Louder Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism (Hardcover)

by Jenny McCarthy (Author) "THE MOMENT I OPENED my eyes that morning, I had an uncomfortable feeling..." (more)
Key Phrases: seizure meds, fatal rashes, bag surprise, San Diego, Thank God, Los Angeles (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Jenny has done an incredible job retelling the story of Evan, who also was forced to make the perilous journey through autism. Autism is not a dead-end diagnosis. It is the beginning of a journey into faith, hope, love, and recovery." --Jerry J. Kartzinel, from the introduction, MD FAAP --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review
"Jenny McCarthy takes us on journey of a mom dealing with her son’s Autism diagnosis and treatment. We learn what it is like to be a parent and have your dreams shattered. We learn about a disease and about how others dealing with similar circumstances can aid one another. We learn about alternative approaches that seem promising. We learn about healing, hope, and faith."
—David Feinberg, from the foreword, MD, MBA
Medical Director, Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA

“Jenny has done an incredible job retelling the story of Evan, who also was forced to make the perilous journey through Autism. Autism is not a dead end diagnosis. It is the beginning of a journey into faith, hope, love, and recovery.”
—Jerry J. Kartzinel, from the introduction, MD FAAP

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult; 1 edition (September 17, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525950117
• ISBN-13: 978-0525950110
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (308 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #56,809 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

52 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I suppose it's OK..., October 27, 2007

By	Reggie Dunlop (Chicago) - See all my reviews

You can summarize most of the book by "Mommy Instinct" and "Google University".

As a person with a Masters in Biochemistry, it pains me that surfing around on Google now qualifies as "research" worthy of printing in a book. I'm sure the true autism scientists who get up every day painstakingly working toward some answers, must cringe that Jenny McCarthy is now their spokeswoman. I suppose any press is good press, and with media coverage comes grant money... so perhaps Jenny may be helping them out somehow.

As a person who is a now a physician, I think Jenny should understand that the doctors she bashes for the first 50 pages of the book did not go to medical school, and work 90 hours a week during their residency, and incur huge debt, just to come to work and give her bad advice. Doctors are human, and actually do care (especially the new ones), yet they must handle situations as they are taught. True, the outcome (or lack thereof) might be frustrating for a parent... but I wish she would accept that the people at the time were likely trying to do their best... and doctors are not God... they sometimes do not know all the answers for a situation that falls outside of the norm.

As a parent of a four year old with autism, I do feel that Jenny accurately conveyed the joys, frustration, fear, tears, more frustration, confusion, and even more frustration that is associated with a parent's discovery and subsequent acceptance that their child has autism. Herein I think is the value of this book. It may give some insight to friends and families of those with autistic children... what goes on in our homes when we are alone. Her best line was to the effect of... "please offer to babysit for these parents so they can go out to dinner."

I wonder if Jenny could appreciate the challenge facing other parents with autistic children, who cannot afford a nanny to help out, who cannot afford intensive therapy, who may have been kicked off their medical insurance plans. Now that would be an interesting follow-up book.

Gluten-free diets. There is no scientific proof yet that these diets help for certain. I think that if your child has obvious GI problems then it is worth a try... however there are also legitimate businesses capitalizing off Jenny's PR campaign who charge $1500 to evaluate a child and then prescribe the same diet to every child. If that child makes gains over the 1-2 year monitoring period... was it the intensive therapy... or classroom instruction... or the diet... or just the passage of time... that caused the improvement?

OVERALL: Its a decent read. Took me four hours. Rather than buy it, go borrow it from a friend and donate $20 to an autism society instead.

36 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars There are better books from a parents' perspective, November 23, 2007

By	H. Michaelsen (Martinez, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I too have a child who has autism and I was disappointed in Jenny's book. If you can get past the swearing (I'm not sure why she has to cheapen her experience with expletives), she definitely writes from her heart. However, as a non-celeb mom trying to find ways to deal with autism and not go bankrupt in the process, I had a hard time identifying with Jenny's journey since she seems to have a lot of money to put towards her son's treatment, and other help like nannies and cleaning ladies and such. Further, Jenny did seem to find a treatment that worked for her son, but I feel that all kids on the spectrum are so different and respond differently to the various treatments out there. She seems to advocate that this is "the only way". I think there are better books out there from a parent dealing with autism. Look at Susan Senator's Making Peace with Autism for starters. I appreciate the awareness Jenny has brought to autism with her TV appearances, but sadly, I thought her book was a little disappointing.

60 of 75 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your money or your intellect on this book, May 7, 2008

By	Entrepreneur & Mom of 2 (Seattle, WA United States) - See all my reviews

I've used Amazon for years, and this is the first review I've ever posted. Halfway through this book I wondered if others were as appalled as I was by this horrible book, so I came to Amazon to read reviews, and I was SHOCKED to see the 4+ stars rating on this book. I felt compelled to post in the hopes of saving others from wasting their money and their minds on this horrible book. I can't believe anyone ever agreed to publish this book. I wish there were more I could do than just post here to warn others off.

Please note that a surprising number of people who gave this book high ratings don't have or know a child with autism. Maybe if you're not familiar with it this book helps you understand it, but unfortunately you'll learn that autism is something to be ashamed of and to hide, and can be easily cured. That's just wrong. Anyone with the briefest exposure to a child with autism will find this book useless and offensive. My niece has autism, and I would never in a million years subject my sister to a book this poorly written, this uneducated, and this useless. There is no quick fix to autism. Don't you think if there were that every parent of an autistic child would be doing it, rather than struggling year after year with helping their child exist in a world that doesn't make sense to them? Autism is a very broad diagnosis, it covers lots of different people with lots of different behaviors and needs. Very smart people agree that there is still a lot to learn about autism, and that there is no one solution that will help all autistic people. Trust me, Jenny is not smarter than these very smart people. Far from it.

As a writer, her book reads like an email message to her best friend. It's train-of-thought writing, it makes her come across as bratty and uneducated, and I suspect the only reason it's not full of typos and poor grammar is because she's rich enough to have a good editor.

I'm appalled that this book was ever published. I'm a huge book lover, I read all the time, anything I can get my hands on. I love most of what I read, but I've read plenty of books that I couldn't finish because they didn't interest me, or they were poorly written. This is the first book I've ever put aside because it was SO BAD I wanted to call the publisher to ask them what they were thinking. I wanted to find a way to make them take this book off of shelves everywhere.

Please, don't buy this book. Don't read this book. Don't listen (ever) to Jenny McCarthy.