FINDING KIND

Baker affirms her Christian faith and her love of her neurodiverse son in this debut memoir.

After attending college and working in Southern California, Baker moved back home to Scottsdale, Arizona in 2002. Through a matchmaking service gifted to her by her mother for Christmas in 2004, she met John. They married when she was 37, and she became pregnant at 39. When their son, Brady, entered preschool at age 2, he displayed developmental and behavioral differences. At age 4 he was diagnosed with autism and ADHD. What followed was a whirlwind of therapies and schools to find the best fit for Brady’s needs. (“We have learned as Brady grows his needs will shift, and we must adapt to meet him.”) Baker was also searching for a spiritual home, which she found at McDowell Church. Her faith journey included Bible study, prayer, and fellowship. She came to accept that God had a plan for her family, finding a key to her peace of mind in “never underestimating what God can do with your life, even if your original plan is torn to shreds.” KIND Families, “a community for anyone who loves Kids with Invisible Neurological Differences,” is her program to connect those who are living with the often-isolating experience of neurodiversity. Baker’s writing is genuine and heartfelt; readers who are searching for their own spiritual connections will appreciate the “long, winding road” of her path. Readers of any faith will identify with Baker’s honest descriptions of universal experiences like having a “perfectly good life plan” derailed by reality, the first difficult months of motherhood, and the feeling of being both “exposed and unseen at the same time” with a child having a public meltdown. The author’s love for John and Brady is deep, and her pride in Brady’s achievements is infectious. They are all “fearfully and wonderfully made.”

A moving chronicle of raising a child with autism and a faith story that will have a wide appeal.