About

Amanda Atchison (she/her)
Amanda has spent her career engaging with children, teens and young adults as a teacher, counsellor and coach and the culmination of this rich, diverse experience has since emerged as The Cortex Collective. She brings a distinctive blend of skills and knowledge to her counselling work with extensive experience as a teacher and counsellor combined with her lived experienced as a diagnosed autistic with ADHD (known as an AuDHDer!).

Amanda specialises in working with older children and adolescents (aged 12+) with a particular interest in school absenteeism and school refusal (sometimes referred to as ‘School Can’t’). She also has a specialised interest in supporting neurodivergent folk from aged 12 through to adulthood, in particular those who are (or may be considering they are) autistic, ADHD or AuDHD. 

Amanda’s strengths lie within her ability to:

• connect with young people through respectful conversation in which they feel heard without judgement
• empower clients as experts in their own life stories
• create a safe, trusted space for change to occur
• engage ‘challenging’ clients who may have struggled to connect with other professionals
• communicate effectively across a wide variety of sectors (e.g Education, Community, Allied Health, Medical) to ensure wrap around care for her clients
  

Clients regularly comment that Amanda is “compassionate, funny and easy to open up to” whilst parents say that she is “considerate and supportive of parents, always open to communication and, someone they’ve been trying to find for a long time!”

For a more detailed look at why The Cortex Collective might be right for you, please visit the ‘Why Choose The Cortex Collective’ page.