Showing results for "Sisters" in Children's Health

"How do I want to die? Oh, I don't know. How about a pillow over my face? It will probably be a family member." Thus illustrates the biting candor of Amanda Bailey, the youngest in this poignant, funny, painfully honest story of bitterly divided family. With their father on his deathbed, eight siblings engage in a feud over property and possessions. Born with Down syndrome, Amanda is pulled into a belligerent guardianship dispute. Her favorite sister, Nancy, is immersed in bankruptcy and foreclosure.

Eileen Garvin’s older sister, Margaret, was diagnosed with severe autism at age three. Growing up alongside Margaret wasn’t easy: Eileen often found herself in situations that were simultaneously awkward, hilarious, and heartbreaking. How to Be a Sister begins when Eileen, after several years in New Mexico, has just moved back to the Pacific Northwest, where she grew up. Being 1,600 miles away allowed Eileen to avoid the question that has dogged her since birth: What is she going to do about Margaret?

A late bloomer’s coming-of-age memoir asks how does one accept and free themselves from visible and invisible disabilities and still retain their sense of connection and humor? Nothing Special is a disarmingly candid tale of two sisters growing up in the 1970s in rural Connecticut. Older sister Chris, who has Down syndrome, is an extrovert, while the author, her younger, typically developing sister, shoulders the burdens and grief of her parents.