The Story
Sally is the mother of David, a severely disabled sixteen-year-old boy. She lives alone with him—his father left years ago, and her daughter moved out at eighteen. The house is neglected and chaotic. Sally has devoted herself entirely to David and lives in complete isolation. Her sister Beatrice, worried about the situation, introduces her to a widowed man—kind, wealthy, childless—and Sally begins a relationship with him. But it goes nowhere. The same patterns that destroyed her marriage and her bond with her daughter resurface: her inability to step outside the role she's chosen, her need to care for David alone, her refusal of help. A social worker suggests placing David in a good residential center where he can be educated and supported. Sally refuses. Through a series of incidents that gradually expose her mistakes, Sally begins to understand that her love for her son is poisoned by anxiety, fear, and her own needs. Only when she learns to see David differently—not as a permanent infant but as a person with his own capacities, potential for growth and recovery—can her love become truly constructive. The turning point comes when she finds the strength to accept help from others and begin a new life.
What Some Mothers from Fede e Luce Think
We invited a group of mothers—friends, nearly all raising severely disabled children like David in the film, ranging in age from forty to seventy. We wanted to watch the film together, gather their thoughts, hear their reflections. Without planning it entirely, the screening sparked genuine interest, engagement, and the desire to discuss, comparing their own experiences with those on screen. The conversation unfolded in an atmosphere of friendship, attentiveness, and listening. What emerged was a new way of helping and supporting one another. We publish their words with their consent; several asked for a videocassette to share with other parent groups.
Mariangela: "What advice would you give David's mother?"
Giuliana: To accept help and ask for it—which is the hardest thing for David's mother.
Lina: I can't give advice because you have to live through these situations. You need to feel something pushing you from within, toward others, so you don't close yourself off.
Fausta: To accept help, but from people who bring both expertise and real love.
Rita: I think she needs to love herself more, so she'd have the courage to ask for help. She's demanded too much of herself and pushed away everyone around her. That's why she ended up alone.
Mariangela: But how do you love yourself more?
Rita: By accepting who you are and accepting your limits. All of us mothers think we can do everything because we believe we're capable, but we're not. We need help from others. If you love and accept yourself, you can better understand what your son actually needs. She didn't see his real needs because she thought she could do it all. That's why she was alone.
Olga: I think it would be impossible to give advice to that mother because she wouldn't accept any. She's been advised before. The social worker did her best to find placements for her son. We know what that search means. Many people tried to counsel her. She never listened to anyone. Still, if she would listen—which she won't—I'd tell her to make space for herself, to be a little selfish, to live something of her own life too. Her life is hers. She can't live for someone else.
Luisa: I think she should properly value what others offer and weigh, case by case, whether to give something of herself to improve the situation.
Rosy: I'd say the same: accept help. Because at first we think we're the only person who can love our child, who can care for him. But that's not true.
Fausta: I want to say that we speak this way now because we've been "educated." If we hadn't been helped by Fede e Luce and others the way we have been, I don't know if we'd be talking like this.
Rita: Educated, yes, but only to a point. There has to be something that comes from you. I know plenty of mothers at Fede e Luce who've been there for years but seem like they just arrived.
Mariangela: We also invited mothers not from Fede e Luce. One refused. Others wanted to come but couldn't. Your point is fair, especially for remembering what our world was like at the beginning, when we were all in crisis like David's mother. Back to the film: David's mother talks to him constantly. Do you think that creates real communication between them?
Giuliana: I think she often talks for herself and tries to speak for her son. That's not growing together. That's one-way growth, and I wouldn't even call it growth. What matters is communicating with your child according to his abilities, giving him space, responding to him—even if he doesn't speak with words but with kicks, with a slap, or by throwing things.
Lina: I've seen plenty of mothers who tell their sons everything. In the film, the boy seemed absent, but it did him good to hear his mother. I think that was real communication.
Fausta: I don't think so. It was a way for her to unload her own emotional state.
Rita: I agree. She even answers for him. Even when she understands his gestures, she doesn't give him space to express himself. She doesn't wait for his rhythm. The way she reacts in public with him, dismissing people—that's not helpful. You have to hold your own pain inside, because if your child senses it, he'll end up looking at others the same way you do.
Olga: For me, communication is something mutual. So there's no real communication here. But it's good to talk to these people even when you don't know why you're doing it. Over time, you can develop a kind of language, even if it's passive. This boy isn't deaf. There's no real communication, but it's better than nothing.
Rosy: People who talk constantly, even for the other person, bother me. I tend to do it too, but I interpret my son David's gestures and translate them into words. In the film, she overdoes it. There's no real engagement. Does David need his mother more, or does his mother need David more?
Giuliana: I think his mother needs David more. Maybe we mothers feel fulfilled having a child who stays forever small, who needs care, feeding, bathing. Not being able to let go of that "baby" seems like a very unhealthy mother-son relationship.
Lina: I think they need each other. David's father turned his back on him. His sister left. So there's no one but his mother. Of course he needs her—for life itself. His mother, like any of us, gives everything to her son.
Fausta: I agree—both need each other. This started at birth. The mother created a relationship where only she exists, always, no matter what. So nothing could change.
Rita: Between the two, the mother needs the son more, because for her it's much harder to let him go. We're afraid to let our children go. Even when they start school, we worry about what might happen, whether others will care for them the way we do. I think the son would be more willing than she is to know other people.
Olga: The son needed his mother, but she could have gotten him used to being with other people from the start. Why did I send Sabina to the center when she was four? That center wasn't perfect, but I understood instinctively that she needed to get used to being around other people. Luisa: I also think the need was mutual. But how they express that need is completely different. The mother reasons, so she can manage a situation as it develops. The son just receives. He can't manage the situation. In the end, it's the mother who needs to be the one directing things—or at least she believes she does. By continuing to intervene, she thinks she's doing right, and she becomes almost obsessive.
Rosy: Maybe there's guilt too. The mother feels she must care for her son, so she hovers over him like a hen, clinging to him as if she's indispensable. When does the mother first question her own attitude toward her son?
Rosy: When they play Monopoly, because she realizes she's playing alone.
Luisa: I think it's when the friend gets David to insert the videocassette. She gets confirmation later at the supermarket when David manages to make the gesture by himself.
Olga: It was the friend. Maybe deep down she already suspected something, but we can't know that. The friend tells her, plainly, that she's the one who needs David and that she's stopping him from making progress.
Giuliana: It's the miracle that happens to every parent who meets someone who shows them how wrong they've been. The final scene between mother and son—where she finally cuts the cord and places him in a place where he can progress, where he'll come home on weekends—is it only sad, or is it a step forward?
Giuliana: It's definitely a step forward. The fact that she's examined herself and understood that her son can live without her, that she's made the decision to help this adolescent grow—that's certainly progress.
Fausta: It's a step forward, but it's also a sad moment. Actually, not sad—I'd say painful.
Luisa: These things mature very slowly. The final scene is definitely a step forward, especially because the mother held firm and didn't give in when her son rebelled at the center and threw everything into chaos. We've lived through so many moments like that. I only began to feel better when, after many struggles, a social worker helped ease our guilt by telling us that society had failed us, not the other way around.
Rosy: A painful moment, yes, but it's something that needs to happen as soon as possible. I wish I could see what comes after—what they actually do at that center, because that's the real problem! That's what drives me crazy. Which scene touched you most, or where did you see yourself?
Giuliana: I saw a lot of myself in this woman, especially the drinking. There was a period when I turned to alcohol, maybe to fill the gap left by the career I gave up. I was a girl with real possibilities, a woman who wanted to make something of herself. My marriage was okay, more or less—I didn't understand much about it, but I managed. Then this child came, and it seemed normal to have a baby. But we never expected him to be different. It was a real shock. In truth, my husband disappointed me more than anything else. His family too. That's why I drank. My only friend was wine. I'm lucky I got out. I hit bottom, and that's how I got out. I get emotional talking about it, but it's important to say these things.
Lina: Mothers are always being judged. No matter what we do, someone criticizes: "You didn't do well. You were too selfish. You thought only about your son, or you neglected him to follow your husband on vacation." We all go through hard times when we don't want to see anyone, like David's mother. But unlike her, when others reach out to us, we open ourselves to their affection and kindness. We don't say, "How nice to have this burden. Let's stay this way!" When we got help, we gave our children to others. We didn't cling to them! Our friends at Fede e Luce—the first ones who took Roberto when he was small—I would have kissed their hands. Those young people who took him from my arms for a few hours were a blessing!
Fausta: I saw myself in the way David's mother treated that little girl who was looking at her son with curiosity. It took me back years. Once, when Carla bothered someone on the bus, a conductor said, "Madam, either you hit her or I will!" I wasn't being helped by anyone then, so I got off the bus and just cried.
Rita: What touched me most in the film was David's mother's personality. Aggressive, almost violent toward the outside world, which prevents any contact even for her son. Her reactions are often cynical, even toward herself. It's a subtle violence that pushes away all affection, as if to punish herself for having had a different child. I think it all comes from deep guilt that makes her feel she must handle everything alone. She thinks she has to be strong, never give in, never show weakness or fragility. She wants to do more and more. And so she loses the courage to ask for help. She wraps herself in a thick armor of indifference to defend herself, to resist every emotion that might make her lose control. It's the help of a friend and a small improvement in her son that makes her understand she's not irreplaceable. It's others who can reach places we cannot, because of that strong dependency between us and our children. So the separation begins—small at first: school, a friend, a vacation. Everything should prepare our child for greater separation and, most of all, emotional growth.