When Francesco was born—deaf and trapped in childhood psychosis—the indifference of our neighbors, our own family, shocked and angered us profoundly. Only our parents, his grandparents, offered the unconditional support we needed. They showed us a boundless tenderness and welcomed us in a way that felt uniquely ours, prioritized.
There was no center for Francesco then, so we kept him at home. Our life was broken into fragmented nights and meals that demanded everything. We could not have survived this daily wear without our parents taking him for a few days each summer—allowing us to escape, to travel, to sleep, to have real vacations.
In this work, our parents were helped and sometimes replaced by one or another of our brothers and sisters. But not all of them: reactions varied widely in a large family like ours.
Some cousins, not particularly close—people we rarely saw—surprised us with unexpected help. Two of them hosted Francesco in Paris for his surgeries and drove him to the hospital. Others opened their country home to us and always asked about our son's progress.
Time brings understanding
Apart from our parents and a few siblings, the attitude of the wider family sometimes deeply unsettled us. We were in shock, grieving, and we could not understand why some reacted so differently from others. We expected everyone to treat Francesco as we did: to share our fragile hopes and our despair; to care, at least outwardly, about the minute-by-minute struggle that consumed us. Now, looking back, we understand better—though not always accept—why some relatives seemed indifferent to Francesco. We have learned that a child's suffering, and that of his parents and siblings, shifts the attitudes of those around them. It draws people closer or pushes them away, reshaping friendships and family bonds. Shallow sympathies are tested by the fire of trial. Some prove genuine, deepening into real friendship. New bonds form, born from the solidarity of those who suffer or who fight. Others reveal themselves through their capacity to draw near and help someone in anguish or rage. The trial changed how we experienced human relationships—cruder, but also truer.Do we have the right to judge?
This truth about people made us judge harshly. In our minds, whoever was not with Francesco was against us. A brother, sister, uncle, or cousin who did not say hello or goodbye was classified as hostile, beyond reach. We were so consumed by Francesco's education that we had neither time nor patience for the indifferent. "Who loves me will follow," and the rest we left on the roadside. But were the hearts of those we dismissed truly so withered? Over time, we realized that some showed real shyness—they simply did not know how to express their care. Others found us too focused on Francesco's difficulties, too self-centered, too hardened by the struggle. We could not listen to their problems, which mattered enormously to them, however small they seemed to us.A reckoning with ourselves
Perhaps we created much of the misunderstanding, the apparent indifference that wounded us so deeply? Had we not often made others feel that their complaints were trivial compared to our suffering? Even now, if someone seems indifferent to Francesco, do we not guard our pride and avoid speaking of him first? In doing so, do we not build our own wall—one that brothers and sisters no longer dare cross? Through our rigidity, do we not push away a young cousin who might help Francesco, who might be close to him?Opening a circle of love
How should we treat relatives and friends, then? There is no formula. We must recognize that in the early phase of crisis, when parents of disabled children are in shock and gripped by spontaneous rage, it is almost impossible for them to step back. But once they move past the hardened core of despair, it becomes their work to hold the family together—to become witnesses who welcome, not people who drive others away. Their own experience of suffering and of daily, extraordinary difficulty can help them do this. If that suffering does not harden but is carried by the Spirit, it can transform into the wisdom of the heart. Then they will know instinctively how to respond to each person. They can speak of their disabled son with the same ease they use for their other children. They will share his progress with the same joy they announce the academic successes of their other children. Without hiding difficulties or setbacks, they will share with relatives the small, exhilarating steps of their disabled child's growing self. Gradually, through brothers and sisters, uncles and cousins, they will reveal the richness hidden behind the handicap. At every opportunity, they will teach—without imposing—how to greet him, which gestures to use. Slowly, not through theory but through living contact, they will show that human worth is not measured by appearance; that even the most disabled person, through the circle of love they create around them, can become a source of profound human and spiritual light. Jacques Labrousse, 2005(from O.L. no. 154)
