…don’t let bullies bother you. If you are getting bullied in school or if you’re struggling with someone not getting what you’re doing, don’t give it attention at all. That very thing they bully you for could be the very thing that changes your life…
I had the pleasure of talking with Gabrie’le Eato, a woman whose life story reads like a modern digital fable. Today, she is known as the “Digital Design Psychologist,” a brand strategist and the CEO of Eleable LLC who has built a loyal following of over a hundred thousand people. But long before she was pioneering accessible web architecture or speaking at national autism conferences, she was just a kid trying to survive the cruel hallways of middle school.
Growing up, Eato faced the kind of relentless bullying that leaves permanent scars. She remembers being ten years old and feeling entirely outcast. Kids would run from her and touch her like she was a sideshow attraction. “I was called a fat, ugly gorilla,” she recalls. “They’d call me stupid, ugly, all sorts of things, and I really started to take this as my truth.” The weight of that isolation pushed her to a devastating breaking point. “At one point — these are really heavy topics — but I almost took my life because of it.”
Salvation came in the unlikely form of a dial-up connection and a virtual pet website. Retreating to her bedroom after school, Eato logged onto Neopets.com. While other kids were simply feeding animated dragons, she was cracking open the site’s architecture. She fell in love with coding and graphics, eventually getting hired as a freelance web designer by people who had no idea they were employing a child. When they finally discovered her age, they promptly kicked her out. Still, the seed was planted. She had found a sanctuary where her mind made sense.
That mind, it turns out, is a rare one. Eato later scored in the top one percent globally on the WAIS IQ test for spatial reasoning. “It’s better than 99 percent of the population, apparently,” she notes. In school, her creativity was her only companion. She once built a life-size Elmo by herself for a Spanish project simply because nobody would partner with her. Her teacher gave her a perfect score despite her ignoring the actual directions.
The path from a lonely teenager to a digital visionary was far from straight. Eato originally set out to be a psychiatric nurse, driven by a deep desire to care for people and talk them through their pain. While working as a Psychometrist and at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, her life took a profound turn. A colleague tested her, leading to a late clinical diagnosis of autism and ADHD. For Eato, the puzzle pieces finally snapped together. She realized why her blunt honesty was often misread, and why she struggled with sensory issues like severe migraines from bright sunlight.
She began helping the very psychologist who diagnosed her by applying the web design skills she had honed back in her Neopets and Webkinz days. “Magically, the phone was ringing and it would not stop,” Eato says. She soon realized she didn’t have to throw away her passion for design to help people. She dropped the nursing path and merged her twin loves: psychology and digital creation. This fusion became the bedrock of her own creative agency, where she invented “Storytelling Web Design,” an approach that builds accessible, emotionally resonant online spaces.
Despite her success, Eato’s daily reality is shaped by her neurodivergence. As someone diagnosed with Level 1 autism, previously known as Asperger’s, she often navigates a world built for neurotypical brains. She relies on a core piece of wisdom she learned in speech therapy: “When you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve really met one person with autism.” People often look at her ability to make eye contact and speak articulately and assume she faces no hurdles. They miss the hidden struggles, from missing non-verbal cues to navigating a diagnosed sensory processing disorder. “My heart is always in the right place, as it is for most autistic people I know,” she explains.
To keep herself grounded, Eato relies on a strict regimen of self-care. She focuses on intentional nutrition, nature walks, and a profound spiritual life. She writes music, sings, and prays, viewing her connection with God as the pure essence of her work. Oddly enough, the glow of a computer screen is still her safe haven. “Coding is a very peaceful thing for me,” she says.
Through her platform, NDverse, she has created a community for neurodivergent individuals and their families to find resources and feel less alone. Her ultimate goal is to disrupt the medical establishment by starting a fund for free autism evaluations, pushing back against the three-thousand-dollar price tag that keeps so many people in the dark.
For Eato, it all comes back to a shockingly simple philosophy. If she could inspire a single movement, it would just be love. “I’m not just saying it because it sounds like a cheesy thing to say,” she insists. “If people could legitimately focus on love, I would have a hashtag #loveistheanswer because love is the answer to everything.” From the lonely girl building websites in her bedroom to the innovator breaking down digital walls, Gabrie’le Eato has proven that sometimes the best way to survive a hostile world is to design a kinder one.
Yitzi: Gabrie’le, it is so delightful to meet you. Before we dive deep and talk about your work and advocacy, readers would love to learn about your personal origin story. Can you share with us the story of your childhood, how you grew up, and the seeds for all the amazing work that has come since then?
Gabrie’le: It’s good to meet you. [laughs] When I was 10 years old, I got bullied a lot. I was called a fat, ugly gorilla. Kids would touch me; they would run from me. They’d call me stupid, ugly, all sorts of things, and I really started to take this as my truth. At one point — these are really heavy topics — but I almost took my life because of it. For me, I had found a love for social media and web design through this process. What happened was I would go home because I had no friends at school, and I would play on neopets.com, which was really funny. I didn’t even care about the pet. I did care about the pet, but I liked the intricate things that you could do on it. You could do a lot of coding or graphics. Then I got hired as a designer because they didn’t really know my age. I started working for them, and then they found out my age and they were like, “Get out!” That happened, but I found a lot of peace in creating and designing things. I didn’t think I was going to be a web designer; I didn’t think I was going to do all these things. But I realized I’m very creative. I got diagnosed with autism, and I scored in the top 1% globally on the WAIS IQ for spatial reasoning. That is my creative aspect. It’s better than 99% of the population, apparently. I realized that at school I wouldn’t have friends, so I even built this life-size Elmo on my own for a Spanish project because nobody wanted to be my friend or partner. My teacher, even though I didn’t follow the directions, gave me a 100% anyway because it was so awesome. I have a picture of it; I’ll have to send it to you. In a nutshell, I was very alone a lot of times. Through web design and social media, I found my creativity, and it really helped me a lot in just loving myself the way that I am.
Yitzi: Amazing. Is that the story of how you first created your business?
Gabrie’le: I was working at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, and I went and got tested for autism and ADHD. I’m a little bit later diagnosed because the whole time I didn’t really know what was going on. I would try to communicate with people; I was very blunt in a lot of ways. People would misperceive me a lot of times when I was just trying to be kind to people. I don’t present stereotypically. What ended up happening is, again, I was alone a lot of times. I was working for Nationwide Children’s Hospital, and I also got a job as a Psychometrist. I wasn’t really supposed to be hired by this person, but she tested me, and I got clinically diagnosed with autism and ADHD. Then I went and got another test and evaluation because I wasn’t even sure. I thought, “That’s just ridiculous,” because I had all these stereotypes in my own mind. That led to me doing my web design and development, my social media, and things like that, because I realized I was really good at it. I was helping the same lady who had worked with me and diagnosed me with her business. Magically, the phone was ringing and it would not stop. It was really crazy. I was just doing the stuff I would do on Neopets all day with her actual business. That turned into my own web design business. Then I started doing a lot of social media and more because I realized, why should I throw out what I like? I was also a nursing major. I know it’s kind of everywhere, but I was a nursing major planning to be a psych nurse because I liked to care about people. I liked talking to people through their issues. I wanted to be a therapist at one point. I knew I liked helping people, but I grew up being told that you have to be a nurse; you have to be a doctor. I was actively in nursing school, but it just was not where I thrived the most. I ended up taking all the things from Neopets and Webkinz when I was 10, applying it to this psychologist’s business, and the next minute I was also doing psychological testing on an internship. That turned into Digital Design Psychology. I met a lot of really incredible people through it, and it helped me a lot with my own personal journey.
Yitzi: You probably have some amazing stories from different parts of your career, from your social media success, from your advocacy, and from your business. Maybe this is hard to single out, but can you share with our readers one or two stories that stand out in your mind from your career?
Gabrie’le: I have a friend now who is a Hollywood casting director. I wasn’t really expecting to meet a Hollywood casting director at all when I first started my business, and I low-key did fangirl over it a little bit. She doesn’t know that, but I did because I thought, “Oh, that’s really cool.” She built a lot of things with me through business. She taught me to aim for authenticity; that’s what she does. She has a great heart. Changed my life. I was always encouraging but had met others who made me feel it wasn’t okay to be myself. She taught me it’s okay to be myself, to be encouraging, and we just ended up encouraging each other a lot. Through her, I’ve met a lot of really nice people. I know there have been a lot of people who have come to me and didn’t know how to trust themselves and love themselves but through her helping me trust and love myself… I now help others do the same. I think it’s really cool that I got to meet her because getting to meet her has taught me a lot about my own spirituality, loving God, and growing in that way. Before her, I did love God, but it wasn’t really a big core of my business. There are so many stories; I don’t know which angle to take this. I have her, which has been profound to me. Then I have stories of when I was a Psychometrist, parents would come in and speak with me all the time. They would say, “I don’t understand my child.” And because I can verbalize things, I was able to help the parent understand autism and ADHD in a verbal way. Overall, I think just in general — I’m going to generalize it — I just love the fact that every single day I get to meet someone new. A parent, a child, anybody who needs support and can’t find it. They come to me and they feel actually supported after feeling unsupported for many years. Whether through website design, social media, or my advocacy through NDVerse… With website design it may seem like it should be separate for my advocacy but it’s really cool to see how psychology can merge with that. Not only that, but I focus on ADA/WCAG Compliance — which is all about fostering love and inclusion not just for neurodiversity, but those who are blind, can’t hear, etc. All the sites I build take these things into consideration. And it’s why I now offer the ADA/WCAG Reviewed badge. Somebody might come to me about a website, and they’ll bring their child into the conversation — not physically in, but into the conversation. Then next minute, I’m helping coach their child. I’m not kidding. It naturally expands beyond just website design — it grows into something much deeper.
Yitzi: Let’s now move on to talk about your advocacy. First of all, I’ll let you introduce it. Please tell us the causes that you are a passionate advocate for.
Gabrie’le: A lot of things, but obviously, the big things are neurodiversity, autism, and ADHD. I’m also a big advocate for mental health because I know the toll that being undiagnosed for so long, or just people misunderstanding you, can take on your life. I almost took my life. I took a lot of pills at one point and almost died. It was really bad; it was a really bad position that I was in. I support people in their mental health struggles, but I know with God none of it would have been able to happen. I had this really supernatural experience with God, so I do know for a fact God is 100% real. I support autism, ADHD, mental health, love, and inclusion. Anything to make the community a better place that’s filled with unity, flooding the world with as much love as possible. Our world is in a state where people don’t really have as much love in their hearts for each other, but it’s about being compassionate to other people. That’s why I run my business the way I do. I don’t really have fixed pricing or anything like that because I want people to come to me who really do need the support, and get that support. I have NDverse, which is the bigger piece of the work that I do. That has built a community for parents, kids, all sorts of people. It doesn’t matter if you’re neurodivergent or not; it’s a community that’s been built to help people who feel alone so that they don’t feel alone the way I did. It helps them find resources for autism and ADHD. Eventually, I want to incorporate resources that get people tested, hopefully even for free at some point. I want to start a fund because the cost of an autism evaluation is really ridiculous in my opinion. It’s usually around $3,000 to get an evaluation. I’m working towards that. I’m also attending the NAMI — the National Alliance on Mental Illness — resiliency ring next month on May 6th. It’s exciting because there will be legislature there and a lot of awesome people. I do a lot of these kinds of things.
Yitzi: What are a few things you would like more people to understand about people with autism?
Gabrie’le: Not one person with autism presents the same as another. When I did speech therapy — yes, I did speech therapy — even as somebody verbal, that was something my Speech-Language Pathologist would always say: “When you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve really met one person with autism.” People might not understand. They think, “Well, she talks, she speaks, and she makes eye contact; she’s fine. There’s no struggle.” But there are a lot of struggles; I just choose to have a positive mindset and not let those debilitate me. I do understand there are different levels of the spectrum, which I acknowledge greatly. For me personally, I know I’m level one. That was previously called Asperger’s. How it impacts me is, again, I’m very blunt and literal. Sometimes I might say something and it might seem like, “Oh, that’s not really appropriate for what you’re saying.” But if people had a different mindset and perspective and understood what I really mean, it might not pose as much of an issue. I have a lot of sensory issues. I have a diagnosed sensory processing disorder. The sun bothers me a lot; I get really bad migraines. I feel like there’s a lot of confusion around autism because if people are speaking, and you Google it, it says “communication disorder.” People need to understand that communication is both verbal and non-verbal. There are a lot of cues that I don’t always understand and pick up on. My heart is always in the right place, as it is for most autistic people I know. You have the good, the bad, and the ugly everywhere you go. I know a lot of people who are autistic who are often misunderstood and treated very poorly because people think they’re either being mean or they don’t understand what’s really going on. If everybody had an open mind to understanding that autism presents differently — everybody is different and unique in their communication style — our world could really grow and foster that love and inclusion I spoke about previously.
Yitzi: Amazing. This is our signature question, Gabrie’le. You’ve been blessed with a lot of success now, and you must have learned a lot from your experiences. Looking back all the way to the beginning when you first started your career, can you share five things you’ve learned over the years that would have been nice to know when you first started?
Gabrie’le:
- The first thing is God is always with you throughout everything that you do.
- The second thing is people are always going to misunderstand you. If you focus outwards on what other people are saying, instead of the spirit that’s within you guiding your actions, you’re going to be really depressed and frustrated all the time. But if you allow God to guide you and realize who you truly are — your essence and your being — all of that stuff does not matter. It just matters what you can create and what you can do to be the best person you can be.
- Number three would probably be that people around you might not support you. They might think what you’re doing is really stupid and dumb. You have to vet yourself, know who you are, and know where you stand. Don’t allow other people and their misunderstanding to influence what is within you, because ultimately you know what’s best for you. People will try to make your career for you; they’ll try to say you shouldn’t say this or you should do that. Every day now, people are commenting all sorts of stuff of my posts. There are good people and there are bad people. I choose to focus my energy on good things — things that are uplifting and supporting me. When you focus your energy on good things, you can elevate and continue to elevate. We truly get to decide for ourselves if we have a happy fulfilling life by where we gear our focus. When you focus on bad things, it lowers your energy and makes you struggle a lot.
- Number four would probably be, don’t let bullies bother you. If you are getting bullied in school or if you’re struggling with someone not getting what you’re doing, don’t give it attention at all. That very thing they bully you for could be the very thing that changes your life.
- Number five is just keep going. Even if you’re struggling and you feel like it’s going to end, or you feel like this is not going to work, you might hit roadblocks. But it’s the one time that you keep going that keeps leading you towards success and changes your life. That’s what I would say.
Yitzi: Can you share some of the self-care routines that you do to help your body, mind, and heart to thrive?
Gabrie’le: Self-care? Drinking water, for one. But really, nowadays I like to do a lot of workouts. I do a lot of exercise. When I first started, I wasn’t working out at all. I didn’t eat right; I was eating a bunch of junk all the time. Now I’m really intentional with what I consume because it’s all energy that you’re putting into your body. You have to be really careful. I like to take walks in nature and grounding. I like to pray. Having a relationship with God has changed my life immensely. I like to write music, and I sing a lot. I do a lot of other things, but I just like to stay in my element. Website design is very peaceful to me. I know a lot of people don’t find it peaceful, but for me, it is. Coding is a very peaceful thing for me, so I’ll do that. I really like to just spend time with myself and God, taking quiet time to focus on what is next. I ask myself What do I need to do?” “How can I be in alignment with where I need to be?” I really focus within.
Yitzi: Can you articulate why you think more people would improve their lives if they had a relationship with God?
Gabrie’le: When you have a relationship with God, it’s your purest essence. Like I was talking about, when you focus outward, you’re left without. But when you focus on the Holy Spirit that’s within you, God governs everything that you’re doing. You’re not left without; you focus within and you get to stay connected with the right things. God is with you everywhere that you go. If you ignore your essence, your truth, and who you are, you won’t ever be happy because you’re focusing on the wrong things. But when you know who you are, what you were made for, whose you are, and what you’re called to do, you realize that everything just falls into place the right way. It’s just about loving yourself and being in truth.
Yitzi: This is our final aspirational question. Gabrie’le, because of the platform that you’ve built and your amazing work, it’s not an exaggeration to say that you’re a person of enormous influence. If you could spread an idea or inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can spread.
Gabrie’le: A long time ago, I was connected with some people who partnered with the United Nations. I proposed that there should be something out there that helps promote love and inclusion. That’s the biggest thing for me because love has the ability to protect, it has the ability to guide, and it has the ability to heal. It can do anything. If our world would be flooded with love and compassion, that would be really awesome. I’m not just saying it because it sounds like a cheesy thing to say, like “Oh, just love everybody.” I really mean it. If people could legitimately focus on love, I would have a hashtag #loveistheanswer because love is the answer to everything. If people could just love one another, we wouldn’t have people trying to rob or steal from people. We wouldn’t have people lying. All the misunderstanding that I went through in my life, where I could have taken my life — all of that would cease to exist if love was the one thing everybody focused on. It seems like everybody is focusing on all the other things. They’re worried about what this person did or what that person did. But if we focused on love, which is our true essence and who we’re called to be collectively, we wouldn’t struggle in a lot of the ways that we do. It’s about being more open-minded to other perspectives, but also just flooding the world with as much love as you can. I think that’s important.
Yitzi: I love it so much. Gabrie’le, how can our readers continue to follow your work? How can they engage your services, and how can they support your work in any possible way?
Gabrie’le: Well, if you see my post, like it. [laughs] Like it, share it. Really, it’s not about vanity metrics; it’s about spreading the word of love, compassion, and inclusion. You can follow me anywhere at @gabbyeato. It’s really easy: GABBYEATO. That’s literally my handle everywhere. It used to be @iamgabbyeato, but I just wanted it more pure and simple. So we have @gabbyeato, and I’m pretty much on every platform. If you look there, you’ll probably find me somehow.
Yitzi: Amazing. Gabrie’le, it was so good to talk to you. It’s so good to finally meet face-to-face. I wish you continued success, good health, and blessings, and I hope we get to do this again soon.
Gabrie’le: God bless you, Yitzi. Thank you. You too. Bye-bye.
How Gabrie’le Eato Turned Neopets Coding & Digital Design Into a Viral Movement for Neurodiversity was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.