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Spelling Love with an X: A Mother, a Son, and the Gene That Binds Them
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| List Price: | $16.00 |
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Product Description
When her son, J.P., was first diagnosed with fragile X syndrome, the most common inherited cause of mental retardation, Clare Dunsford discovered that she and three of her four siblings carried the fragile X premutation and had therefore passed on the full mutation to J.P. and several of his cousins. An English professor by training, Dunsford draws on poetry to explore her new identity as a “mutant” and reflect on her life with J.P., a colorful young man with great verbal dexterity and a lovable cheeky streak. Brimming with warmth, Spelling Love with an X shares the disarming insights of a compassionate scholar on motherhood, literature, and genetic inheritance.
“A touching and poignant literary memoir . . . Through vivid descriptions of her relationship with J.P., readers can glimpse the parental highs and lows of life with a child who has developmental delays.” —Lisa M. Jordan, Library Journal
“Clare Dunsford navigates the X that has mapped her own and her son’s paths with humor, honesty, and clear-sighted intelligence—and in prose that sings.” —Elizabeth Graver, author of The Honey Thief and Awake
“Dunsford does much more than inform us concerning a disorder we know too little about. Through a prose both lucid and beautiful, she is able to communicate the strangeness, even the poetry, of fragile X.” —Clara Claiborne Park, author of The Siege and Exiting Nirvana
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #350537 in Books
- Published on: 2008-10-01
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Binding: Paperback
- 203 pages
Features
- ISBN13: 9780807072806
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Editorial Reviews
Review
About the Author
Customer Reviews
Touching and Intelligent
Clare Dunsford's book is an unusual blend of personal memoir and scientifically researched information drawn from a mother's poignant journey raising a child with Fragile X. Dunsford's book blends poetic elegance with important up to date information about her son's genetic condition, a useful read for anyone living or working with children or adults with any developmental disorder. As a special educator who is also an avid reader I was fascinated. Further, I learned of the relationship that this disorder may have to autism which has touched my extended family and of the hope that the future of medical research holds for all those affected by developmental conditions. Ms Dunsford tells her story with strong emotion and wonderfully crafted writing but does not stray from her goal of sharing the knowledge base she has been accumulating over the 21 years of her charming and interesting son's life.
A Classic Love Story
While informing us about Fragile X Syndrome, Clare Dunsford reminds us in a distinctive voice that much more than genes binds us. Her well-told tale captures the complexity of competing realities running through most of our lives -- identity, vocation, family, faith, parenthood (and the profound difference between motherhood and fatherhood), friendship, support, loneliness and love. So we laugh, cry and rejoice with her as she recounts the frustrations and surprises of her childhood, romances, career and parenting experiences. Her references to classic literature make manifest the mystery encountered in human differences no matter the time or culture, a mystery best understood in the binding of body and spirit despite the fragility of either. "Spelling Love With an X" is a classic love story. Dunsford's X is her and her family's cross (a cross that marks others' lives in other ways) and is only made bearable in anyone's life by Love which is more Divine than human. Her story offers hope to all of us who want to live and love well.
A Mother's Story Told with Great Courage
As a parent of a son with Fragile X who is a couple of years younger than Ms. Dunsford's son, J.P., we've experienced the despair as well as the joy she writes of. Her story is beautifully written and shines with the love we have and hope we need for the future for our adult children. She is able to describe the charming, witty character of her son in a way that rings true for parents of children with Fragile X. It's her own story as well. Life as a carrier of Fragile X has its own challenges - ones you might believe are your own character faults - until you find out, at whatever age, that you are a carrier and that the personal battles you've fought for so long are the result of a genetic defect you were born with. The science is helpful. The research is hopeful. Parents, family, carriers, friends should read this book to get a good look at life with Fragile X.
