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  • I Overcame My Autism and All I Got Was This Lousy Anxiety Disorder

  • A Memoir
  • By: Sarah Kurchak
  • Narrated by: Zura Johnson
  • Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (4 ratings)

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I Overcame My Autism and All I Got Was This Lousy Anxiety Disorder

By: Sarah Kurchak
Narrated by: Zura Johnson
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Publisher's Summary

Sarah Kurchak is autistic. She hasn’t let that get in the way of pursuing her dream to become a writer, or to find love, but she has let it get in the way of being in the same room with someone chewing food loudly and of cleaning her bathroom sink. In I Overcame My Autism and All I Got Was This Lousy Anxiety Disorder, Kurchak examines the Byzantine steps she took to become “an autistic success story”, how the process almost ruined her life, and how she is now trying to recover.

Growing up undiagnosed in small-town Ontario in the '80s and '90s, Kurchak realized early that she was somehow different from her peers. She discovered an effective strategy to fend off bullying: She consciously altered nearly everything about herself - from her personality to her body language. She forced herself to wear the denim jeans that felt like being enclosed in a sandpaper iron maiden. Every day, she dragged herself through the door with an elevated pulse and a churning stomach, nearly crumbling under the effort of the performance. By the time she was finally diagnosed with autism at 27, she struggled with depression and anxiety largely caused by the same strategy she had mastered precisely. She came to wonder, were all those years of intensely pretending to be someone else really worth it?

Tackling everything from autism parenting culture to love, sex, alcohol, obsessions, and professional pillow fighting, Kurchak’s enlightening memoir challenges stereotypes and preconceptions about autism and considers what might really make the lives of autistic people healthier, happier, and more fulfilling.

©2020 Sarah Kurchak (P)2021 Dreamscape Media, LLC

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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  • Sam
  • 06-05-2022

Brilliant book, poor choice of narrator.

The tone of the book and that of the narrator where at total odds. Sarah speaks with humour and passion and swears, Zura does not. I feel as though this was the first time Zura had sworn in her life.
If you're able to, I'd suggest reading this book rather than listening but if you're like me and not much of a reader, then don't be discouraged by my review of the narrator as the book is absolutely worth it.

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    4 out of 5 stars

Off-putting narrator

Really hard to feel connection to author when the narration is so cold. Hard to listen to, I’m sure I lost a lot of the value of Sarah’s lived experience because of this.

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