Kayla is a Registered Occupational Therapist (OT) with the Newfoundland and Labrador Occupational Therapy Board. Prior to founding her identity-based solo occupational therapy practice in July 2024 she spent a year working in the non-profit industry developing and facilitating a life skills program for Autistic teens and adults that encouraged autonomy and self-advocacy, as well as facilitating social and peer support groups that allow participants to unmask and be their authentic selves.

Kayla promotes occupational justice, “the fulfillment of the right for all people to engage in the occupations that they need to survive, define as meaningful, and that contribute positively to their own well-being and the well-being of their communities” and aims to support clients understand their unique brains and sensory systems, find tools and strategies that work from them to complete meaningful activities, and reach their goals. Her approach is marked by a trauma-informed, neurodivergent-affirming stance that is both evidence based, and values lived experience.

Education and Training

Kayla holds a Master of Science in Occupational Therapy from Dalhousie University, where she completed fieldwork placements in adult neuro-rehabilitation, adult mental health and addictions, and return to work. She took a keen interest in Autistic culture, community-based participatory research, sensory modulation and interoception in mental health care, program development, and neurodivergent affirming occupational therapy practices. She has completed continuing education on neuro-affirming practice, trauma-informed care, harm reduction, gender affirming care, interoceptive awareness, nervous system regulation, peer support, suicide safety planning with Autistic youth, Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST), and is in the process of becoming a Certified Sexuality Occupational Therapist through the Institute for Sex and Occupational Therapy.

Lived Experience

Kayla is an adult diagnosed Autistic ADHDer and was featured on the cover of Occupational Therapy Now (July/August 2023) magazine for her article, Advocating for Neurodivergent-Affirming Spaces with Lived Experience, that highlighted barriers encountered on her academic journey, community level accommodations to embrace neurodivergent and disabled identities, and the positive experience of unmasking with neurodivergent clients.

She is a clinical and lived experience consultant for the NLHS Adult Autism Working Group that recently released the Autistic Adult Occupational Therapy Service Survey that aims to capture data to advocate to NLHS and Government of Newfoundland and Labrador for OT services specifically for Autistic adults, and she is a co-convener for the Research and Knowledge Exchange on Autism through the Newfoundland and Labrador Centre for Applied Health Research.