My son Jack was diagnosed with autism in 2005. I didn’t know a single person with autism. I didn’t know anyone who was shuttling their toddlers to speech therapy or sitting through evaluations in small, windowless rooms. Sensory processing disorder was a phrase you might find in a medical textbook, not on a questionnaire for […]
Mama, what is a family? A family? Well, my child, a family is at once the easiest and the hardest thing to build. Think of it as a garden. Maybe you expected rows and rows of neat tulips, standing straight and tall in their church pews. You pictured them eating organic apples and placing the […]
The first time I went to an IEP meeting was in 2006. My son Jack had just been diagnosed with autism. He was barely two years old. I sat in a folding chair. I remember feeling nervous. I wasn’t sure where to put my hands. The room was stuffy. We flipped through the reports. We […]
Hi. My name is Carrie. I am married to a man named Joe and we have five children. Our second son, Jack, is diagnosed with autism. For as long as I can remember, I’ve cooked dinner. I cooked with small kids at my feet and babies on my hip. I stirred tomato sauce while toddlers […]
My son Jack has autism. He is seventeen. He doesn’t have the television kind of autism. He doesn’t know how to count cards in Vegas or solve medical mysteries in a busy hospital. He doesn’t paint masterpieces or write concertos. He has the regular old kind of autism with delayed communication, limited eye contact, rigidity, […]
I have a son with autism. His name is Jack. He is seventeen. Every morning, I make Jack’s bed. I pull the sheets up tight. I smooth the blue plaid quilt and stack the pillows. I do it even though he is perfectly capable of doing it himself. I’m not even sure he notices, to […]
I had the son who bit the teacher. I had the son who couldn’t wait in line at the zoo, or sit through a meal in a restaurant, or play tag at recess. I had the son who slept fitfully and woke at dawn. I had the son people stared at in the grocery store. […]
Lately, when it comes to our son and his autism, we are not, as they say, on the same page. I mean, it’s not like we haven’t been here before. Typically I latch onto an idea—integrated preschool, music therapy—and you don’t say much. You nod your head and I take that as agreement. Except we aren’t […]
Pssst, hey you. Yes, you. The Mama whose brain is a catalogue of shoe sizes, permission slips, meatball recipes, and social stories. The woman trying to balance marriage/motherhood/autism and the cart in the grocery store. I see you. I hear you I am you. My name is Carrie. I have five kids. My second son, Jack, […]
I’d like to apologize for my son Jack’s behavior today. He didn’t answer when you asked what grade he’s in or look up when you commented on his height. Still you packed our bags cheerfully—the new pitcher for iced tea, the yellow placemats, the fragrant candles. But I felt a tension settle over us like […]