There was a time when I struggled to understand why the world felt so overwhelming. The lights were too bright, the noise too sharp, the conversations too fast. I saw patterns where others saw randomness, I focused where others drifted, and I felt deeply, sometimes too deeply for my own comfort. I knew I was different but didn’t always know what that difference meant. I used to think my differences were obstacles, barriers that separated me from others.

Aashna Parsa, Founder, Davidson Young Scholar Growing up, I watched my brother, endlessly curious, turn his voracious reading into a spark that lit up his future. He'd spend hours researching teen healthcare access issues, not because he had to, but because he needed  to know more. My mom, his fiercest champion, fought against whispers in our community that labeled him "different." Being undiagnosed herself, she saw his strengths, his hyperfocus and brilliance, where others s