As We Speak

When wandering through a clinical studies program, I began a practice of writing verbatims, capturing the essence of conversations messages for their therapeutic integrity. In this frame of mind and heart, several years ago I wrote this verbatim on behalf of my daughter with oppositional defiant disorder and cerebral palsy. Rereading it just now, I wonder how different really are her imagined thoughts than mine or ours, in diverse senses speaking with each other across our less than confluent divides: You asked me to ask when I need help, and to add a please and thank you, if at all possible. I have done that often. You ask me to ask to hold your hand when you can't otherwise hear me ask for help. I am doing that right now. I am not like you. I wish I could be, but I cannot. I need you to appreciate me for who I am more than attack me for who I am not, and probably will never become. My mind and body work similarly to yours, but do not produce feelings and faith, health and happiness, language and love as effectively as does your incarnation. I worry. You and life often make me anxious, stressed, confronted by possibilities that I am not fully human in your eyes and mind, perceived as not only different but inferior. I tend to panic. Frequently your world overwhelms me. I lose self-control when bombarded by too much stimulation. I want time and Earth and life and you and us to slow down. In these anxious situations, if you want to help me, then please stop, slow down with me, look at me, wait until I am ready to look back. Just give me a moment or two or three or a lifetime to catch up. If I can trust you to do this, I and we will be OK. I will learn to trust that I could be OK, and I will feel grateful, occasionally to live with you, to share my life with you as you share yours with me.