About

Hi! I'm Nithya Krishnamoorthy. I've spent 25 years working with kids who don't fit standard educational models and 10 years building infrastructure at Google. I'm an aunt to a child on the autism spectrum, and for the past several years I've been providing educational and behavioral support.

My work has always been with kids the system tells to "work harder" - first with kids trapped in poverty, spending all their energy on basic survival, then told they should have worked harder in school if they wanted to deserve better in life. Now I see neurodivergent children spending all their energy just coping in a world built against how their brains work, trying to understand communication patterns that aren't meant for them.

The specifics are different, but the pattern is the same. When standard approaches don't work, the system blames the child instead of questioning whether the approach was ever designed for them.

What I've seen

The system is failing these families. Through my intensive work with one child and my many conversations with dozens of families with kids on the spectrum - especially those who aren't classified medically as having high needs - I keep seeing the same things.

The parents are exhausted. By the end of each day on what feels like a battleground, they don't have much left to give. They get generic advice from professionals who don't care enough to understand their specific child. Cookie cutter advice that hasn't worked once for their child. Most suggestions feel like they were designed for someone else's kid.

And a lot of these kids are dealing with massive anxiety that gets mistaken for defiance or laziness. What looks like a child being difficult is often a child who's paralyzed by overwhelm, terrified of getting something wrong, or can't shift gears without clear structure. But from the outside, it just looks like they're not trying.

And every kid on the spectrum is different. What works for one fails completely for another. Strategies that help one child manage meltdowns might make another child worse. Approaches that engage one kid shut down the next. There's no template.

What I learned

When the child I work with was in 4th grade, the school said he didn't know how to compare numbers. I asked him over dinner: if he had 10 cookies and could give me either 4 or 6, which would he choose? He chose 4 - the smaller number. I plugged in other numbers. He picked the smaller number every single time. He didn't guess. He knew exactly which number was smaller because he wanted to keep more cookies for himself.

But when I asked him directly, "Is 4 greater than 6?" he would take a random guess.

What the school interpreted as "doesn't know how to compare numbers" was actually "absolutely could not care less about an abstract question that means nothing to him." The knowledge was there. The ability was there. But without something that mattered to him, he simply couldn't access what he knew.

The usual motivators that work for neurotypical kids - authority, social pressure, future consequences, pleasing the teacher - mean nothing to many kids on the spectrum. They need a reason that matters to them, right now, in concrete terms they can connect to.

This shows up everywhere. A parent asked me recently for help with her child leaving the house on time. Not just remembering items, but the whole thing - estimating how long tasks take, organizing what to do when, actually getting out the door. What some of us do without thinking is completely foreign territory for these kids. It's completely overwhelming. They feel out of control, overstimulated, and they shut down. Pressure makes it worse.

So what actually works?

Make abstract things concrete. "We need to leave on time" is meaningless. But walking through exactly why we need to leave at 8:15 to get there by 9:00 - that can click. When I need to explain why something can't happen, I make it tangible: "That's like me wanting the sun to rise right now when it's still night. Can I make that happen?" Not me saying no - just how reality works.

Get the chaos out of their head. When everything hits at once, the brain can't sort it. Worries, steps, time pressure - it all piles up. I give these things physical form: a "later box" for thoughts that can wait, visual checklists, timers that make time something you can see. You're not pushing down the overwhelm, you're just giving it structure.

Look for what the behavior is doing. Most "problem" behaviors serve a purpose. I figured this out with my own skin-picking - once I saw it was self-soothing, I found something else that worked: gently rubbing my hand with a bit of compassion for what I was feeling. If a kid dawdles before leaving, maybe transitions are genuinely hard and they need a different kind of help, not just "hurry up." The memory game works the same way - you don't fight the special interest, you use it.

Build supports that teach, not just manage. If you're always the one prompting each step, they're not learning to do it themselves. You want supports they'll eventually internalize - checklists they stop needing, strategies they start applying on their own.

Knowing your limits. Sometimes the anxiety runs too deep, the dysregulation is beyond what you can address with behavioral strategies alone. Recognizing when you need professional help is part of this too.

What I'm building

I'm building tools based on these ideas - starting with a memory game that uses special interests instead of fighting them. I'm also putting together the frameworks and stories that have actually worked, because a lot of neurodivergent kids can understand something in theory but have no idea what to do with it in the moment. That gap is real and it needs bridges.

Everything here is designed for neurodivergent brains from the start - not neurotypical tools with accommodations tacked on.

So many kids could thrive with the right supports. So many parents and caregivers are doing impossibly hard work without enough help. I want to build things that actually make a difference. If this resonates with you, try what's here and tell me what else would be useful.