By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services She is thirty eight, and by every outward measure she is doing fine. The degree got finished. The job gets done. The kids get where they need to be. But the machinery underneath tells a different story: the sticky notes layered three deep, the calendar reminders set for reminders, the private sense that she is paddling twice as hard as everyone else just to stay level with the boat. Her husband is tired of the mi

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services When a legal case turns on a question of psychological injury, mental capacity, disability status, the quality of the psychological evaluation at the center of it matters enormously. Not just clinically, but legally. An evaluation built on sound methods, validated tools, and defensible professional standards can anchor a case. One that isn’t can be dismantled on cross examination, excluded by the court, or quietl

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services If you’ve taken an online ADHD quiz recently, and statistically speaking, there’s a decent chance you have, you probably already know how it ends. Eighteen questions about how often you lose track of conversations, forget appointments, or find yourself starting three projects before finishing one. A score. A message telling you that your results suggest you “may have ADHD” and should “talk to a healthcare provide

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services Senior year of high school: two AP classes, varsity soccer, a part time job, and somehow a 3.5 GPA. . . with lots of parents’ help. First semester of college: one missed deadline became two, two became a pattern, the lectures blur together, and the student who was “fine” for twelve years of school is suddenly not fine at all. Then they are called into the Dean’s office to talk about academic probation. This is o

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services Reading should be the kind of thing that gets easier with practice. For most kids, that’s exactly what happens: a slow, sometimes effortful start in kindergarten and first grade, followed by a gradual smoothing out as decoding becomes automatic and reading becomes a tool rather than the task itself. Why Dyslexia Is Often Missed For children with dyslexia, that smoothing out doesn’t come. The words stay slow. The

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services “He’s so bright, he can’t have a learning disability.” “She’s just bored. She’s too smart for this work.” “If he really had ADHD, he wouldn’t be able to focus on the things he loves.” These are among the most common things parents of twice exceptional children hear, from teachers, from pediatricians, sometimes from well meaning specialists who look at a child’s intellectual horsepower and conclude that the strugg

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services Most parents don’t walk into my office saying “I think my child has a learning disability.” They come in saying something more like: “She’s so smart, but something isn’t clicking.” Or: “He tries so hard, I don’t understand why reading is still this hard.” Or simply: “Her teacher keeps saying she seems ‘behind,’ but I’m not sure what that means.” That uncertainty, that feeling that something is off but you’re not

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services You’ve seen the word everywhere lately. Social media, wellness blogs, maybe in a conversation with a friend who recently got diagnosed with ADHD or autism. “Neurodivergent.” It has the feel of a term that means something important, but also one that’s been stretched in enough directions that it’s worth slowing down and asking: what does it actually mean? As a psychologist, I find this question genuinely interesti

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services If you’ve spent any time in neurodivergent online communities recently, you’ve probably encountered the term “AuDHD”, shorthand for people who are both autistic and have ADHD. What started as community language has quietly become one of the more clinically important conversations in the field of psychological assessment. Because yes: ADHD and autism can absolutely occur together. They do so frequently. And when t

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services, Spokane, WA "I know exactly what I need to do. I just can't make myself do it." If you have ADHD — or suspect you might — that sentence probably hits close to home. You're not lazy. At least not always. You're not unmotivated. You may genuinely care deeply about the thing you're not doing. And yet there's this invisible wall between knowing and doing that nobody around you seems to understand, and that you're i

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services, Spokane, WA She's articulate. Makes decent eye contact. Laughs at (almost) the right moments in conversation. She's held down jobs, maintained friendships — at least on the surface — and managed to move through the world without anyone raising a flag. She's also been quietly exhausted for as long as she can remember. Social interactions that others seem to find effortless require something from her she can't q

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services, Spokane, WA Picture this: a woman in her late 30s sits across from me. She's sharp and accomplished. She's also exhausted in a way that sleep doesn't fix. She's been in therapy on and off for years — treated for anxiety, then depression, then "burnout." Medications have helped some. Nothing has quite fit. Then we do a thorough evaluation. And the picture that emerges isn't primarily anxiety or depression. It's A

By Dr. Tyler Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP | Gerdin Psychological Services You’ve probably Googled it. Maybe late at night, after another day of scattered thoughts, unfinished tasks, and that low hum of worry that never quite goes away. The question that keeps coming up: Is this ADHD? Or is it anxiety? Or both? You’re not alone. This is one of the most searched mental health questions on the internet, and for good reason. These two conditions share a surprising amount of overlap in how

Understanding yourself or a loved one can sometimes feel like piecing together a complex puzzle. When it comes to learning challenges, the first step toward clarity is often a learning disorder diagnosis . This process can open doors to support, strategies, and a better understanding of how your brain works. If you’ve ever wondered how professionals identify learning disorders or what to expect during the process, you’re in the right place. Let’s walk through this journey tog

You know that feeling when something's off, but you can't quite name it? When your internal world feels like a puzzle with missing pieces, or worse—like you're holding pieces from three different puzzles and can't figure out which ones actually belong together? That's often how people feel when they first come in for a psychological evaluation. And honestly? That confusion makes perfect sense. Our minds are astonishingly complex. They're shaped by genetics we didn't choose,

By Dr. Tyler A. Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP Far too often, people walk into my office and recount their invalidating experience of a psychological assessment where they did not feel heard—they were quickly labeled and sent on their way. However, individuals walk out of a high-quality evaluation describing the experience as clarifying, validating, and even life-changing. A well-conducted assessment does far more than identify symptoms—it reveals how a person thinks, learns, feels, and

By Dr. Tyler A. Gerdin, PsyD, ABPP Let’s be honest: When people think of ADHD, they often picture the kid who can’t sit still or the...

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3 Benefits of EMDR Therapy for Trauma EMDR, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, is a relatively new therapy approach that was...