Amy Julia Becker's Blog, page 36

The Deeper Truth

There are two true stories that run through my life. 

The first one, the one I’ve paid attention to a lot over the years, is the one that says, “You are never good enough. You are often overlooked and rejected. The only way things work out is if you work for them. The only way you can get it all done is if you work harder.” 

I have evidence to back up this story. The polite “no thank you” notices from publishers. The friends who have told me I don’t get invited to parties because I’m “too religious.” The countless dinner parties where no one asked a question about me or my work because the attention turned elsewhere, all night long.

But recently, I’ve begun to recognize a deeper truth. This is the one that says, “You are a beloved child of God. You have been created with purpose. You bring delight to the world when you live out of love and offer your gifts. You are seen and known and valued.” 

I have evidence to back up this story too. The countless encouraging words and notes when people read posts and essays and books I’ve written. The excitement I feel deep within me when I get to interview someone for the podcast. The joy I experience when I get to introduce others to their own belovedness. 

So the question for me—for you—is which truth I’m going to live in to? Am I going to reject the shallow truth of rejection? Will I put down roots and grow and flourish out of the deeper truth—the one that is true for each and every one of us—that I have been created in love and for love? 

I want to live into the deeper truth.

More with Amy Julia:

Tell Your StoryForgetting our HumanityWho “Deserves” Rewards? | Life to the Full

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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August Introductions

Welcome to everyone who is new around here! I’m Amy Julia, and I wanted to take a minute to introduce myself this August: 

1. I started out as a blogger 17 years ago, when I didn’t even know what a blog was. Our daughter Penny had just been born and diagnosed with Down syndrome, and my friend Jocelyn set up a blog for me so I could share updates with family and friends. Social media didn’t even exist at that point. I started writing weekly updates, which eventually led into this space where I share thoughts about disability, spirituality, and meritocracy through the lens of our life as a family. 

2. We spend some part of our summers in Madison, CT, where my family has had a cottage on the Long Island for five generations. It’s not always as picture-perfect as Instagram/FB makes it look, but it is pretty glorious to return to the same place year after year. My grandfather taught me how to sail here. My sister Kate and I wandered through the grassy marsh and jumped in the river and created films of all the younger cousins lovingly mocking the older relatives here. As we come to the end of the summer, I am grateful for this place.

3. I have been wondering what color I should call my hair. I stopped getting highlights 18 years ago, when I was pregnant with Penny. Ever since then, I’ve wondered if I have blonde hair or brown hair. My children tell me that Google says I am a dark blonde, but they think light brown is more accurate. 

4. I am a very good winker. I have no party tricks to speak of, but I can still impress my kids with my ability to wink one eye and then the other in rapid succession.

5. I’m thinking a lot these days about Christian humanism, which is a strand of Christian thought that asks questions about what it means to flourish as humans, in our bodies, minds, spirits, and in community. I’ve learned a lot from Anne Snyder Brooks at Comment magazine on this topic, and I hope this space and the writing and speaking I’m doing will point us back to our shared, vulnerable, strong, beloved, and messy humanity. 

How about you? What are you grateful and/or nostalgic for as summer wanes? What color is your hair? What are you thinking about? And do you have any party tricks?

More with Amy Julia:

AboutBooksSpeaking

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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When You Post About Barbie on Social Media

A few weeks ago, I wrote about “Barbie” (the movie) and disability. As Amber, my social media coordinator says, “the algorithm decided to show your post to a lot of people.” More than a million people, in fact. And wow, did those people have something to say.

I won’t get into all the details, but I will offer a few thoughts on what I learned from this experience:

1. Some people had wonderfully insightful comments about my Barbie post.

I loved hearing from various wheelchair users about how they disagreed with me because they felt seen and represented so well through the dance scene. I loved hearing from other wheelchair users that they wished the film had done more to acknowledge people with disabilities. I deeply appreciated the insights into the character of Weird Barbie (played by Kate McKinnon). These comments changed my mind about the message around disability within the film. (You can read about what changed here.)

2. Some people had terribly snarky and cynical comments.

I have a pretty thick skin in this space, but it troubles me a lot when my page holds mean remarks towards other readers. 

3. Lots of people saw my post as being unjustly critical of Greta Gerwig’s film.

I would say that the sign of a truly great film is when it generates terrific conversation about what went well and what could have been better. I hope this post honors Gerwig’s achievement rather than diminishing her craft in any way. 

4. I’m still considering WHY so many people reacted with such fervor to this post.

As a society, we like to celebrate diversity without reckoning with what it would cost for us to truly become people and places of welcome. I wonder whether the vitriol that came towards me for suggesting that this film could do better was essentially defensiveness. 

5. Social media is fickle.

I had a post with over one million views one day, and one with fewer than 300 views the following week. Again, it comes as a reminder that my calling is not to write controversial posts in order to gain more likes. Rather, it is to faithfully reflect on what it means to be human. Sometimes a million people are interested. Sometimes a handful. 

In the end, this flurry of comments and likes and shares and disagreement and affirmation leaves me more or less where I started. Writing about faith, disability, and our meritocratic culture with hopes that I can help us all (myself included) imagine new possibilities for a culture shaped not by conformity and competition but by belovedness and belonging. 

More with Amy Julia:

Hollywood, via Barbie, Still Doesn’t Know What To Do With DisabilityWhat Do I Think About the Barbie With Down Syndrome?The Significance of Our Social Worlds

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform.

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Tell Your Story

On the first morning of Hope Heals camp, the woman beside me said, “I can’t really believe I’m walking next to you right now. I follow you on Instagram, and I prayed that you would be here.” Her name was Anne, and she and her family live in France. They have a daughter with Down syndrome who is six years old. 

A few days later, she came to a presentation that Penny and I did together where Penny talked about planning for her future and becoming more and more independent. Anne left the room in tears. 

We walked to dinner together, and she explained. “When our daughter was born, I googled ‘Down syndrome Christianity book.’ The book that came up was A Good and Perfect Gift. So that’s what I read the whole time she was in the NICU. Sitting in that room and hearing Penny talk about her future was just too much for me. But in a beautiful way.” 

She wrote to me a few weeks after camp:

“I’m also more than ever convinced of the power of words and of sharing what the Lord does in our lives! Your book was instrumental to starting my journey as a parent of a little girl with Down Syndrome…one day I hope my story will be an equal encouragement to another parent, God willing.”

We won’t all get to write books about our journeys from grief to joy, but we do all receive an invitation to share the stories we have lived. If you are in a place of pain, perhaps there is someone out there who can offer a story that doesn’t ignore or deny your pain but that offers you hope in the midst of it. If you are in a place to tell a story of hope, here’s an invitation to do so with gentleness and faithfulness and courage. And if someone else’s story has been a blessing to you, let them know.

More with Amy Julia:

Book: A Good and Perfect Gift: Faith, Expectations, and a Little Girl Named Penny Free Resource:  Missing Out on Beautiful: Growing Up With a Child With Down Syndrome Hope Heals and Hope Heals Camp

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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How “The Ones We Sent Away” Connects to Our Present Moment

Because we have a daughter with Down syndrome, I hear lots of stories about family members with Down syndrome and other intellectual disabilities. Sometimes I hear the stories of siblings or cousins or uncles who are beloved and crucial aspects of family life. And sometimes I hear the stories of the ones who were sent away. 

There’s the middle-aged woman who discovered she had a half brother with Down syndrome upon her father’s death. And the one who found out about an uncle he had never met. There’s the boy with the brother he sees once a year. The mother whose daughter has lived in a different country for decades now.  

The Ones We Sent Away, Jennifer Senior’s cover story for this month’s Atlantic, tells her own family’s poignant and heart wrenching story. She learns her mother was not an only child, but rather, an older sister whose younger sister was institutionalized for her entire life. 

Once Senior and her mother meet her aunt, she aches with the loss of relationship. She underscores the series of missteps that led to her aunt’s institutionalization–the assurances by doctors that this would be best for everyone, the deceptive promises that her aunt would never be able to live in loving relationships, that she needed antipsychotic medication, that she would never grow old or have meaning in her life. Senior only meets her aunt a few times, and yet all these assumptions are exposed as lies.

Senior does not connect the dots to our present moment. But when parents receive a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome and other genetic conditions early on these days, they often hear a version of the same words that Senior’s grandparents heard. “It will be better for your family if this child isn’t with you.” But what if we assumed that this child’s life is valuable and meaningful? What if welcoming this child would bring love and learning and growth, even if it also means hardship and vulnerability and uncertainty? What if it would be better for you and your family to receive this child, as they are?

More with Amy Julia:

New York Times: I’m Thankful Every Day for the Decision I Made After My Prenatal TestsAcknowledging the Harm Inherent Within the Abortion DebatesThe Ambiguities of AbortionIn the Wake of the Supreme Court’s Decision, The Lord’s Prayer

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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Summer Loving

Peter and I had just under 48 hours away and alone together to ride bikes and sit on the beach and eat halibut and read and talk and walk along a rocky coastline. It was enough time to return to past hurts and get mad and defensive all over again and then actually push through the conflict and begin to trust each other more. I’ve written before that honesty, humility, and hope all lead to healing. I stand by that, but I will add that time and a summer sunset can make a big difference too. 

More with Amy Julia:

The Most Important Thing We Do as a Married Couple3 Questions We Asked That Really Helped Our Marriage

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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Forgetting our Humanity

“‘The propagandist’s purpose,’ Aldous Huxley observed, ‘is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.’”

This quotation came from an essay in the New Yorker referring to the way the far-right of our political spectrum have no regard for the humanity of their political opponents. And when I first read it, I immediately thought of all those people and institutions that forget our humanity. 

I went into critique and condemnation mode. The far-right. The far-left. Every advertisement I encounter that tries to sell me productivity and surface beauty and denies my human limits. The medical establishment that tells expectant mothers with prenatal diagnoses of Down syndrome that their children will be burdens. 

But then I wondered about me. How do I participate in forgetting other people’s humanity? 

Well, there’s the quickness with which I critique whole swaths of people, like I did upon reading this quotation. 

And there’s the relative homogeneity of my world, where I talk with and read and watch what I tend to already agree with. 

So perhaps I am the one who is in danger of succumbing to propaganda and forgetting our common humanity. Perhaps I’m the one who needs the encounters with people who have differing political and religious viewpoints than my own. 

We all can do the work, and receive the joy, of remembering one another’s humanity.

More with Amy Julia:

Embracing Our Common HumanityPeople to Follow Across the Political DividesFor Those of Us Who Feel Politically Homeless

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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Ableism at the County Fair

Last week, I received an email from Amber, who has three kids, including Cal*, her son with a rare genetic difference. Amber is also my unbelievably talented and faithful social media coordinator, but today I’m featuring her as a mom. Here’s what she wrote:

We don’t often take Cal to events with big crowds, but we decided to try the county fair last night.

I paid for rides/admission, but the gatekeepers refused to give me Cal’s ride bracelet to carry for him (there’s no way he would wear it or have it attached anywhere to him). Their rule was that if he wouldn’t wear it himself, he couldn’t have it at all.

There was no compassion or exemption for a teen with intense sensory challenges. I wanted to be more assertive in asking them to give us the bracelet since it was included in the admissions price, but he was distraught over the tone of the ladies’ voices, so I made the choice to leave the ticket booth before he became even more distressed.

He probably had more fun watching the rides than he would have had riding them. But still…

Sometimes you get the kindness of a Taylor Swift concert employee. And sometimes you get rigid county fair rules. Not knowing what we’ll get keeps us home more than I should let it.

Three thoughts I want to offer in response to ableism at the county fair:

The way we act towards individuals matters. Big time. Even if the county fair workers couldn’t override the system and give Cal an exemption, they could have engaged with care and patience, and they didn’t. People with disabilities and their family members experience bigotry and discrimination on a daily basis. These slights are often small and subtle, but they add up, and they take an unjust toll. Which brings me back to point #1: kindness to individuals matters.Moms like Amber shouldn’t be the ones who have to fight for their kids’ welcome and inclusion, both because it is exhausting and also because it might be impossible. In this case, Amber chose not to become more assertive as a way of caring for Cal.

We can all be on the lookout for ways to care for the ones who are most likely to be overlooked and disregarded. 

*Name changed

More with Amy Julia:

Penny Got a JobWhy Go to Hope Heals Camp | Penny in Her Own WordsDown Syndrome, Teenagers, and Holy Limits

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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Penny Got a Job

Penny had her first day of work last week.

That’s right. Work. Employment. Four hours, three days a week, at a local cafe and bakery. 

She made brownies and spicy walnuts and came home with traces of flour and sugar and chocolate.

I dropped her off on her first day. She squeezed my hand and said, “Mom, this is a dream come true.” 

The state of Connecticut has a job program for teens like Penny. They coordinate with local businesses to find summer jobs. The local business pays minimum wage. The state provides a job coach. Everyone wins. 

This is what it looks like to assume that everyone can contribute, everyone belongs, and everyone can find ways to make their dreams come true.

More with Amy Julia:

Penny’s Education PATH ProcessWhy Go to Hope Heals Camp | Penny in Her Own WordsAll Kids Can Learn

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast on your favorite podcast platform.

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What’s Wrong With America Right Now?

What’s wrong with America right now?

Everywhere I go, I encounter this question.

Pop culture’s biggest current hit, Barbie, has one answer: patriarchy.

Tim Urban’s recent book, What’s Our Problem?, has a different one: lower order thinking. 

And David Brooks’ recent column for the New York Times offers yet another take: meritocracy.

I have found all three of these sources helpful and credible in trying to understand our polarized era, but I want to focus on Brooks’ argument. As I write about at length in White Picket Fences, I am a card-carrying member of the meritocracy, so I want to pay particular attention to critiques that point out how my social group contributes to society’s problems. 

Brooks identifies two problems that his social class has perpetuated:  

One, he writes:

“We built an entire social order that sorts and excludes people on the basis of the quality that we possess most: academic achievement.”

And two:

“We also change the moral norms in ways that suit ourselves, never mind the cost to others.” 

Assuming for a minute that he’s right (I don’t have space here to explain why I think he is), what would it look like to build a social order that values more than academic achievement? And what would it look like to uphold moral norms that especially serve those who are most vulnerable? (Brooks gives the example of marriage, but he could also write about any moral norms around faithfulness to one another in the midst of illness, injury, and aging.) 

What’s wrong with America right now? The more I’m willing to say, “I am,” or “We are,” the more I have responsibility and opportunity to be a part of the solution. 

David Brooks’ Essay: What if We’re the Problem Here?

More with Amy Julia:

White Picket Fences​: Turning towards love in a world divided by privilege Meritocracy Is the Antithesis to Love | Plough EssayI Want Our Kids to Accomplish Things, Not Achieve Them

Subscribe  to my newsletter to receive regular updates and news. You can also follow me on  Facebook ,  Instagram , Twitter ,  Pinterest , and  YouTube , and you can subscribe to my  Love Is Stronger Than Fear  podcast on your favorite podcast platform. 

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