For a good portion of the book, Hattie expresses frustration over the adults in her family being impatience with Adam, especially her grandmother Harriet. She attributes this impatience with being an Upper-Class Twit and wonders whether they really love Adam at all. While Hattie isn’t entirely wrong about her grandparents upper class snobbery, there are a few things to consider:
For Adam to be twenty one years old in 1960, that would mean he was born in 1939. It’s possible that Adam's birth was unplanned given the big age gap between him and Dorothy and birth control was not great during the 1930’s. This is also a case of Fridge Horror because Adam likely started showing symptoms as a toddler in the midst of World War II when resources were limited, even for wealthy families.
Leo Kanner and Hans Aspergers started publishing their findings on autism right around this same time, but it had to have been frightening for Hayden Sr., Harriet, Hayden Jr, and Dorothy to watch Adam regress and not understand what was going on. Them being the only family in a small town with a special needs family member couldn't have been easy either. Harriet specifically must have felt a lot of self blame for Adam because by modern standards, prenatal care wasn't great during the 1930's. If that weren’t enough, Harriet was probably labeled a "refrigerator mother" without hesitation note
With all those things to consider, the Chicago school had to have been a last resort. Adam would have moved there in 1951, but it’s debatable as to whether this counts as Values Dissonance or not. On one hand Adam was twelve at the time, but on the other hand it’s arguable that Hayden Sr. and Harriet were proactively trying to make sure that Adam will be taken care of, because they never anticipated that they would outlive Adam.
