The Golden Ticket
Dilshad D. Ali recounts how life with her now six-year-old autistic son first led her to lose her faith (she and her husband are devout Muslims), and then “reinvigorated” her to become “a better Muslim.” In the January 24th Daily Inspiration in Beliefnet, Ali writes about the despair she felt at her son’s diagnosis and how her faith was “shattered” as her son struggled:
The next month, when my son started going to one of Manhattan’s best schools for autistic children, was the worst of our life. It was November, 2003—the month of Ramadan by the Islamic calendar. Every day my son cried, paced our apartment, wrung his hands, repeated one phrase endlessly, and began panicking as soon the evening adhan (Islam’s call to prayer) sounded from our computer. (He knew that the sound of the adhan meant the day was coming to a close, and he would have to go to school the next day.)
Ali writes about how she then devoted her energies to her son’s therapy and how she and her husband decided that “we would just work hard at being happy.” Yet over the next two years she felt a need to “reconnect with Islam and Allah”: “Living a life full of therapy and without a larger sense of purpose was draining me. And I needed to be a whole person, connected with my faith, so that I could be the mother my children needed me to be.” In January of 2005, Ali and her husband went for Hajj, the “once-in-a-lifetime pilgrimage” to Mecca and Medina that all Muslims are required to do.
I came away from that experience with the feeling that when you finally accept your fate, you can embrace your life. And then you can actually celebrate and thank God for giving that fate to you. And that’s the golden ticket, I believe, to being happy and strong. An autistic child is not a loss, I realized, but a sort of gift that can be managed through faith.
An autistic child, not a “lost” child: I have to thank Ali for writing so openly about herself and about raising an autistic child. Her piece, Because of Autism, captures the narrative of how a parent—however accepting of their child’s autism—can feel, now tragically sad and fearful, now at peace and thankful knowing that life has given one such a golden ticket.
6 opinions for The Golden Ticket
mel
Feb 6, 2007 at 10:23 pm
“And then you can actually celebrate and thank God for giving that fate to you.”
Even though interesting, I have to say that from my viewpoint, god doesn’t give anyone a “fate”. rather we have all fallen short of the glory of god, and because of this none of us are “perfect” and biology can be the cruelest of all. I mean have you ever looked at the sheer volume of birth defects that children can be born with? It boggles the mind.
On the other hand, raising a child with autism is a “trial by fire” and molds us into better(hopefully more compassionate) human beings.
But I get envious of people who don’t have that kind of stress. Really. It must be nice. But they probably think someone else has a “perfect” life, so there ya go.
Jez Rourke
Feb 7, 2007 at 1:34 am
Blessings always come in disguise, don’t they? We just need open our eyes in new ways to see them. I’m not a deeply spiritual person really….. I waver. I was once a full time catholic school girl. I usually have one prayer: I ask God, whatever life brings me I accept…. just please don’t let the lesson be lost on me. I’d really like to leave this earth wiser, more compassionate, with my heart fuller that it was when I arrived. And somehow in that perspective things make much more sense.
Jez Rourke
Feb 7, 2007 at 1:34 am
Blessings always come in disguise, don’t they? We just need to open our eyes in new ways to see them. I’m not a deeply spiritual person really….. I waver. I was once a full time catholic school girl. I usually have one prayer: I ask God, whatever life brings me I accept…. just please don’t let the lesson be lost on me. I’d really like to leave this earth wiser, more compassionate, with my heart fuller that it was when I arrived. And somehow in that perspective things make much more sense.
Lisa/Jedi
Feb 7, 2007 at 10:39 am
The lessons of faith can go both ways, too. We have shared our journey with our son with our church community since the beginning & have found that, not only do we receive support from that community, but we are able to educate & help them, too. It’s been a good way for us to help the ripples of acceptance travel out into the world…
Kristina Chew, PhD
Feb 7, 2007 at 10:44 am
The world doesn’t make sense to me without Charlie as he is and has always been.
mel
Feb 7, 2007 at 12:46 pm
The world still doesn’t make sense to me with Michael the way he is. The worlds doesn’t make sense anyway. I would rather my child not have autism
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