Odd Girl Out Quotes

“In the end, only three things matter: How much you loved, How gently you lived, And how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“Even today I enjoy reading a book much more second time around. A first read can be filled with apprehension. What if I don’t like the way the story goes? What if something awful happens to a favourite character? What if I get bored halfway through after I’ve invested something of myself in the story? A second read is a joy. I know exactly what is going to happen, so can immerse myself in the words and the subtleties in a way that would have been too stressful the first time.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“I still feel stuck in my late teens – always a girl, never a woman – but I have learned to deal with the world more effectively.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“Girls can be more bitchy and mean, and Aspie girls don’t play that game. They are loyal, trustworthy, and kind. They just don’t do bitchiness, and they find it very hard to understand why girls would actually enjoy being so cruel to each other and so destructive.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“People with Asperger’s or autism expend a huge amount of mental energy each day coping with socializing, anxiety, change, sensory sensitivity, daily living skills and so on.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“I am confused at the idea of dressing for someone else. It makes little sense to me.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“Everyone would wear the same clothes every day and they would be made from soft grey fabric that felt good against the skin, not itchy, scratchy or harsh. At school, you could choose what to do. If you didn’t like art or PE, you could read instead. Every day the library was stocked with new books. No one shouted or raised their voices. If you ever broke a rule a proper grown-up explained why it was a rule and why it mattered and then you were simply told – kindly – not to do it again.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“Many autism experts believe daily living skills, such as managing finances, need to be explicitly taught to people on the autism spectrum. Everything most nonautistic people pick up as they go along—how to shop, catch a bus, cook, clean, or manage money—are skills that are difficult for me to acquire simply by assimilation. I need a book, a video, or someone to explain and show me how to do it. There’s a perception that anyone with average or above-average intelligence will naturally pick up these skills. Strangely, intelligence seems to have little to do with it, and one study even found that problems of this kind are especially prominent in those autistic people with greater cognitive abilities.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“In an effort to add detail to my blueprint for life, I have begun contacting a number of autism experts, including Professor Tony Attwood, author of The Complete Guide to Asperger’s Syndrome. He stressed that with autism the core features are generally the same for boys and girls, men and women. There are, however, key differences. He told me, “One is how girls react to being different. The other is the different expectations in society for girls. “In terms of how girls react, I think one of the common ways is to observe, analyze, and imitate and create a mask, which delays diagnosis for decades until the wheels fall off.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World

“The truth is that it frightens me. What if I don't love people properly? What if I'm missing out on the most essential part of life. Love is seen as the driving force of our world.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out

“That the spectrum is linear couldn’t be further from the truth. To get a more accurate perspective, I met Dr. Judith Gould at the Lorna Wing Centre for Autism. Judith is a chartered consultant clinical psychologist with more than forty years’ experience. She specializes in autism-spectrum disorders and learning disabilities. In the 1970s, with the late Dr. Lorna Wing, Judith came up with the term autism spectrum. Judith believes the key point to understand is that autism is a spectrum not because it is linear but because any factor can be present at any point. She said, “[In our study] we saw the classic autistic aloof person with repetitive rituals and elaborate routines. But we also saw children with aspects of social difficulties, communication difficulties, and imagination difficulties who didn’t fit in with [earlier] precise criteria. “These traits tended to be seen together, but you could have anything on the dimension: anything on the communication dimension, anything on the imagination dimension, and so on. At first we called it the autism continuum. Continuum implied severity from high to low, but that’s not what we meant. The spectrum would look like a rainbow because anything can happen at any point. The colors merge. “In terms of communication, people can come anywhere on the spectrum. There are those who only communicate their needs, and there are those who don’t realize the person they are with may be getting bored when they talk about special interests. Then you’ve got those with a highly intellectual, formal, little-professor communication style.”
― Laura James, Odd Girl Out: An Autistic Woman in a Neurotypical World