What if Normal was a myth,
and your family never had to fit in?
Practical, Evidence-based Support for Parenting a one-of-a-kind teen.
“Written with warmth, wisdom, and the kind of hard-won honesty that only comes from lived experience, this book is unlike any parenting guide you have encountered before.” — from the foreword by Esther Wojcicki, author of How to Raise Successful People
About the book:
For all parents of adolescents who feel "different" in some way, a first-of-its-kind, inclusive, evidence-backed guide to surviving the hard days and raising your teen to have confidence, joy, and a sense of belonging.
Parenting a teen who stands out can feel isolating, exhausting, and full of second-guessing. Whether a child is neurodiverse, struggles with mental health, lives with a disability or serious medical illness, or simply moves through the world differently from their peers, parents may find themselves unsure what to do next to support their child best. Authors and parents Dr. Kelli Harding and Sara Blanchard know this insecurity well, and it's what inspired them to write Different together.
This one-of-a-kind guide for one-of-a-kind teens is a compassionate road map for parents raising kids in a world built on outdated standards of achievement and success. It blends lived experience and evidence-backed research from a variety of fields -- from medicine and education to positive psychology -- to challenge the myth of "normal" and invite parents to see their kids' differences as meaningful variations of the human experience. With warmth and honesty, Harding and Blanchard address the fears, guilt, grief, love, and hope that accompany raising teens who may not follow traditional timelines or rigid cultural expectations.
For parents who have felt judged, misunderstood, or alone in their journey, Different is both an emotional support lifeline and a joyful, deeply humane reframe of what it means for unique children to flourish on their own terms.
About the authors:
Kelli Harding, MD, MPH (she/her), is dedicated to creating a kinder and healthier world for all. An expert in mental health, medicine, and public health, she teaches at Columbia University’s Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons (VP&S) in New York City and is a diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, also boarded in the sub-specialty of consultation-liaison psychiatry or psychosomatic (mind-body) medicine. Known for making complex scientific research understandable to general audiences, she’s the author of the critically acclaimed book The Rabbit Effect: Live Longer, Happier, and Healthier with the Groundbreaking Science of Kindness. Dr. Harding has appeared on Today, Good Morning America, the BBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Prevention, the LA Times, Oprah Magazine, Parents, Medscape, the Sesame Street Workshop, March of Dimes, and the World Economic Forum. Additionally, she has spoken at global events at the United Nations and the World Happiness Summits. She has served on Boards of Organizations such as the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the social media platform Nextdoor, and Reader’s Digest. She lives in NYC with her husband and three teenage sons. What’s not usually mentioned on her CV but central to Different: “I’m neurodiverse and know what it feels like to navigate the world with non-apparent disabilities, hiding parts of yourself to fit in. This project isn’t just an academic interest — it’s a personal journey that I know can help transform lives for the better.”
Sara Blanchard (she/her) believes everyone deserves the opportunity to thrive. She brings that perspective into the room as someone at home with both the research on human flourishing and the messiness of social change. After graduating from Harvard and working at Goldman Sachs in Tokyo, Hong Kong, and New York, she disentangled other people’s notions of success and decided to build a life and body of work defined on her own terms. In addition to being the primary caregiver for her children, she’s also a positive psychology–informed speaker, moderator, and coach. She is cofounder of the platform and podcast What Do You Mean by That?, a space for honest, inclusive dialogue that continues to move people long after the conversation ends. Her work has taken her to stages as varied as TEDx, World Happiness Summits, and the American Psychological Association’s annual convention. She is the author of Flex Mom: The Secrets of Happy Stay-at-Home Moms and coauthor of Dear White Women: Let’s Get (Un)comfortable Talking About Racism. Sara is Japanese and White, and she and her White Canadian husband are constantly learning and unlearning as they raise multiethnic teenage daughters with nonapparent differences — the lived experience at the heart of this book. They live in Denver, Colorado.