SPECIAL PRAISE FOR
Not Always Happy
“Not Always Happy is the book that, as a parent of a child with Down syndrome, I have always wanted to read. And, it is the book that I want everyone else to read. . . . drawn with humor and without the opportunistic sentimentality so often used in the literary treatment of disability.”
—CATIA MALAQUIAS, founder and director of Starting With Julius, director of Down Syndrome Australia and the Attitude Foundation
“Intimate, entertaining, at times hilarious . . . it illustrates that parenting a child with disabilities is really no different than parenting any other child. What is different are the attitudes and obstacles encountered along the way—and that’s the problem we, as a community, still need to solve!”
—PETER V. BERNS, Chief Executive Officer, The Arc
“. . . I found myself nodding, laughing, and grumbling audibly—each story feeling frustratingly familiar to me, bringing back memories of my experiences as a disabled person who received a public education. . . . Not Always Happy [is] a gem that’s worth the read.”
—EMILY LADAU, wordsiwheelby.com, Editor in Chief of the Rooted in Rights Blog, Host of The Accessible Stall
“With wit, insight, and humor, Wagner-Peck has a written a book for all parents because it gives us the true power of unconditional love.”
—BOB KEYES, Arts Reporter at the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram
“I don’t have much in common with Kari’s experience yet I remained glued to her story, gulping it down in two sessions. Your own parenting trajectory need not be the same as hers to understand, sympathize, and thoroughly enjoy hers.”
—MERIAH NICHOLS, meriahnichols.com
“Her easy conversational writing will keep you turning pages to see what happens next. . . . books about Down syndrome either have made me want to kill myself with their list of all the terrible things about having a baby with Down syndrome or puke at the blessings of it all. Not Always Happy was something that I could relate to and laugh with, and it helped me see Thorin for who he is, not the extra chromosome he has.”
—LIN RUBRIGHT, mother of six, advocate and founder of Anna Foundation for Inclusive Education
“Not Always Happy is a book you’ll be glad to read thanks to Kari Wagner-Peck’s wry humor, unvarnished observations, and memorable anecdotes about her son. . . . Parents of children with disabilities will relate to this mother’s metamorphosis into an advocate.”
—ELLEN SEIDMAN, lovethatmax.com
Central Recovery Press (CRP) is committed to publishing exceptional materials addressing addiction treatment, recovery, and behavioral healthcare topics.
For more information, visit www.centralrecoverypress.com.
© 2017 by Kari Wagner-Peck
All rights reserved. Published 2017.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
Publisher: Central Recovery Press
3321 N. Buffalo Drive
Las Vegas, NV 89129
22 21 20 19 18 171 2 3 4 5
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Wagner-Peck, Kari, author.
Title: Not always happy: an unusual parenting journey / Kari Wagner-Peck.
Description: Las Vegas: Central Recovery Press, 2017.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016059564 (print) | LCCN 2017001779 (ebook) | ISBN 9781942094388 (e-book)
Subjects: LCSH: Adopted children—United States. | Children with disabilities—Education—United States. | Home schooling—United States. | Parenting—United States. | BISAC: BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Personal Memoirs. | FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / Children with Special Needs. | FAMILY & RELATIONSHIPS / Adoption & Fostering.
Classification: LCC HV875.55 .W34 2017 (print) | LCC HV875.55 (ebook) | DDC 362.3/3092 [B] —dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016059564
Photo of Kari Wagner-Peck by Betsy Carson, All Art Media
Every attempt has been made to contact copyright holders. If copyright holders have not been properly acknowledged, please contact us. Central Recovery Press will be happy to rectify the omission in future printings of this book.
Publisher’s Note: This book contains general information about child development, Down syndrome, foster care, adoption, and related matters. The information is not medical advice. This book is not an alternative to medical advice from your doctor or other professional healthcare provider.
This is a memoir—a work based on fact recorded to the best of the author’s memory. Our books represent the experiences and opinions of their authors only. Every effort has been made to ensure that events, institutions, and statistics presented in our books as facts are accurate and up-to-date. To protect their privacy, the names of some of the people, places, and institutions in this book may have been changed.
Cover and interior design and layout by Marisa Jackson.
FOR WARD,
THORIN,
AND JADE
Table of Contents
FOREWORD
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
CHAPTER ONE
Hitting the Kid Jackpot
CHAPTER TWO
The Longest Labor
CHAPTER THREE
A Typical Son
CHAPTER FOUR
How I Earned the Privilege of Being Called Mommy
CHAPTER FIVE
I Hear You Knocking, but You Can’t Come In
CHAPTER SIX
We’ve Crossed Over to the Twilight Zone
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Littlest Avenger
CHAPTER EIGHT
Funny How Life Happens
Foreword
Stories of happy families triumphing over disabilities, intellectual or otherwise, tend to be false. If somebody gave you this book hoping to give you a smile and a tear and a lump in your throat and a tugging sensation in your heart, call them and tell them they shouldn’t have.
If you bought this book expecting that kind of cheap uplift, go back to the bookstore and look for something with dogs.
But keep this book anyway. Keep it and read it so you can find out what really happens in a family where one member has Down syndrome. See what they see, learn what they learn, get a handle on a dimension of human existence that journalists and commentators and educators and other experts so often fail to understand. One that they fail to understand because they fail to see, because they refuse to see.
I don’t really know Kari Wagner-Peck. We have never met in person, and I’m not sure I could pick her out of a lineup; we are not Facebook friends or book-club buddies, though I do keep tabs on her Twitter tweets.
I follow her because she is a writer who is on to something. She and her husband and their
