Catch Them If You Can
Bravo to The New York Times for exposing Cheon Park (on the front page of last Friday’s paper), a contractor that was supposed to provide services for developmentally delayed 3 and 4-year olds. There are countless criminals to be pursued, but someone who preys...
read moreProphylactic Cleaning Frenzy
What’s driving Henry and me to madly clean the apartment? At first I thought it was because I invited a few friends over. I was reciprocating their invitations and noticed how much cleaner and less cluttered their apartments were. I ran to Bed Bath & Beyond...
read moreAutism Unawareness
Despite the fact that April is National Autism Awareness month, it seems to me that most of the world lives in a state of profound unawareness. The Center for Disease Control recently announced that 1 in 50 babies will now be diagnosed on the autistic...
read moreThe Boy Who Cried Everything
There's no getting around it--my son is a hypochondriac. At the ripe old age of 22, Max imagines himself suffering from a variety of ailments. When his leg tingles, it's multiple sclerosis. If his hand trembles, Parkinson's. Any rash or pimple in the pubic...
read more25th ANNIVERSARY JIGSAW
Henry and I had planned a romantic weekend get-away for our 25thanniversary. We found a lovely inn with a room overlooking a lake, complete with fireplace, balcony and a complimentary massage or facial for both of us. After two decades of family vacations...
read moreOver the Cliff
We’ve hurtled over the financial cliff. It’s been front page news. Yet for us it seems like old news. As parents of twins in college and living in New York City, we went over the financial cliff years ago. We invested in early intervention for our daughter...
read moreFast Forward Birthdays
As my family gets older, it seems like birthdays are happening more often than they should. Yes, I know they occur on the same day every year. But sometimes I feel as though my life has become a Twilight Zone episode where the hands of the clock are spinning...
read moreThe Never-Empty Nest: An Introduction
Even though my twins have been in college for a few years, I still don’t have a truly empty nest. Of course our apartment is deafeningly quiet—except when our dog is hungry—and there are no empty soda cans, piles of laundry or boots to trip over except on their...
read more



Marguerite Elisofon is a New York City writer and the author of My Picture Perfect Family, a memoir about how her family navigated life with a child on the autistic spectrum before the internet and support groups existed. She also blogs about parenting young adults and disability related issues in The Never Empty Nest. Her writing has been featured in a variety of publications, including Time and NY Metro Parents magazine, and her family’s story has been featured by the NY Post, Fox News, The Daily Mail, and on Jenny McCarthy’s Dirty Sexy Funny radio show. A Vassar graduate, Marguerite was born and raised in New York City, where she still lives with her husband, Howard, in their mostly-empty nest. She is available to speak about a wide variety of issues relating to twins, parenting, and autism.