The Nest is the Australian real-life practice environment of FREE 2B ME, operated by registered NDIS provider Neurodivergent Empowered.
It was built around a simple idea: people should not have to become less of themselves in order to belong, participate or receive good support.
The Nest brings that idea into everyday practice through neuroaffirming disability support, real-life participation, counselling, navigation and Specialist Behaviour Support.
It is neurodivergent-led, LGBTIQA+ affirming and designed so people can participate without having to mask, perform, hide or shrink themselves in order to belong.
Same space. Different goals. Individual support.
Less fixing. More living.
FREE 2B ME is the connected ecosystem. Neurodivergent Empowered is the registered provider and professional practice. The Nest is the real-life community practice environment.
At The Nest, people can come together around meaningful interests while receiving support that remains individual to them. Beyond The Nest, the wider FREE 2B ME ecosystem includes counselling, Specialist Behaviour Support, evidence and review, professional learning, books, workforce capability, technology and governance.
The same practice sits underneath it all: begin with the person’s knowledge of their own life, add useful support, skills, evidence and professional expertise, and do not replace their authority.
Hover or tap each card to see what this value looks like inside The Nest.
People should never have to mask, perform or comply simply to belong. We support people to communicate, connect and build skills and practical capability without making conformity the goal.
Pikachu was offered evolution and said no - choosing to stay itself and prove it was enough exactly as it was.
Meaningful interests can create accessible opportunities for participation, communication, relationships, confidence and skill development.
Mew plays, explores, and follows curiosity freely. Its strength comes from interest, not pressure.
Relationships are built through consent, pacing, trust and accessible participation, not expectation or pressure. Relationships and belonging can be meaningful support outcomes when they matter to the person.
Sylveon only evolved because it felt safe enough to bond, and its ribbons only reach out when trust is already there.
We design environments around access, predictability, choice, communication and different ways of participating.
Snorlax is grounded, settled, and takes up space without apology. Nothing to brace against - just steady presence.
You bring authority over your own life, priorities, preferences and goals. Support should add options, information and useful expertise without replacing that authority.
Lucario recognises what is true, holds clear boundaries and trusts its own judgement.
We adapt communication, information, sensory access, pacing and support while also building useful skills and capability where that matters to you.
Psyduck experiences the world intensely - sometimes overwhelmed, sometimes powerful, always different. That is not a flaw.
Curious which Pokémon you are? Take the quiz here →
People often tell us that The Nest feels different. That difference is intentional. Rather than deciding in advance that the person must change, we look at the whole situation. Sometimes the useful work is changing something around the person. Sometimes it is teaching or practising a skill, supporting communication, strengthening a relationship, providing practical assistance, using a professional intervention or asking a service or system to do its part. Shared interests can provide meaningful real-life context - but the person’s goals and individual support determine the work.
Because every person is different, the support each participant receives is individualised. Two people may enjoy the same activity while working towards very different goals, using different strategies and requiring different levels of support.
The Nest may look like gaming, art, Dungeons and Dragons, Pokemon, music, animals, anime, making things or simply being together. Beneath those activities is individually tailored disability support focused on the foundations that make participation possible: communication, practical capability, self-advocacy, relationships, choice, confidence, community participation and support that fits.
We document what matters for the individual person: what happened, what support was provided and why, how the person responded, what changed, what remained difficult and what this means for support next time. This includes what outcomes are emerging. This helps families and support teams understand the value of the support being delivered.
The Nest is deliberately local and real-life. The ideas behind it are much bigger. FREE 2B ME connects participant support, professional practice, evidence, learning and system design so the same values do not disappear when the setting changes.
The aim is not to create one perfect service. It is to build an ecosystem where neurodivergent people do not have to keep starting again every time they move between support, learning, community and professional systems.
FREE 2B ME and The Nest were created by Tanya Hicks - founder and CEO of Neurodivergent Empowered, Human Systems Architect, author, neuroaffirming counsellor and NDIS Behaviour Support Practitioner.
Tanya’s work grew from lived experience, professional practice and years of seeing the same problem from different sides: neurodivergent people were too often expected to adapt themselves to services, environments and systems that had never been designed with them in mind. Rather than build another isolated program, Tanya began building a connected ecosystem.
FREE 2B ME brings together real-life support, counselling, Specialist Behaviour Support, evidence and review, professional learning, books, workforce capability, technology and governance. The Nest is where much of that thinking becomes tangible - the real-life community practice environment where people can participate alongside others while their goals, support, evidence and professional responsibility remain individual.
Tanya’s work has been recognised locally, nationally and internationally across disability inclusion, education, therapy, innovation, leadership, human rights and community impact. But the point of the work has remained the same: Less fixing. More living.
The FREE 2B ME Practice Library captures the thinking behind the ecosystem in person-facing and professional companion books. The first paired title is FREE 2B ME: Less fixing. More living. ↔ Access Before Intervention.
The library exists so the ideas behind the work can be examined, challenged, taught and carried beyond one organisation or one building.
We are a deliberately small, multidisciplinary team. Each of us came to this work for personal reasons, and each of us brings something different to the way we make space for safety, connection, participation, capacity building and belonging here.
Mega Diancie
Eevee
Espeon
Pokemon coming soon.
Leafeon
Arceus
Sylveon
Rockruff
Serena
Warabbit
Pikachu
The work across Neurodivergent Empowered, The Nest and Tanya Hicks’ wider practice and leadership has been recognised locally, nationally and internationally. These awards are not the reason the work exists. They are one external marker of a model built from lived experience, professional practice, community need and sustained implementation.