A mother’s take on the difference vs. disability discussion — The meaning of an autism label has changed so radically that I sometimes feel it hardly relates to my 29-year-old son anymore. When autism is described as difference and only difference, the label which took me so long to embrace no longer applies to him. My Three Stages of the Autism Label Acceptance I kept the label to…

About womanhood, money, aging, morality, immigrants, and parents — “On the whole, our indiscriminate enjoyment of being right is matched by an almost equally indiscriminate feeling that we are right.” Kathryn Schulz, in Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error Growing up, I believed the prettiest girls had blue eyes and blond hair. Therefore, my blond-haired, blue-eyed sister…

A teacher’s reflection — Back in May 2020, I wrote this about the pandemic: In general, things are neither as terrible as people fear nor as wonderful as they promise. That’s usually the case, but there are always exceptions. Could this be the exception? Covid-19 clearly was. It was as terrible as we feared…

What accounts for the quality of a person’s affection? — Winter is treadmill running season for me, and given my nerdy, guilt-driven personality, I can’t just watch silly Netflix series for entertainment. I also must watch educational type content -you know, documentaries and such- to justify the just-for-escapism screen time. Lately, I’ve alternated 45-minute-long episodes of the soapy series Firefly…

Will it ever subside? — If you’ve read anything about Diego, my developmentally disabled son and the inspiration behind this publication, you know that he’s keen on birthdays, all birthdays, but especially his own. Diego swells my heart and drives me crazy with his birthday obsession. Others — family, friends, acquaintances, strangers —only experience the…

Addressing my fears and need for approval — I had a hard time deciding how to structure this list. My first thought was to start with the great and end with the pathetic, to then conclude with how I would do better or different in 2023. But the pathetic is always more relatable, especially if, like me, you’re…

A teacher’s take — Allow me to establish two things from the get-go: Quiet quitting is nothing new. Though the term is new-ish, it relates to age-old human realities: ever-changing priorities and the fact that time is limited. There’s no agreed-upon definition for quiet quitting. …

I just don’t get it — In line at Starbucks the other day, the young woman ordering had a tiny dog (a Chihuahua I think) in her arms. The cashier was all ooh and aww, and they got to babbling about their dogs. …

“Everything you always wanted to know about having a child with autism and intellectual disability but were afraid to ask.” That’s the title of the Instagram Live I’ll be doing Tuesday, August 9 (that’s tomorrow!) at 6:30 pm EST. My 28-yr-old son (Diego) is autistic and intellectually disabled, as you may know if you follow my little publication. I’m also a special education teacher. I’ve seen and experienced a lot!