Broken, Not Beaten: Finding Grace in My Neurodivergent Mind

I once believed co-teaching was where I was supposed to land. Inclusion of students with disabilities in the same classroom with their peers is my ultimate dream. Their success is my success.

It looked right. It sounded right. But no matter how hard I tried, my brain didn’t fit the rhythm of shared classrooms or shared control. Personality differences with co-teachers weren’t dramatic, but they were constant. Different pacing. Different priorities. Different ways of thinking and communicating.

Eventually, I had to face a hard truth: forcing myself to fit was costing me my peace.

For a long time, I assumed that discomfort meant something was wrong with me.

But Scripture tells a different story.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”
— 2 Corinthians 12:9

I used to read that verse as a reminder to endure, to push through, adapt more, try harder. I focused on weakness as something to overcome.

Now I see it as permission to stop pretending.

Paul didn’t ask for grace after he fixed himself. He asked while struggling. And God didn’t remove the thorn. He reframed it. Not as failure, but as a place where divine strength could live.

My neurodivergent brain—fast, nonlinear, deeply intuitive—felt like a liability in co-teaching spaces. I needed clarity, autonomy, and room to respond in real time. Instead of thriving, I was shrinking. Praying to be easier. Quieter. Less complicated.

But God wasn’t asking me to become someone else.

He was leading me out.

When I returned to teaching math solo, working one-on-one, building lessons around the learner instead of the system, I felt alignment instead of resistance. The very traits that caused friction before became strengths: deep focus, creative problem-solving, relational teaching, and flexibility.

That’s when this verse finally settled into my bones:

“When I am weak, then I am strong.”
— 2 Corinthians 12:10

Not because I suddenly felt strong, but because I stopped fighting who God created me to be.

Kanye West’s “Jesus Walks” echoes this tension between struggle and faith:

“God show me the way because the Devil tryna break me down.”

For years, I thought my differences were what was breaking me down. Now I see they were the very things God was using to redirect me, away from spaces that demanded conformity and toward a calling that required authenticity.

Faith didn’t erase my neurodivergence.
Grace didn’t “fix” my brain.
God didn’t smooth out my edges.

He met me in them.

So if you feel out of place in systems that work for everyone else…
If collaboration drains you instead of energizing you…
If your prayers to “fit in” keep going unanswered…

Consider this:
Maybe you’re not broken.
Maybe you’re being led.

And maybe, right there in the tension, God is saying exactly what He promised:

My grace is sufficient for you.