The Catholic Writers Guild

You have gotten over the shock of the news that your child is not normal. They have a developmental disability. They are not hitting the milestones at the predetermined time frames. The experts advise therapies, which is not a bad idea. The voice inside your head mutters and sometimes screams dire predictions about the future. At times you lie in bed at night and fearful thoughts assault you.

These reactions are normal, but you must remember one fact that is one hundred percent true — no one knows the future.

How often have you fretted about a potential problem that never materialized? Yes, the stakes are higher — we’re talking about your child’s life here — but those fears you are having are just that, fears, and there is no guarantee the bad events will happen.

The best thing you can do for your child is to give them every opportunity to learn and develop skills for life. Many parents of normal kids neglect this, as witnessed by how many young adults can’t cook, do laundry, or schedule appointments for themselves.

Begin very early. Start with having your child help pick up their toys. Make a game out of it. Have them put their clothes in the laundry hamper and help load the washer. Even if they have no arms, have them use their feet. Have them carry their dish to the sink and either wash it or put it in the dishwasher.

Do you garden? Spend time with your child and have them help you. Have them use a broom, a mop, even a vacuum cleaner. Have them help make dinner. Teach them to safely use a sharp knife, cook on the stove, put groceries away.

Praise and thank them for their efforts and gently correct their mistakes. Be consistent. Don’t look at these activities as chores but rather, first, you’re spending time together, hopefully making some good memories. Second, each task requires multiple successful actions that can later be adapted to other tasks. If a professional were doing this, they would call it Physical and Occupational Therapy and charge big bucks!

Does your child have any persistent, overriding behaviors? For example, do they insist on arranging or aligning objects up in a pattern? Do they exhibit compulsive behaviors? These can be channeled.

In my professional work, there was a woman who exhibited extreme compulsive behavior. It overwhelmed her day to the point that she could not participate in the workshop she had been enrolled in. Something had to change.

Our team decided to think outside the box. Instead of insisting that she remain at a workstation and do the repetitive task she was given, her job assignment was changed to that of a housekeeper. Over a period of time, she was introduced to how the chairs were arranged around the table, where the centerpiece was placed, how the trash was emptied into the outside dumpster, how the table was set for meals, and many other domestic tasks. She was also assigned a specific break time for lunch and morning and afternoon breaks. Over a period of two years, her compulsive behavior was channeled into productive work. She earned a paycheck that she learned to cash and then go shopping with. Her shopping became part of her regimen and part of her social interaction with others.

It wasn’t easy at all, and there were craters in the road as opposed to bumps, but patience and persistence won the day.

Another woman had a different problem: she kept her fingers closed in a fist all the time. This caused her hand to sweat, and the constant moisture caused the skin to break down. To keep her fingers open, she was prescribed hand braces, which she barely tolerated. She was severely mentally impaired and functioned at about the six-month level on most activities.

A staff person noticed she enjoyed touching the keys on a keyboard. She would actually extend her fingers, opening her fist to do it. This was reported to the therapist who was in charge of applying her hand brace. One day, instead of putting on the brace, the therapist placed her in front of a keyboard. For a full hour, the same time she was to wear the brace, she kept her fingers extended and happily played the keyboard. After discussion, a music therapy program was devised in which a keyboard replaced the need to use a brace. In addition, other staffers reported that she loved to visit the spa where staff did her hair and her nails. She kept her fingers open while they painted and trimmed her nails.

I hope you can see that everyday activities can offer a multitude of opportunities to teach skills and solve challenges you may encounter with your child. For my own kids, reading was a challenge. Like many children, they were attracted to video games. Many of the games have on-screen text that must be read to play the game. Learning to read from a book bored them, but they were motivated by the game to read and sound out the difficult words.

Meet them where they are, and use the talents, interests, and challenges they have to develop real-life skills.

Never give up. Learning should be lifelong for all of us.

God bless!