their own businesses or whatever as well. So we have a certification program that professionals or parents join. learn the

Mark (: 41:20

and then it makes it easy for them.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 41:44

our intellectual property of how I go in and do it because like you said, I am just one person and since I am trying to impact the grander scale, I don't have a lot of time to do the one-to-one. So we've rolled out that certification so that advocates can say I am autism and black certified and I will go in here and advocate in the manner that Maria does, which, for me, I'm going in there and down the course.

Mark (: 42:10

I'm good.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 42:12

I'm

not playing, I would be the villain. It's not gonna bother me. I do that in every manner except for with my children. My advocate comes in and bulldozes me. But yes, I don't play no games.

Mark (: 42:17

You know, you gotta be strong.

Okay, bulldozes for you.

Yeah, you have to be strong in that regard, right? And is this would this be more of like a national thing or more local where you train people?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 42:34

We're trying to get

it to that level. We're going through the process. mean, anybody in the states, of course, can join. You have to get it to a recognized certification. You have to have a certain number of individuals who are certified and have to have practices for so long. So now, I guess you would call in the research phase of it of.

These advocates are getting trained and they're going out. And once we have a certain number and we have the actual data behind it, we can go and get that national certification to have an actual stamp.

Mark (: 43:06

Mm-hmm.

One of the things I was interested in is when, we talk about the future and preparing our children for the future to graduate and what's beyond that, because we know services are very difficult once you graduate. They're not there the way they are in elementary school and primary school and high school. With already the community behind.

Do you, as far as transitioning out into the world, what's your impression of that as far as the impact on the black community?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 43:36

It is, it's difficult because society doesn't understand that autistic children grow up to be autistic adults. So that's even something that I have to navigate as an autistic adult and people not understanding that I have a disability, right? ⁓ People will not understand why I can't do certain things, but they'll give the grace.

as much as they can to a child, but when it comes to an adult, we don't get that same kind of rollover of the grace. So for me in preparing for adulthood, it's really about that mindset shift of do not let anybody gaslight you into thinking that you no longer need services or that you no longer need support or that you no longer have a disability. I think that shift in is one of the most important things that we do for

Mark (: 44:10

Mm-hmm.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 44:32

our adults because they have to go into their workplaces and advocate for themselves. They have to go into, you know, the college rooms and advocate for themselves to get accommodations. And as an adult, people do not try to understand why you need an accommodation as an adult. So for us, it's really about that mindset shift and understanding that, you still need support and it is okay. There's no shame in that. And you can advocate for yourself to get those things. And that's

The biggest thing we see with the adults armed to autism and Black is people not understanding adults still have disabilities and they still need supports and services.

Mark (: 45:12

So you do have an adult arm to the organization. Okay,

so you're there to support adults in their transition to, okay. because traditionally, theoretically, it's supposed to be scaffolding, and at some point, like in middle school years, you're supposed to start paying attention to what's gonna happen in transitioning. I would imagine, I I kind of already feel like I know the answer, but that can't be very strong in you know, chuckling kind of.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 45:35

Middle school is the hardest transition for parents. It's like they go from being handheld on everything and then they get to middle school and it's like, you're an adult, go be great. It is, my whole dissertation is on middle school in itself. Yeah, because it's just, I'm just like, I don't.

Mark (: 45:38

You

You

wow.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 45:57

I don't understand how that gap is so large that you are literally hand holding every step of the way in elementary. And then as soon as they get to middle school, it's like, hands off, go be great.

Mark (: 46:12

that's when it's supposed to be starting to help you prepare for high school and beyond, you know?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 46:14

There's

no kind of like, ⁓ this is what it means to advocate for yourself. There's no kind of transition into it. It's just boom, here it is. it's difficult. It's difficult for me as a parent. It's difficult for my child. And I'm still trying to understand. And she's about to go to high school and our twins are about to go to middle school. And I'm still reeling with the fact of that transition from three years ago of her starting

middle school. I mean, it's a difficult, difficult transition.

Mark (: 46:45

Mm-hmm.

It's almost like they're just left to their own devices at that point in a sense.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 46:52

It is and I think the most difficult part with having a child who has a disability that impacts communication is the fact that the school relies on the student to communicate what's going on with the parent. And that is a lot of the gap because my child has a disability that impacts communication. So there's going to be things lost in translation. There's going to be things that don't get back to me. And if I

don't know and you guys don't want to tell me you want to rely on her, that makes me not trust you. That makes the foundation of our rapport shaky. If you see me more often than you want to, because I have to constantly come over here and see what's going on. It just leads to a lot of things when you can just communicate with parents

Mark (: 47:45

And then there's that resentment that comes in from their side towards you because you're present too much and you're asking too many questions and demanding too much.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 47:52

Yes, exactly. And now

I'm coddling my child and they need, I just want to know what's going on. I still have, they're a minor. I still need to know what's going on and you're not, they can't sign the stuff themselves. So I don't understand why there's such a gap in that. I just don't get it.

Mark (: 47:59

Mm-hmm.

Absolutely.

I we've talked about it little bit already. we're coming up an hour. I appreciate all this time you've given me. I say this often to people because I do mean it. I'd love to have you come back and continue this conversation because there's so much, and update as we go and see how things are. But if you could maybe just, it might be too simplistic, but to state maybe one strategy that you can give a parent to advocate for their child, what might that be?

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 48:37

I would say go with your gut. ⁓ You know your child, you are living with them, you know the environment of your home. Understand that you have that lived experience and go with that gut. The professionals have their professional expertise, but you know your child and you know your home. And please advocate. Don't let anybody gaslight you to think that you shouldn't be advocating for your child. You need to advocate.

for your family and do so and give yourself grace because it's not always going to be perfect. It's going to be messy sometimes and give yourself grace in that. make mistakes, but we learn from them and we keep going. So that is what I tell.

Mark (: 49:20

Okay, that's wonderful. And what message would you give to the powers that be that are changing the system to really continue to put people further and further behind.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 49:24

you

I would say if you're making decisions for a group of people and those group of people are not present in the room helping you make said decisions, you're doing it wrong. How can you possibly make policies and procedures regarding a group of people you don't even have in the room so you're not even understand if it's beneficial or not. Listen to those who are living the day to day of whatever decisions you're trying to make because it will be helpful on both sides.

⁓ So I'll leave you with that PG version. ⁓

Mark (: 49:57

Mm-hmm.

We could move this up to an R if you want. Feel free. I haven't done that yet, but I'm way willing to do it at this point.

The intersection of race, autism, and advocacy is such a huge subject. There's so much more to it. I feel like we got to some really important issues here and talked about some things fairly in depth. But I feel like we're still scratching the surface on the challenges ahead. And I would definitely love to come back and talk about the challenges ahead. And I know you have your own platform. But if there's anything that I can do using my platform to continue your message or to help you out, please.

don't hesitate. I want to be here for you and for the community that I know really struggles and suffers a lot because we haven't even gotten into the idea of poverty levels and people that just don't have enough money to pay for their food and kids going to school and now these SNAP programs being taken away and all these concerns on top of now we have to deal with my child's diagnosis and the services. I mean it is just.

beyond beyond and so there's a lot more to talk about and we'll see as things unfold with this bill the realities as they start to hit the community and I'd love to have you come back and talk about that as we go.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 51:23

Thank you. I will be back anytime you want. I'm here.

Mark (: 51:27

Okay Maria,

thank you so much for your time and thank you for all you do. It's incredible work and I give you so much credit for getting up every day when you've got so much to deal with on your own at your own home to go and fight for others. Amazing, amazing. I applaud you.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 51:31

anything.

Thank you for your platform. Thank you for letting me be on here to talk about the intersection of race and disability. And thank you for what you're doing. So I appreciate it so much when we can have honest conversations about what's going on.

Mark (: 51:59

Yeah,

absolutely. Yeah, we need more of this for sure. So thanks for being part of it. I'll be in touch and have a great day and all the best.

Maria Davis-Pierre, LMHC (: 52:04

Thank you.

Thank

you.