We Walk

In this collection of beautiful and raw essays, Amy S. F. Lutz writes openly about her experience 'the positive and the negative' as the mother of a son with severe autism. Lutz's human emotion drives through each page and challenges commonly held ideas that define autism either as a disease or as neurodiversity. We Walk is inspired by questions raised by Lutz as a parent of a severely autistic, now twenty-one-year-old son: What is the place of the intellectually and developmentally disabled in society? What responsibilities do we, as citizens and human beings, owe one another? Who should decide for those who can't decide for themselves? What is the meaning of religion to someone with no abstract language? In exploring these questions, We Walk directly, but humanly examines social issues such as inclusion, religion, therapeutics, and friendship through the lens of severe autism.In a world where the public perception of autism is largely shaped by the "quirky geniuses" featured on television shows like The Big Bang Theory and The Good Doctor, We Walk demands that we center our debates about this disorder on those who are most impacted by it.