Author: Overcoming Adversity | Buteau’s Odyssey

Likert scales are widely used in the medical and mental health systems, as they are a useful tool for rating everything from mood to pain levels. For autistic people, however, Likert scales can be more of a hindrance than a help, as the scales often do not make sense to our neurodivergent brains. To help illustrate this, I will use my own experience as an autistic adult and my struggles over the years to use pain scales. When I was giving birth to my first child, the nurses kept asking for my pain levels. They were using a scale from…

The best players in the world will be on display this summer at the 2026 World Cup. So, let’s rank them. Ahead of the world’s premier sporting event, our experts ranked the 100 best stars who will likely feature at this summer’s World Cup, hosted by the United States, Mexico and Canada. We have officially released all 100 players on our list, and there are some serious star players here. We’ve got legends, rising names and players looking for their World Cup breakout moments. From Brazil’s Vinícius Júnior and Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo to Spain’s Lamine Yamal and Egypt’s Mo Salah,…

Night of the Dribbler was made in 1990 … and wasn’t released until 2009.Night of the Dribbler might be the only film of its type … thankfullyNight of the Dribbler is NOT a good movie. But as far as slasher movies go, it might be one of one in the annals of horror film history. Sure, there are plenty of horror movies that are adjacent to basketball. But Night of the Dribbler might be the only horror movie ever that’s explicitly about basketball — to the point the mad slasher of the movie wears a basketball mask on his head. Pretty…

Many people—especially those who identify as neurodivergent or highly cognitive—live beautifully in their heads. Thinking, analyzing, and problem-solving are no doubt great strengths. They help us adapt, succeed, and make sense of a complex world. And yet, many people come to me in my capacity as an AEDP psychotherapist—an experiential therapy specializing in emotions and attachment—saying: “I don’t feel much” or, “I know I should feel something… but I don’t.” This is what we often call numbness. Sometimes it overlaps with a difficulty in identifying and describing emotions, technically called alexithymia. But I want to start by reframing this completely:…

June is here, which means the sun is out, the cookouts are happening, and every streaming platform has decided to remind us that staying inside with the curtains closed is still a valid lifestyle choice.This month is not equally stacked everywhere. Shudder came to play. Peacock brought a few sharp knives. Tubi opened the vault and dumped half a haunted video store into the living room. Hulu, meanwhile, gave horror fans a smaller plate, but at least one of those servings comes with zombies, drag queens, and enough glitter to confuse the undead.Here is the best horror, thriller, and horror-adjacent…

Chatbots are becoming increasingly sophisticated. And they are getting better and better at creating an emotional bond with the user. This, of course, has its risks, so much so that there has been a lot of talk about regulation. We easily form emotional bonds with chatbots, and they vary widely from person to person. Some people find it easy to connect with them emotionally, while others find it more difficult. Young people and men tend to belong to the former group, whereas older people and women are more likely to belong to the latter. A recent study examined these variations…

The best players in the world will be on display this summer at the 2026 World Cup. So, let’s rank them. Ahead of the world’s premier sporting event, our experts ranked the 100 best stars who will likely feature at this summer’s World Cup, hosted by the United States, Mexico and Canada. We have officially released all 100 players on our list, and there are some serious star players here. We’ve got legends, rising names and players looking for their World Cup breakout moments. From Brazil’s Vinícius Júnior and Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo to Spain’s Lamine Yamal and Egypt’s Mo Salah,…

“I hate you!” What does it mean when your child says this? What do you do about it? At the end of a busy weekend filled with tumultuous moments that included screaming, Jackie found herself carefully considering if she should impose the usual Sunday-night limits on 14-year-old Erin. Just letting it go in order to maintain the peace seemed very appealing. She was tired of the explosions and the tension. Ultimately, Jackie decided to relax the time a little, but still when she told Erin it was time to surrender the phone and get into bed, her daughter began screaming…

To C.M. – a reminder. We live in an age of specialization in which the counsel of professionals is sought for everything from parenting and relationship advice to matters of health and well-being to questions of public policy, finances, education, and even personal development. And while the proliferation of apparent experts raises interesting questions about our desire for authority figures to whom we can defer when challenges arise, it has been accompanied by an equally fascinating increase in skepticism regarding the reliability of the very persons and institutions upon whom we have come to rely. On the one hand, it…

It’s officially Vampire Summer, with the third season of AMC’s critically acclaimed series Interview with the Vampire — now titled The Vampire Lestat — arriving exclusively on AMC and AMC+ on June 7.After two seasons adapting the 1976 novel Interview with the Vampire, the series now moves into the next chapter of Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles, bringing The Vampire Lestat to the screen for the very first time.The AMC series stars Jacob Anderson and Sam Reid as Louis de Pointe du Lac and Lestat de Lioncourt, a pairing whose chemistry has become the emotional anchor of the series. Anderson…