Special Needs Mom, How Are You Doing this Mother’s Day?
Special needs mom, how are you doing this Mother’s Day?
Has anyone ask you that question before? Has anyone acknowledged that your feelings may not match what cards and commercials make them out to be? Have you had the courage to acknowledge, even to yourself, the swirl of emotions that surround you as the second Sunday in May approaches?
Joy.
Loss.
Love.
Grief.
Wonder.
Fear.
Gratitude.
Guilt.
I felt all those emotions as Mother’s Day and our son’s first birthday arrived within weeks of one another in 1983. I was a wreck that May––exhausted, worried, depleted, and unable to think straight. Though our son is now an independent adult, those early emotions tend to resurface each May. As our son got older, I became wiser about how to acknowledge my feelings and celebrate being a mom without letting difficult emotions rule the day. I hope these 5 lessons help you do the same.
Lesson #1: Enjoy your Child
Your child is a wonder, perhaps not the wonder you expected, but wonderful all the same. Take a moment to enjoy who your child is––or who she was if she’s no longer physically present. What about her makes you laugh? How does she surprise you? Why is your world better because of her? What has she taught you about love? Let your answers increase your joy in the wonderful aspects of her life and lighten your heart.
Lesson #2: Make Room for Grief
The joy your child brings is real and so is your grief. This Mother’s Day weekend make room to acknowledge this emotion for what it is––the loss of many dreams. Dreams of what parenting would be like. Dreams of how your child’s development would progress. Dreams of celebrating milestones. Write your thoughts down. Tell God how much your heart hurts. Admit how hard your grief is to bear. God knows a thing or two about loss and heartache. Let him hold you as you grieve.
Lesson #3: Put on your Mama Bear
Not the kind of mama bear who destroys everything in her path to protect her child, but the kind who uses her strength to advocate for her child, her family, and herself. This can involve big things like advocating with doctors, therapists, schools, and churches regarding resources and accessibility needs. It can also mean being the mama bear who lets other people in by introducing herself and her child to other moms and kids at the park. By joining an online or in person support group for parents of kids with disabilities. By taking advantage of a neighbor’s offer to come over with coffee and cookies to get to know her and her child.
Lesson #4: Anticipate Adventures to Come
Thinking about the future was tough when my husband and I were busy keeping our son safe and alive. I wish I could go back to Mother’s Day 1983 and assure the woman I was then that the future held both struggles and adventures. I would want her to know that the adventures yet to come were rooted in the hard stuff our family was experiencing then. The same is true for you and your family. Since anticipation is part and parcel of future adventures, start dreaming about what’s yet to come now!
Lesson #5: Trust the God Who Is Both Parent and Child
You may not understand why God allowed your child’s disability and your parenting journey. God, however, fully understands why Mother’s Day is a mixture of joy and grief for you. He has been where you are. Cling to that truth even as you doubt his kindness and are angry with his ways. Cling to this promise that held me fast when I couldn’t hold onto him. I am praying it for you this Mother’s Day.
He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered him for us all,
how will he not also graciously give us all things?
Romans 8:32 (NAS)
Written by Jolene Philo
Jolene Philo is the author of several books for the caregiving community. She speaks at parenting and special needs conferences around the country. She’s also the creator and host of the Different Dream website. Sharing Love Abundantly With Special Needs Families: The 5 Love Languages® for Parents Raising Children with Disabilities, which she co-authored with Dr. Gary Chapman, was released in August of 2019 and is available at local bookstores, their bookstore website, and Amazon. See Jane Dance!, the third book in the West River cozy mystery series, which features characters affected by disability, was released in October of 2023. The audio version of Book 1, See Jane Run! See Jane Run!, was released in November of 2023.
5 Simple Activities To Talk About Big Feelings
I find myself reaching for creative ways to get the conversation going to help me to support my children through this time where I’m sure they’re wrestling with huge emotions – fear, disappointments, worry, uncertainty in all the changes, helplessness, out of control.
Written by Cathy Porter
Covid-19 has stirred up some big feelings. What is happening in our own communities and around the world is so very unexpected and unusual it is difficult to work through the emotions that have come along with all this change. Talking about feelings, naming them and acknowledging them together can be incredibly helpful at times like this. But where can we begin?
Knowing where something hurts, or what emotion is being felt doesn’t come instinctively to some members of my family and I find myself reaching for creative ways to get the conversation going to help me to support my children through this time where I’m sure they’re wrestling with huge emotions – fear, disappointments, worry, uncertainty in all the changes, helplessness, out of control. Talking together gives a chance to bring myself alongside and support more closely, and for us helps us to pray more specifically having talked about how we’re doing.
Here are 5 simple activities to help us talk about big feelings:
Out of control get a large piece of card or paper and draw a big circle in the middle. Using old magazines to tear out words and pictures, and pens to draw and write fill the circle with things you can control and outside the circle with things out of our control. Picking one of the things in our control that we could act on can even bring some relief to the big feelings.
Body mapping – make gingerbread cookies talking about what each part of your child’s body might be feeling like right now. While they’re cooking maybe draw round the cookie cutter and mark the parts of the body that feel different (like butterfly tummy, or aching head) and be detectives together to work out what emotion might be making our body feel that way.
Playdough faces – use Playdough to make faces with different expressions. Make one for how you are feeling today.
Color– Get out some paint and paint those feelings – what kind of character are they, what do they look like, what color are they?
·Charades– play emotion charades, taking turns to act out and guess emotions. Have a good laugh together and then chat about which one each of us have felt recently.
I hope these ideas are as useful to you as they have been to us. These are unsettling times for us and our children and anything that can help me to stay closely alongside, ready to help and support seems to be a worthwhile thing – I guess chatting with them about their big feelings is inside my circle of control!
Written by Cathy Porter
