My daughter is sixteen years old.  She lives with her mother and I in Evansville, Indiana.  She also has special needs.

Our daughter is named Hope Ophelia, but we call her Hopie.  She has Down syndrome and is mentally handicapped, with the mind of a five-year-old child.  Even though she is a teenager physically, mentally, she is more like a young child.  That is, suffice to say, she loves to play with her dollies, play dress up, and watch shows like "Barney", "Caillou", and "Sesame Street" on PBS.

Hopie also loves to play with her younger sister, Carrie, who is fourteen, and her little brother, Erick, who is seven.  They are her closest friends.

They do everything together.

Sadly, Hopie doesn't have any friends at school.  She will be going into the first grade when Mo and I start to homeschool her this fall; she did go to public school until this past school year, and it's been a total disaster.  She was picked on constantly, and it got to be so bad she would throw up most mornings and would have to stay home.  She missed over 30 days this past school year alone and failed most of her classes.  Hopie just wasn't reaching her full potential, so it was with heavy hearts that Mo (Maureen, my wife) and I made the decision to home school our daughter instead.  That way, we could work with her and she could learn at her own pace.

The only friends Hopie does have are Erick and Carrie.  Also a few kids from church, but she only sees them on Sundays, when she goes to her Sunday school lessons.

It is hard having a child like Hopie to raise.  Oh, she has a winning personality, but she is so immature, in comparison to most kids her age, and she has significant health problems involving her heart and her breathing.  She has asthma really bad, and she's had several surgeries done on her heart.  She faces more in the future.  Hopie has been in and out of hospitals ever since she was very small, and it's only by God's grace that she is even still here.

Besides the health issues, we have to put up with people making fun of her or staring at her.  A lot of the times, the adults are worse than the kids, and in our neighborhood, we're often regarded as pariahs because our oldest daughter is "damaged".

If I could wish anything for Hopie, it would be her happiness.  I'd give anything to see her laughing or singing instead of crying her eyes out because some people were being mean to her again.  I'd also wish her good health, so she wouldn't have to go into the hospital yet again because her heart (or her breathing) decided to act up.  I'd also wish that she had many friends because for now she is a very lonely young lady.

Well, I hear Erick and Carrie arguing again, and before they wake up their sister, I'd best deal with it and nip it in the bud.  I will write in here again another time; until then, this is Larry Taylor saying so long!  God bless you always!

~Larry Taylor.

*to be continued.*