An autistic woman has begun to question whether her eight-month-old nephew actually wrote a message in her birthday card, it has been reported.
The message addressed to Karen Hoyland, 25, reads, “Happy birthday Aunty Karen! Lots of love from Finley”. Despite his father’s insistence, Hoyland suspects that Finley did not write the message himself.
Hoyland said: “Something doesn’t add up here. Finley still can’t speak, and he doesn’t even know what a birthday is. I don’t think he has the motor skills to write in cursive, either. Unless he’s some sort of prodigy, in which case we really should be making more of a fuss about that.”
Hoyland now believes her brother is joking with her, although she strongly disapproves. “Pretending a baby can do grown-up things like writing in birthday cards… Is that what passes for entertainment these days? A meaningless, paper-thin charade? And I’ve probably got to laugh, because if I don’t, I’ll be spoiling the ‘fun’. What’s so fun about a child forced to grow up before his time?”
Finley’s father, Wallace Hoyland, 29, said: “God, Karen, it’s just a cute little joke. If we don’t ascribe that level of agency to him, we’ll be forced to admit that he’s basically useless.”
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