See Sam Run

Thousands of children are diagnosed with autism each year, with a rate of occurrence of 1 in 150 births, compared to 5 per 10,000 just two decades ago. Of course, behind the numbers, the debate, and the speculation, individual families are struggling to live with autism every day. This is the story of one such family raising a young boy with autism. In See Sam Run, Peggy Heinkel-Wolfe describes how her parenthood quickly descended into chaos as her son, Sam, became uncommunicative and unmanageable. "I'd grown to hate making entries in his baby book," she writes. "The energy I had before he was born, when I wrote paragraphs anticipating his arrival, was gone now. Writing down Sam's barest achievements felt fraudulent." Little by little, she found a new truth: that by learning to understand the ugliness inside herself, she learned to love her new life and her son, and to harness, at last, the energy needed to realize Sam's fullest potential. See Sam Run reaches deep into the heart of anyone whose life has been touched by developmental disability--and it will resonate profoundly with those who have been transformed by a newfound ability to love. "See Sam Run is well written and poignant as well as emotionally satisfying for the reader. The author's narrative voice is strong, intelligent and authentic. Her story is one that is important to get out."--Dianne Aprile, Spalding University