HEATHER CONNOLLY-SMITH is a therapist, person-centred counsellor and mental health professional based in Norwich. She has over a decade of experience working across clinical and supportive settings. Her lived experience as an autistic person deeply informs her neuroaffirmative, person-centred and trauma-informed approach. Heather writes and works with a commitment to challenging structural ableism, reducing harm in therapy and helping autistic clients to feel understood, respected and supported. She is a specialist mentor for university students who are neurodiverse or have mental health difficulties. She is passionate about social justice and accessibility, and she hopes to inspire others to create therapeutic spaces where autistic people can thrive.
Description
Talking Therapies for Autistic People is a compassionate guide designed to transform how professionals understand and work with autistic clients. Written from the author's dual perspective as an autistic person and a mental health practitioner, it presents a neuroaffirmative, person-centred and trauma-informed framework that exposes longstanding assumptions about autism and the harm they can produce. Rather than seeing autism as a deficit, Heather Connolly-Smith book positions autistic processing as a natural variation in human experience, emphasising that distress arises not from autism itself but from structural ableism - neuronormative expectations, inaccessible environments and repeated interpersonal misattunements. Drawing on social models of disability and the neurodiversity paradigm, she uses three running case studies to explore simple ways in which therapists can support autistic clients to live more authentically and in ways which work with, rather than against, their neurotypes.
Foreword by Cathy Wassell CEO and Founder, Autistic Girls Network Preface Introduction Part 1: Theory, History and Understanding Autism in The Present Day 1. A Neuroaffirmative Understanding of Autism 2. Three Key Areas of Difference in The Autistic Brain Part 2: Presenting Concerns in The Therapy Room 3. Accessibility Starts Before the First Session 4. A First Session 5. Autistic Burnout 6. Autistic Inertia, Anxiety and Avoidance 7. Shame, Self-Criticism and Safety in an Unpredictable World 8. Reviews and Endings Part 3: The Future of a Neuroaffirmative Approach 9. Neuroaffirmative Therapy as Social Justice References