Ize & Dan, A.K.A. Isaac and Daniel, are my twin sons who graduated from high school just this year (2024). As teenagers they have been the nicest, kindest, easiest to raise young men a mom could ask for. Over a decade ago they displayed their teenage angst and anger for me to deal with. Because of the stresses I started Ize & Dan, a comic strip that helped me find the humorous and heartwarming side of raising neurodivergent kids.
Ize, Dan, me-Mom, Dave-Dad, Skimble-the cat, Sampson-the dog and Javier-our Au Pair from Mexico formed the cast of characters. In it, we adventure through school conflicts, IEP meetings, day-to-day squabbles, disappointments and insights, defeats and victories.
Classic comic
After about a year of drawing all the comics myself, I realized that my cartooning abilities were holding me back. I hired a young man, Mudjib Pradana, from Indonesia off of Fiverr to take my sketches and turn them into a professional comic strip. I had no shortage of material and ideas.
Collaborative comic
After about two years life became so hectic and so unmanageable that I quit making cartoons. Now that I have some distance from that time in my life, I could probably find the hilarious, heartwarming side of the situations I faced, but I just couldn’t back then.
I must have done something right because when they hit adolescence the boys calmed down. They stopped getting into fights at school. Isaac stopped switching schools (he attended 13 different schools by the time he hit high school). I no longer feared they would be arrested for arson. I had no more visits from CPS. Today, I am so proud of them. They both graduated with honors and a solid high school record of accomplishments.
My challenge today is tracking down those comics from a decade ago. I have published those I can find on my current computer. When I find the others I will publish more.