Wednesday, February 13, 2008

About this project:

There’s a saying that children need to be seen, heard and believed. For “special needs” kids (and their parents), this should read “seen, heard, respected, and believed.”

As parents of differently-abled/special needs children we are often put on pedestals. People wonder in awe about how we cope, or tell us platitudes about how we have landed in a different but wonderful country, and we need to dream new dreams for our special angel children. But when we’re our in public, our ‘special angel children’ are most often stared at and treated like second class citizens. Our children are inconvenient, awkward, and difficult and it’s true that coping challenges us. But those who wonder how we do it are really just highlighting for themselves (and us) that they will never have to know. The truth is that our kids aren’t angels, they’re real people with big challenges. And their challenges make our lives as parents incredibly complicated, messy, and sometimes heartbreaking, no matter how much we love them. As parents who are already marginalized by politics, sexual orientation, gender, race/ethnicity, parenting philosophy, our own disabilities, economic status, blue hair and piercings, or something else that makes us unlike the CNN-camera friendly special-needs family America knows and adores, it can be harder to find support among other parents or be taken seriously by the teachers, therapists, and other professionals we often have to rely on to get the services our kids need.

My Baby Rides the Short Bus will be an antidote to the saccharine laced anthologies that exist for special needs parents. It will give punk, alternative, and marginalized parents a place to write about their realities. Readers who have special needs kids themselves will feel like they’ve found honest voices and community, while others will have a better understanding, and hopefully respect, for us and our struggle.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just a quick question, does the 'speacial need' need to be one that is able to been seem or could it be one that is given away by actions? Specifically I would be talking about my daughter's battle with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and how different teacher, parents and doctors helped or made things worse....

Short Bus Book said...

We're pretty open to what the definition of a special need is and won't be making decisions on which pieces to include for a while, so please write away and submit

moplans said...

I'm a white middle class CNN friendly looking gal and I cannot wait to read your punkrock book.
The platitudes are eating me alive.

ZM said...

Oh, thank heavens. If someone hands me another 'special kid makes good' book, I think I'll start screeching in Hindi. Those things are the literary equivalents of the drive-by 'there, there'-ists.

Bah.