Where were you when…

So you’re angry now? Something MUST be done?  Where was your anger before? Why weren’t you angry as the single mother was told they couldn’t help her son? When they sat and played with him and said he seemed perfectly normal to them after only an hour. Why weren’t you angry when CPS was called on that same Mom for restraining her child during a meltdown? Where was your anger as people sneered and made comments as her son overstimulated from the noise and lights and things in the grocery store lashed out in need to flee from it all? The mother wanting to protect her child from it all but needing groceries to feed her family.

Where was your anger when the parents simply looking for someone to watch their child so they can feel he or she is safe for an hour were told they had to wait three years to get on a waiver that would provide someone trained to help them?  Where was your anger when the Mom and Dad wept as they had to call the police to put their child in an ambulance because he or she was so violent during an episode they had no other choice?

Where were you when a Mom lay curled up with her other children for fear of what her child might do at night? When her tears stained the bedsheets and she had no where but prayer to turn? As she took every day items and hid them under lock and key never knowing before how scary a simple thumbtack could seem?

When the government decided to fill their pockets and turn away thousands for medication and therapies in desperate need…were you yelling then?  When the child was teased and bullied for being different…were you standing there yelling to defend him? Were you telling anyone something needed to change then?

Were you standing next the Mom or Dad as they searched through hundreds of documents and facilities to see if anyone helps children with emotional and neurological disabilities? Did you hand them a tissue or offer an ear?  When they were told there is no support for “just mental health issues like his” -Where was your anger then America?

You scream about justice needing to be done, where is God, outlaw the guns as parents everywhere are ashamed to even voice who their children are out loud for fear you’ll name their child next as the enemy.  We sit quietly in the shadows looking out in desperation. We are given no hope. We advocate, we research, we cry, we love them with more passion than you’re five minutes of caring will ever know.

When three people held down a child for an IV to administer another test for another hoop to jump through on the road to getting no answers…where were your words of comfort then?

When the child stood on the sidelines and watched others play, sad and alone not knowing how to change it, why no anger then?  As our 6 and 7 and 10 year olds threaten to just disappear, to run away, to never be born to make it better themselves, as they receive no answers from the adults and parents that are supposed to protect them and know how to make it better – you sit at home and yell fix it from the comfort of your chair.

Where were you when the child that needed you cried out for help America.

Where will you be when this pain too begins to fade, and the children and the parents who need the help the most are still crying?