What s wrong with Iris? She is difficult to make contact with, she talks gibberish. She refuses food, she wets herself, screams for almost everything, bites small children, and never does what she is told. And why can she in short rare moments solve problems which not even grown-ups manage? How can she learn so many complicated words that she s heard only once? Why was she already as a small child a full-fledged liar and con artist? A different childhood is a fascinating autobiographical depiction of what it s like to grow up with autism. A true story about the trans-formative power of love and a unique document from the inside about an autistic child s life and struggle create for herself a place in the world. Iris Johansson was born 1945 in Sweden and is diagnosed as autistic. Overcoming this handicap by using her intelligence to solve the problem of how to behave normally she has in the process figured out how people really communicate and transformed her handicap into a highly sought-after capability which has enabled her to establish an international career as as consultant, lecturer, and workshop leader. She is currently teaching a series of courses on the subject Communication as art and is in the process of completing her second book called A different life.