A LITTLE LESS BROKEN

A woman’s self-discovery and acceptance as an autistic person.

For years, the author thought she was weird. As a kid, she sucked her hair, spat on the floor, flared her nostrils, and displayed other tics. She also couldn’t read social cues, which made her few friends and led one assistant school principal to call her “the worst kid in fourth grade.” As an adult, others called Schembari lazy when she preferred staying home to going to a party and moody when she would scream or throw a chair in rage over a seemingly small problem. She consulted doctors and therapists who diagnosed her with a variety of disorders including “high sensitivity,” Tourette’s syndrome, and depression. But drugs left her feeling jittery or like a zombie, and no amount of writing in a gratitude journal helped ease the feeling that she was a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. She was 34 years old when she was finally diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder. And that knowledge freed her: ”Learning that fact felt like crawling into a crisp hotel bed after a lifetime of sleeping upright in a barn.” Readers learn that autism is a highly heritable condition and can display differently in girls compared with boys. It can be expensive and difficult to diagnose, and it is still misunderstood. “People can’t be a little autistic or extremely autistic…a spectrum is not a ranking of severity.” Rather, it’s “a collection of related neurological conditions, each one presenting differently depending on the person.” Schembari’s memoir, told in a sparkly, humorous, and personable way, makes the drier, more research-driven parts of the book engaging.

Personal experience combined with biomedical research shows the many facets of a still-evolving field.