“I wish the autistic child I have did not exist, and I had a different [nonautistic] child instead.”

Source: Far from the Tree, Ch. 1 Son, p 37.
Context: When parents say, "I wish my child did not have autism," what they're really saying is "I wish the autistic child I have did not exist, and I had a different [nonautistic] child instead." Read that again. This is what we hear when you mourn over our existence. This is what we hear when you pray for a cure. This is what we know, when you tell us of your fondest hopes and dreams for us: that your greatest wish is that one day we will cease to be, and strangers you can love will move in behind our faces. —Jim Sinclair

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I wish the autistic child I have did not exist, and I had a different [nonautistic] child instead." by Andrew Solomon?
Andrew Solomon photo
Andrew Solomon 33
American journalist 1963

Related quotes

George Carlin photo
Anthony Trollope photo
Kurt Vonnegut photo
Philip K. Dick photo

“When I was a child, I thought as a child. But now I have put away childish things. … I must be scientific.”

Source: The Man in the High Castle (1962)
Context: When I was a child, I thought as a child. But now I have put away childish things.... I must be scientific.

Sherrilyn Kenyon photo
Otto Ohlendorf photo

“In the child, we see the grown-up. I see the problem differently.”

Otto Ohlendorf (1907–1951) German general

To Leon Goldensohn, March 1, 1946, after Goldensohn asks Ohlendorf, "How did you figure a six month old Jewish infant must be killed - was it an enemy? Quoted in "The Nuremberg Interviews" by Leon Goldensohn, Robert Gellately - History - 2004.

Amy Tan photo

“I saw what I had been fighting for: it was for me, a scared child…”

Source: The Joy Luck Club (1989), Ch. 10, pg. 183

Robert G. Ingersoll photo

“Is that the idea we now have of love? If I have a child, no matter how deformed that child may be, and if it dies, nobody can make the loss to me good by bringing a more beautiful child. I want the one I loved and the one I lost.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

My Reviewers Reviewed (lecture from June 27, 1877, San Francisco, CA)
Context: And thereupon the Lord gave Satan the power to destroy the property and children of Job. In a little while these high contracting parties met again; and the Lord seemed somewhat elated with his success, and called again the attention of Satan to the sinlessness of Job. Satan then told him to touch his body and he would curse him. And thereupon power was given to Satan over the body of Job, and he covered his body with boils. Yet in all this, Job did not sin with his lips. This book seems to have been written to show the excellence of patience, and to prove that at last God will reward all who will bear the afflictions of heaven with fortitude and without complaint. The sons and daughters of Job had been slain, and then the Lord, in order to reward Job, gave him other children, other sons and other daughters—not the same ones he had lost; but others. And this, according to the writer, made ample amends. Is that the idea we now have of love? If I have a child, no matter how deformed that child may be, and if it dies, nobody can make the loss to me good by bringing a more beautiful child. I want the one I loved and the one I lost.

Related topics