Dear Jess,

Originally I had wanted to write about the various Christmas presents, and Christmas things I’ve done over the past two days (Christmas at moms, then at dads) but something extremely appalling came up and, not to put a damper on the Christmas spirit, as I wish you a very merry Christmas, but its something that’s on my mind and incredibly serious.

Two days before my oldest step-brother, Holden, turned 19, and a few weeks before Christmas itself, he was served legal papers from his own father, whom he’s lived with 50% of the time, stating that all of his human rights were going to be taken away from him. I never knew that was legal, and currently think that its completely immoral, and unconstitutional. His father, Eric, claimed that Holden was incapacitated, and unable to function in the adult world, thus Eric would become his guardian for life. With this legal process these rights could potentially be stripped from Holden:

• To marry or divorce
• To vote or hold an election
• To enter into a contract or make or revoke a will
• To appoint someone to act on your behalf
• To sue and be sued other than through a guardian
• To possess a license to drive
• To buy, sell, own, mortgage, or lease property
• To consent to or refuse medical treatment
• To decide who shall proved care and assistance
• To make decisions regarding social aspects of your life.

This sickens me to have those rights taken away has in simple terms made you a slave of your guardian. Not only is Holden an entirely capable person but he excels more so than I do in countless areas. Evidence presented by his father as to why Holden is capable were along the lines of-- he scored 177 on his PSAT, and was above average in two sections, but since on the third section he was average (not even below average) he will be unable to sustain himself in the adult word. Holden drives himself to and from school every day, this being a 50 mile round trip. He has a 3.8 GPA. The only thing about Holden that people judge is how he portrays himself socially. He doesn’t like to socialize and instead spends his extra time on the computer or with video games. 90% of all teenage boys do that too!

The first statement made in the documents to the judge had the world “autistic” in it, so the case was accepted. Holden is a highly-functioning autistic. Meaning he functions better than most and even so, the word autism shouldn’t determine the rights that Holden is given. This to me is discrimination in one of it’s ugliest forms, used to strip rights away from someone. I’ve seen many times people without mental disabilities that have less a right to live without a guardian than Holden.

All in all, the next few months will be spent supporting Holden (due to the fact that he’s legally an adult now, he must work with the attorney on his own) and molding him to be the legally accepted average 19 year old man. It makes me so sad that his own father, rather than giving as people typically do for birthdays and Christmas, served him papers saying he will be taking everything away from him. I love Holden so much, and have bragged about how smart he was on many accounts. We’re going to win this so Holden can live his life to the fullest and with all the potential Holden has, he’s going to make something of himself.

Again, I’m sorry for putting a damper on the Christmas mood, but this was just revealed last night. I do sincerely hope your Christmas is fantastic and feel free to blog about it as much as you want (I’ll post again, eventually, with the presents I got and things that I did over Christmas as well.)

Love always,
Sam