Kayla Concannon (00:17):
Okay. Welcome back to the Lived Expertise is Greater Than Degrees Podcast. I have an awesome guest today that was recommended by one of our other guests, so you know that they are going to be an awesome conversation. I am here with Morenike and I am going to let them introduce themselves.

Morénike Giwa Onaiwu (00:40):
Thanks Kayla. And I'm, like, so paranoid because I have a lawnscaper in the background. (laughs). I'm hoping that it's not audible. But thank you everyone. I'm really glad to be here on the podcast. And so my name is Morenike, uh, my last name is Giwa Onaiwu and I am a twice exceptional adult and I was identified as a young child as being intellectually gifted, and then I obtained diagnoses of ADHD and later autism in adulthood. The autism one being the last one as I stumbled onto it by accident after my children kept pointedly mentioning, the professionals, how similar I was to them (laughs). And my latest development is I have neurodegenerative condition. So it's kind of like all of these different parts of my brain, all kind of working together with one another, sometimes against one another (laughs) sometimes.

Morénike Giwa Onaiwu (01:30):
I live in the US I was raised by parents who are, uh, immigrants from West Africa who came here for studies and ended up staying. And my work experiences in the nonprofit sector like community research, education, kind of a variety of things, consulting, writing, and I'm really passionate about disability justice and human rights overall. And so I'm just really happy to be able to talk to you and just kinda share some things about this whole topic of lived versus learned expertise because it's someone that's really personal to me and important.

Kayla (02:05):
Yeah, I'm so glad that you're here. I think there's so many different aspects of you that are different lived experiences, certainly different lived experiences to me, but also probably a lot of listeners. And I know that you also have the degrees, so lived expertise is greater than degrees, but sometimes you have both and I think the lived expertise and the lived experiences that you have throughout your life can impact what degrees you go for, what degrees you're able to obtain, what niches you spend your time learning and what you also learn outside of the classroom. So, what's something that you've learned in school that has impacted you in your life?

Morénike (02:50):
It's interesting. I think one thing that I learned is that a topic can be inherently important, or interesting, or of value, but depending upon the way that it is often, like, portrayed or presented to people, it can impact how it's received by others. And I think about that, I went to schools when I was young that were really, we had like a lot of eclectic learning and project based and self-paced and accelerated types of opportunities to learn and different learning methods. I feel like that was really something that where a lot of us really grew in that type of environment. And it makes me think of, my family moved and I remember in high school attending a different school and being kind of shocked by how dreadfully boring a particular course was that I had loved. I had absolutely loved this course.

Morénike (03:48):
The material was so interesting but the delivery, the person who was teaching it had so little passion for it. It was quite clear that this was just the paycheck and they just wanted to get through the day and just wanted to kind of go over for rote learning. And so I thought about so many people who had this mentality that, "Oh, I hate certain types of science or certain types of math," but I don't think the, that they really hate it. They were never taught it in a way that it seemed to have any practical application. They were never able to really own it and do fun things with it. And I remember just being really shocked, 'cause at that time I had no idea that such and such could be made uninteresting. But it, it was clear to me that this stuff really is variable.

Kayla (04:24):
Wow. I haven't really thought about that too much, but it absolutely makes sense. The content and the teacher have to get along. If you have an awesome teacher, they can probably make anything interesting or applicable. And if you have a teacher that's having a bad day or it's the paycheck or their burntout-

Morénike (04:49):
A whole bad academic year. Yeah. (laughs).

Kayla (04:50):
Yeah. A whole, a pandemic maybe (laughs).

Morénike (04:53):
Yeah. (laughs).

Kayla (04:55):
Then you know, even your favorite subject matter can lose its spark.

Morénike (05:00):
Absolutely. And I don't say this to blame teachers 'cause I've worked, in addition to working as a professor, I've also worked in K-12. So, I know that teachers have difficult jobs. So it isn't to criticize anyone, but I think that a lot of the problem is in our society, how we view, really everybody is a bit of a teacher in my sense. Everybody has like, it shouldn't just be the person who is in the teaching profession, whomever you are, whatever you're doing, you're teaching, you're mentoring, you're molding people who are watching you, working with you and they're teaching you as well and your environment. And so I think that some people's skill is not in communication or dissemination of information. And I think the problem is if we took more of an engaged pedagogy approach like Bell Hooks encouraged, then we would see that everyone is learning collaboratively. The student, the teacher, like we're all bringing something important to kind of meld them all together and cultivate knowledge.

Kayla (05:54):
We've been reading a lot of different Bell Hooks works in my classes and I was excited to see some of Bell Hook's books at a local bookstore near me. I think-

Morénike (06:06):
Yay. (laughs).

Kayla (06:07):
... she's making a, a mainstream impact. And I think she recently passed away, like maybe in the past year?

Morénike (06:14):
Yes. Yeah.

Kayla (06:15):
That collaboration, you really can't be... we know that schools are so under-resourced. I mean class sizes are getting bigger and teachers don't have planning periods, grading periods, all the communication with everybody at home. And it is really, definitely, a hard and underpaid job to be a teacher. And so I understand why there would be days that the lessons don't go that well. But I think about that as an occupational therapist too, that if I'm the only OT that someone is going to meet, I have to do a good job. I have to present the profession well, I have to make an impact for this client because even if it's my day-to-day activities, it's new for them and that matters.

Morénike (07:00):
Absolutely.

Kayla (07:02):
Let's switch to that outside of school. So everybody's learning, everybody's learning through life. What's something that you learned outside of school that had an impact on you?

Morénike (07:12):
Truly, I think that I learned that a lot of things are not what they appear to be. That you really need to dig deeper or understand more or have context. I also learned that there are so much difference, but there's also so many common factors that people have as well. Structures, ideas, philosophies, and, but most importantly I think I learned is how much things in the past, what people have been through or seen or known or they're aware of how much that still impacts us today. I think people really underestimate that. Several years ago I took my children to visit where I used to live in Southern California and I remember they were asking some questions about this one particular area, and I stopped 'cause I realized they weren't alive when (laughs), you know, they're little, like they didn't realize that there were wildfires. So this area they're asking "why does it look this way," and it looks this way because all of the trees were burned up.

Morénike (08:07):
And so, but they don't have that context, they're just looking at what they see right now so they don't understand. And so I started thinking about how much is that with so many things in life when they talk about how they can still find in the DNA of relatives of people who survived the Holocaust, how the trauma has impacted people and how do we can just see so many things like when they do neurological scans of people who've endured neglect or abuse. Like there's so many things that has happened way before we ever encounter a person or a situation that could be working behind the scenes to impact it. If we only go with what we see or what we think we know, we're really limiting ourselves.

Kayla (08:44):
This is an interesting subject that you brought up because this was something that another one of my guests was talking about. Asiatu was talking about how we are all so connected. Of course there are differences, but Asiatu kind of compared us to a garden and how, yeah, there are different flowers or you can have fruits, vegetables, whatever [inaudible 00:09:05].

Morénike (09:04):
I love that analogy, (laughs).

Kayla (09:05):
... but we're underneath, we can't separate from each other, our roots [inaudible 00:09:10].

Morénike (09:10):
Exactly.

Kayla (09:11):
You're bringing up such a good point because I think we spend so much time, at least generationally in an individual, kind of focused way, we're fed so much information about self-care and taking care of yourself and working on your goals and managing your life and all these things. But we aren't individuals in a bubble, we're a whole society [inaudible 00:09:35].

Morénike (09:35):
Exactly.

Kayla (09:35):
Oh my gosh, it has to be so interesting parenting. I don't have any kids, but when you see things through your kids' lenses-

Morénike (09:45):
Yes (laughs).

Kayla (09:45):
... of just, it's so different. I mean, I work with some kids and I'm like, "Wait, you were born in 2010. What?" (laughs).

Morénike (09:51):
I know.

Kayla (09:51):
That is wild (laughs).

Morénike (09:57):
I literally, as I was having a discussion with my daughter yesterday and so everyone in our house, we all are neurodivergent in, in numerous ways. So, but my two youngest children are autistic as well. So my daughter was humming and singing parts of a song and I was thinking, "How on earth do you know that song?" And she was like, "Oh, we're learning it in choir." And I was really confused 'cause there's a song by Coldplay, When I Ruled the World (laughs). And so she was asking me questions about it because obviously she could tell it had to do with monarchy and just any the other, and she was trying to figure out what it meant. And I was explaining it had to do with the French Revolution, but it could also be seen as other empires. And we were just talking about all this stuff.

Morénike (10:31):
And so she just made some observations about little parts of it that made me like, "Hmm, I don't know why that's like that." And I went and looked it up. And it was just so fascinating to me because this is a song that came out the year she was born. Like, you know, (laughs) she didn't even exist. And I've heard it my whole life and never thought about what it meant until she asked me (laughs). It just was a song with a catchy phrase. But her asking me, wanting information and me wanting to give her accurate information is what made me look it up. I had never thought about it before. (laughs).

Kayla (10:58):
Yeah. The things that we fall into habits with and then we don't even realize that there's so much that we don't understand. Think about that with with song lyrics. I was talking to somebody the other day about phrases like "kill two birds with one stone"-

Morénike (11:13):
Yes.

Kayla (11:13):
... and how violent that is.

Morénike (11:15):
Yes, it is. Ugh, (laughs).

Kayla (11:17):
And it's like these phrases and this jargon, things that we just don't even read into because it's just part of our experience.

Morénike (11:26):
What's interesting though is I think those of us who are neurodivergent, we, they're part of our experience, so that might be why we kind of coast over them. But if we, any of us didn't think about it, like you just said about the "kill two birds with one stone," it's something that impacts us. Two phrases that people used to say, teachers or whomever, I never loved, "Well there's more than one way to skin a cat." I'm thinking, "Ew, why are we talking about skinning a cat?" And then the other one, "How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time." And it's like, I get what they're trying to do, what they're trying to illustrate. But it really kind of reveals a lot of the violence in our society, (laughs), that we may-

Kayla (11:57):
Yeah.

Morénike (11:58):
... not even think about, that's embedded.

Kayla (11:59):
Yes. And then it kind of speaks to just the things as a society we're uncomfortable with. We come up with phrases like that sometimes I think to, I don't know, maybe like avoid talking about the actual subject matter.

Morénike (12:12):
I think so, yes.

Kayla (12:13):
Then we're in metaphors and idioms and then most of my work is related to sex ed. So that-

Morénike (12:18):
Well that's even worse.

Kayla (12:19):
(laughs).

Morénike (12:19):
I'm like, so to have things be unclear there, you know what I mean? [inaudible 00:12:23]. When it's already unclear for everyone, period. And then you throw [inaudible 00:12:27] into the mix (laughs).

Kayla (12:29):
Right. It's a safety hazard. It's really dangerous when we don't-

Morénike (12:32):
Yeah.

Kayla (12:33):
... clearly communicate. But, oh my gosh. So let's go back to this because I think a lot of the listeners of this podcast will probably be service providers.

Morénike (12:42):
Mm-hmm.

Kayla (12:42):
I'm thinking occupational therapists, speech language pathologists, behaviorists, teachers, educators. And so, what I want those listeners to get out of this is kind of to come out of their own perspectives, from their own training-

Morénike (13:00):
Yes.

Kayla (13:00):
... their own schooling, their own practice and think about how what they're doing and what they've learned from the textbooks and the research articles for evidence-based practice, how that actually leaves people out.

Morénike (13:14):
Yes. How it leaves them out and how it also really minimizes who people are and what the contributions are. Because I think that I have my degrees, I'm proud of them, but I feel like I've learned just as much... My, my maternal grandmother was illiterate, functionally illiterate, not read. And was one of the most brilliant people I'd ever met. The life experiences that she had. I love the Sojourner Truth's, Ain't I A Woman speech and how important it is. And I think about the deep concepts and the way she's deconstructing the idea of gender and all of these different things in womanhood without having any formal education. And I think that's what we miss, the people that we encounter in the community.

Morénike (13:51):
So maybe for various reasons, maybe it's 'cause of educational attainment, maybe it's 'cause of cognition, maybe it's because of disability for whatever reason, cultural reasons, any reason, personal preference, if someone is not communicating, I guess in a standard, traditional way, in terms of using the concepts or the ideas that are kind of revere, I'd say, then I think we need to look at the fact that what's the bigger idea behind it? Do we care that they're using the proper terminology or do we care that they understand the general framework and can apply things in a practical way? And I think about, for myself, I've always been really good at learning. I was one of those people who never had to study for a spelling test or an English test. Things just kinda came to me.

Morénike (14:29):
And so if someone was to ask me the types of figures of speech and I can do the basic simple ones like noun and verb, adverb, I can use all of these things, the superlative, the perfect, the preterite, the this... But I can't tell you what they are. I just know that it's right because it's right. I can't give you the explanation as to why. I don't know the term, I don't know the rule, but I just know how to apply it. And I think we need to think about that more and more with the people that we work with and that we encounter and that we love and befriend not to look down on them. They might know a whole lot more than you believe that they know if you give people a chance.

Kayla (15:01):
Yeah, that is definitely true. Here's another phrase, "If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, the fish will spend its whole life thinking it has no skills" or something like that.

Morénike (15:11):
Yes. Yes.

Kayla (15:13):
So we have these standards, we have ways that we socially, informally assess people's intelligence. And those ways are, well generally, like ableist and racist, classist, and all-

Morénike (15:28):
Yes.

Kayla (15:28):
... sorts of things. But also they're just not accurate because it depends on so many different factors. And I think similar to what you were saying, I think most people can tell you if something is right or wrong without going to law school or without being-

Morénike (15:44):
Yes.

Kayla (15:44):
... a philosopher.

Morénike (15:45):
Yes. And it isn't that that-

Kayla (15:46):
So there's-

Morénike (15:47):
... specialized knowledge is not important, but it means we have to-

Kayla (15:49):
Yeah.

Morénike (15:49):
... respect that there's a baseline understanding that people do have, you know?

Kayla (15:54):
Right. Somebody needs to know how to read the laws 'cause I don't, and I (laughs) had to try to read some for some clients that I've had and I really have a hard time decoding it. But I think one thing that it comes back to in a lot of instances with my clients is we have a sense of right and wrong, but a lot of times through all sorts of different therapies and all sorts of different ableism and stigmas that we put on folks with disabilities, I think especially neurodivergent folks in this instance, we disconnect people from their own gut feeling, from their own [inaudible 00:16:32].

Morénike (16:31):
Oh my gosh. Yes. We gaslight them-

Kayla (16:33):
Yeah.

Morénike (16:33):
... out of knowing what's intrinsic to them and what isn't. So you spend your life questioning, because this-

Kayla (16:38):
Yeah.

Morénike (16:39):
... thing seems wrong or this hurts, or this is confusing, but it isn't to anyone else. It only is to you. So you learn to start, start ignoring that internal compass that you have and possibly even shutting it off.

Kayla (16:49):
Exactly. Because we spend so much time with neurodivergent youths telling them to fit in. They don't wanna stand out, they don't wanna draw negative attention-

Morénike (16:59):
Mm-hmm.

Kayla (16:59):
... to themselves. Stop singing, all these [inaudible 00:17:01].

Morénike (17:01):
We teach them to lie and to act, basically-

Kayla (17:03):
Yeah.

Morénike (17:04):
... unfortunately. And that's not the way it should be. What we should do is, is teach them how to be multilingual and to speak different languages and codeswitch when you need to, but that's not what we do, unfortunately. We teach them to adopt these new ways as the way, and sometimes, like with my children, they'll ask me, "Well why?" You know? And I just have to tell them, "Well, people will think it's rude if you don't do X." Like there really is no valid reason for X thing, but you must do it. Or you must know that if you don't do it, this is what people are thinking of you. So you can choose not to do it with small talk or different things like that. I think there's so much, like you said, that we are trimming away, carving away bits and pieces of who the neurodivergent youth are, to where when they become adults, do they even know who they are?

Kayla (17:42):
And I think so much of the providers that go in, right, we go in with our textbooks, our coursework, our board exams, our licenses, everybody tells us-

Morénike (17:53):
And good intentions.

Kayla (17:55):
And good intentions, right?

Morénike (17:55):
Yeah.

Kayla (17:55):
But we also go in with a kind of a power trip of-

Morénike (17:59):
Absolutely.

Kayla (18:00):
... "We, we are here to help." Um-

Morénike (18:01):
Yes. "We're here to help. You're broken. I know what to do to help you pull yourself out or fix you." It is very much a power trip.

Kayla (18:10):
Good intentions. And with all the things we're told we're supposed to do. We have the journal articles. But the thing is, the journal articles are written by the providers and it's [inaudible 00:18:22].

Morénike (18:21):
Yes. Who have biases, who, who use, you know, stigmatizing language and who have a particular worldview where they are really heavily influenced by the medical model as opposed to, you know, more of an interactionist model.

Kayla (18:33):
Yes. And we also have this perspective of not experiencing a lot of the struggles that people on our caseload might because-

Morénike (18:44):
Yes.

Kayla (18:45):
... that would make it hard to become that provider.

Morénike (18:48):
Absolutely. Absolutely. Wow.

Kayla (18:50):
Which I think is-

Morénike (18:51):
That's really deep when you think about it. So it's like, you care very much, people aren't going into these fields for money (laughs), they're going into these fields because it's just something important to them, if they want to serve. So there's an altruistic angle, but it is true that the lived experience, not having that, I think people don't have a sense of humility about what you don't know until it's pointed out to you. Like I think about a friend of mine who, years ago, she played a song, like a little segment of a song for me, and she asked me what it meant and I just kind of started sharing my thoughts about it. And I had no idea what it meant. I'd never heard it before, but I thought it was about a breakup, like a relationship. A couple who had just broken up and they were missing each other around the holidays.

Morénike (19:30):
And you know, she stopped and she just looked at me, and she just kind of shook her head (laughs). And I was like, "What?" And she said, "It is so obvious you don't understand." And I was really confused. And so then she started to break down the song to me, like to recite the lyrics and explain what each line meant. And she was like, "This is about divorce, this is about how every holiday, when your parents are divorced and you've gotta go to mom's house for this and dad's house for this, how you feel and the separation." She said, "Your parents are still together. So you have privilege in that regard and you don't understand, you can't even conceive of what this means when anyone who's been through this can listen to this for a few seconds and it has such a deep meaning to them. And that meaning it just completely lost on you." And that was just so poignant for me.

Kayla (20:08):
That is really a changed moment. I mean, just thinking through, I know I've had moments like that where I've just had to, you know, you almost get winded. You lose your words-

Morénike (20:21):
Yes.

Kayla (20:21):
... and you don't know how to respond. And I think the narrative, and probably the most common reaction, is accountability and then defensiveness. But sometimes it's just being open, it's just listening.

Morénike (20:34):
Yes.

Kayla (20:34):
It's just-

Morénike (20:36):
Yes, yes.

Kayla (20:38):
Yeah. It's knowing that you can have all of your experiences, but that is never gonna be the same as anyone else's history of experiences.

Morénike (20:49):
Exactly. And that you can miss so much as a result, as close as you might be to a situation that you are, are not always necessarily gonna perceive it accurately. And that's why we need to have, to work together. That's why we need to have those with lived and learned expertise together. Because there are certain things that obviously, you know, lived expertise is important, but no one's going to allow you to diagnose someone or treat someone or provide an intervention without those qualifications. So you need the learned expertise, and the lived expertise brings the realness to it. It's almost like, if you think about, you know, an X and a Y axis, you need them both to meet.

Kayla (21:23):
Exactly. I know this podcast, I provocatively called it Lived Expertise is Greater Than Degrees.

Morénike (21:31):
I personally think that it is (laughs).

Kayla (21:32):
Well, I know we need both, but, right? For so long, the degrees, the academic, the accolades, the credentials, the licenses, all that stuff has always come above actually experiencing something. Actually having a diagnosis, actually having a certain trauma or living situation or race or gender or sexuality. And you can read, you can learn, you can talk to people, but you don't ever know. If you haven't lived it, you'll never know the whole experience.

Morénike (22:06):
Yes. And that's something that people shouldn't be ashamed of. 'Cause I think people get upset or frustrated when someone tells them that you don't have lived expertise. But you don't, we can't all be experts in everything. We have different life experiences and we can use it as a tool to learn. Like, you know, I think about, I'm both a biological and adoptive parent and I know that there's some parents who get really angry. They say, "All these jaded, negative, angry adult adoptees, they're so this and that." Like people have these judgements and I'm thinking, maybe the delivery isn't always the softest (laughs), but I think about if you can kind of, kind of remove that emotional piece, what is the message? What are they sharing? Because I've been an adoptive parent for many years, I will never have one day of experience of knowing what it's like to be an adoptee. Doesn't matter how much I care about the issue and how involved I am, it's not the same. There's a level of separation.

Morénike (22:56):
So if I can learn from what people are sharing, if I can hear it, if I can filter out certain things, yes, perhaps, but learn from it. If, it can only help me be a better parent. Instead of being upset that they're saying, I "don't know." I should admit, I don't know. I know what it's like to be a parent of adopted children. I will never know what it's like to be adopted. And that's not a judgment against me or an indictment. That's just the reality. And so I think whether it's gender, race, neurology, age, I think that's something that we as humans need to come to an understanding of as well. That not having something, like you said, being open means you can still learn and gain and grow. It doesn't mean that you're a bad person. Failing to learn, failing to grow, failing to be accountable is what makes you a bad person (laughs).

Kayla (23:37):
Oh my gosh. I would love to talk about this all day. I think I've said that on probably every episode though, (laughs). But, but it's true because I picked the best guests. And I appreciate everything that you've shared. But I know we're pretty much out of time.

Morénike (23:54):
Yes.

Kayla (23:54):
So I'm wondering if you have any closing thoughts or wanna shout out anywhere that people can find you.

Morénike (24:03):
Sure. I guess in terms of closing thoughts, I just want people to just remember we're learning every day. We're growing every day. And don't be afraid to ask questions or to challenge things or to try to build your repertoire of learning. It's never too late. You can always grow. In terms of finding me, I'm on social media, um, @morenikego, so it's like More-Nike and then GO, um, that's also my website, morenikego.com. I'm on LinkedIn and, as well. And so people are, you know, more than welcome to say hello or if they'd like to.

Kayla (24:37):
And I'll make sure that we have you tagged in things and in your websites, all your links and profiles in the show notes as the podcasters-

Morénike (24:46):
Awesome.

Kayla (24:47):
... call it (laughs).

Morénike (24:47):
Awesome.

Kayla (24:50):
Thank you so, so much Morenike. Thank you for being with me today and for sharing your time. And I can report that I did not once hear a lawnmower.

Morénike (25:00):
Yay. (laughs) I was so worried because it, like at one point it was, like, so loud, but (laughs), my husband tried to cough to hide it at one point. (laughs).

Kayla (25:09):
Oh my gosh. Good cover up. That's great.

Morénike (25:11):
[inaudible 00:25:12].

Kayla (25:11):
That's a true partner right there. (laughs).

Morénike (25:13):
Yeah (laughs).

Kayla (25:16):
Oh, a keeper.

Morénike (25:17):
Yeah. (laughs).

Kayla (25:19):
Oh, thank you.

Morénike (25:20):
Awesome.