Tanya Hicks, MCoun - Neuro-Affirming Clinician & Authenticity Architect

Well my friends, thank you so much for helping me to tick something on my ever growing "to do" list.

🎉 WE DID IT! 🎉

Amazon #1 Best Seller! 🏆 for our collective Resilience and Reinvention book.

What an incredible journey this has been.

A huge thank you to every single person who purchased the book, shared a post, left a review, sent a message, cheered us on, or simply believed in the vision behind this project.

This achievement doesn't belong to one person. It belongs to a community, so thank you to my fellow co-author sistas. Together, we helped bring these stories of resilience, courage, growth, and reinvention to more people than we ever imagined.

I used my chapter to tie a bow and literally "close the chapter" on an incredibly hard time in my life. I wanted to springboard from the experience, and make it mean something more than the pain, and on these pages it did.

#1 Best Seller.
Together.

Thank you Peace Mitchell and Katy Garner from The Women Changing the World for including me in this incredible book. I honestly feel so humbled.

Now that's how you close a sh*tty chapter - woop woop!!

‼️ TRIGGER WARNING FOR MINORITIES ‼️

I am a counsellor. The part of my work no one sees is the part where I am simply keeping people alive.

I sit with people who have spent their whole lives being told they are too much, too strange, too other to belong. And I watch what it costs them every time the culture decides their existence is up for debate.

Because for some people, that is all this is. A debate. An opinion to try on. A side to pick, a thing to post, forgotten by morning. That is the privilege of choice. You get to treat someone's right to exist as a hobby, then close the app.

The people I work with do not get to close the app. They live inside the conclusion.
Twelve years ago I started down the autistic road with my child. Alone. While strangers online debated whether she was real, whether she belonged, whether her needs were everyone else's inconvenience.

Then more of you had autistic children, and "neuro-affirming" became something you were allowed to say out loud.

Suddenly it was acceptable.

I welcomed you. I still do. But I have not forgotten what it cost to be early, and quiet, and on my own. And my brain did not let me forget who it was, and what they shared. It's been quietly stored in my "Would be setting fire to crosses on the lawns of black people's yards back in the day," file that my social injustice brain will not let me delete, even with forgiveness.

This carousel looks like it is about toilets. It was never about toilets. It is the oldest trick there is. Pick a small group, call them a danger, dress it up as protection, and let ordinary people do the enforcing for you.

I have watched that trick aimed at women, at Aboriginal people, at gay men, at disabled people. I am watching it aimed at trans people now.

I am in perimenopause now. Whatever tolerance I once kept for watching this happen quietly has run out.

I stayed silent the first time. I will not be doing that again.

If today sits heavy, you are not the problem here. Support is always available.

Lifeline 13 11 14
13YARN 13 92 76
QLife 1800 184 527
1800RESPECT 1800 737 732

Today is LGBTQ Domestic Violence Awareness Day.

Established in Australia in 2020 by the LGBTQ Domestic Violence Awareness Foundation, this day exists because domestic violence inside LGBTQIA+ relationships has often been overlooked, misunderstood, or not recognised at all.

Not because it doesn't happen.
Because people have struggled to see it.

When a harm isn't recognised, people often spend years wondering whether what happened to them was serious enough to count. The confusion becomes part of the injury. The piece taken first is usually your own perception.

Violence is not only physical. It can look like coercive control, isolation, financial control, stalking, s*xual violence. It can also look like someone using your identity against you. Threatening to out you.
Controlling how you express yourself. Cutting you off from the people and communities that help you feel safe.

Many LGBTQIA+ victim survivors carry an extra weight. Not just surviving the harm. Surviving the doubt.

Will I be believed?
Will I be understood?
Will I have to explain my identity before I can explain what happened?

You are allowed to name what happened. You are allowed to seek support.
You do not need your relationship to fit someone else's picture before your experience counts.

The relationship counts. The harm counts. You count.

Awareness does not create safety on its own. But accurate naming is often where safety begins. It is also where the pieces start coming back.

Where to start, for yourself or someone you care about:

1800RESPECT: 1800 737 732
QLife (LGBTI peer support): 1800 184 527
13YARN (First Nations support): 13 92 76

IT'S LAUNCH DAY!!

Today I officially become a co-author in Resilience & Reinvention, a collection of true stories from women around the world who met what looked unsurvivable, and did not disappear inside it.

That is the thread I came to write. Not the triumph narrative. The quieter truth underneath it. That reinvention is rarely chosen from a place of strength. More often it begins the moment you stop paying for belonging with pieces of yourself, and start building a life that fits the person you actually are.

I am honoured to stand alongside these voices:
Amy Laughlin, Angharad Candlin, Ashley Mansfield, Dr Cara Antoine, Carol Hanlon, Dr A. Carole Grace Mbarga, Cherry Farrow, Comfort Dondo, Dawn Williams, Ellie ter Haar, Emma Sheth, Emma Payne, Justine Martin, Karen Rosner, Katy Garner, Khatija Halabi, Lee Jen Bartlett, Lisa McArthur-Collins, Mandy Hawtin, Marisa Estela, Melanie Vairawanathan, Mila Samarzich, Peace Mitchell, Wambui Machua, Wendy Neuberger and Zwelihle Banks Nsiiwa.

Today we are going for #1 Bestseller, and your support is the thing that carries it there.

Grab your ebook copy here:
Amazon AU: https://bit.ly/4uunkI9
Amazon US: https://bit.ly/4nU4uHZ
Amazon UK: https://bit.ly/49nfxU6
Thank you for being here for this one.

xx

Today's Resilience & Reinvention featured author is Tanya Hicks! ✨

Tanya Hicks is a globally recognised advocate, author, and visionary founder, redefining leadership through her groundbreaking concept of authenticity architecture. With transformational programs and empowering stories, learn more about how Tanya ignites a movement of courage, connection, and purpose, inspiring individuals and communities to embrace their unique strengths and create a ripple effect of joy and meaningful change worldwide.

Order your copy today: wcwpress.com/resilience-reinvention

The biology of being trans, in plain language.

Most people are not against the trans community. Most people were simply never taught how s*x development actually works in the body. And we tend to be wary of what we don't understand.
So here is what the science shows.

The body does not develop s*x through a single switch. It develops in layers. Chromosomes, go**ds, hormones, hormone receptors, ge****ls, and the brain. Each layer develops at a different time, through different signals.

For the first six weeks of human development, every embryo's go**ds are the same. Not male. Not female. Developmental biologists call this the indifferent or bipotential stage. Every human body passes through it.

After that, the layers begin to differentiate. In most people, all six develop in the same direction. In some people, one or more develops differently. That isn't rare at the biological level. It's a normal possibility when a system has this many moving parts.
Older textbooks taught that the body became female by default when male signals were absent. That isn't accurate anymore. O***y formation requires its own specific genes, including WNT4 and RSPO1. Female development is an active biological process. Not a leftover.

At birth, doctors record male or female based on what they can see. But the visible layer is one layer. The brain develops on its own timeline, with its own hormonal exposures. A person's internal sense of being male, female, or something else develops there.

The Endocrine Society, the largest professional body of hormone scientists in the world, states there is "a durable biological element underlying gender identity." The exact mechanisms are still being researched. The existence of that biological element is not.

So when a trans person says their gender doesn't match the s*x they were assigned at birth, they aren't describing confusion or a choice. They are describing what happens when the visible layer and the brain layer didn't develop in the same direction. The biology already tells us this is possible.

Most of us were never told the whole story.

This is the Connection Series. Not to shame people for asking. Not to flatten people into slogans. Not to turn complexity into camps. Just to help us stay human when the subject gets tender.

Better science. Softer certainty. More room for each other.
That is how understanding begins.

Sources: UNSW Embryology (S*xual Differentiation: S*x Determination), Endotext via NCBI Bookshelf (S*xual Differentiation), Endocrine Society Position Statement on Transgender Health.

They didn't debunk the body. They engineered a headline.

As someone considering doing my PhD in this space, I have been taking notes. Not on the new paper. On what was done to make it go viral - and on the audience paying the price.

The paper: The body does not keep the score by Kotler, Mannino, Fox and Friston, in Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience (2026). The title is an exact inversion of the most influential trauma book of the last decade. Published in a specialist neuroscience journal, but built to travel far beyond it.

Inside the paper, the position being refuted is not van der Kolk's. The authors target the idea that trauma is literally stored in fascia or non-innervated tissue.

Van der Kolk's actual position - that traumatic experience alters physiology and perception in ways cognition alone cannot resolve - is not addressed.

The paper itself acknowledges van der Kolk drew on interoception, embodied cognition and Damasio's somatic markers research.

The body is involved. The authors know.
The headline says otherwise.
And the headline is what travelled.

The mechanics, because survivors are paying for what they cannot see:

→ A famous co-author lends authority
→ A provocative title manufactures urgency
→ A flattened opponent guarantees a clean kill
→ A confident verdict produces a shareable line
→ Clinicians repost "debunked" before reading the abstract

This is not how science moves.
This is how content moves.

In February 2026, 39 researchers called polyvagal theory untenable. Within days, social media buried it. The actual paper critiqued the mechanism, not the clinical practices. The nuance was lost in the time it took to share a screenshot.

A field cannot mature inside an algorithm built for outrage.

What cannot be refuted by any paper is the body of the survivor who finally felt believed - and the betrayal of being told, by a screenshot, that they were taken in.

The body still keeps the score.
The science is just learning, slowly, how to listen.
🤍

Two of the most common therapies you'll be offered are Solution-Focused Therapy and Narrative Therapy.

Both can be helpful.
Both can also miss the mark - especially if you're autistic, neurodivergent, or LGBTQIA+.

The truth nobody tells you when you're handed a referral:

The type of therapy matters less than the person doing it.

A good therapist asks what you want your life to look like.

A poor one has already decided - and usually it looks like fitting in more, masking more, being easier for other people to be around.

You are not your anxiety.
You are not your burnout.
You are not the mask you had to wear.

Before you commit to anyone, you're allowed to ask:
→ How do you work with autistic / neurodivergent / q***r people?
→ What does success look like to you?
→ What happens if I need to slow down?

A safe therapist will be glad you asked.
An unsafe one will make you feel like the question itself was a problem.

You don't have to stay with someone who doesn't feel right.
You're allowed to choose the room before you do the work inside it.

🕯️ Save this for the next time you're searching.
🕯️ Send it to someone who's about to start therapy.

- Tan x

***rmentalhealth

This, my friends, is why it's crucial to understand how your mind and body works at its optimal.

Contrary to popular opinion about "work/life balance", I do a lot.

Not because I do not feel enough.
Not because I am chasing my worth through the next piece of paper.
Not because I cannot sit still.

I do a lot because it is great for my mental health. Because I am genuinely happier when the work is meaningful and aligned. Because for a neurocomplex brain like mine, alignment is regulating. Not draining.

While I was in Rome last month being a single-mumma, on a business expansion tour, launching a book, and walking the streets of one of the most beautiful cities in the world, I submitted two assessments for my Masters.

The following slides are my exact feedback where I received two High Distinctions back. Both at 92 %. The two highest marks I have received so far.

Not because I pushed through.
Not because I burnt the candle at both ends.
Not because I sacrificed, (though prioritising focus & capacity is part of it).

Because the work was on my terms. Aligned with what lights me up. Meaningful enough that doing it felt like rest, not like an extra demand.

And here is the part I cannot leave out.
On that tour I was my authentic self. Fully. No mask. No edit. No different version of me for someone else's comfort. And I was surrounded by people reflecting back to me all the wonderful parts they saw in me. Not the parts I had to perform. The parts that are actually there.

That is what made the work flow.
That is what made my brain regulate.
That is what made the High Distinctions possible.

Not despite everything else I was doing. Because of it.

For a long time the world told me I needed to slow down.
Do less.
Manage my energy like everyone else. And every time I tried to live by that rule, I got worse.
More burnt out. Less myself.
What works for me is the opposite. Pace and intensity that would burn out someone else are exactly what keeps me well.
As long as it is aligned.
As long as it is mine.
As long as I am being met as the whole person I am.

This is what an affirming life looks like like for me.

Not less, just aligned and congruent to me.

Yesterday was IDAHOBIT. The International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Inters*xphobia and Transphobia.

I am posting this a day late. On purpose. Because IDAHOBIT is not a one-day moment. It is a one-day name for an everyday reality.

The 2026 theme was "At the heart of democracy." A reminder that when q***r rights erode, democracy itself is eroding. Authoritarian governments test the strength of democratic systems by first attacking LGBTQIA+ people and bodily autonomy. If you care about democracy, you already care about this.

The numbers in 2026 are not better. 65 UN member states still criminalise same-s*x acts. For the first time in years, that number has gone up rather than down. Trans children are being legislated against in country after country. Gender-affirming care is being banned. Foreign aid for LGBTQIA+ civil society has been cut at the exact moment it is most needed.

This is the world our LGBTQIA+ clients are walking through. Every single day.

At The Nest, we will keep being a place where you are free to be you. Yesterday and every day.

If you are LGBTQIA+ and reading this, you do not have to earn the right to exist. You already have it.

A not so sneaky finger to those who disagree with these basic human rights.

*xAwareness