Kelly Mantoan

Kelly Mantoan is the author of Better Than OK; Finding Joy As A Special Needs Parent, and the founder of Accepting the Gift, a national ministry for Catholic parents of children with disabilities. When she's not encouraging or advocating for special needs parents, she enjoys reading, thrift shopping, and occasionally blogging at This Ain't the Lyceum. Kelly is a happily married Catholic convert with five children who loves living near the Jersey shore.

Recent Posts

caring for a special needs child

Count Your Crosses: The Graces of Fortitude and Perseverance

By Kelly Mantoan / September 29, 2023

The cold had run its course through our whole family, taking down each man, woman, and child for days at a time, eating up the entire month of March in early 2011. While everyone else recovered, even five-month-old Teddy, Fulton struggled, weak and congested, long past the point when the other four were back to…

READ MORE
pruning idea of perfect

Pruning My Idea of a Perfect Life

By Kelly Mantoan / August 14, 2023

At some point early in our marriage, my husband and I took a shine to the idea of living on a self-sufficient homestead. After poring over books about the Catholic back-to-the-land movement, Catholic Worker farms, and homesteading, we thought we’d found the perfect escape from the normal 9-to-5. We had our plan: purchase a house…

READ MORE