The Myth of Normal

DNF. I stopped reading after chapter 13. I got very frustrated with this book for multiple reasons, but the most important are that the author doesn't approach the topic from a neurodiversity framework or a fat liberation framework, and the valorization in anecdotes of people who were once extremely ill but today take no medication gave me a bad vibe.

The attachment parenting advocacy felt like a repackaging of refrigerator mother theory, with the twist of “society creates situations that coerce or strongly encourage refrigerator parenting.” It's not a framework that I find helpful as a parent or as a neurodivergent person.

In summary, I don't know if the author is one of those people who thinks that I as a chronically ill person should have “be on no medications” as a goal, but I don't want to continue reading to find out. Of course I'd love to not be in pain. But I can't read about mental illness and chronic illness from a perspective that seemingly depicts being 100% nondisabled & neurotypical and on no medications as something that I have a responsibility to want.

I did appreciate that the author has zero tolerance for Jordan Peterson.