Penny for Your Thoughts: A Letter to My Nonverbal Daughter

By Guest Blogger, Brittany Gummere

Brittany’s daughter lives with Phelan-McDermid Syndrome and a 7q Duplication and is nonverbal

Penny for your thoughts, my darling girl.

Who am I kidding? A million dollars and my heart from my chest for your thoughts, my darling girl.

What I would give to know:

What makes you giggle when you’re silly? Or sad when you cry? What are you saying to yourself when you wake at 4 AM? Do you miss me when I leave? Will you miss me when I’m gone? Do you ever wonder why anything happens? Why storms have thunder or why we have to hold you down for painful things or how the TV works? Are you happy? Do you forgive and forget the hard things you’ve gone through? Do you ever feel lonely? Why do you love Lizzo and Hozier but not Baby Shark and Cocomelon? Do you know how much we love you? Like really, truly, honestly, deeply know it?

I hope you do my little love, and it breaks me into pieces that we will never, ever hear answers to any question we pose. Every “I love you” we say will hang unreturned in the air, every question we ask unanswered...for the rest of our lives. And that’s a special kind of heartbreak that knocked me on my knees today when I got this sweet picture of you. No matter how good we are at knowing what you need and listening to what you cannot say, I’ll never know what’s going on behind those eyes because you’ll never be able to tell us.

Life with you is so, so sweet, the sweetest. AND it can knock the breath out of me with sadness some days. You’ve taught me the complex beauty of living in the “and”, and I’m so thankful for how you shine.