Parents with Disabled Children facing a situation that is common

I was reading Casdok's blog today and noticed as a parent, she is facing a situation that many, many parents of sorts of disabilities face everyday. From my own experiences, I have seen in the deaf community for years and many parents of deaf children have been divided on this as well. I love Casdok's quote in her blog "Autism is fine! My son is fine, I love every autistic inch of him. And im sure autistic people themselves who read this would be very upset." Many of her comments were also positive. Here what some have said:

I agree with your sentiment. All of my kids have disabilities and I still love everything about them.

In my opinion I think that this is one of the critical questions that parents and autistic people face from the moment that they are first diagnosed. I'm very much in the camp who celebrates my children, and tries to gear our therapy/choices to enable them to have as fulfilling a life as possible without trying to "cure" them.

My son doesn't want his autism cured. He wants to be accepted as the person he is. Is his life easy? No. Does his autism stand in the way of achieving some of his goals? Yes. Has his autim caused him to find himself in danger for lack of understanding social situations completely? Yes. Can anyone say their life is easy, that they easily achieve all of their goals and have never found themselves in danger for misreading social cues?

How many parents out there can say their children have lived perfect, easy lives and have followed the path of total, unencumbered success? All parents find the most difficulty accepting their children when their children fail to live up to parental expectations. Not everyone goes to Harvard,becomes a doctor, is straight, gets married or pops out grandkids......................His life would be easier and happier if the world could see him as a valid, valuable, and wanted human being.

This is my comment in her blog:

Reading this reminds me of many parents of deaf children. There are some who wants to "fix" deafness and there are others who wants to make the best for the child dispite the circumstances.

The same situation with parents of autism children. They are divided and disagree on certain issues.

My wife has a daughter with severed cerbral palsy and mild mentally challenged. We love who she is while at the same time, get frustated with her disabilities. We will never change the way she is unless there was a miracle. We accepted who she is as she is. We love her as she is regardless.

Parents of deaf children wants to their kids who can hear so they can "love them more". What's wrong with loving them as they are even "if" they can't be fixed?

Thank you for sharing this.

Jim

It appears that regardless of what disabilities of children that parents are facing, this type of issue will always be divided and we will never be truly united. We can learn to accept this as a fact of life and we will find ways to deal with it. I love Angela's comment and she said this beautifully as she post in her blog...

I think I would be a basket case if I couldn't see the humor in Autism. I like Karen's strip...I think she does a good job of saying the things that many only dare to briefly think about. People need to lighten up a bit and take it for what it is...a release that allows her to lighten the enormity of Autism while making people feel like it is okay to have those passing thoughts. Thanks for the great post!!