Idaho

Guest post by Robin Pullen

Special Needs Parenting: Idaho

Two weeks after Christmas, my gift arrives.
It’s a girl.
When you find out you’re a mother, you think Disney. Magic rides, mouse ears, a sparkly castle. Ten sweet fingers. Ten tiny toes.
But Sammy’s fingers don’t unclench.
The pediatrician steers us to a neurologist. Muscle weakness, he says. A form of cerebral palsy. CP, just a “garbage term.”
“Don’t worry,” the doctor adds.
Can you imagine telling any mother not to worry? That’s what mothers do. That’s what we’re good at.
We were supposed to go to Disney. But when you have a baby with special needs, you take a left and head to... Idaho.
IdaWHERE? Like the potato?
Other mothers soothe their infants. Mine just cries and cries. So I read and read. If only there were a Mother’s Manual— so I could turn to page 67 and know exactly when she’ll put one foot in front of the other.
Other mothers take their babies to Baby Genius Gym. Our extracurriculars are Specialists. Occupational therapy, physical therapy. Thank goodness for girlfriends I can cry to, though even they can’t hear my inner scream: Why isn’t she walking? What if she never walks?
Will I dance at Sammy’s wedding? Will she?
So, we OT and we PT. We blow bubbles—good for mouth muscles. We mold playdough. We stretch. We smear chocolate pudding between our fingers. Then comes baby swim class.
I must love you, Baby, because I’m squeezing into a bathing suit for you.
I look at all the other special mothers in the pool. I’m part of that group now—Idaho. Four other darling babies float beside us. Their mothers wrap them in gauze so their limbs won’t splay. Emily, next to me, swaddles her eleven-month-old effortlessly. How can she wrap and unwrap without all the tears I can’t seem to stop shedding? Does Emily wonder, like me, if her precious one will ever walk? Why isn’t she
crawling!
There are tests. Then—a diagnosis. Developmentally delayed.
What does that even mean?
Papa watches her on Tuesdays so I can work. He joins Baby Class, bouncing her on his knee so she can be a “monkey jumping on the bed.” Sammy turns 18 months. Then 18 and a half. Still no steps.
After a long morning teaching other Preschoolers to hop backward on one foot, I pause outside our home’s front door. I breathe deeply, pushing open the heavy divide between what is and what is becoming.
Inside, Papa holds out his palm. Sammy falters, pushes her right foot forward, and--
takes her first step into Papa’s arms.
Sammy is walking.
I’m going to dance at her wedding.
Papa squeezes my hand. We’re both teary.
“Happy birthday, Honey,” he says.
And it was.
That day, I arrived.
In Idaho.

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pullenplaywright.com, linktree.com/robinpullen
Robin Pullen's...Women of Roswell earned “Best New Play” at the Georgia Theater Conference, Finalist at New York’s American Globe Theater, Kennedy Center participation following a ACT/KCT nomination, and Finalist for the David Mark Cohen National Playwriting competition. Paint!, Marc Chagall’s Colorful Musical Adventure, a National Children’s Theatre Festival winner, was produced at Coral Gables’ Actors’ Playhouse, and is published by Samuel French. Teachers, the Musical, winner of a Metropolitan Atlanta Theater award, has enjoyed many regional productions. Bullies, the Musical! toured Atlanta area schools. Robin's short story, Mysterium Tremendum, won first place in Creative Loafing's annual story competition, and was published in O’Georgia. CARO'S COMET, The Celestial Cinderella (also a picture book) earned Semifinalist in 2024’s Eugene O Neill National Musical Competition, and is published by Plays for New Audiences. A gifted teacher, Robin has served on the Advisory Boards of the Process Theatre and Working Title Playwrights. She participated in New York’s ASCAP Musical Theater Workshop, and DC’s Kennedy Center Playwriting Intensive. She is a member of the SCBWI and the Dramatists Guild.