A Quiet Wisdom

By Peggy Connolly

In this heartwarming memoir, follow the inspiring journey of a mother and her developmentally-disabled daughter as they find each other. Told from the mother's perspective as she learns to cope with her daughter's diagnosis, it explores how she calls on Japanese art forms to describe her child's perfect imperfections and the unexpected gifts her daughter brings to the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 2, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543979695

Book preview

Copyright © All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Print ISBN: 978-1-54397-968-8

eBook ISBN: 978-1-54397-969-5

Contents

Acknowledgements

Author’s Note

The Tree Hugger

Great Expectations

Truth and Tears

The Blame Game

Perfection Is an Illusion

Kintsugi

The Family Jewels

Cat’s Eat Birds

A Red Letter Day

Roasting Marshmallows

Christmas At Our House

Becoming an Advocate

Unerring Grace

The Mission

Meditation

Jenny and the IPhone

Resilience

The Beat of Her Own Drum

Holding Kindness

Taking Care of Mom

A Double Edge Sword

Finding and Loving My Daughter

Acknowledgements

To my husband, Jim, who has been by my side throughout this life journey. Your unwavering love shored me up when the cracks would appear. We cried and laughed and argued our way through 50 years of blessings. We fit like a glove.

I am eternally grateful to Merek who saw the possibilities in me when I was too bruised to see them myself. You kept me on track when I would hit a wall whether it was in my discovery and healing process or in my writing. You showed me the path to self-love, sometimes with patience and love and sometimes with a thump on the head – whatever it took to wake me up.

To Mary, who encouraged me to stretch my wings and fly. Your confidence in me was my catalyst to begin.

Just because you don’t look like the other crayons in the box,

does not mean you still can’t make the most beautiful pictures!

My daughter, Jenny, is not like the other crayons in the box.

She is the rarest of the color crayons

and she has colored some profound

and beautiful pictures

for those who know her.

Author’s Note

In traditional Japanese aesthetics, wabi-sabi, in its barest sense, is the Japanese art of finding beauty in imperfection and profundity in nature. It’s simple, slow, and uncluttered, and it reveres authenticity above all. Our intellectually developmentally disabled (I/DD) children are the essence of what is wabi-sabi. They are asymmetrical and have a simplicity about them that begs those of us who are willing to do so, to see them through a cherished lens. My disabled daughter, without knowledge or purpose, has taught me how to live the wabi-sabi philosophy. She has helped me find the beauty in imperfection.

She patiently waited for me during her early years to become accustomed to my upside-down world that began with her diagnosis. This is my journey pertaining to giving birth to and living with an I/DD child; my path to finally seeing her innate wisdom as I began to accept and honor my daughter completely as she is. She continues to amaze me with her kindness and her infinite capacity for forgiveness. Even with her brokenness, she is the most authentic and wisest woman I know. She has evolved over the years, and I’ve had to sometimes run to catch up with her.

She is my teacher. And I can’t help but laugh out loud, for as wise as she appears to be, she still awkwardly clomps out the door to get on the bus that will take her to work-with her rain boots accidentally on the wrong feet.

Life journeys are as individual as each of us. Those who walk their path in a mindful manner may relate to this story of my journey with my intellectually developmentally disabled daughter, Jennifer, and coincidentally coming to love myself through connecting with her. Writing this book, with all the lovely as well as painful memories, has proven to be a camera lens for me in that it allowed me the opportunity to clearly see and focus on some of the outstanding moments of this tangled journey of coming to deeply love my disabled child. It has helped me to find my voice in the grief and the fear and the great anxiety of birthing an imperfect developmentally disabled child. This story has many watershed moments that have proven to be healing for me therefore allowing Jennifer to grow into her own power and self-awareness. It has opened my eyes to her uncomplicated worldview that is the source of her quiet wisdom. Come with me on this journey of how I came to love my daughter.

The Tree Hugger

She didn’t come into the house right away when she got off the bus from work the other day.

I stood at the door watching her move about the yard. It was one of those rare and perfect early spring days when the breeze is gentle and the sun invites you to shed your jacket and enjoy the feel of its warmth on your skin. She moved around the yard examining everything. When she got to the big tree that shades us from the summer heat, she impulsively stretched her arms around its trunk and just laid her cheek against it. She hugged that tree for a good 30 seconds or longer oblivious to anything else. She gave it her full attention. She seemed to be listening to it or maybe she was just appreciating it being in her yard. Then, to my surprise, she meandered over to a smaller tree and again hugged it to her giving it a few pats as if to say, Good job, little one. My eyes leaked with tears at the quiet beauty I witnessed. How could I