My son’s going to be 8 next month. That’s eight years since the day Max was born, eight years since we found out he’d had a stroke at birth, eight years since doctors told us he might never walk or talk, eight years I’ve spent going to all sorts of specialists and doing all sorts of therapy for him.
It’s also eight years since I last did volunteer work.
My son, who has mild cerebral palsy, has been my charity project for eight years. Or so I’ve told myself. How could I find time to help anyone else when Max required so much attention? I had become a person who needed help, from the teen boys who came to visit my son through a volunteer program to the caregiver we got through the state.
Before I had kids, I did a fair amount of volunteer work. In college, I ran a toddler playgroup for a low-income housing community. In my twenties, I worked in the pediatric playroom of Sloan Kettering, a hospital that treats people for cancer. I’d do projects through New York Cares, and pitched in with a program that delivered meals to the elderly. Once, I spent Halloween at a home for kids with special needs.
Then I had my son. And I stopped volunteering and funneled every ounce of do-goodism into him. [Read more...]
