Do you think life has been unfair and cruel to you? Do you feel that you were promised one thing and were given something totally different? Do you think your life has come to a standstill and there is no way out? or worse, if you’d ever be able to smile again? If you are thinking any of these things, please know that you are NOT ALONE!
Questions like “This was not meant to happen to me. what did i do to deserve this” are perfectly normal to arise in your mind.
The overwhelming emotions, the hurt, the anger and the pain, will not go away in a few days; it will stay and haunt you at all waking hours, but will eventually fade and become bearable. It is absolutely OK to cry your heart out for the loss of the child that you always wanted. You are not supposed to come to terms with this new situation before your heart does. But, take it from a fellow mother that YOU WILL! I never believed till it happened to me but, time is the greatest healer! You might not be able to believe it now and may feel like there is no way out and you are drowning in the sea of emotions and pain. But, this moment just like a ferocious storm will pass. Though you must live and feel these moments because a few years from now you’ll be recalling them for a fellow mother, just like I am doing today.
Let me tell you some facts before I go on. Your child will do EVERYTHING that a normal child would do, it’ll just happen at his own pace.
He might not become a rocket scientist, yet he’ll become a lot of things which you’ll be proud of. The times are changing and so is the attitude of people. For every person who’d look through your child pretending he is invisible, there will be many who’d stop and shake his hand. I have learnt from my experience that the more I treat my daughter like a ‘typical’ child, the more she is treated the same way by other people.
The help that we can get these days in terms of therapies, new researches, books, technology can make a remarkable difference in our children’s lives. My daughter can operate a laptop and an iPad independently. She goes to a mainstream school and last week read a simple book in front of her whole class. She has just turned 4.5! I would’ve never thought she was capable of any of this when I was at your place about 3.5 years ago, just after I got her diagnosis.Your trust and conviction in your child’s abilities will take her to new heights. You might think you are not ready for this but just the fact that you have this little life in your arms, means you are.
The last thing I would like to say is ‘TO HAVE A LIFE OF YOUR OWN’. Do something that makes you happy because a happy parent can make the whole family happy. The job that you’ve been given is going to be extremely demanding and most of the times exhausting, But if you have a set of friends that you can talk to, a hobby that you can get to, this journey would become easier and rewarding.
So if you think you’ve cried enough and now want to move on, welcome, we all are there to help you out. You’d have the unconditional support of thousands of mothers from all over the world. You’d be a part of the group so close that you’d not feel lost or alone again. So my dear fellow mother, gather yourself, look into your baby’s eyes, kiss her and be ready to take up the challenge. We all know you can and you will.
For more information…here are some common questions, you’d like to read about.
http://www.twominuteparenting.com/2013/07/09/the-baton-for-new-parents-of-children-with-down-syndrome/
For more information…here are some common questions, you’d like to read about.
http://www.twominuteparenting.com/2013/07/09/the-baton-for-new-parents-of-children-with-down-syndrome/
