Fiction

For years, I had avoided all the literature that, yes, might have helped me understand Mia better. However, I avoided it because it threatened to reduce my Mia to a clinical definition— a set of symptoms and statistics. A pathology…

Despite my overly-analytical pedagogical self,  I had no need to focus the symptomatic or medical or analytical lens upon her. She could never be compartmentalized to that portion of my thinking that was reserved for diagnostic tragedy. Besides, that place had already been taken by my late husband and love Raj. 

No, Mia was neither a psychiatric study, nor my life case study. Indeed, I extremely resented the notion that, by my not being a scholar of autism, I might not be suited for the role I had taken on to care for her. 

Decidedly, I would take no part in studying Mia. I wasn't Mia’s parent; her mother, who was dear to me, led that role with profound magnanimity.

Come and know Mia and let her change you!