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Counting Our Blessings
by Cammie McGovern

The truth is, the first time Carrie asked, I wanted to say no.   “I'm thinking about starting an afterschool play center for kids with special needs, if you're interested in helping…”

I wanted to say no because it felt like forming a club no one in their right mind would want to join.   Having a child with special needs means that for years you perform a kind of charade for family and friends, of trying to appear fine, trying not to draw too much attention to how different your child has made you feel.   Why start a group that rolls out a banner and announces it to everyone?

Eventually I agreed for purely selfish reasons.   Carrie's teenage son played and taught drums, the one instrument my six-year-old with autism was desperate to try, but panicked and withdrew with every “real teacher” we took him to. With Carrie's oldest son, an unflappable, nodding teenager, Ethan came alive. He slipped on the headphones and happily pounded away while I went upstairs and peeked at the plans Carrie was drawing up.

I'll help for six months , I thought, and when Ethan gets tired of the drum lessons I'll ease my way out.   Then an interesting thing happened. At the meetings, in between talk of fundraising and equipment purchasing, we started telling each other true stories of our lives: the horrible public scenes, the battles for services, the medical difficulties, and also this—the funny things our kids had finally started to say and do.

Being part of a group that I would have, in all honesty, rather not be qualified to join has taught me many things but probably the most important is that the choices we do make in the face of circumstances we can't control can make a big difference.  

Over the last three years, we've learned that opening and operating a non-profit center is unbelieveably hard work, and there is never enough money to do everything we'd like.   We are still holding tag sales to pay for telephones that will work and for computers that were made after 1990. We've screwed up our courage and asked our parents, our friends, everyone we can think of for money, because suddenly this no longer feels like a club we don't want to be part of. It's a haven; a place for our children to be themselves, to laugh and play, and for us to follow their lead for once.

For most of the parents who gather every afternoon in the Whole Children lobby, life felt very unlucky for a long time, and now that's less true.   We have children who are playing and growing and making friends over red rubber balls they roll into each other. One boy doesn't walk without his braces. One girl can't see much beyond a foot directly in front of her. My son laughs longer than most of the sentences he puts together. But we all feel lucky to be here. We do. Very lucky.