S1 | EP2: Locked Inside Finally Heard

Locked Inside, Finally Heard

What if the screen wasn't the problem?

What if it was the solution?

In this episode of Infinite Halls, I sit down with Mary, a mother, advocate, and founder whose journey began with one heartbreaking moment.

Her son Alex is nonverbal and autistic.

Like many parents of neurodivergent children, Mary spent years navigating a world that often misunderstood him. People saw behaviors. They saw disruptions. They saw what he couldn't do.

What they didn't see was the person inside.

Then one rainy day in Hong Kong, a denied bathroom key led to a moment of public humiliation that changed everything.

Alex wet himself in front of strangers because no one understood his disability.

Mary went home furious.

But instead of staying angry, she built something.

What began as a search for dignity grew into the Talos Foundation, a movement that has distributed tens of thousands of disability awareness lanyards, trained organizations across Hong Kong, and created opportunities for neurodivergent individuals to be seen, heard, and included.

But underneath that story is another one.

A story about communication.

Because for Mary, the breakthrough wasn't simply advocacy.

It was discovering that technology could give her son something every human being deserves:

A voice.

Using an AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) device, Alex began communicating his wants, needs, frustrations, and thoughts through an iPad. What looked like a screen became something much more profound.

It became access.

It became connection.

It became understanding.

Together, we explore:

• How technology can unlock communication rather than replace it
• Why many behaviors are actually unmet communication needs
• The difference between speaking and being heard
• What AAC devices teach us about human connection
• The importance of presuming competence in children who communicate differently
• Why parents sometimes need to trust their instincts before the world catches up

This episode asks a powerful question: How many children are communicating in ways we're simply not recognizing yet?

Because sometimes the challenge isn't that a child has nothing to say.

It's that we haven't found the right way to listen.

Mary's story reminds us that communication is not a luxury.

It's dignity.

And sometimes the technology we fear might be the very thing that helps a child reveal who they've been all along.

If you've ever wondered whether screens can be more than entertainment—or if you've ever fought to help someone feel seen and understood—this episode is for you.

No judgment. No easy answers. Just a real story from inside the endless twists and turns of raising humans in a digital world.

If this episode resonated with you, follow Infinite Halls and share it with someone who needs this reminder:

Every person deserves a voice. Sometimes it simply arrives in a form we didn't expect.

If this episode resonated with you, follow Infinite Halls so you don’t miss what’s next—and share it with someone who’s navigating this too.

You can find more from me at https://infinitescreentime.com
Follow along on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/infinitescreentime/
Connect on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/arcadiakim/

No judgment. No rules. Just real stories.
See you in the next hall.

Transcript

Welcome to Infinite Halls

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Hey, it's Arcadia, your screen time squad mate. Welcome back to Infinite Halls, where we explore the endless twists and turns of parenting in the digital age: the guilt, the joy, and the completely unexpected. I'm a former video game exec and a mom who's lived the screen time battleground from every angle. Around here, there's no judgment, just real stories and deeper understanding. Today's episode is called Locked Inside, Finally Heard. It's a story of a mother, her son, and the search for a voice that didn't come through sound, but through a screen. Mary's son Alex is nonverbal and autistic. And like many families, she faced judgment, fear, and the heartbreak of not knowing how he felt or what he needed. What changed everything was technology, not just as entertainment, but as access. What looked like an iPad became a lifeline, a language, and a doorway into his inner world. This episode dives into what communication tools matter, how a mom turned frustration into innovation, and what happens when a child finally gets a chance to speak. Okay, Mary, welcome to Infinite Halls. I've been so excited to talk to you. This is such a cool story. Can you introduce yourself and your family and what we should know about the world that you come from?

SPEAKER_00 1:42

Absolutely. And thank you so much for having me here today. Very happy to talk about the story and about Talus Foundation and about Alex's use of the AAC device. So I've been in Hong Kong for 22 years. I'm a lawyer by training. I come from the US originally, and I'm an advocate by nature. And in my day job, I am an HR leader at a global law firm. My work is about building and growing law firms, advocacy, systems, people, inclusion. I'm also the wife to a neurodivergent person who is an amazing business person. And my two boys are both neurodivergent. So my teenager has ADHD, and my son, Alex, who is the younger of the two, has nonverbal autism, as you mentioned, and fairly severe ADHD and was diagnosed with intellectual disabilities because he was nonverbal. And Alex is how old now? Alex is 12, and my older son is 17.

Bathroom Incident Sparks Advocacy

SPEAKER_01 2:47

Okay, so you have an amazing turning point in your advocacy for Alex in a very painful moment when Alex was denied access to a bathroom and he wet himself in public. Can you walk us through that moment and what happened and how that shifted for you?

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Absolutely. I mean, it really started even before that, because when Alex was diagnosed, as I mentioned, with autism, ADHD, and intellectual disabilities at three years old in Hong Kong, we heard a lot of what he wouldn't be able to do. And as a person who is naturally a fighter and an advocate, I wanted to help him. We went to the insurance companies and they said he wouldn't get insurance coverage because of his disabilities. And when we would go on public transportation or in airplanes, people would make rude comments to him. When he would go out to dinner as a family, there would be people looking at us, giving us an evil eye, or making rude comments about our son or our parenting styles. All of that felt really unjust to me. As a person who was an advocate in my daily lives, I felt a lot of anger and frustration and I didn't know what to do. But I always believed that the universe gives us points in our life that we need to step up. And that was the point when I took Alex to a special need sports class in one of the government centers. If anyone listening has been to one of those government centers in Hong Kong, they're huge buildings, they're wonderful centers that provide a lot of services to people. It's one of the great things about Hong Kong. But unfortunately, the toilet situation in those government centers are not specially accommodating. So usually on the floors, which are really large, there's only one toilet per floor.

SPEAKER_01 4:33

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:34

And on the floor that we were waiting for the class, it was a disabled toilet. And in Hong Kong, many of the disabled toilets are locked for different reasons. My first instinct when Alex tapped me and asked to use the toilet in his own way was to try to help him as soon as possible and to get a staff member that was close by to help us unlock the toilet. I flashed his disability card, clearly states that he's disabled and he was still denied access. Because the person wasn't speaking English and I was having a hard time communicating with them. I couldn't say he's intellectually disabled and he just needs to go to the bathroom. Right. It was horrible and dehumanizing, and it really made me so angry, you know. Again, coming from the sense of justice that I've always had.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

He also has one of these invisible disabilities. If you see him, you wouldn't know, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:36

You wouldn't know. You wouldn't know. He's devastatingly handsome, of course, is my child, right? Right. So um which makes it even harder. Which makes it even harder, right? Um, but this was all during the time of COVID, right? And so it was a rainy day, you know, I'll never forget that day. And I went home and I was so angry. And, you know, I really was trying to think through what to do next. So I actually went home and I started writing letters and to hundreds of people, and I was gonna go and sue everyone. And what happened was that I got locked up in Penny's Bay. I got rounded up and I got sent away for two weeks. I got stuck in a in a in a COVID jail. And I had a lot of time to think. Time to think. I had so much time to think. I had to think this through because I needed to understand why something like that would happen. As I was thinking that through, I knew that that person was not a jerk, knew the person that wouldn't unlock the bathroom, wasn't trying to be mean to Alex. I just knew that because that person was a human being and no person should do that. Figured it was awareness. They didn't understand invisible disabilities, they didn't understand autism, they didn't understand someone who was non-durable and who could not advocate for themselves.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

Right.

Badges Go Viral

SPEAKER_00 6:56

And I thought about a similar situation, which was my father, who at the time, who's passed away since then, had Alzheimer's. Because he had gone through this whole journey of really losing his voice, appearing to be normal, but people didn't understand his behaviors and things that he would say and do did not match what a normal person would do. I remember that many years before that, I had created a badge and a card in English that said, I have Alzheimer's. Thank you for your patience. And I thought to myself, while I was locked in Penny's Bay, that's what we need to do in Hong Kong. Right. We needed to do that, but we can't do exactly that because unfortunately, I don't speak Chinese. I needed something that Alex could wear that educate other people without words. So I sat down and I designed some lanyards and badges. I had some friends help me with the Chinese translation. And I then sent it to a designer who helped me refine it. It was really the first iteration. I had a mock-up picture and printed, I think, about a hundred of the badges in the lanyards. At that time, actually, they were stickers in lanyards. And then I got out of Penny's Bay and I was having my coffee and I thought, I'm just gonna post this on Facebook on one of the mom's groups because there may be some people interested. They can just contact me and direct message me, and I'll send them these badges and try to help them because I I felt that that would be good. Because when I had used them with Alex myself, right? It worked instantly. Instantly, right? I thought this can help other people, so let me put it out there. I posted it and thousands of people responded. Right. It was unbelievable. I was shocked, you know.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

It's so simple, but so effective, right? I I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised.

SPEAKER_00 8:46

Exactly. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

You are a problem solver. You were able to take two different situations and see the correlation and then execute on it. It's amazing how a small post on a public forum can build wildfire.

Building Talos Foundation

SPEAKER_01 9:03

Tell me about Talos now. Was this the basis of your foundation that you've started?

SPEAKER_00 9:08

That's right. I didn't intend to found Talos Foundation. I intended to help a couple of people with a badge or a lanyard and help them prevent these situations. But when we started getting such great feedback from companies, from people, I thought, oh, we need to do something to help other people. So the post was in 2021 and it's 2026 now, so it's almost been five years. And since then, we had such a great outpouring of support among parents, among schools, that we've scaled the distribution of our lanyards and badges to about 30 points around Hong Kong. We've distributed over 20,000 lanyards at this point. Since that count was about six months ago, we're probably closer to 25,000. We have delivered corporate training for companies using exclusively neurodivergent trainers to so many companies around Hong Kong, Asia, the UK. Thousands of employees have been trained. We have an employment normalization program where we recruit people who are non-verbal using AAC devices and other people who are not able to get into other vocational training programs at a monthly program and event where we allow them to demonstrate that they can work. And from that program, they've been able to get full-time jobs. And that is unbelievable because a couple of years ago, if you would have asked me, would Alex be able to work in Hong Kong, I would be concerned about that. Now I think it's happening and people are seeing it, and that's normalizing it so that other people can have that opportunity. So what we've done with Talos Foundation, and this month, we will be launching a short animated film of ours, who is a pretty renowned filmmaker. That actually came from that Facebook post where she reached out to me and it's exclusively voiced by neurodivergent people, including a person using an AAC device. And it's in English and Cantonese, and it's just something that is so exciting. That small idea, solving a problem, is going to help so many people. From that pain, from that frustration, from that hurt, from that moment.

SPEAKER_01 11:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Exactly. Exactly. Incredible.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

I'll pause here to tell my listeners that we will post everything about these badges and talos and your film, all of that exciting stuff as part of this blog post as well as a podcast

AAC Device Breakthroughs

SPEAKER_01 11:47

post. And so people can find you and support you because this is an answer to something that they've been really thinking about. Okay, so I'm going to shift a little bit and talk about, let's talk about this AAC technology because you're not a technologist in training, but clearly a problem solver. How did you move from anger to creating communication tools for Alex?

SPEAKER_00 12:09

Absolutely. So it's called an adaptive augmented communication. So it's that's right. And so it can take many forms. And again, I'm not a technologist, I'm not a speech therapist, and I'm not a personal user of AEC for my own communication. So I'm saying that with love because I think that it's important that people who use it for their own communication have that voice to explain what it is as well. So I'm coming at this as a parent, right? But what I noticed was that because Alex was struggling with neurotypical verbal communication, but I knew he understood the receptive language. So when I would speak to him and ask him to do something, he would be able to do what I've asked him to do. So I knew that he was in there. I knew that he understood his disconnect or that what he needed help with was expressive communication, expressing what his wants, needs, and feelings were. And where that became a frustration, and I wouldn't say anger, but just sadness, actually, was just when I knew he was hurting or I knew he was sick or I knew there was something wrong, but there was no way for him to express that. So we tried to figure out how to bridge that gap. And what we decided to do was invest in AAC and hiring the speech therapist who specializes in that. And that therapist specializes in training Alex how to use that device as well as the family, because that's equally important so he can communicate.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

Maybe it's helpful to pause and explain what AAC is.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

Can you explain what it looks like and how does it work? Absolutely. My vantage point, it is normally used on a phone or an iPad. There's a number of different emojis that represent words, feelings, thoughts, actions. So you tap that emoji and it correlates to a word that then says the word. If you wanted to say Apple, you would hit the emoji Apple and then it would say Apple.

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:15

And it's cool because it actually will have different voices. So you can program it to have different accents, different languages, right? And that is really, really awesome. And there's technology now where you can record the sound of even a person who is fairly nonverbal, then it creates a voice for them, which is awesome.

SPEAKER_01 14:34

That's awesome. That's really, really amazing. And so how do you use this in the home? Like when you, when let's say you're getting Alex to do something, like pick up after himself or something like that, and he doesn't want which is a very typical thing, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:47

Um, well, first of all, that's very hard, as it would be for any pre-team, right? For any 12-year-old. So that may involve other communication. If you were to use that example, we have the iPad, a stance that's pretty heavy duty. Everyone in the family, including Alex, knows that's not for play, that's for communication. It's usually on our kitchen table in the middle of the home. We will say the words, Alex, we need to make your bed. And then we would go to the iPad, the program, and we would hit Alex, make your bed, and then would say, Alex, make your bed. And he can either go and make his bed, right? And he would have that receptive language and go ahead and do it. Or if he wanted to say, No, I don't want to make my bad, he will go back to the device, whatever his you know, response would be, and then he would hit that. So we try to have a two-way conversation with that iPad as much as possible. So it's equally as important for the people in the household who can speak to actually use that and normalize that conversation.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

So that's how it works. It's something so subtle but brilliant. You created a family iPad on a stand just for communication, not for entertainment.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

How does Alex feel about this? Well, at first, I think he was frustrated by it because it, you know, we all have to adapt, right? And it's a little bit of extra work. And I think that it was frustrating for some of the family members. But I think the breakthrough really happened a couple of times, had it on a family trip and headed towards the airport. A couple of family members really didn't think it was for real. When you start using the device, you'll find that many times the person who needs to utilize it will play with it. You know, just, oh, this is apple, this is peanut butter, this is cheese. I'm just gonna hit cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese. So sometimes he'll hit catch up and he'll just say catch up, catch-up, or he'll hit crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy because he likes the way it sounds. So sometimes Alex will stem, which is something he'll do for fun or to calm himself, and that's what he was doing there, or maybe he was just something cheeky. So when that happens, sometimes it's easy to just fall into the trap of believing this thing doesn't work. This is pokey pokey, right? But I think when we used it and we were going to the airport, and actually just out of nowhere, instantaneously, he hit airplane. And once that happened, I said, this is not hokey pokey. This is the real deal. Yeah, actually. And so that moment for me was I'm doubling down on this. And we're gonna invest in learning this and having the therapist train him, train us.

SPEAKER_01 17:32

Hey, it's Arcadia, your screen time squad mate. There's this moment I've had more tons than I want to admit. You take something away, maybe it's a screen, maybe it's access. And for a second, it feels like you've done your job. You set the boundary. Then later, you wonder, did I actually teach anything, or did I just pause the behavior? Because the truth is, so much of parenting right now, especially in the digital world, feels like you're just stopgapping things. But shouldn't we be trying to help our kids make sense of this world? Considering that they're living in the digital world already. And that's exactly why I've been working with Life Beyond School. They're creating these weekly cards, simple prompts, simple moments that help families practice things like decision making, emotional awareness, and even how to handle tension, not in a big overwhelming way, just one conversation at a time. I've been thinking about these cards a lot as I'm building something similar around screen time, because they're really doing something by shifting the question from how do I control this to what is this moment really trying to teach? If that question has been sitting with you, it might be worth exploring. I've been trying this in my own home through Life Beyond Schools, and you can find their cards at lifebeondschools.co or on Amazon. There's a link here in the show notes and a discount if you want to try it. Use ISTPROMO 20 for 20% off on these wonderful cards. IST Promo 20 for 20% off. And see you around Life Beyond Schools. Woo!

SPEAKER_00 19:29

A real moment that really allowed everyone to buy in was when he was having a sensory meltdown, which is by the way, that is one of the areas that's most challenging for family members who have kids who are nonverbal and autistic, is that the kids will have a meltdown. And I always would get frustrated by it because it's hard. Right. But the reason that many of them do have a meltdown besides the sensory issues is that there's no way for them to communicate what they're upset about. But in this case, we didn't know what was going on. It appeared that it was a sensory meltdown, I should say. And I brought him to the table and I said, Alex, how are you feeling? And he went straight for frustrated. I said, I know you're frustrated. I know. I said, Why are you frustrated? And he went to catch up, which I told you before misused in the past for like you know, being cheeky. Right, right. And I said, Okay, hey, Alex, are you really frustrated about ketchup? And he kept hitting ketchup. And I said, Okay. Are you hungry? And then he went to I said hungry, and he said hungry. And I said, What are you hungry for? And he's and then he went to ketchup again. And then my husband was listening and he needed some time to actually get on board with the program. And he said to me, Have we ever considered that Alex may consider ketchup as the main dish and sausage or potatoes or hamburger as the you know compliment? Yeah. And I thought, I didn't think about that. So we promptly started the sausage and we brought it in and said, Is this what you want? Sausage and ketchup. And he went, yes. And that's when we all knew that was an example of he's able to express what he was frustrated. And he did, he was not frustrated anymore. He stopped the meltdown and he was okay. That was a moment where we realized this can really help with things like meltdowns that are just so difficult for the family, and especially the person who cannot communicate verbally, right?

SPEAKER_01 21:45

I mean, that is impounding giving a child autonomy to communicate. It's funny we should talk about this. I have a 13 year old, you have a 12 year old. Those one line responses that you're trying to decipher come from. Neurotypical children as well. True. Right. And we are moving more towards this emoji conversation, right? I love this story you share because there's this fear all parents have about being able to reach their children and communicate with them, which I think probably runs very deep when you have a nonverbal autistic child. And being able to use this technology to create that bridge, I think it's a really powerful story to tell. Because why wouldn't we use all of the things that are at our fingertips to be able to make those sort of connections? Absolutely. I was blown away in our previous conversation with your perspective on using this technology

Future Tech and Final Takeaways

SPEAKER_01 22:46

because you have a powerful conviction that in five to 10 years, brain-to-device interfaces will open communication even more. If you read a lot of the tech magazines and trades and AI and predictions, there's a lot of that conversation happening. The fact that you've come at this as a parent is fascinating. What are your thoughts on this?

SPEAKER_00 23:10

I think the first thing is to say Alex is so lucky to be alive now versus 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 50 years ago, because if he was the same person that he is 50 years ago, he would be in an institution. And it would be delusional at that point to think that my child would be communicating and getting a full-time job using an iPad, right? And so that that's possible now. And I think that's awesome. And so I look at technology, again, I'm not a technologist. I say, let the smart people figure out how to make this happen. But from a very high level, if you look at the technology for Neuralink, it is it's examining those brain patterns that then elicit a response in the body. And so they've started with people who are paraplegic who have lost their ability to walk, for example, move their arms, whatever that is. That's a mind-body connection that we all have as human beings.

SPEAKER_01 24:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:15

But there's certainly a mind-body connection with speech because we have to think about what we're saying and then use our body to think. For me, that seems to be a logical step. If someone is able to think about what they want to communicate, which is what he is doing with the device, if that can then be somewhat instantaneous, that would be amazing. I think that all of these things that have happened with AAC have happened over the past five to ten years. And we already have the technology with Neuralink now. What's stopping that from happening? And I really believe that it will happen in Alex's lifetime. And I think that's amazing. And, you know, I will just say one thing. As a person who is not nonverbal, as you can tell, um, and is not autistic, I don't want to speak for people who are autistic and nonverbal. It's ultimately that person's individual choice. And I want to be very firm about that because some people may choose that that they don't want to use it or they don't want to use an A T device. I think having that technology available is incredible and it gives people the opportunity to have their voice heard to society who does speak through their mouths. So I think that's really important. And I think it's important that we presume competence do have the ability to think and express themselves. And that that is actually an understanding that comes from you and I, not from them. We need to do better in that regard and give people the tools to do that and whatever that looks like.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

That's such an important perspective. Mary, I love the fact that you put this problem solving into action, right? And so for families that are listening, especially those who may be overwhelmed or scared, what do you tell parents who are just beginning on this journey? What's some advice that you might give to them?

SPEAKER_00 26:18

It's a journey, right? I think the most important thing is you have to trust your instincts. You have to trust your gut as a parent. If that's telling you that your child is not intellectually disabled and that they are in there, you should go with that. You should find the resources to help your child. Problem that I saw when Alex was diagnosed was that there was not enough awareness, even in the medical community, to help him have those resources. It's important that the instinct you feel you honor that and follow up on that. So that would be the one thing. Trust your gut.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

It's hard to do when you don't have the resources as well. And so Talos is there for that reason. One question that I like to ask a lot of my guests, particularly because the technology is constantly changing, go back and tell your younger self at that moment in those early years one thing. What would it be?

SPEAKER_00 27:18

I think it's knowing that from that instinct, that gut feeling, and using that to give him that access that he needs and that accommodation that he needs to speak and keep communicate with the world. That is just so important to remember and to believe that your child is confident, your child is in there, your child is speaking to you.

SPEAKER_01 27:44

So trust that. Thank you so much. I think this story is incredible. Even for parents who have neurotypical kids, we get bombarded by like, you shouldn't be doing this, you should be doing this. Why are you doing that? You had to listen extra hard, extra hard. Because in many ways the cards were stacked against you, right? And then in the same time, that's our jobs too, right? We just have to listen through puberty, through friendship issues, whatever it might be, like riding a bike, eating healthy, looking at your child and really focusing on what they're doing and what they're trying to communicate to you. So I think that's an important reminder for all parents. Mary's story reminds us that communication is not a luxury, it's dignity. For Alex, an iPad didn't replace a voice, it revealed one. What began in a moment of public humiliation became a journey towards advocacy, inclusion, and a future where every child, verbal or not, has a way to be heard. This podcast is a project of Infinite Screen Time, the organization I founded in 2020 to help parents raise green smart kids while embracing the infinite possibilities of technology. The goal isn't answers, it's understanding. Stories like Mary's open the hallways a little wider for all of us. If this episode spoke to you, I'd love to hear from you. Email me at akim at infinite screentime.com. Or use the link in the description to learn more. Until next time, I'll see you around the Infinite Halls.