Cerebral Palsy Alliance

Archive for October, 2008

Holidays

Holidays … do you get them? If you do, where do you go? Does it stress you out to see your child frustrated because, when you get to your destination, you find that the facility is not disability friendly? Stress levels go up, everyone becomes tense and frustrated, and you start asking yourself, Why did we do this?

I don’t know if this happens to anyone else, but this is what happened to us on our first holiday as a family. Daniel and William were about six and four and we had a great idea to get away to a hotel somewhere that had some nice facilities and that we could all enjoy, so we took off to Port Stephens for 10 days …

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Siblings of children with a disability

Family with sibling feeling left out

Brothers and sisters of children with a disability have it tough.

As they grow up, not only do they have to learn about their world, they have to come to terms with why their sibling is getting most of the attention from mum and dad.

Have you ever thought of the logic they are using to understand what is going on?

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Tormented from Trying

It’s funny how the sole purpose of a memory is to serve as a reminder to trust your instincts in the future … When Daniel was about 3 we were advised that his hips would develop incorrectly if we didn’t put him in a plaster cast from his hips to his ankles for 6 weeks.

Imagine putting both of your child’s legs into a position similar to that of a wishbone of a chicken, and then cementing them into a plaster cast for 6 weeks. It sounds almost barbaric, and even still we went ahead with it.

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Think Outside the Dots

Have you ever been told by professionals, don’t do this, don’t do that and you should do this because … but in your heart you really thought to yourself, That doesn’t sit right with me, or your gut is saying, that doesn’t feel right.

Have you ever put your child in one of those baby jumpers? Those things that you hook up in a door frame which suspends the baby on two bungee chords so that the child can just touch the floor and bounce up and down by using their own legs? I’ve seen babies faces come alive when they experience this for the first time.

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