Once upon a time, there was a girl who at fourteen found herself studying on the top landing of her home's staircase—all because of her brother's seizures.
Few people wanted anything to do with Roberto back then. Among other things, he had a syndrome involving severe global impairment across multiple areas of psychological development.
My brother's fate was shaped by two extraordinary women: our mother and neuropsychiatrist Dr. Maria Irene Sarti, who with persistence, courage, and faith devoted years of their lives to a deliberate—and perhaps ambitious—therapeutic program.
The work was hard and unrelenting because their goal was absolute: avoid institutionalization at all costs. So they created a genuinely alternative program, one woven into the fabric of our community, working alongside the staff of the social health cooperative serving our area. Everyone bound by a single effort, a single purpose: not to give up on Roberto, not to lose him.
Today Roberto lives in a group home created and overseen by Dr. Sarti herself, supported by two social workers and a community educator from the local health service, as well as the cooperative staff who run it and have walked alongside my brother all these years. The road to build this home was not without obstacles—brutal bureaucratic battles, humiliation, helplessness, despair, psychological anguish, and guilt.
Yet I still can barely believe that a public community service actually created something so important, so beautiful, so real and alive—a place where activities are truly shaped around the needs of the young people who live there.
And Roberto? I have to say he has genuinely thrived. No, he did not turn into a swan, but when I visit him at the home and he comes toward me in the garden—with his fine presence, a pure and simple beauty that mirrors the silence of his soul, that childlike smile on his face—I know that in this place there is no room for his anguish or his fears. Only peace. Only work toward becoming whole.
Well done, Roberto! You found your way. And I will always hold your hand.
- Mariangela Cusimano, 1998