Children With Special Needs Don’t Need Compassion
Children with special needs do not need compassion, but certainly other attitudes: naturalness, affection and understanding. Nobody likes to be looked at with compassion.
A compassionate gaze can hide the best intention in the world, but it can also stigmatize and underestimate the person in front of you. When they look at us with compassion for a physical defect, for our financial situation or for having made a mistake, we feel even worse and think “what did I do wrong to deserve all this punishment?”.
The child and his family experience an infinite number of stressful situations that can be mitigated if there is quality social support, in which they feel protected and understood. We will now talk to you about some of the situations that certain parents and their children face, so that you can develop an appropriate empathic attitude towards them.
A difficult diagnosis
Pregnancy for every woman is a reason for happiness and all mothers and fathers want things to go well, that their child is born healthy in order to face the demands of an increasingly demanding world.
Some tests done during pregnancy can detect the presence of genetic problems, consequences of teratogenesis and other incurable diseases affecting the fetus. Parents will have to face the situation and decide whether or not to proceed with the pregnancy, based on their way of thinking and their personal values that we will not pause to describe.
That is to say, many mothers and fathers are diagnosed with the diagnosis already during pregnancy. In other cases, the diagnosis will be made at birth and it may be that the baby is having difficulties as he begins to grow. In any case, it is always a difficult, complicated and emotionally impactful diagnosis.
It is in that moment that the woman, alone or with her partner, understands that motherhood will be different, not better or worse, simply different… and it is a fundamental moment to face the situation to follow. The information must be true, concise and must be transmitted with delicacy and understanding.
Coping with the diagnosis
The time comes to select the correct information, to think of an action program to take better care of the child, to love each other psychologically and to understand that it is about raising a child, knowing, however, that there is something stranger.
Little by little, by accepting the diagnosis, the parents will dedicate themselves to the child with all their strength and hope in order to guarantee him everything he needs. Rehabilitation sessions, a space for the child and, above all, the affection that all children need.
A special child is with us
Children with special needs have a lot to teach. They are champions who fight to be able to overcome very slowly all the difficulties they have to face and they always do it without complaining, with a smile.
Sometimes their feelings are so intense that they give chills, but you have to give an image of positivity, make them understand that they have support in the challenges of everyday life.
Children with special needs open their hearts to you and keep nothing for themselves. They are pure feeling in a body that perhaps does not respond to them. They are grateful, tremendously affectionate, they judge with the eyes of love and their silence is not uncomfortable. It is the silence of calm and reflection.
Many times they need more hospitals and rehabilitation centers in a few months than we need in a lifetime. They don’t deserve a look of compassion, because they have nothing to be pitied for. They give us a lesson in struggle and life at any time. Pure and beautiful, undoubtedly healing.
Integration with peers and society
Depending on the problem, these children have fewer or more difficulties in adapting to the environment in which they live. Unfortunately, people who “a priori” have no intellectual disabilities behave towards these children by showing hatred, compassionate looks and sorrow for what they face.
Moreover, they allow themselves to make even more negative comments: “Poor thing, I feel sorry for you”, “This thing has happened to you and it is not right”, “God knows why He does things”. The ignorance that people of this kind transmit must hurt.
These people must be removed from the life of the child and the parents, they must be ignored as they deserve. Most people are good, polite and respectful towards these situations, so don’t give too much importance to those who don’t deserve it.
People who care about the baby need the situation to be addressed naturally, as a developmental problem that can be kept under control with the help of the best professionals and all those who love to see the baby smile like nothing else in life. .
We must fight for all children to integrate and get along well in the park, at school, in any place, eliminating any architectural barrier. Because a little justice and a loving environment can work wonders for children and keep them happy most of the day.
Family, companions, professionals and friends ask for nothing more … if a child is happy in any circumstance, what more could he ask for?
Images courtesy of Analía Heredia.
