Introduction

There are a lot of common problems that people go through in their day to day lives. However, there are different perspectives of these problems depending on the person or their context. Some of these common issues include diseases, where people silently fight to overcome them, and poverty, which is a universal problem and everyone is struggling to alleviate it. This paper thus will critically look into the story of a parent that has two children with autism. It will analyze the book “I am in Here” by Elizabeth M. Bonker and Virginia G. Breen to understand the struggles that both people living with autism and parents with such children go through in their everyday lives.

Summary

The book talks about a girl that was diagnosed with Autism at an early age and the struggle that her parents have gone through to understand her. The family has two children with autism. However, the condition has manifested itself in different ways with Charles, being able to speak while Elizabeth not capable.  This has put the parents in an awkward position as they do not know how to handle the varying conditions. Despite the struggles, Elizabeth has however found a way to express herself without having to speak. She has found a passion for writing poems that have helped her parents understand what she is going through in her everyday life.

The first chapter in the book talks about hope, Virginia G. Breen, who is Elizabeth’s mother talks about the frustrations that she has gone through to raise her daughter. She then expresses her joy when the daughter starts writing poems and she describes this by the way tiny flowers have found their way through the most challenging situations to grow. She talks about how she came about to write a book about her daughter’s life. She described how her friends that have a passion for books inspired her to write about Elizabeth’s condition. She explains how her friends have encouraged her and go ahead to write some of the poems that her daughter has written that have always lifted her spirits.

She states that there are two kinds of people, the “why people” and the “how people”. She asserts that the “why people” are the kind of people that question the reason that certain situations happen to them. They will face a problem and will wonder why they were the ones to go through the struggle. The “how people” on the other hand are those that will face a situation and will seek to find a way to overcome the problem. They are the optimists that will always look for a situation for every situation that they go through. Virginia states that her community of “how people” are the ones that inspire her to carry on with her struggles because they face different situations in their daily lives but have chosen to fight and find a solution to it. She then goes ahead to post a poem that her daughter wrote that states the presence of God and that she will survive Autism. The poem has grown to become a mantra in her community such that everyone has changed it to suit their struggles.

Virginia then goes ahead to state that Elizabeth is a “how person”.  She then posts her poem that describes how we should all be kind to all because everyone is struggling over something. There is also the poem that highlights that despite Elizabeth not being able to speak, she still understands what goes on around her. She then goes ahead to describe the struggle she has gone through as she fought against the autism condition that her daughter and son were diagnosed with. She explains how they were saddened by the news that two of her children had autism and how the doctors had told them that nothing could be done. However, despite the diagnosis, Charles was able to speak by the age of 3 while Elizabeth failed. Elizabeth was then taken to various specialists to determine what the problem was. Many of them could not comprehend the reason as to why she could write poems but could not speak. Some of the specialists even thought that she was pretending and that she did not want to speak. She explains how Soma Mukhopadhyay was able to help her understand her daughter well. Having taught her son to read and write, Soma was able to teach Elizabeth to find her niche in writing, and that explains the reasons as to why she has managed to express herself through her poems. This turned out to be a very emotional moment for her as the first words that her daughter wrote were ” I finally got to talk”. She then explains the similarity between the struggles that Elizabeth goes through in school to what she went through during her days in school. She asserts that her daughter’s autism has acted as both a barrier and a connector and that she has been successful in explaining to her that words are not always needed.

Analysis

This novel is a motivational narrative that revolves around the life of Elizabeth. With the narrator being Virginia, who is Elizabeth’s mother, the story manages to incorporate poems from Elizabeth into its narration, and they blend in well. The author writes her story around the poems that Elizabeth writes and uses them as a topic to pick from. For instance, the poem “Bright Future” is a poem that Elizabeth writes to point out the strength that she has to fight the condition that she suffers from. It give a vivid explanation of how tough she is by comparing herself with a tree that is growing, the sun that is shining and water on a lake. The author therefore intentionally uses this poem in the first part of the story to highlight the strength that her daughter has. She points out the fact that despite the condition that she is going through, she displays amazing optimism that she will overcome the challenges that come with it. The author thus goes ahead to validate her optimism by stating that despite doctors diagnosing her as retarded at an early age, she was later found out to be more intelligent than the average kid. She then goes ahead and uses Elizabeth’s second poem “God Is Everywhere” to explain how her daughter has taught her many things in life. She is the reason that the author came to learn about the two kinds of people who are the “why people” and the “how people”. This is one of the many life lessons that she has been able to learn from her daughter. Through her poem “The Things I Know For Sure” the author states that she has managed to inspire many women that are struggling with a condition in their life and many have used this poem as a prayer by modifying it to suit the kind of problem that they are going through.

The authors use their life story to pass across their message. Despite their case being a little unique, they can point out the struggles that parents go through as they raise children with disability. Virginia has used the story of her children to let other parents know that autism manifests itself in different ways and that parents with children suffering from this condition should pay particular attention to the small things that happen in their lives. In her narration, she elucidates how she put both Charles and Elizabeth through the same type of treatments, but their response was different. While Charles was able to speak after a while, Elizabeth could not(Bonker & Breen, 2011). She goes ahead to highlight how Elizabeth finally found her passion and started writing poems. This was after she was taken to Mrs. Soma Mukhopadhyay who had also managed to raise a son suffering from the same condition. She was successful in understanding her son, and he turned out to be successful. When Elizabeth was put through the training, she found her love for poems, and it turned out to be a new way of expressing her reactions to the things that are happening around her. This narrative is thus successful in pointing out the different faces of autism and educates parents with kids affected by this condition that there are various ways of handling them. She highlights the fact that each child is unique in their way and should be treated suitably. However, despite her finding the best treatment for her daughter, she does not put across the precise steps that a parent with such children should take to find out how to handle their condition. Her situation is more like a trial and error where she took her children through different therapies before she could find the right one.

There are two authors in the narrative and Elizabeth’s role in writing this novel is giving her life story through poems. While her mother does a great job in interpreting what her daughter is expressing through her poems, there is the first person’s point of view expressed through the poems. This, therefore, gives the reader the freedom to interpret them in their way. The poems help the readers understand what Elizabeth is going through and through it they can be able to tell the kind of person that she is. It can be seen that she is a kind hearted person that would love to dedicate her life towards serving others. It is also clear that despite all the challenges she has gone through she still is optimistic and is hopeful that someday, the world will get to understand her well. This is manifested in the title of the story. It exhibits the struggle she goes through as she tries to get people to follow her. Her poems are also a demonstration of the problems that a typical teenager goes through as they fight through adolescence. Through the poem “Me Revisited”, her mother can reminisce her teenage age and the struggle she went through in school. This poem gives an insight into Elizabeth’s adolescent life and the crisis she has as her friends laugh at her in school when she starts to shake.

Conclusion

This paper has thus studied the story of a parent with two children who have autism. The story is written from the parent and the daughter’s point of view and thus the reason as to why it has two authors. From the story, one can understand the suffering parents with such kids go through as they try to understand their children. The story also acts as a motivation for people struggling with different situations. It gives people hope that despite the suffering, there is hope. The authors in the narrative have used several styles to ensure that autism is understood and that parents can now know what their children are going through. However, despite the lessons and motivations that readers derive from reading the story, parents with children with disability need to find the right therapy that will apply to their children so that they can be able to know their strengths and weaknesses soon enough.

 
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