Life’s Journey by Eustacia Cutler
I was young when Temple was first diagnosed– both in years and experience. If I was going to help her, I’d have to put away my baby terror, and grapple with whatever each day brought. So in effect, this book is also the story of my own young awakening and growth; a classic bildungsroman, if you will. Putting the years into words for a book or lecture has been another learning experience. I’ve taken my cue from the poet Robert Frost who wrote “I teach to find kindred spirits, to comfort them and myself.”
Guided by this thought, I learned when presenting that many mothers of autistic children suffer from a loss of their own sense of self. We know that a baby needs a mother to know she’s a baby, but equally true, a mother needs a baby to know she’s a mother.
Theodore Morison—a poet, novelist and teacher of creative writing at Harvard–was a close friend of Robert Frost. He said Frost came late to lecturing and wasn’t entirely at ease with it.
He told Morrison “I always carry something in my pocket I can touch when I’m talking, so I’ll remember who I am. Lately it’s been a thorn.”
Hence the title of my book: A Thorn in My Pocket: Temple Grandin’s Mother Tells the Family Story
About Eustacia Cutler
Eustacia Cutler, author and renowned speaker on autism, brings to national and international conferences her extensive research and personal insight into the nature of autism and the confusion it creates for both child and family; whatever the country.
She earned a B.A. from Harvard, was a band singer at New York’s Pierre Hotel, composed and performed cabaret acts, and wrote school lessons for major TV networks. Her research on autism and the developmentally disabled laid the groundwork for two WGBH documentaries: The Disquieted on autism; and The Innocents, a prize winning first on the developmentally impaired.
Her 2006 book, A Thorn in my Pocket, describes raising her daughter Temple Grandin in the 1950’s when autistic children were diagnosed as infant schizophrenics and banished to institutions. Today Temple Grandin Ph.D. is a top professor of animal science and the world’s most revered autistic.
Mother and daughter have founded the Temple Grandin and Eustacia Cutler Autism Fund, a nonprofit organization that provides education and support for families where there is autism; also the latest medical information for professionals. Webinars with Eustacia Cutler and other experts can be found at www.templegrandineustaciacutlerautismfund.com. The author lives in New York, has three other children and five grandsons.
