My son Tyler came into the world at seven pounds and two ounces, with a specific and fully formed opinion about every single thing.

I know this sounds like the kind of thing mothers say.

I mean it literally.

The nursery nurses told me that most newborns have a period of quiet observation in the first days, a kind of adjustment to being outside the womb, a settling-in.

Tyler did not observe quietly.

Tyler was, from the first hours of his life, a person with things to communicate.

He communicated them loudly.

He communicated them without ambiguity.

He communicated them until he was sure the relevant parties understood what he needed, and then he communicated them some more just to be certain.

My mother, who has always been honest in ways I find more useful in retrospect than in the moment, held Tyler when he was four days old, looked at me over his head, and said: you are going to have your hands full.

She said it with love.

She said it with the knowledge of a woman who had raised me, and who therefore understood something about what a child with strong opinions and a high tolerance for making noise could become.

She was not wrong.

My name is Laura Hendricks.

I am thirty-three years old.

I am a dental hygienist.

I work Tuesday through Friday at a practice in the part of town with the good coffee shop on the corner, and I take Monday off because Monday is the day I try to do the things that do not get done when I am working.

I am also, for the past four years, doing all of this alone.

Tyler’s father, Jason, left when Tyler was three.

What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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