Where are the poets with neurodiverse children?
- Bravebutafraid

- Jan 27
- 2 min read

I became angry the other day while reading Mary Oliver. I love her poetry and have "The Journey" framed above my bed. But as I read my comfort poems I wondered: Where are the poets with neurodiverse children? What would Mary Oliver's poetry have evolved into if she had a child who struggled with suicide for years on end? Mary Oliver had her own demons, of course, including a traumatic childhood. "Tell me about your despair." But what if, as an adult, she parented a child with special needs? What about Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman or Rumi?
They're out there. I did a google search and found Amy Sieberer, for one. I should delve deeper, do more research. Because right now I don't feel heard or seen. Throw my parental struggles into a bucket and see what overflows. Daily monotony mixed with hypervigilance. Childhood suicidal ideation. Divorce. Chronic illness. OCD, ADHD, sensory processing disorder, depressive disorder, anxiety disorder. Homeschooling. Limited food preferences. The verbal and physical self-flagellation of a nine year old. Pills. Doctors. Nurses. Therapies. Hopelessness. Periodic rainbows of friendship or fishing. Hospitals.
And then my own bucket. Numbness. Low self-esteem. A constant nervousness I am either doing it all wrong or not doing enough. Brain fog that impedes my ability to work and makes me feel lazy. A deep, deep yearning to make life easier for my children. Five years of questions, confusion, and terror. Dangerous future projections that leave me paralyzed. Loneliness. The niggling fear that I will never find a partner to walk this journey with me. Listlessness. Mary Oliver, what if I am too tired to see the world offering itself to my imagination? What if my imagination has gone dark?




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