17 episodes
The Loudest Girl in the World Pushkin
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- Society & Culture
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4.7 • 327 Ratings
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For years, Lauren Ober wasn’t all that jazzed about herself. She was always getting in trouble, she had weird sensory issues and her anxiety felt off the charts. Plus, socially she kind of sucked. Life for Lauren just seemed harder than it should have been at 42. And then, in the middle of a global pandemic, she found out why — she was autistic. The Loudest Girl in the World is a new podcast that tells the story of Lauren’s journey to understand what the hell it means to be on the autism spectrum and how to live life as a newly diagnosed autistic person. It's about finding yourself broken in a place you never expected to be and emerging from that place a mostly glued back together person.
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1 - Talking: A Love Story
Lauren loves to talk. She’ll talk to anyone — baristas, postal carriers, neighborhood dog walkers. But her talking is more than just idle chit chat — it’s a kind of compulsion that’s gotten her in a lot of trouble over her life. Lauren’s never been able to turn it off and has never been able to figure out why… until recently, thanks to a diagnosis that changed everything.
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2 - Goodbye, Routine; Hello, Meltdown!
The pandemic upended nearly everyone’s lives. It caused people to reevaluate their jobs, their relationships, their lives. For Lauren, the pandemic meant a collapse of her daily routine. When the day-to-day fell apart, so did Lauren. After a while, she needed to understand why. Her creeping suspicion that there was something going on in her brain got louder and louder. So she did something about it.
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3 - Little Robots and Casual Rockers
If you want to get evaluated for autism, you have to take some tests. But the earliest autism evaluations suggested that autistic kids were like little robots who wore the same clothes every day and looked through people like they were ghosts. So when Lauren decided to get evaluated, she was stepping into a problematic history. Still, she needed to do it.
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4 - Hannah Gadsby Is My Bestie
So Lauren finally got her autism diagnosis. But what the hell did that even mean? Where is the neurodiversity roadmap for someone diagnosed in their 40s? Turns out, there isn’t one. So Lauren has to make it up on her own. It’s time to do a deep dive into the world of autism. Which in itself is very autistic. Let’s get our research on!
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5 - Let's Talk About Hard Things
It’s no fun being autistic all by yourself. If you feel comfortable, you have to tell folks and let them into your truth. So it’s disclosure time for Lauren. It’s time to tell her pals this wild new thing she’s learned about herself. But that’s not as easy as it sounds. Predictably, things get…kinda awkward. So Lauren calls in an expert — her pal Anna Sale, host of the podcast Death, Sex & Money — for advice.
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6 - Autism Pleasantville or: A Ridiculous Journey Into A Neurodivergent Fantasia
This autism stuff is hard. So Lauren needs a break. And she gets it on a trip to Autism Pleasantville — a perfect world made just for her and all her quirks and weirdnesses. Autism Pleasantville is place full of cute dogs and restaurants that accommodate extreme food sensitivities and autism support humans who help Lauren navigate sticky social situations. Is Autism Pleasantville real? No. But it is nice to pretend.
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Customer Reviews
Real, raw, and funny
Lauren’s journey through her autism diagnosis has made me laugh and cry. So very relatable - especially to those who are a little neurospicy themselves. As someone who’s spent most of my life being told I’m “too much” it’s validating to know I’m not alone.
unethical creepy host
the host, lauren ober, recorded the conversation of a private zoom meeting of autistic women without consent of the group, and used the audio in an episode. this unethical behavior has caused shame and pain for the people in the autistic community. lauren ober is unprofessional, disrespectful and an unfit “personality” for podcasting. cancel.
Thank you 💗
I just listened to the entire podcast on 2x speed in less than 24 hours (because I couldn’t concentrate on the regular speed and it was giving me anxiety🙃). I’ve done a lot of sobbing with relief for feeling seen, not alone, and having a better understanding of how to move forward to get myself (and my family) the support needed to be able to function better in this world. Thank you for your honesty, your vulnerability, your humor, and your superpowers. Oh my god I related to so much of what you shared, and it’s already helping me and my spouse understand what may be behind a lot of my unexplainable behaviors.
As my friend recently told me, “You’ve been measuring yourself with a ruler that was made by someone else.” Between realizing I’m queer (and always have been) and very surely neurodivergent (and if so, also always have been), it’s been a very, very eventful pandemic. Time to rewrite the world.