Unmasking Autism: The Power of Embracing Our Hidden Neurodiversity

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I wasn’t entirely satisfied with the way the medical and social models of disability were presented, the explanation felt a bit overgeneralized to me and I didn’t feel like the medical model was described or critiqued entirely accurately. What I'm still working through: I don't think I expected to walk away from the book unsure if I am on the autism spectrum, but man did this book's exercises bring up a lot of very vivid and traumatic childhood memories around social misunderstandings and ostracization, lol! One of my biggest takeaways and most memorable moments while listening to this book was just kind of the acceptance that even if I could never figure out if I truly am autistic or if I am just a spicy ADHD with anxiety, it doesn't matter that much. I do however see a reader coming off believing that almost all autistic individuals have gender identification issues and tend to belong under the LGBTQ umbrella, and I doubt that to be factual.

Unmasking Autism’, and the author - Reddit I am reading ‘Unmasking Autism’, and the author - Reddit

The author also presents sex work as a strictly positive choice that some autistic people make for themselves, despite writing in Chapter 4 about how consent can be tricky for autistic people and describing in many places the ways in which autistic people are vulnerable to abuse and manipulation. Saying that being closeted is equivalent to having a disability is extremely disrespectful, not only to disabled people but also to closeted people. An Autistic Community that is centered around women, afabs, nb, queer, trans, and others that are not cis men. Neither of those things have anything whatsoever to do with autism or accommodating Autistic people.As a queer person pondering my own potential place on the autism spectrum, this book was an excellent introduction and gave me a lot of food for thought! This book encourages compassion, self-knowledge, community building, and unmasking- the process of shedding the habits many autistic people employ to hide or mask their autistic traits.

Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity

But I will say that the exercises in this book are perfectly apt for me and anyone like me -- which is a point I want to drive home here, that anything that can help neurodivergent individuals is ALSO SOMETHING THAT CAN BE USEFUL to neurotypicals (*also* I very much look forward to Dr. It is much less that, and much more a discussion, along with autism, of various other matters: gender identity, various mental health conditions (including depression and schizophrenia), sex work, among others. For every visibly Autistic person you meet, there are countless 'masked' people who pass as neurotypical. It's a world that is safe for everyone and we broaden our definition of what is socially acceptable.Unmasking Autism is at once a most deeply personal and scholarly account of the damage caused by autistic (and all) people leading masked lives, and how Right now in the wake of reading this book I'm trying to reframe how I interact with the world -- I have always been able to work in highly productive boon-bust cycles where I do a lot of things socially/work-related/in physical space and then need a few days to recover and be more hermit-like, and have generally thought of this as a personal failing.

Unmasking autism – unlearn shame and nurture a more - NPR

I'd like the interspersal of some additional autistic POVs beyond the author and like to the variety in the chapters. I especially got a lot out of the chapter discussing comparisons and differences between ADHD and autism. I liked the medical vs social disability aspect, and how a significant portion of what renders us autistic folks disabled is a lack of accommodation.

Upon reflection I think the author made it clear what the book was about but I wanted to believe it was about something else, that is, masking/unmasking. The author of this book does a fabulous job explaining what autism is and how so many people mask it. I had been thinking of my relationship to some noise-heavy music as strange, and now I can understand it as a (very rewarding) auditory stim.