A story that’s trying hard to be a feel-good tale is doing the rounds on Facebook. A family that includes a special needs child was eating out at a restaurant, and the special needs child started to get a little boisterous. Mom was feeling self-conscious, knowing that her son’s behaviour might be bothering other diners, but then a waitress approached the table and said that a kind stranger was footing the bill for their meal.
So far, so good, right? As the parent of a child with autism, I am touched that someone would extend such kindness to a special needs family. But the story doesn’t end there. The waitress also handed the family a note from the stranger. The note said, “God only gives special children to special people.”
While many people are going on about how sweet and kind all of this is, I am blown away by the presumptuousness within the message. Yes, paying for the family’s meal was incredibly nice, and I have no problem with the gesture. It’s the note that I take issue with, and not only because of the implied assumption that everyone believes in God.
My son was diagnosed with autism at a time when a lot was wrong in my life. My relationship with my husband had hit a rocky patch, our finances were in complete meltdown, I was going through postpartum depression, I was struggling with the loss of my father… There was a lot going on.
During this terrible time, while I was trying to adjust to the reality of autism, someone told me that God never gives us more than we can handle. If that is true, how do you explain the fact that there are people who reach the point of being unable to cope, who feel so desperate that they decide to take their own lives? How do you account for the mothers who feel so overwhelmed and lost that they either abandon their children or surrender them to social services? What about the people who lose their homes, families and jobs because they feel that they can drown their problems in drugs or alcohol?
God only gives special children to special people?
The implication here is that autism and other disabilities are some kind of reward. What kind of God would do that?
“This person is so great and so awesome and so special that I am going to give their child a disability that slows down their speech, slows down their learning, reduces their chances of independence, and makes them scream in frustration when they cannot express themselves.”
Call me crazy, but that’s one messed-up reward system.
Here’s the reality: there’s nothing special about me. Yes, I’m a good mom. I provide my kids with the necessities of life, I shower them with love, I advocate for them, I try to instil them with confidence…
But I also get overwhelmed. I have days when I yell at them too much. Sometimes I let them watch as much TV as they want because I’m too tired and fraught to entertain them myself. Occasionally I’ll buy them junk food because I don’t want to cook. There are times when I get impatient with my son’s autistic behaviour even though it’s not his fault.
In other words, I am just like 99.99999% of other moms: I do the best I can with what I’ve got, and I accept that I will have my good parenting days and my bad parenting days. I’m not any better – or more “special” – than anyone else.
I didn’t get my child with autism as a result of God deciding that I was special. I got my child with autism through an accident of genetics.
I love my son more than life itself. Whenever I see the look absolute desperation in his eyes when he’s having a meltdown, my heart breaks for him. I ache inside when I think of the fact that he doesn’t have friends because he doesn’t know how to, and I constantly worry about whether he will be OK in the future.
I don’t believe in God, but if I did, I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t make a child go through life with a disability just because the child’s parents were “special”.
This is an original post by Kirsten Doyle.
