Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
"That summer of striding out towards a life of open fields and sacks of corn, I brought a confused black hole of something pernicious but not yet acknowledged along for the ride." This was supposed to be the year that Rebecca Schiller, her husband, and two young children finally achieved The Good Life: moving onto a 2-acre homestead in the English countryside, waking with the sun, milking their own goats, and eating sustainably from their own field and orchard. No sooner do they begin to put down roots, though, then Rebecca's own health begins to crumble. Faced with a constellation of bewildering symptoms: frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory, Rebecca desperately searches for answers, even while farm and family hold together by increasingly tenuous threads. After months of fighting to be seen and believed by a range of medical specialists, her diagnosis, when it comes, is utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
As tenaciously as she seeks the truth of her own mind and past, Rebecca also digs for the truths of the land she farms: a place where wolves and lynx once roamed; where other women gathered eggs by candlelight and raised children whose fathers never came home from war. Her mind processes the world in prismatic abundance: she's aware of multiple points in history, different life-forms, science, and art all in one rush of sensation, a reality she brings breathtakingly to the page. No matter how difficult the truths she uncovers, Rebecca's commitment to the land in her care testifies to the power of one deeply known patch of nature's power to solace when everything else falls away.
The narrative that emerges across Rebecca's harrowing year is ferociously candid and compulsively readable. In her quest to be seen--and see herself--as whole, Rebecca gives a clarion call to the growing number of neurodiverse people, especially women, pushing back against a simplistic narrative of minds that are either normal and good, or different and broken. Just as one plot of land's capacity for beauty and life has little to do with ordered perfection, one mind's apparent chaos, understood differently, might also be a powerful gift.
Synopsis
One woman's narratively propulsive, lyrical search to understand the land she farms--and her own neurodivergent mind As Rebecca Schiller's young family moves to a two-acre homestead in the English countryside, Rebecca begins to suffer frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory. Doctor after doctor delivers one misdiagnosis after another. When the answer comes, it's utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
Rebecca's narrative of her harrowing year is compulsively readable and ferociously candid, both a medical mystery and a love song to the landscape she calls home. Here is a clarion call to the growing number of neurodivergent people pushing back against simplistic narratives of minds that are either normal and good or different and broken.
Synopsis
As propulsive as Brain on Fire and as poetically candid as The Collected Schizophrenias, one woman's quest for the truth of her neurodivergent mind. As Rebecca Schiller's young family moves to a two-acre homestead in the English countryside, Rebecca begins to suffer frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory. Doctor after doctor delivers one misdiagnosis after another. When the answer comes, it's utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
Rebecca's narrative of her harrowing year is compulsively readable and ferociously candid, both a medical mystery and a love song to the landscape she calls home. Here is a clarion call to the growing number of neurodivergent people pushing back against simplistic narratives of minds that are either normal and good or different and broken.
Synopsis
As propulsive as Brain on Fire and as poetically candid as The Collected Schizophrenias, one woman's quest for the truth of her neurodivergent mind. It should have been Rebecca Schiller's dream come true: moving her young family to the English countryside to raise goats and coax their own fruit and vegetables from the land. But, as she writes: The summer of striding out toward a life of open fields and sacks of corn, I brought a confused black hole of something pernicious but not yet acknowledged along for the ride.
Rebecca's health begins to crumble, with bewildering symptoms: frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory. As she fights to be seen by a succession of specialists, her fledgling homestead--and her family--hang by increasingly tenuous threads. And when her diagnosis finally comes, it is utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
In her scramble for answers, Rebecca's consciousness alternately sears with pinpoint focus and spirals with connections. Childhood memories resurface with new meaning, and her daily life entwines with the history of intrepid women who tended this land before her. Her family weathers their growing pains where generations of acorns have fallen to rise again as trees, where ancient wolves and lynx once stalked the shadows.
Written in unsparing, luminous prose, this is an all-absorbing memoir of one woman's newfound neurodivergence--and a clarion call to overturn the narrative that says minds are either normal and good or different and broken.
Synopsis
In this "exquisite and probing narrative" (Publishers Weekly) of life on her small farm in the year leading up to a surprising diagnosis of severe ADHD, Rebecca Schiller pens a vivid rallying cry for anyone wondering if different doesn't have to mean broken It should have been Rebecca Schiller's dream come true: moving her young family to the English countryside to raise goats and coax their own fruit and vegetables from the land. But, as she writes: The summer of striding out toward a life of open fields and sacks of corn, I brought a confused black hole of something pernicious but not yet acknowledged along for the ride.
Rebecca's health begins to crumble, with bewildering symptoms: frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory. As she fights to be seen by a succession of specialists, her fledgling homestead--and her family--hang by increasingly tenuous threads. And when her diagnosis finally comes, it is utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
In her scramble for answers, Rebecca's consciousness alternately sears with pinpoint focus and spirals with connections. Childhood memories resurface with new meaning, and her daily life entwines with the history of intrepid women who tended this land before her. Her family weathers their growing pains where generations of acorns have fallen to rise again as trees, where ancient wolves and lynx once stalked the shadows.
Written in unsparing, luminous prose, this is an all-absorbing memoir of one woman's newfound neurodivergence--and a clarion call to overturn the narrative that says minds are either normal and good or different and broken.
Publisher's Note: A different version of this book has been published under the title Earthed in the United Kingdom.
Synopsis
It should have been Rebecca Schiller's dream come true: moving her young family to the English countryside to raise goats and coax their own fruit and vegetables from the land. But, as she writes: The summer of striding out toward a life of open fields and sacks of corn, I brought a confused black hole of something pernicious but not yet acknowledged along for the ride.
Rebecca's health begins to crumble, with bewildering symptoms: frequent falls, uncontrollable rages, and mysterious lapses in memory. As she fights to be seen by a succession of specialists, her fledgling homestead--and her family--hang by increasingly tenuous threads. And when her diagnosis finally comes, it is utterly unexpected: severe ADHD.
In her scramble for answers, Rebecca's consciousness alternately sears with pinpoint focus and spirals with connections. Childhood memories resurface with new meaning, and her daily life entwines with the history of intrepid women who tended this land before her. Her family weathers their growing pains where generations of acorns have fallen to rise again as trees, where ancient wolves and lynx once stalked the shadows.
Written in unsparing, luminous prose, this is an all-absorbing memoir of one woman's newfound neurodivergence--and a clarion call to overturn the narrative that says minds are either normal and good or different and broken.
Publisher's Note: A different version of this book has been published under the title Earthed in the United Kingdom.