Special needs parents lead different lives.
We spend a life of searching. Sifting through websites, articles, picking up rogue posts off social media, or a snippet of information from a conversation. Information which will change things for our children going forward.
In the begining we quickly realised that there was no special parenting guide or resource base where everything was waiting for us. You had to find it, and they hide it so well, scattering it in a multitude of places!
We lead a life of fighting
We lead a life of fighting. Fighting the authorities for the best support and education for our children, and then fighting to keep that support. We fight for a referral, and then have to wait months, sometimes years to get the services we deserve, to only get pushed aside with a written report ready to file away with the others.
Our children are discharged from speech and language specialists when they are still unable to communicate or speak a single word, leading to new fight to keep what you were promised.
The documentation is endless. Multiple write-ups of our child’s development, always in a negative tone, visually showing in black and white, all the things our children cannot do, rather than the difficulties that have overcome or the amazing barriers they have smashed down.
We hold legal documents which define the education to be delivered to our children, and then fight the schools to deliver it. Education that is published as free for all, but really it is just for those where it is easy to cater for.
We lead lives of staring and comments. A life where we stand out because our children are louder than others, or attract attention to themselves by shuttle runs up and down supermarket isles or getting super excited at a moving piece of equipment, their hands flapping in a overload of euphoria.
We communicate differently, in ways we have had to research, try, fail and then finally succeed with. Stooping down to our child’s level and holding up pictures or round coloured traffic light cards, to help them understand what is next or about to end.
Stares come from those parents who can just shout for their kids to follow, confused at why we don’t just tell our children through voice commands about what to do. They hold their heads up high thinking they are better parents that us – but we know different, we know how far we have come.
We have to contend with angry parents whose children have been pushed, hit or kicked by our child. We try to articulate that the reason wasn’t out of violence, but rather a form of non-verbal communication, or frustration or sensory overload. We continuously voice our apologies for something out of our control. But those parents don’t listen, they just want justice for their hard, a hard that is so much different to ours. So we start to avoid those places, we steer clear of those people.
We know all about sensory overload, an area which meant nothing to us before. We learn how to help our children manage it, how to notice the signs and places to avoid. It becomes a central reason for the way our children act and how we coordinate everything we do.
Our children can’t go to all the places.
Because our children can’t go to all the places. Some places are too over-whelming. It could be a birthday party, or a catch-up at a play centre, or an unknown location you don’t have a picture for. We decline these places because we know the potential outcome. We know it may not be pretty.
We are however parents who make our own rulebooks. We create new goals for our children, milestones you will never find in professional checklists or folders. We punch the air in jubilation when our children manage to zip up their coats after years of hard work, through the use of strategies and techniques we have mastered along the way.
We high five our partners, keeping our celebrations within our tribe.
We high five our partners when we watch as our child follows a verbal instruction, because we have had years of them not understanding, just sitting blank faced at our request.
We keep our celebrations with our tribe, the parents who know the same struggles. Because there are no words to explain the feeling when your child finally says their first word, years after the rule book said they should. Other parents are past that stage, that phase was years ago, when their children were also celebrating their first step or ball throw. They have moved onto newer and bigger things.
We feel the loneliness, the separation from other families. We talk about our hard to those who understand, because only by living through it, do you know how hard it actually is.
But our children are still here. They may not be meeting the expectations of society, but they are exceeding all of ours!
Special needs parents are taking each day at a time. They are fighting for their kids. They are advocating for their children’s conditions and pushing for inclusion in a world which cuts them off.
And while we do that our children will continue to grow and develop in their own way…
Because..
…the world doesn’t define what our children are to become, our children define the world they want it to be.
