4.5 stars

I find it really hard to rate memoirs as it’s not like you can rate someone’s life so I rate more based on quality of writing and my interest level.

Laura talks about her experience from childhood knowing that she didn’t fit with the masculine presenting mould that she was pressured into filling.

She also talks about how living with autism and having gender dysphoria is common but is often overlooked or ignored by doctors as they assume it is an obsession/fixation or that they are not of sound mind to make decisions about changing their appearance and/or having surgery to corroborate how they present themselves.

I found chapter 5’s addiction quite repetitive but interesting and filled with statistics and her personal experience.

I think this is well worth a read for anyone who wants to understand more about why representation is important, those who are struggling to find help, information or support for transitioning, living as a trans person, or trying to navigate early adulthood with autism.

I got an ARC of this book.

The title and the cover drew me in. Just that play on words and all the feelings that it brought up was enough to sell me on this book. I again didn't read the description before I read the book. I was delighted to get a memoir that hit so many notes that I needed and wanted to see in the world. 

This is the sort of memoir that I will be waving at people, demanding that they read it. I have started to reach out more and more into trans spaces again. It has been full of autistic people which wasn't really talked about in the groups before. Now it is just another source of comfort for me. Finally groups are realizing that people can and do experience the world differently. Its so wonderful seeing trans people being accepted and loved. It is wonderful to see autistic people being listened to and seen as people. This book just has all of those feelings written so well in the last few chapters in particular. 

Laura Dale tells her story in this way that invites me in and kept me around. She said so many things that I wish I had been able to read when I started my transition. There were things about clothes just not being right, in more than just fit. There was the fear of shopping for clothes and the way the fabric felt. The way that interacting in the store was just so intense and complicated. I am going to put out my offer to go with anyone who needs or wants support shopping. I am a trained suit and bra fitter. I can help you find clothes that fit and work for you without fear. No one should be afraid or targeted while they are dealing with base necessities like clothes. She covers this so well. I just wanted to hug her for all of her openness, which brings me to my next point. 
She never shies away from mentioning what can suck about being autistic and being trans. She mentions how they can set the other off really easily. How her touch aversion has impacted her life. How she has to fight so hard to conform or risk being seen in a way that isn't good or healthy. How there are so many barriers for trans people to access medical care. How autistic people are treated in the medical community and by family. It is so important to read her words. Read them all. Sit with them. They are important. 

Just all the yes. I felt like cheering when she describes her experience with the roller derby league. I am just so happy and proud of her. She has continued to be herself no matter how hard others have made it. She has created this resource so others can feel like they aren't alone. She has broken into a hugely male industry of video games. She is the type of person that I hope I can be like when I grow up.

I've followed Laura Kate Dale on Twitter and throughout her journalism career for a while. This was a wonderfully honest and personal memoir and really opened my eyes to a lot of things I hadn't even considered relating to autism and being part of the LGBTQIA+ community.

*3.75 Stars*

This book was the memoir of 27 year old Laura Kate Dale. It was about her struggles as a transgender, gay, autistic woman but also her hopes and joy.

I thought her story was an significant one to tell and to hear. I found it deeply moving and interesting but I had trouble concentrating. The way it was told didn't really excite me I guess and I had trouble getting through the whole thing even though it's only a hundred and eighty pages long. Still, it's a very important story and I think a lot of people would benefit from reading it.

A memoir I'm very happy I read. It feels quite informal, almost conversational in tone, and that makes it feel quite personal; it was easy to connect with the author. I loved reading about the different aspects of her identity and the connections between her queer, trans and autistic identities. Dale explores coming to term with the labels she chooses to describe herself, and how they interact.

The structure of the book was sometimes confusing and a bit repetitive at times, but the copy I read was an ARC so this may be fixed at publication. Regardless, this was a really interesting read and I'm glad I got a peek at life from her perspective.

The highly personal nature of memoirs, especially on such sensitive and potentially painful topics, simultaneously creates high potential for emotional impact ... and makes them really freaking hard to rate and review. Because this is such a candid, unflinchingly account of some pretty dark periods in the author's life, multiple sections of this book were difficult to read.

It's definitely an eye-opening read regardless of how familiar you are with autistic and/or trans experiences — I could go on about the importance of intersectionality, but suffice it to say every autistic person's experience is different, as is every LGBTQIA+ person's, and so on for each aspect of life affecting one's level of privilege / quality of life. Of course Dale spends a lot of time on personal anecdotes, but she also examines the societal constraints that created so many of these situations and issues.

As Dale explains in detail, it's largely the influence of external factors — judgment, hostility, aggression — that make it difficult to be non-heterosexual and non-neurotypical. (Hell is other people.) There are some advantages to being autistic, trans, and gay; and at the end of the day, Dale makes it clear that she wouldn't change herself despite the challenges she has faced and continues to face. For the majority of us, life goes on, and it gets better.

Empathy, understanding, and destigmatization can go a long way toward preventing the kind of discrimination and bullying that Dale faced and hopes to combat by sharing her story. So whether you're LGBTQIA+, autistic, both, or neither, I would highly recommend this book.

(I initially left a more positive review, but having reread the sections that initially confused me, I have amended my original review. Both are below.)

So. This book isn't bad, per se. It was a quick read, largely because of the informal, conversational tone of the author, and I definitely feel like I learnt a lot from it. This sort of book is so timely and necessary. We all need to understand one another better, and there really is no better way to foster empathy than by reading and listening to the actual words of others and their lived experiences. I'm genuinely thankful that books like this are being published and that I got a chance to read it, and I would absolutely recommend it as a book which gives a vital window into the life of someone with autism who is also trans.

That said, the quality of this book leaves much to be desired. Reading it, I was convinced it was a first draft and not an ARC. Entire paragraphs are essentially rephrased and repeated; Dale makes a point and then she makes it again. She writes near the end of the book that she wrote 4 chapters on one train ride, and it honestly shows in the quality of her writing. I was surprised to read that she is makes a living writing about video games, because the standard of writing here really is very poor. I feel that Dale has a great story to tell and I wish that the publisher had given her more help to tell it, because she is in need of an editor who will be more sensitive to her narrative and shape it into the book that this deserves to be.

As it stands, this book has a lot of potential and I think it needs to be published to further a necessary conversation, but I really feel that it needed a lot more editorial work.

(Original review below)

A genuinely eye-opening book. Dale's tone is friendly and conversational, which makes the heavy subject a little easier to digest. It does, at times, border on reductive - there are some claims and statistics cited without sources - but as the general tone of the book is a personal narrative, I'm not sure it's the end of the world. If it were an academic textbook, it would matter more.

I also wanted Dale to talk more about the intersections of her identity. We hear much about the factors in isolation, as discrete labels, but it would have been beneficial to hear more about them as a linked whole. For example, we hear that trans people are both more likely to identify as gay / bi and more likely to be autistic than the general population, but it's never really explained or theorised why. Again, it's Dale's overall experience that matters and so whatever she feels is most important for the narrative is probably what's most important, but still. I wouldn't want to say what should and shouldn't be included in a memoir by someone who has characteristics that I, a cis woman, don't.

Most of all, this book absolutely serves to dismantle the strereotypes that I feel a lot of us hold about trans and neurodivergent people, and I'm glad to see it published. We could all do with a little more empathy, and hearing other people's stories is invaluable. Dale is a very capable writer and I'm looking forward to the rest of her work (I can see she already has another book on the way about video game butts, so that's promising!)

Imagine growing up on the autism spectrum, having to navigate a world that isn't set up for the way that you work. Imagine also being a trans-woman, having to figure out how to communicate your bodily and medical needs and exist in the LGBT space which isn't always autism friendly.

Laura's story was fascinating and I loved being able to take a look into her life and how being a Gay Autistic Trans Woman has shaped her life and made her into the woman that she is today. I didn't know before this book how often the LGBT and autism worlds collide and and how it can be to be in both spaces.

This was a very good book and I would highly recommend it for anyone.

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley!!

This memoir is about Laura Kate Dale... a gay trans woman with autism. This memoir is unique for so many reasons.

Laura tells us about her life experiences from her transition to her autism melt-downs and much more.

Such an amazing read.

Brilliant beginning with the title, "Uncomfortable Labels" is a memoir of the author's overlapping challenges in finding safe and welcoming spaces.

She's autistic, so she has to expend more effort to fit in smoothly with the allistic people around her.

She's English, so fitting in smoothly is of more importance generally. (I should point out that she doesn't speak of being English as a salient challenge, but readers from more gleefully iconoclastic parts of the Anglosphere will project that onto her.)

She's trans, so she missed out on the childhood fun of close female friendships and practical knowledge like sleepover etiquette. And since NHS seems to have zero sense of urgency vis-a-vis the race against the indelible effects of testosterone-dominated puberty (and regards everything but bottom surgery, or 'lower surgery' in UK English, as mere vanity), she's had to make tough choices on a daily basis between what will help her pass (a scarf can keep her safer from transphobes by helping her pass) and what is physically comfortable (a scarf can be sensory hell for an autistic person).

And she's gay, so even on days when she sacrifices enough physical comfort to attain passing privilege as a woman, she's still visibly lesbian if she wants to go out on a date.

What I didn't know about her until after finishing the book is that her beat as a reporter is gamer culture, than which you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. Jesus Christ, she's got unobtanium ovaries.

I'm autistic and genderqueer (raised as male), so I found this memoir more personally relatable than a lot of readers might. Even with those advantages, I was still astonished by some of the things I learned -- for example, that having trouble hearing one particular voice amid background noise is much more common among autistic people. I'd been thinking it might be a hardware problem, but it's probably in my software! A lot of the symptoms of ADHD can apparently also be part of autism (difficulty directing the direction and depth of one's mental focus; opposite-to-normal reactions to central nervous system stimulants). It's little bits of insight like this that delight me most about the book, and make me particularly grateful to the publisher and to NetGalley for allowing me to have a free early copy of Uncomfortable Labels.

Uncomfortable Labels is an unusual book, and one I'm glad I read although not enjoyable in the usual sense of the word. Here we are presented with Laura's story focusing on her challenges with gender identity and transitioning while also dealing with the complications of an autism spectrum disorder.
Laura identifies as a lesbian, and here she shows bravery and strength, and honestly shows the challenges that come with a post-puberty transition.
More than the depiction of ASD, this book will be a great read for anyone interested in learning and understanding more about transgender issues and challenges. It is an important story. I also hope it might provoke some thoughtful reflection from the more exclusionary cisgender lesbians out there.
Thank you for this ARC.

Actual rating: 4.5

As a queer and autistic reader, I was very excited to be able to review this title. Since autistic people are statistically more likely to be part of the LGBTQ+ community, it was very interesting to see this intersection of identities highlighted and explored.

Of course, Dale's experience is different from my own in a lot of ways, because every autistic person will have a different experience, and I'm not transgender myself. But we are the same age, and her experience with autism is rather similar to mine. So her book was hugely relatable to me personally. And because she compares her experience of being trans with her experience with autism, I've also gotten a more thorough understanding of what it's like to be a trans woman. In that sense, this book was a win-win for me, and I think it will be a very insightful read regardless of whether or not you're autistic and/or trans yourself. However, I hope and, honestly, expect that this book will be quite relatable for anyone who's autistic and/or transgender!
When it comes to the descriptions of autism, there were so many small details that were genuine light-bulb moments for me, as I still become (more) aware of aspects of my own autism every single day. I really saw myself in the way Dale explained how she experiences and processes the world around her.

This was such a valuable reading experience for me, and I will definitely be buying a physical copy so I can reread it and mark the most relatable passages.

CWs: transphobia, ableism, attempted suicide, discussion of suicidal ideations, depression, bullying, addiction, assault/harrassment, misgendering.

This book was super informative - as someone who knows the ins and outs of most trans issues, but bare minimum (outside of the regular misleading stereotypes) about autistic issues, it brought me up on how little I knew. And just as importantly, the intersection of trans identity and autism.

A lot of the book focuses around childhood; how the author came to realise she had autism and was transgender, and the isolation she felt due to peer responses to both. There's a lot about bullying, self-discovery and acceptance (as well as aspects of, if not rejection, then denial) from family and friends. The struggles of the whole memoir culminate in finding places of acceptance, as she discovers communities - not inherently trans/autism related - that hold a welcoming place for her.

This was a wonderful autobiography that i would recommend to anyone who needs an insight to being trans!
plus it has a wonderful front cover which is a real eyegrabber

Laura Kate Dale’s Uncomfortable Labels: My life as a Gay Autistic Trans Woman summarizes her life as a child through an adult, covering both her transition, diagnosis of being on the Autism Spectrum and her discovery of being gay. She talks about no only everyday things that are involved that are being part of these groups but also the long term effects on her and others that are involved in these groups.
Dale writes about how there is an overlap between being Autistic and Transgender, unfortunately, she only sources one article. While this is not my area of expertise, one article is not enough to prove that it is common. I was frustrated through the book when she stated things as facts but didn't give the evidence to prove them to be so. All of the things that are presented as facts are not and that makes a lot of the attempted academical writing in this book to be moot.
I applaud her for talking about how things are when you’re transgender. The most striking thing that she brought up was “passing.” Where you have to pass as “looking female” or “looking male” to be considered the correct gender and avoid being misgendered. Bringing this up here made me realise the need to stopping thinking of people as the gender that they look but as the gender that they wish to be called, regardless of my perceptions. Not everyone is going to look “traditionally” male or female.
Unfortunately a lot of things in this book were constantly repeated or she started to ramble. She at one point makes a statement about how her autism allowed her to focus and write four chapters in one train ride. Boy does that show. Dale meant to point out a good part of having autism but this statement is not a good one. Honestly, parts of this book remind me of unedited papers were things become muddled and unfocused. Of course there are good things about autism and hyperfocus can be one of them but that doesn’t mean that those 4 chapters should never be revisited. It progressively gets worse as the book goes on.
Dale has good intentions with this book but she falls short on the execution. I hope that before this book is fully published that she is able to add more resources, other than her personal experiences, and and remember that longer does not alway mean better.

There are two titles that I have read recently that I thought might be worth highlighting because they are a little bit outside of those boxes. Although Uncomfortable Labels by Laura Kate Dale is a memoir, it’s the first that I’ve seen that tackles the exploration of multiple identity labels in such a thorough way. The title alone, for anyone who’s familiar with sensory sensitivity, was a great nod to the content of the book.

I received an ARC of Uncomfortable Labels through NetGalley. This book piqued my interest because one of my partners is a queer, autistic, and transfeminine. I, too, am queer, have some neurodivergences that resemble autism spectrum experiences, and am trans. The same partner also has experiences with MDMA, and introduced me to roller derby… eerily, these are also topics that Dale dedicates chapters to.

Here’s the thing: this is a great book! The downside of it being so relevant in my life is… I basically didn’t get anything novel out of it. The upside of it being so relevant in my life is, I’m so glad that someone wrote this book. If you look at the reviews that already exist on Goodreads, you’ll see that lots of people are learning a lot from it.

I’ve accepted that this one just wasn’t written for me. I’ve learned a lot about the identity experiences explored in this book from years of living alongside my partner and learning from zir, and from parallel experiences in my own life. But for cis readers, or neurotypical trans readers, this book is a gem. It’s clear, it’s thorough, and it’s extremely vulnerable. There is so much that makes this a memoir worth reading. Uncomfortable Labels comes out in July, and is available for pre-order now.

This review will be included in a blog post that will be released in May 2019.

I liked this, a memoir of Laura's early life designated as male, her painful teen years, coming out as a woman, and how being trans intersects with being autistic.

Uncomfortable Labels : My Life As A Gay Autistic Trans Woman
by Laura Kate Dale
due 7-1-2019
Jessica Kingsley Publishing, UK
5.0 / 5.0

I was so deeply touched by this memoir of growing up as a trans, autistic and gay person in the UK. I was completely blown away by Laura´s honesty and integrity, by her memories and experiences, some so emotionally and psychically hurtful. Many times intentionally hurtful. To get beyond it and to have become the beautiful and inspiring woman and soul she is, is beyond inspiration for me. There are no words.
Laura Kate Dale is proof that we do not have to wear the labels people/family/religion/society give us. We can get beyond the veneer of others stereotypes and become comfortable with ourselves-our own brand. We can become comfortable, functioning and successful beyond branding.
Laura shares her very personal life experiences, conflicts and growth:
*From ignoring the early signs of Aspergers, to fully embracing and learning to live with the super sensitivity she has for light, sound, noise, texture and touch.
*Being the weird kid everyone bullied and took advantage of; being sexually abused with few people to talk to or share her feelings of loneliness and rejection; feelings of depression and suicide from a society quick to marginalize anything different, marginalize them with stereotypes and treat them as less worthy, to becoming a successful author and advocate for those that were also disrespected for daring to be who they are. 50% of Trans and 35% of people with Aspergers commit suicide.
*Transitioning into Laura- and being able to live and work under the name Laura, having a successful career and finding love. She always felt trapped between 2 choices:live with the pain of not ever transitioning.....or, transition and live a miserable life. Now in her late 20ś, she has not attempted suicide in 5 years, is engaged to a loving partner and able to support herself. Life is not miserable, in fact, it got better!

This is a wonderful and very personal memoir, shedding much information and passion on the conflicts of transitioning from a male to a female. It is also one of the best and most intimate sharings of learning to live with Autism Spectrum I have read. Its influence on her childhood- her teen years-adult relationships and day to day life are told with openness and candor; I felt involved in her life and this book helped me to understand so much more about living with Autism Spectrum. Things many of us think nothing of or take for granted....like going to see a movie at a theatre.....going out to eat....hanging out in public places or crowds....even clothes shopping......these all took meticulous and careful planning for Laura to do, as she learned to deal with her stimming and sensitivities. They are trying something new in the UK to help those with anxiety or autism. In public shopping areas, they are putting rooms of respite, that are subdued, quiet and a comfortable space that anyone can use to help calm and de-escalate, if needed. What a wonderful idea. I hope it is something the US will notice and incorporate.

This memoir will take you inside the emotions, spirit and life of a Trans person- a gay person- people on the autism spectrum, with intelligence, grace, respect and complete honesty. I learned so much and felt so much. Learning how others live and feel is the first step toward a more respectful and inclusive world, where there is no division, just differences. It taught me that how we approach things, either to judge them, or to learn from them importance of respect and dignity, is telling about all of us.It also taught me the importance of reaching beyond yourself to realize just how human we all are.
Enriching, important life lessons. Essential reading.
Thank you to Jessica Kingsley and Laura Kate Dean for this e-book ARC for an honest and fair review.
#netgalley #UncomfortableLabels

This was a fascinating memoir. I had no idea that the population of trans people who are on the autism spectrum (or vice versa) was higher than would statistically be expected. I also enjoyed how the author neatly debunked a number of the prevailing theories as to why.

But back to basics. This is a memoir written by Laura Kate Dale, a woman who was diagnosed with autism in her late teens, and came out as trans soon after. Her clear portrayals of how she experiences the world and the people in it, and the added complications she's had in transitioning because of her autism, and complications in her autism that were brought about by transitioning, were a window into a world that I wouldn't have otherwise been able to experience or know about. She addressed a number of issues, prejudices, presumptions, and other beliefs that she frequently encounters, and one of the threads running through all of these topics is that one-size-fits-all solutions are... not a thing. I truly enjoyed how she patiently and logically explains why no one should expect that X should work for her because she's on the autism spectrum, or that Y should work for her because she is trans, and that perhaps people should stop jubilantly offering solutions as if she's never heard of them before (the last part about stopping offering might have been in my own interpretation instead of in the actual text).

In any case, above being completely needed (are their any other #ownvoices works about being trans and on the spectrum?), this was a very informative, interesting, insightful read.

This is from an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

Erratum:
“The more I learnt into trying to hide it, the more it hurt.”
I'm not sure what she was trying to convey with that! I wonder if the 'R' in 'learnt' ought to have been omitted so that it read 'leant' which is Brit-speak for 'leaned'. Or maybe I'm misunderstanding what’s being said there.

This made for a difficult read because of what that author went through, but it was a worthwhile read, and I commend it for that. It was well-written, informative, educational, and important. It felt like a sick joke how much was piled onto this author's plate: mtf transgendered woman who is queer and on the autism spectrum which poor understanding by those closest to her and a late diagnosis of both the ASD and the transgender circumstances did nothing to help. This is precisely why we need understanding and education, so that this doesn’t happen to other people undergoing these same realizations and discoveries.

If either experience (the transgender or the autism) had been the only one this writer endured, it still would have been difficult, but it might also have made for a better outcome. Having both of these to deal with together not only served to confuse things, but also seemed that one would sometimes to feed off the other, obscuring what ideally ought to have been early recognition and a smooth treatment to help both the ASD and the transition to what was to become, if unfortunately belatedly, her natural gender.

The book is divided into three sections: before, during, and after, and each has its own story to tell and difficulties to relate, particularly the last section. For me, who didn't have to go through this, that last one sounded the most painful, but the middle one gave it a close run for its money. The first section as sad, but in some ways very cute and endearing. The whole is a heart-warming story with a happy ending, and a useful tool for others in similar circumstances. I highly commend this as a worthy read, and an essential one for anyone who wishes to understand and learn.