Author: Chloe Hayden

Category: Memoir

Publisher: Murdoch Books

Publication date: 4 April 2023

Blurb: An empowering lived-experience guide to celebrating and supporting neurodivergence from 24-year-old actor, social media star and advocate Chloé Hayden.

Growing up, Chloé Hayden felt like she’d crash-landed on an alien planet where nothing made sense. Eye contact? Small talk? And WHY are you people so touch oriented? She moved between 10 schools in 8 years, struggling to become a person she believed society would accept, and was eventually diagnosed with autism and ADHD. It was only after a life-changing group of allies showed her that different did not mean less that she learned to celebrate her true voice and find her happily ever after.

Different, Not Less is a moving, at times funny story of how it feels to be neurodivergent as well as a practical guide, with insights on how autism and ADHD present differently in females, advice for living with meltdowns and shutdowns, tips for finding supportive relationships, communities and workplaces and much more.

Whether you’re neurodivergent or supporting those who are, Different, Not Less will inspire you to create a more inclusive world where everyone feels like they belong.

Review: This was one of the first memoirs by autistic women that I read. It was engaging and readable, however it fell a bit short for me. As someone who wasn’t diagnosed until her 40s, there was a lot in this that I couldn’t relate to and I was left wanting more, mostly to hear experiences from women who were diagnosed in their 40s and navigated marriage and children prior to diagnosis. Given that the author is the same age as my oldest child, that would explain this feeling.

I am glad that I read this book as there was a lot of great information in it, however for someone my age, it wasn’t the resource I was looking for to help me understand my brain. This is, however, a book I would recommend to autistic girls in their teens and 20s, as well as parents of autistic girls as it provides a valuable insight into autistic girls.

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