We were sent this anonymously. Read it out loud for all those detained.
ATU’s Mother’s Day
My child is a prisoner, I the walking wounded.
He cries at night, Mum! My body and soul bled of the life force I so desperately need to get him out of there.
“He’s fine today, he ate his dinner”, cold comfort six months later, detained he’s still a sinner paying the price for not being ‘nice’ for being autistic.
My son, my love, my centre of being, my thoughts of you now, of what you have seen, heard, endured in that hell-hole of the absurd where so many others have been. You didn’t deserve this.
Tomorrow is Mother’s day, our 30 minute visit cut short to allow other mums to elicit a reaction, smile, hug, from their own traumatised childen, sustaining them another week, while they ask when will this nightmare end.
It’s the night before Mother’s Day and while I believe this day was made more for Hallmark Cards and florists than me, this Mother’s day will get my attention, the day my son remained in secluded detention for something he didn’t do and the failure of this nation, despite the First World location, to understand he is:
autistic