Parenting is one of the most challenging jobs an individual will ever face. Being a parent of a child who has special needs is indeed challenging and sometimes frustrating. Though there are joyous moments but there is no denying the hardships parents face in rearing these children. Right from the start, the shock of finding out your child has special needs is life-changing to most parents.
I can really testify how tedious it is because I have a daughter who was diagnosed with autism when she was 3 years old.Most children with special needs are more like normally developing children than they are different from them. Only, they have a different way of expressing themselves and learning things. Most of the time, they are misunderstood by many which makes it more difficult to enter into their own world. As I have been observing my daughter, other kids and some adults with special needs, I can really feel how frustrating it is to try to blend in and appear to be normal in the eyes of others. But behind their struggles are the parents who are loaded with the heavier laden of caring for these valiant spirits. These parents need assistance and understanding from the rest of us.
The challenge of coping with stress that parents experience is a difficult thing to do, especially for mothers who are more involved in child rearing. There are many mothers who are struggling every day to cope with stress of having a greater responsibility towards the child with special needs and the demands of her other children and job responsibility which are upon her. These mothers may not be receiving the appropriate assistance, therefore need the most of interventions to function better and live a more satisfying life.
The daily struggles in understanding a child with special needs, coping with emotional stress while magnifying the responsibility towards his/her job and family made me realize that something has to be done to help these parents and the rest of the caretakers of children with special needs. I have tried to understand the strain involved in raising a child with special needs and the coping strategies that parents made. If one can understand what stresses have the most negative impact on families, then we can move to address them. And if the government can figure out what most parents do to cope with the stress, it can give intervention to assess these individuals who also need special care.
The government might also assist the professionals to form a helping partnership with parents to improve service delivery, assistance and the support given to parents especially to mothers. Helping these parents of children with special needs feel less isolated in their experience of raising their child.
By: Joselyn L. Gardoci | Teacher II | Bataan National High School
