1:52Diana Hayes: Welcome to Even the Dog Has ADHD because apples don't fall far from trees and there's never just one. I'm absolutely thrilled to have Natalie Isabella with us today, who's going to share her story of neurodivergent family life on this series called The Bark. This is a place where I'm extending the invitation to you as well when you listen to Natalie Isabella's story. I guarantee there'll be elements of her story with her own life and her children's life that will resonate with you. And there is an invitation to you to come and share your story because when we share our stories, other people benefit from it. It's not a printed out PDF with broken links. It's a real person sharing their lived experience. And I guarantee you will find like nuggets of inspiration. So welcome, Natalie Isabella. I am so thrilled and honoured that you are up for recording your story.
3:00Natalie Isabella: Thank you for having me, Diana. And I just can't stop staring at your beautiful little donkey in the background. Diana Hayes: Yeah, so this one's Buddy, he's the king of the world. Natalie Isabella: Oh, it just reminds me of like a little chocolate chip muffin. It's beautiful. Okay. Diana Hayes: he is we should have called him rocky road or something and i don't know if there's the the cat who's bigger than him just on the just off screen there lollipop Natalie Isabella: Yeah, I can't see I can't see her.
3:29Diana Hayes: I wonder if I can just move the screen. Everything will drop. You can see the squish of the cushion. Everything will just drop off my very full desk if I keep moving it around. So welcome. Like when we chatted, you shared about your own story as a little girl in school, in primary school. Do you want to share a bit about, shall we start there? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, that's fine, yeah. So yeah.
3:59Diana Hayes: So, yeah, go ahead. Natalie Isabella: Yeah, when I was in primary school I had this memory of a teacher calling my mother in to speak to her. And she pretty much said, um, in short form that she feels that my mum should take me to go and see a doctor 'cause she feels like whatever the classroom things are happening. Uh I don't know whether she used the word something wrong with me but she sort of indicated, you know. things happening in the classroom, like she did remain, she's not paying attention, she's talking to the person next to her and interrupting the classroom. I think that she could have I don't know what term she used, but yeah, I think you should go and see the doctor about it. So my mum did book an appointment to see our local doctor. we spoke to her, Susan, she was called, and she just basically said, um that she doesn't see anything wrong with me and that she just thinks that the teacher, the teachers in the classroom aren't stimulating me enough and that I'm just bored. Which is pretty much like a a prime symptom of ADHD anyway, isn't it? Getting easily bored and struggling to make connection with well, we're very good at making connections with everything and linking up, but also we're not really presenting something in a way in which our brain works or it's something that's not interesting to us, then we we struggle to connect. So um then I didn't get diagnosed, I didn't get um put through the assessment, I just carried on life as normal. I just remember that so vivid and thinking I didn't really understand the term ADHD back then or what all that was about, but I kind of felt what the teacher who said was right. I could I could recognise them patterns in myself and I thought I know that sort of my persona and my the way my brain works or the way I act and behave is different. to everybody else in the class. So I knew that was something different about me compared to the average child.
6:07Diana Hayes: And that really impacted you, it? The doctor saying that it was a classroom problem because later on, tell me a bit more about, well, before we go to your son, what did the rest of school life feel like for you? Having had that experience, being aware of your difference, finding it a bit of a struggle to fit into the class. I'm not hearing the struggle. What I'm hearing is your awareness of difference.
6:45Natalie Isabella: Yeah. So um primary school obviously it's very light, isn't it, compared to high school with what you learn and the activities you do. But I would say that I see the struggle happening the last year of primary school. I said like preparing you for high school. And then in high school I kind of adapted well in the sense that I'll it was a big, big school compared to the primary school, so I learned my way around pretty fast. And I did what I had to do. I knew like the routine and everything. But I wouldn't say that I was overly engaged with learning some subjects more than others. And I feel like I noticed over time that I struggled. But also then, when I was 13, I developed another health condition, autoimmune disorder, which made my immune system attack itself and it caused arthritis. Um and that also you take tablets and you have side effects from your tablets and then you have other symptoms as well as the aches and pains of arthritis. You have things like the the chronic fatigue and stuff like that. Which then sort of led to a cycle of night nighttime, like having insomnia, struggling to sleep, and then during the day the chronic fatigue. So I think that had um big impact on my learning just as much as the ADHD side of things. But then there was never
8:05Diana Hayes: kind of support did you or your parents get around your learning when you were 13 and really struggling physically as well as mentally with the learning? What kind of support did you get? Natalie Isabella: Well, there was never any indication of any of the teachers wanting me to be assessed for anything like ADHD or autism or anything like that. Uh or anything to do with learning difficulties or but they did they was made aware that I got arthritis 'cause my mum wrote several letters and spoke to the head of the gear at the time and she made it point blank after speaking to my doctor that I would get exempt from PE. because physical education might make my joints worse and flare up at the time because it was really bad. So that was one like GCSE that I got out of. And yeah, she did ask for like any accommodations that could be made to make things easier for me. So that would be things like uh maybe like an extra week to do coursework or extra time exams. And for English exam, I actually got a person to write for me. So I sat in a room with them. I told them verbally. they'd write it down so that saved me from like hours of writing and my hands aching.
9:27Diana Hayes: So your mum was advocating for you. Was there any kind of EHCP support then for you or none? Natalie Isabella: not that I know of, there was never anything put into place like an EHE plan. Diana Hayes: so your mum was advocating for you to the school Natalie Isabella: Yes. Diana Hayes: to get the support you needed. Natalie Isabella: Sorry butch. Diana Hayes: And then, so after your GCSEs with your own education, what happened next after GCSEs?
10:01Natalie Isabella: I did a year in sixth form, I did a G V Q Business General course and I resapp Diana Hayes: Mm-hmm. Natalie Isabella: resapped the master English. I probably did worse the second time around with master English to be fair. Uh just scraped through the business course. But it wasn't really something that I wanted to do, but I think my mum encouraged me to stay an extra year. But I really wanted to go to the big separate general college and then I applied to do a B therapy course. It probably the wrong course for me physically. 'cause of my hands and everything like that, but I did enjoy it. I learned things like facial, manicures, pedicures. I sort of managed it even though I struggled. And um yeah, I just like learning about the theory side of it as well. Like 'cause not only do you learn just to do like manicures, pedicures, facials, waxing, that kind of stuff. The treatment side you learn a lot of theory related to like the body, the human, biology side, the skin, the layers of the skin, the muscles. So that was quite fun for me. And then I did another course after that sports therapy again. Physically it wasn't a good course for me. But because my brain was bored and just wanted to do something. And at the time my brain wasn't primed to do a job and I wasn't pressurized by my parents to get a job or anything like that. But I think some point through that second year in college that I did get a part time job and I worked for a promotions company and promoting like cosmetics. I'd like stand in the um stores, you know, like Bootsies and Boots the Chemist and have these little samples to get out to people and talk to about like what products they use. So that was quite fun while it lasted. And that's sort of as well when I got a bit more confidence about myself because I'm work hanging around with people that I did at school. Everyone was more mature. I think everybody well the obviously there's gonna still be like pitches and stuff in college and people that are nice but
11:57Diana Hayes: Hmm. Natalie Isabella: I think you do tend to grow more confidence and get connected with a wider variety of people. And I went out to clubbing, nightclubs and stuff like that for a while, about a year, and then I met my husband quite early at nineteen, just before I turned nineteen. Diana Hayes: And then your son, tell me a bit about your son. when was he born, when and what was school like for him.
12:32Natalie Isabella: Yeah, sure. So my son's called Connor, Connor James. And he was born on the in May in two thousand and eight. So we'd been together I'm thinking five years and married for a year. Uh I remember the actual day of doing like the pregnancy test at home because we was living in a flat at the time in the town cellar. And I remember a couple of days later thinking, Oh my gosh, the positive test that I got was on the third of September, which was three days after I turned twenty five. And I thought, what what's there's something about this date, the third of September? But it took me a couple of days to realise it was like the seventh year anniversary of my granddad's death. And I thought that was like really sort of magical and special. Um but also like when it shows my husband and that we both sort of like didn't show whether we believed it or not and was like, Oh, sometimes these tests, these sort of cheap, especially against the supermarket, they can be like false positives.
13:28Diana Hayes: Mm-hmm. Natalie Isabella: So we'll we'll have to go to doctors and get another test was being done just to confirm it. So we did do that. Yeah. But I don't think anything felt fully real until I saw the scan and I felt the movements and stuff. Diana Hayes: So while you were pregnant, were undiagnosed as well, weren't you? Yeah. Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: So what was pregnancy and birth like for you with him? Natalie Isabella: Yeah. I feel like sort of the pregnancy and birth 'cause I've only had one experience of pregnancy but I don't really have much to compare it to. I feel like it was probably very sort of traditional, standard like everybody else is got quite a bit of morning sickness, but I didn't really throw up throw up like I've seen I've seen us other people do and heard other people do, but I did get the nausy feeling. it was very much from about four and a half, five months pregnant. it would really like kick a lot. And in a way that was reassuring, but it wasn't we he had really hard kicks and I thought, my gosh, at least he's got some good strong bones on him. And that was like a relief. Um but yeah the the pregnancy just went no no no maj no complications. Um I think yeah I was supposed to I was predicted by the scan the thirteenth of May and then we moved house And my I've lived in this new house for about three days and then the labour pain started, so came about three days, four days early. the birth I feel like it's straightforward. I remember I know that I wanted like a home birth, but then my husband taught me out of it. It's like, we just moved into this house, it's not really you know, set up for that and also the hospital once something goes wrong. Uh but I feel like I'm glad that I had hospital birth now and So I woke up in the morning like very early with these pains and I remember like Dungeon Wednesday some Saturday's like, no, it's not you're not ready yet, you're not ready, go back to sleep. So I like spent probably like six, seven hours just sleeping through these pains and waking up like every 40 minutes or something like that. And I I remember at one point about eight o'clock in the morning bringing the hospital as it or far are they and all that, or don't come in yet, just wait till they're like every 15 minutes and then come in. So then eventually we went. I got a taxi to the hospital. And at this point my waters haven't broken or anything. So they that sort of got me on the bed and examined me. They said, your waters haven't broken have they? So no. So then they had to do that thing, the internal sweep thing to bring that on. so I think, you know I probably started very early. The contractions at like three o'clock, four o'clock in the morning. I was in hospital for like midday. Um But I think after the sort of contractions when it came to the pushing stage, that probably lasted about two hours. I remember having gas and air and nothing else, just the gas and air, but I think in some ways that actually made things worse because it made me a bit lazy. Because it kind of relaxed it, you sort of your head, your mind and your body's like in two separate places. So then I kind of really struggled with the pushing side of things. And um it's almost like it it made its way down. And then he kind of stayed stuck or went back up a bit and then um they were saying that they have a sting around me which would record the heart his his heart rate is showing signs of you know, uh panic. So the attitude thing like a cut thing. It's got a fancy name to it, getting a D. So I think obviously like to do a sterile it's too much um time consuming. So I said, Yeah, just do whatever you've got to do and that helped.
17:20Diana Hayes: Hmm. Natalie Isabella: Yes, well with the the gas and the air with the court and everything else went pretty smooth. Diana Hayes: That's amazing. So when he was little with all the kicking, the prelude, big kicker, what was he like pre going to school? How was that for you as a mum? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, I feel like he was a very easy baby and a toddler, who was quite lively, but he wasn't um difficult at all. He slept well and yeah, he was he liked playing with his toys quietly on the floor. He wasn't bothered about having light friends, he was happy just with me, he'd die as family.
18:00Diana Hayes: And then what was it like when he started school? Natalie Isabella: He started mystery first and that went really well. He enjoyed it. He had a couple of nice little friends and the teachers really liked him. And then he did reception year. And then he did like a term year one and that's when I started to see in some issues. Like every week, the other week a teacher would come in and would call us in and speak to us. It was getting to stage like it was so often that I thought, you know, what could I do about it? The they're trained to deal with that and they're not dealing with it.
18:35Diana Hayes: Mmm. Natalie Isabella: but then I started looking into homeschooling and I didn't know a lot about it at the time. But I looked online, I had access to the internet, so I started Googling it. And I wondered I'm on Facebook. I wonder if there's any like Facebook groups for people who do it. Diana Hayes: Mm. Natalie Isabella: And then I saw one come up for like um North Manchester, Rochdale, Buryalden and all that like where I live. Diana Hayes: Mm-hmm. Natalie Isabella: so I put to join it and then they ask you all these a lot of groups, Why do you want to join? And I just said, I'm not home
19:06Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: I'm not homeschooling yet but it's something I'm seriously considering for my child. So I'd like to join this group to ask to connect with people and ask them questions to see if it's the right path for me. So I kinda got accepted and I spent a few weeks chatting to people and I spoke to my husband and my mom and everything. My mum says, I'll be here to help Um, my husband says, I'll help on the days off. And I just thought, I'll give it a go, we can do it temporarily, maybe like a year. And then we can always put it back in the system when he's a bit more mature and he's more uh regulated to deal with the school structure and the system. And it just ended up being like a decade, except for there was a time when this lady came to visit us called Anne Marie. She was like the home education officer. She'd come around like twice a year to begin with. and talk to us and we show her like stuff that Connor had done. She write a little report and she send us a copy. Um but like at one point she said, Would you like you to try high school? And I told her because uh and she went, we can get um a EHC plan done for you if you want, to give it a ch a try. Um so we did I did um an assessment form for that and he got that EHC plan through and he was gonna he got enrolled into like special school for betting year. Well It was supposed to be for a year but it was more like a few months 'cause then COVID happened. So then automatically the whole world was home schooling.
20:36Diana Hayes: Hmm. Natalie Isabella: Yeah. And then they started to bring kids back into school so we went back and then a couple of months later I pulled them out again because they kept calling me in every week and the uh over some petty little things and then also they were trying to transition them into a mainstream school which I wasn't totally against but it was just the way they were doing it quite sneakily and not really keeping us up to date with things that annoyed me.
21:04Diana Hayes: So did your son have any kind of diagnosis when you decided you wanted to homeschool because of the difficulties in year one? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, he didn't have the autism diagnosis, the autism spectrum. Uh he did go see a speech and language therapist and they just said they identified he's got some slow information processing. So that I think that's more to do with auditory, so like when he hears things, sometimes his either his brain either completely doesn't register it or it takes longer than the average person for it to sink in and to know what you said. So sometimes you're like you have to repeat things to him before it fully sinks into his brain.
21:50Diana Hayes: So in year one, when you were being called a lot, they did assessment and that's when they picked up the auditory, but you didn't have any diagnosis for autism. Natalie Isabella: No, that came later on and I think that took about a year or two and I remember going to the hospital it called um CAMS back then and I think they changed it to help young minds then. But we had two or three appointments and then they were supposed to do home visits. they made appointments with those open space, I think you get three. And they she didn't show up to any of them. Can you like imagine that was us not showing up to our appointments? And I don't know what happened to her, but I think she might have like left that job. So then eventually I I rang them and spoke to them and said, you know, this is a bit much and they they called us in again for more appointments. I think we had a bit two then and then I finally got your diagnosis.
22:51Diana Hayes: I remember you saying previously, your experience of not being believed, you and your mum not being believed by your GP, that it felt a bit of a challenge to get your son diagnosed. So you were already homeschooling him when you went to CAMS, is that right? To Natalie Isabella: Yes, that's right. Diana Hayes: get the diagnosis. So what was it that made you... seek the diagnosis because I know there was a bit of a barrier. What made you want to get your son's diagnosis?
23:29Natalie Isabella: feel that I wanted to get his diagnosis or assess assessment to even rule it out just to know what what his brain was like, whether he was having any whether any of his difficulties that he was having was down to something. Whether it was just down to him, just not like wanted to put the effort in or whether it was down to general difficulties due to a condition. And that way, once I knew I could do all my research on that condition. And it just didn't really matter to me then whether he was home schooled or he went back into a school system, at least I'd have the knowledge of what's going on with him and be able to do the research to like find the tools or resources and connect with the right people to help make things better for him.
24:16Diana Hayes: So as his educator, you could see that he needed some kind of adaptation in learning. You, in your own experience of learning with a chronic condition and undiagnosed, it was ADHD, wasn't it? Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: So when you got your son's diagnosis for autism, how did that... feel for you as a parent and educator because you were both
24:52Natalie Isabella: Yeah. There was a sense of relief and then there was a sense of now I've got a foundation to work with and I know now that I could do all the research I want to do, connect with the right people and I'll be able to put more things in place to help me. Diana Hayes: Yeah. So you got the diagnosis, you got an EHCP, you tried special school, but it didn't work for you. They were trying to get him into mainstream high school. When did your desire to get your own diagnosis come up for you in this journey? When was that?
25:42Natalie Isabella: I feel like it wasn't necessarily a desire. Like on and off over the years I thought should I shouldn't have, but it also felt like it's too much effort to put into it. Uh, 'cause I've known I've spoken to the people and they just said how like dragged out it is and stuff like that. And then I've uh spoke to somebody else who talked about um going through a process called writer choose instead of just Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: doing it directly through speaker to your doctor NHS route. It's still NHS. But it's called right to choose and the process is faster. It's like ten months rather than six or more years. What and
26:19Diana Hayes: Well, well, so at the time we're recording this, I spoke to one provider for the right to choose for ADHD and autism assessments. And it's currently an 18 month waiting list. Natalie Isabella: Is what's that for? We Diana Hayes: uh Right to choose for ADHD and autism assessment. A provider that's through Right to Choose because now Natalie Isabella: And that's the right to choose. Wow. Diana Hayes: more people are aware of this option to go through Right to Choose and more people I think are aware of ADHD. I kind of feel sometimes that takes the headline and that people can kind of focus on that and maybe not so much autism sometimes. um But your right to choose when you were going through assessment with your son with autism, did you go for assessment for ADHD and autism or just the ADHD? What did you do?
27:30Natalie Isabella: With Connor, you mean my son? With myself. Uh Diana Hayes: with you, for you, yeah. Natalie Isabella: I just put forward for ADHD for myself. I felt like um I think with the autism I don't really think you get that much support. And there's no light pills to support you that I feel. At this stage, I was like, I needed something. More than just like breath work and meditation. There was 'cause at the time I was going through what I would imagine is paramedopause. Because all of a sudden this ADHD, which was manageable, highly masked, all of a sudden masking didn't work. And I didn't have any medication and I just went through this period of like at least a year where I just felt shocking, like I was dying inside. I didn't want to leave my bedroom, I didn't want to go for dog walks, I didn't want to be around people, I was scapping at people. I could literally go to bed at night and think, Oh, I just Hope I don't wake up tomorrow 'cause I just don't want to continue feeling like this this rubbish. And that's sort of where I pushed, you know, like but I pushed a bit before then for the doctors and I was waiting for the assessment. Then I've had the doctors again said, I'm on this wait list with assessment now. I think if any week now or a couple of months I'm gonna see somebody. But I don't think I can wait that long. I feel like I need something sort of now to help me out. So that's when the lady doctor that's thought to put me on antidepressants. So I think I took them about two months, three month max and that and then I had the assessment. So then I ditched the antidepressants and went straight on to the ADHD medication. I'd read up on whether I should continue having both, but I've read something called seritine syndrome and that can really cause some bad problems. So yeah.
29:23Diana Hayes: So when you were on the... um the antidepressants. Did you find that helped? Natalie Isabella: Yes. It it definitely dramatically helped. It was like almost instant within a couple of hours. But so it felt like somebody had got like robot hands and digs into my brain and literally pulled loads of like stuffing out and all of a sudden I just felt car carb and like people if they said things or did things that would normally irritate me didn't bother me anymore.
30:11Diana Hayes: And when you decided to ditch that because you had the option for the ADHD meds, what was the journey like? Did you have to try many different kinds of ADHD meds? And how were those meds different for you compared to the antidepressants? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, I've pretty much stick to the same medication called El Elvance, I think it's called. And started me off on twenty. I've noticed a immediate difference. Like I was lying in bed at night and I was thinking to myself automatically. I don't normally do that. Um and then I did that for a few weeks and then they put me onto a fifty. And then they did me put me onto a seventy. I did that for a couple of days and I felt worse. So I'm like linking the doctor, I'm not taking these anymore. I've got a few fifty left, I'll continue, but can you kind of rush things through and get me back on the fifty, please? So then I sort of thought then my dosage level there. Done that for a few months. And then just before I got signed off from ADHD three sixty, I then went through, got transferred back to the doctors. I said, right, these ADHD, these tablets, some of these Evelyn's they they went brilliantly some days and other days not so much. And like we discussed that other things can affect it like sleep or food, like if you don't have added protein. I said sometimes they wear off um quite early, other times they don't. So then they said, we can give you some boosters called Amphexa and they're only five G, but they're pretty good as well.
31:47Diana Hayes: So do you take the booster, the five milligram, just when you need it and some days you have it, some days you don't? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, and some days I just take boosters, like I'll have one in the morning, then I'll have one in the afternoon. Uh if I'm not particularly feeling like I'm doing anything like major, they major and productive. If I know I'm gonna be doing like a lot in the day then I'm gonna take the evidence and then a booster a little bit later on.
32:19Diana Hayes: So how would you say the medication, because you had the experience of the antidepressants, Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: and then you've got the experience of ADHD meds, which is definitely a stimulant with L-vans, how were those two things different for you? Natalie Isabella: I think they made me feel very much similar in the fact that they reduced the anxiety, they made my head a lot lighter. And so I could function better and just enjoy life better. I think the only major difference is with the antidepressants they make me feel more sleepier. So I was kinda glad to go up then. Even though they made me feel peaceful and like not bothered with the world. I was having like sort of driving lessons starting them up at the same time, so I didn't really want to be f like driving in the light.
33:09Diana Hayes: you Natalie Isabella: I needed something to keep me alert. So that's why the evidence was the best, best choice. Diana Hayes: And I hear what you're saying with the, it's not every day you take the Elvance, and you might just take the booster based on what you know is coming in the day. So that, it almost feels like... Like it's something you take when you need it. It's like a tool somehow. I can't explain it. It feels like it's a brain tool to help you when you need a bit of support, a bit more support or a bit less support. But having gone, but you went from not wanting to get up bed, not even wanting to take your dog for a walk, not wanting to wake up the next day. to what was life for you like, how different was that when you were on the Elvance.
34:11Natalie Isabella: Yeah, so things changed dramatically. I was um getting out the house, walking the dog near enough every day. I was going to monthly meetings, you know, w women in business meetings local locally. I was starting driving lessons after like decades of putting them off. I went to a event, it was where I saw you actually, it was October or November twenty Diana Hayes: 2025. Natalie Isabella: Yeah. It was called Big Festoon. That was based in Bolton at that time. And there was like over three hundred people there, strangers. And I was surrounded by them, sat at the table, my friend invited me. And then less than five months after that, mid March this year, I actually volunteered to be one of their support staff called Flight Squad. And that was that had changed venue from Bolton to Manchester. There's over like a thousand people there. And I was there surrounded by a thousand strangers after Not even wanting to be around my own family. You know what I mean? It was that's cra crazy.
35:09Diana Hayes: That's huge. Natalie Isabella: It's a massive transformation. Diana Hayes: huge transformation and how it almost feels like an acceleration of you getting to be you, how you wanted to be once you were able to access medication that helped take the edge of what was going on in your mind and how you felt about stuff. That's massive. And it's also massive having had a I'd love people to hear this, like, you know, when Natalie Isabella and I first spoke, we spoke at great length about that experience of you as a little girl, going to the doctor and having that pushback and how that really impacted you. But it didn't stop you advocating for your own child. And you won. And I hope people hear this. You had an incredibly straightforward birth, easy child nursery was there weren't weren't problems but when you got into mainstream school things started to not quite work, but you,
36:30Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: and you know, that courage that's needed to, to ask for help, but you already started on that homeschooling, exploring what's out there, speaking to other people, like online, like you mentioned the Facebook groups and forums where you were interacting with people that were already a little bit more ahead in their journey. Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: And I think probably, over the last few years, there's probably been an explosion of support that's now available to us as people that might be exploring things, revisiting childhood when like physiologically, like you talked about that change in you. And when we talk about masking, it's maybe, maybe... I don't know, it feels like we have to adapt to ways of working so that we're accepted, we're part of family or whatever, and it takes a lot of work, doesn't it? And perhaps someone who's listening, supporting their child, maybe they're functioning at the school, but when they get home, it's game over. And that's a surefire sign, I would probably suggest. that they may be masking, they may be working really hard to keep it together in school or anxiety about going to school because they know they're going to have to use a lot more energy to fit in. And then... Your son. Now how old is he now?
38:17Natalie Isabella: He's eighteen, he turned eighteen in day. And he's actually done two years at college, Main Street. Now so Diana Hayes: And so where we left off the story, he tried to put, you got your EHCP, you got him into a special school. They were trying to get him into mainstream school and then you took him back out, didn't you? This is around, how old was he then? Natalie Isabella: Yeah. That that w um it would have been like twelve, I think. Yeah. But i I wouldn't say that I took him out just because they were trying to push him into a mainstream school. I think it
38:55Diana Hayes: No. Natalie Isabella: was a mixture of other things as well. Diana Hayes: So when he was in the special school, how did he find, I mean, you said that you were getting phone calls from that school as well. Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: So what led you to deciding that you've been homeschooling him by that time, what, six, seven years before he went into the special school? So what made you bring him back home to homeschooling?
39:31Natalie Isabella: feel just 'cause it was like getting to the stage again and like every week, every other week, call us in about something and they couldn't deal with it. And well I feel felt like when I tried to speak to they just didn't kinda take on board what I was trying to say. And it was just what they thought that was it. They knew what was best for Connor and just some ridiculous things but you know, um
40:00Diana Hayes: What were the class sizes like in that special school? Natalie Isabella: I'm not hundred percent sure but I would say smaller down a mainstream. Maybe like half. Diana Hayes: And then how old was he when you started homeschooling again? Natalie Isabella: But twelve. Diana Hayes: about 12. So it was just a few months, it was supposed to be for a year and then you brought him back home to do homeschooling. And so tell me about homeschooling and then what led you, well what led both of you, I guess it's a joint decision to go to college. Tell me about that journey.
40:44Natalie Isabella: Yeah, so home schooling initially. Uh took about a year one primary school. We're supposed to be like, we'll try it for a year, see what happens. We can always go back into school a bit later on. When he's like more emotionally regulated, more mature. He's got those sort of ability to deal with it better. And we just enjoyed it that much and it continued. And then I would probably continue but Anne Marie made the suggestion. I thought, well I can give it a go because if I don't at least give it a go I could say I've given it a go and like th then later on down the line I can't say I've got regrets of not letting him try it out. And he did really well I think for the first year. We had a teacher that he really bonded with and then after the COVID thing he left because he actually um he did part time but he wasn't at school and then he part time actually home school and his own daughter who was having similar issues to colour. but they changed like teachers every year, then he had this female teacher and she just didn't get colour at all. And I think that's when all the problems started.
41:54Diana Hayes: And then um tell me about 12 upwards. What was it like doing GCSEs at home? Natalie Isabella: Yeah, we didn't opt to do these G C C's, we just did on school learning, which is taking the child's interest and then finding um like work learning activities to do based on that. And we did a lot of trips out the house, lot of forest schools, lots of museums, workshops, because there was some not many, but a few home schooling mums that had actually previously been teachers, science teachers and stuff like that. So they there's one woman from America. who came to England. I think she might have gone back to America now, but she had this um a teaching degree and then she had this other qualification which was for the specialised kind of education and I can't remember for the life of me what it's called. But she was very into science. So she did science workshops which were r really good. Um 'cause I thought to myself, um he could do GCSEs at college if he needs to do alongside whatever he's doing. But I never really fully believed in the G C S E system anyway, myself.
43:06Diana Hayes: So what led to college? Tell us a bit about that process. Natalie Isabella: Yeah, 'cause it was sixteen and it's kind of a case of you can't just sit at home, you can't continue home schooling you till you're like thirty and you can't just sit at home be you know, there's nothing wrong with enjoying the internet, enjoying gaming, but you can't just do that twenty four seven. So y you need to get yourself a little part time job, even just pa you don't have to be full time, part time start off with or college. I think you need something to give you that sense of purpose away from the home, away from people around you. And he could do any course and he couldn't think of a course for what to do. So me and Wade spoke, my husband, and we said we looked at different courses. What he likes animals, doesn't he? He's really into into animals and into technology. Let's just start off with something nice, light and airy like animal care. And he agreed to that. So he did that course for year. And then after that he said he didn't want continue with that. he loves animals but he hated the aspect of being outdoors uh particularly during the winter time. And and I feel like it even though it was nice to feed the animals and learn about and look after I think it gets a bit repetitive. And he was very into his technology. And at home he was doing editing videos. And he he even has a TikTok channel at one point and he's got a couple of thousand followers on that. And what he'll do is I don't know where where he finds them, but little video clips of different like TV shows and films. Could be anything from like The Walking Dead, The Boys, all these different TV shows, Breaking Bad and things like that. And he'll get these little clips and he'll cut bits out and then he'll add um special effects and sound effects and text and make it his own little thing. But he's got a lot of positive comments and a lot of likes and a lot of followers on that. So this Yeah, just girl and just finished recording what to do game design and esports. And then we spoke about that saying that we researched it. Um there's a lot of different sort of areas you could do, like marketing. You could be some sort of like health wellness coach where 'cause they're gonna be gaming for like long time, these professional gamers, you could be sort of the coach that helps them with things like in between doing fitness or sleep and things like that. Um also look into into it long term, it it thinks I feel like if you're really gonna go somewhere deep with that, it involves like a lot of travelling internationally and then we thought with his autism, and not what he's struggling to sort of do things like he would struggle to travel, I think, without being Wayne. And he might get a bit homesick and I think he might might struggle with that sort of career. Uh what else can he do? And 'cause I originally tried to encourage him to do the media production. 'Cause he liked the video editing at first and the
46:03Diana Hayes: together. Natalie Isabella: he said, I want to do game design first and esports 'cause I think I think he had sneakily picked that 'cause he thought it was just gonna be sitting in college all day gaming, but there was a bit more involved in that. So um but this time he has agreed to do the media production because he does like video editing. I think what put him off is 'cause it includes other things like the photography, uh the podcasting side of things, but I said that's a good thing because you'll have such a variety of skills. And even when you do video, you've got to do voiceover. Doing the podcasting side of things, the audio content will help that.
46:36Diana Hayes: Mm-hmm. Natalie Isabella: So I think he's looking forward to that now in September. Diana Hayes: That's amazing. So what, thank you so much for sharing like your whole story of your journey, your mother advocating for you, you advocating for your son. To somebody listening who might be thinking about homeschool. would be best for them and their child. What sort of things would you say that they might find helpful if they're at the beginning of that exploration? Where would you say to have a look?
47:28Natalie Isabella: Um they should start off by researching online. There's a lot of websites that talk about unschooling or there's a a lot of websites as well that talk about homeschooling with more of an academic approach if you want to do the GCCs. there's also Facebook groups, there's sort of general UK homeschooling Facebook groups, and then there's gonna be homeschooling groups for near enough every town out there that you can join and just say If they ask you why you're joining, just say I'm not currently home schooling, but I want to find out more because it's a something I'm considering. just to do the research is the main thing, and also to do like a bit of an audit of what their life is like at the moment, what support systems they've got around them. Is it something that is actually feasible for them physically, financially? Um, like for me, I obviously have a mum that wasn't working and she could support me. And then my husband would support me on these days off. And I've spoken to a of people on Facebook and I was happy because I got to do work from home anyway. So yeah, I felt like that's something doable for us financially. I was was living with my mum and dad and we had enough money to do it and I think the only negative for me that I could say is that I didn't thrive. And I think that would have made the home schooling experience so much easier. So I was limited to where I could go um public transport wise. I didn't want spend more than like an hour and a half or three sort of buses somewhere just to sit there for like an an hour's wick shop and then so I was sort of restricted to sort of North Manchester a of the time unless there was very occasionally some pairs that were really nice that would offer to give us lifts places. But yeah, I think I would have done even better. The two things I think that would have improved the home school gym was if I drove. And then if I had access to this AI stuff now, 'cause I don't think it existed when I was homeschooling or I wasn't aware of it. And I actually
49:30Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: w last night I actually watched your episode that you did with somebody on AI. And I just know how much that that's really helped me in my life. Even from doing the application form for the ADHD assessment, you know, it helps structure your thoughts when you're when you're overwhelmed. Diana Hayes: Yeah, it really does. really does. I think AI as a uh thinking partner for us as neurodivergent people is utterly transformational in terms of helping to get it all out and see the pattern in front of you instead of it all being inside or even journaling and writing it down. Just the way that we can get everything out and pick out the patterns. with something that just looks at our language. It's incredible, absolutely incredible. So yeah, AI as an education partner, I can imagine is huge for homeschooling in terms of opportunity to support your child or children if you have
50:37Natalie Isabella: Yeah. Diana Hayes: more than one. Natalie Isabella: 'Cause at at one time we only had when before the we had ac access to internet or AI, all we had really was libraries to rely on. Yeah. Diana Hayes: Yeah. Yeah. It's incredible, isn't it? Absolutely incredible. So now you're on the cusp of more change yourself, aren't you? When we've spoken about what next for Natalie Isabella, you've been advocating for your son, you've been homeschooling, you've got your own diagnosis. So what does life look like for you now as a parent? who's homeschooled, got them um into college and exploring different mainstream places. You've mentioned AI briefly. What does your life look like next as far as you can see?
51:37Natalie Isabella: I'm doing my driving lessons and I'm getting close to that test date, so that's my main main overall goal is to pass the test Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: and get a car. Um I've been doing I've done virtual assistant work and other just bits of jobs here and there where I can. And I'm looking to sort of I'm transitioning more into a focus on branding. And I've also done some certifications. That was more in two thousand and twenty two. I did a mindset course. coaching course and a neurojetics which I studied subconscious. Uh recently also I have been learning some AI, I've been learning to create like your own bots related to your own knowledge and I'm learning to do viper coding to create apps and stuff like that. Maybe that's something in the future that might help um create for other businesses. But I also want to do once I'm driving is to go meet people and do I do video editing as well, done that stuff, but I wouldn't mind getting the other side of content creation where like taking photographs and videos. I feel if I can do that, if I tech to it and I do well and I get a lot of people wanting it, um, paying me for it, then I can 'cause Connor's doing media at college. On his days off I can bring him with me and have him like as an apprenti apprenticeship so you can get the practical
53:00Diana Hayes: Amazing. Natalie Isabella: experience. Diana Hayes: Yeah, Wonderful. So as with kind of closing out, we've said you've kind of shared like your advice about explore, talk to people, join groups. Is there anything sort of in closing out in terms of support and I've heard what you said when you're maybe thinking about homeschooling look at your whole life look at your emotional support around you look at your finances on what is actually doable for you as a family is there anything else as we kind of close out that you would say say to Natalie Isabella at the beginning of her journey or even actually, do you know what? The bit that is so kind of interesting is you've made that decision really early on about in Conor's education, about homeschooling, but you've been really open to trying different things. And that seems really kind of helpful bit to maybe explore, know. You tried the special school, it didn't you work, but he's right now he's in mainstreams college. So specialist provision doesn't always mean it's the right thing for your child, does it? So what would you say to parents maybe exploring specialist education? um Yeah.
54:48Natalie Isabella: Yeah, I believe that everything is an option. And also timing is a good thing 'cause Connor's eighteen now, so things will be different for him, he'll be able to cope with a mainstream environment much better than when he could when he was eight. Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: So I think timing is a massive thing. Um trust your own intuition. Remember everything is only as temporary as you want it to be. Nothing has to be a life sentence. Diana Hayes: Mm. Natalie Isabella: looking at everything holistically, like I said. Do you have anyone to support you like parents, aunties, uncles? I don't know, you might have an uncle who's an expert in something that your child might be really interested in that could, you know, when they've got spare time they can spend time with them. If you've got a retired parent they can help. If th if they've got the energy and the desire to do so. Um, research and if it if somebody in your heart that says, no, this is not for me, then it's not for you. just stuff. You can't feel bad for whatever I think whatever decision you make, whether you keeping them in a a mainstream school, putting them into a special school, or educating them, unschooling them. I think every option always comes with that feeling of, am I doing the right thing? But,
56:04Diana Hayes: Yeah. Natalie Isabella: you know, it's down to you at the end of the day what feels right in your heart and you can try it if you've got the resources and the ability to try it, you can try it and like you can do it for yeah, then you might think, God, stop this. It's not for me. And send them back. Or you might be like me and and I say you can s Diana Hayes: Yeah, awesome. Thank you so much, Natalie Isabella. So I think it might be quite helpful if we pop some links that you found really helpful to explore homeschooling, maybe particular links if we can make it work to homeschooling Facebook groups nationally for UK that might be helpful for people to explore. um And I want to say huge thank you for sharing. your story and your journey with educating Connor and um your own experience about what that has been like for you getting your own diagnosis and what medication has done for you and helped you. And also that mention and shout out to AI and how it's really, it can be such a supportive tool for us as neurodivergent people. So thank you so much.
57:25Natalie Isabella: Yeah, thank you for having me. Diana Hayes: it's been lovely. So as we close out, want to say, want to say apples don't fall far from trees and there is never just one.
