Once my daughter began crawling, it was obvious that she wanted to be around her brother?the more he laughed at her antics, the happier she became. Such joy was reassuring because I had cautiously waited four years to bring another child into the family.
Our son has cerebral palsy, which, for him, means he needs a lot of accessibility support; he uses a manual wheelchair and also needs help communicating. Because of that, our daughter needs extra support, too.
Like other typically developing siblings of a child with a special need or disability, my daughter is unavoidably implicated in the complications of her family?s life. She?s spent long periods of time tagging along at medical and therapy appointments, she?s had to entertain herself when our attention is needed elsewhere, she?s inadvertently become a caregiver, and, already at the age of seven, she?s affected by the hushed, worried conversations she overhears between her dad and I. Balancing the needs of both kids is like a game of tug-of-war, says Meghan Toswell, a social worker at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital in Toronto who has a sister with a disability. ?There?s one child on each end, going back and forth; that push and pull causes resentment,? she says. ?One sibling is getting more time with a parent and the other gets pulled along.?
The Effects on Siblings
One of the biggest struggles for kids with siblings who have a special need or disability is that they worry. ?Parents often wonder how much ...