Divergent Mind: Thriving in a World That Wasn't Designed for You

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Her clients and previous speaking engagements include the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Tahirih Justice Center, Park Day School, OZY Media, the Aspen Ideas Festival, and others. This book was a great first step into understanding women who are neurodivergent and how certain women have adapted and struggled because of their “differences”. Unmasking is something that has many more risks for autistic Black women and autistic women of color than for autistic white women. Additionally, this book was released in 2020, which is enough time for the author and anyone else involved in this book to learn that terms like "high functioning" and "low functioning" are outdated and harmful.

I picked this up because as an autistic woman, I'm always looking for new books about neurodiversity, but I was honestly quite disappointed.The book de-pathologizes those of us who most profoundly and intensely think and feel the world around us.

This wonderfully positive and accessible introduction to the neurodiversity paradigm is packed with life-changing insight for anyone whose way of experiencing the world diverges from the ordinary. My sensory issues are a big part of my experience as an autistic woman, but it's nowhere near the only one. And I'll save my criticisms of treating "Highly Sensitive Person" like an actual diagnosis because oh my god. Sharing real stories from women with high sensitivity, ADHD, autism, misophonia, dyslexia, SPD, and more, Nerenberg explores how these brain variances present differently in women and describes practical changes in how we communicate, how we design our surroundings, and how we can better support divergent minds. I feel that the author collected a lot of stories from women that were closer to her economic social circles, which is fine, but I’m very much a working class woman who was looking for more help navigating the struggles I have within my social class, which I didn’t find in this book.I could go on, but must rest now (note: the book suggests that needing rest is a sign of neurodivergence. When we allow our wide variety of brain makeups to flourish, we create a better tomorrow for us all. I was very much looking forward to reading this, as the premise is laudable/something I am selfishly interested in, and I was extremely disappointed afterward. I'm not a woman, but since I spent my first 18 years of my life perceived in all my offline social spheres as a girl, my experiences from then are more like late-diagnosed autistic women's than late-diagnosed autistic men's.

I bought the book hoping for lots of ideas of how to manage life in this world however it seemed more of a book about why and how we should advocate for change. While some of the earlier chapters in the book gave helpful definitions for different neurodivergencies, I recommend looking into other sources like, you know, Google and Instagram for the same exact information that’s most likely presented in a less privileged manner. I loved that Nerenberg explained all of the ways the brain functions out of the norm and how to deal with this. This was yet another book by a well-meaning, cis-het, middle- to upper-class, white woman that just…totally missed the mark.Between a flawed system that focuses on younger, male populations, and the fact that girls are conditioned from a young age to blend in, women often don’t learn about their neurological differences until they are adults, if at all. Her suggestions for advocating and accommodating for yourself include up and moving to quieter, less stressful neighborhoods; quitting your job; going to the doctor and therapist and psychiatrist and specialist regularly; how to make the offices of corporate America and Silicon Valley more accommodating…essentially, it’s some pretty “meh” advice for people who have money, access to healthcare, and work for companies like Verizon and other big tech companies or architecture firms or universities. It isn't a "new study", as one of the back blurbs describes it - not in the sense of a scientific study. When it comes to women, sensory processing differences are often overlooked, masked, or mistaken for something else entirely. I'll start with the actual writing itself: definitely needed more editing, topics do not flow well into one another, and the surface level coverage of too many topics ends up feeling disorganized altogether.

The whole book came across, again, as well-meaning, but overall pretty oblivious to neurodivergency (and life in general) outside the bounds of cis-het, affluent whiteness. I also must criticize the amount of time that is spend grouping typical human behavior into neurodivergence. I agree with a lot of people who are slightly put off with this book because it doesn’t really dive deep enough into different types of neurodivergent women who fall into these spectrums.For example there are a lot of interviews about women who work in tech or academia who have found their niche within their company and it has brought out the best in them and their neurodivergencies. I was also extremely confused about the focus on 'sensitivity' as if that was the only qualifier for being neurodivergent. This book left me wondering who exactly this book was written for, the individual neurodivergent, or for those who have the power to enact systemic change?