Book: The Horse Boy

The Horse Boy Rupert Isaacson, 2009, Little, Brown & CompanyA Father's Quest to Heal His Son
What is it like to watch your child slide into autism? What would you do to heal him? Would you travel halfway around the world, trek across Mongolia, into Siberia, on horseback? To heal your child, would you eat half raw, boiled yak organs and drink fermented sour yaks milk tea? And would you - could you- do all this with that child in tow?
We judge, harshly, the parent whose child is publicly disruptive. 'Control your kid!' We think.
Some even say it, venomously. 'Control. Your. Kid!'
What a frightening concept! Control your kid. As parents, as adults, shouldn't we strive to guide our children? To educate them, to encourage them? Shouldn't we be teaching them how to be true to themselves in a world that demands conformity? Oddly enough, we celebrate those who don't conform - the star athletes, the brilliant scientists, the excellent artists of every stripe, and the business people who build something new. Yet we seek to control our children, and mold them in our images.
Parents with autistic children struggle just to communicate!And they do it with a fierce, deep love that aches and thrills, and somehow provides the strength to keep trying.
It's hard. To, day after day, nurture, love and protect a child you cannot connect with. It is stressful, exhausting, frustrating. And when you add the censure, the judgements of those who have no idea what your family goes through, the condemning looks and commentary, it is also infuriating.
You wouldn't wish this struggle on anyone. You wouldn't wish this suffering on any child. Yet you do wish those stone throwers could live your life for just one day. They might, you think, develop some compassion.
We never know what someone else is going through. That snarly face on the train might be someone suffering deep physical pain, or exhausted from nursing an aging parent while working a full time job, or caught up in the circular mental rehashing of something traumatic to them. Even if we have experienced a similar event, we don't know what it is like for them, because it isn't just one event, its one event on top of everything else they have experienced in their lives. We Don't Know! If we could look at these people with that knowledge - that we don't know- and send them a postive thought, of love, or relief, of something to make them smile, not only would they benefit, so would we! You've surely felt it... when someone is looking at you with disapproval, even if you didn't see it, you felt the negative vibrations. You've also felt the uplifting vibrations when a stranger shares a smile with you, or seems to understand your struggle. How you respond to others affects them. And you. More love, less judgement.
There is hope in The Horse Boy. Stress, fear, worry, exhaustion, wonder, awe, joy, beauty, compassion, and profound love. Worth Reading. (Also a movie; the book gives you more of the Father's thoughts. I enjoyed the book more because so much had to be edited out of the movie.)