Description
Book SynopsisAward-winning writer Heather Lanier''s memoir about raising a child with a rare syndrome, defying the tyranny of normal, and embracing parenthood as a spiritual practice that breaks us open in the best of ways.
Like many women of her generation, writer Heather Lanier did everything by the book when she was expecting her first child. She ate organic foods, recited affirmations and drew up a birth plan for an unmedicated labour in the hopes that she could create a SuperBaby, an ultra-healthy human destined for a high-achieving future.
But her daughter Fiona challenged all of Lanier''s preconceptions. Born with an ultra-rare syndrome known as Wolf-Hirschhorn, Fiona received a daunting prognosis: she would experience significant developmental delays and might not reach her second birthday. Not only had Lanier failed to produce a SuperBaby, she now fiercely loved a child that the world would sometimes reject. The diagnosis obliterated Lanier''s perfectionist tendenci
Trade Review
Heather Lanier's Raising a Rare Girl is that rare soaring book: a gripping read that delivers spiritual reflection and serious cultural analysis on disability and parenthood. These sentences are sheer poetry, and in the service of dissecting the ableism in our culture, they are also piercing and necessary. -- Sonya Huber * author of Pain Woman Takes Your Keys and Other Essays from a Nervous System *
Raising a Rare Girl is not just a memoir about Heather Lanier's first few years as a mother, nor is it only about the challenges of raising a child with a rare syndrome in a world that does not welcome differences. It's a tender and powerful book that asks us to look honestly at what we expect of our children, each other, and ourselves, and explores the unexpected joy that comes when we release those expectations. Lanier had no choice but to let go of her expectations of motherhood, herself, and her baby when Fiona came into this world, and we are the lucky recipients of the loving wisdom she gained in doing so. -- Kerry Egan * author of On Living *
