“Stand up for Autism: a boy, a dog and a prescription for laughter” by Georgina Derbyshire
18.09
“Stand up for Autism: a boy, a dog and a prescription for laughter” by Georgina Derbyshire
Laugh out loud funny. Sleep-deprived mum describes her life with idiosyncratic Bobby and the helpful grandparents. Her fights to get Bobby to go to sleep made me feel retroactively guilty, since I know my dad had to tell me five million stories (and then jokes) a night to get me to drop off. No to mention all the carrying and singing required to get me unconscious as a baby, which I *did* wake up from.
Like Bobby, at one point in my tender years I also decided once I was a dog and insisted on eating from a dish on the floor, unlike Bobby, this was more a mood that struck me more than a permanent state and I was perfectly willing to shift into other animals (unicorn-Pegasus, lion, leopard, etc). All these are also proof of quite an imagination, imo, which is something I have always distinguished myself for and was quite surprised to hear claimed to be ‘weak’ on autistic people. Georgina explains it best, though....
Quotes:
I can safely say that Bobby has imagination. What he cannot do is imagine things that are quite possible. He can imaging floating around the Milky Way to help him relax… but he struggles with the concept of imagining a successful career when he is older. 26
For him, it is the world that is odd and everybody else who needs help. He is quite right. To use one of my favouire analogies, nobody of sound mind would say to a person usina wheelchair, ‘if you can’t get up the steps, then you will have to get out and walk.’ 24
*author: female, #non-fiction, #biography, 2012, book-2012, 2012: biography, @read in english, +family, +autism, +disability, [quotes], [quotes] books/non-fiction, +humor