Opinion Shifts and Social Barriers
I read an article by the younger brother of a man, Chad, who has isodicentric chromosome 15. It's no longer available on the internet, but I have a printout. Towards the end he says that despite how wonderful Chad is and how much of that is because he's disabled, he'd never wish Chad's condition on another person.
This reminds me of my opinion on PKU. As I learnt more about untreated PKU, I realized just how valuable these people are. But still I didn't think people should feed PKU babies phenylalanine. I have since asked myself why, and now I am 'pro-choice' on the matter. I want people to be able to choose freely whether to give their PKU baby phenylalanine, instead of the automatic and societally enforced choice being 'no'.
While volunteering with autistic kids, I met a number of parents who seemed to instinctively view their child(ren) as fundamentally different and valuable in a unique way, while still saying that autistic kids should be cured and not thinking of it as destroying who their children were.
It seems to me that oftentimes, people who, through no choice of their own, ended up with a disabled family member reach some degree of acceptance (which is necessary for them to ever be happy again) but they stop at the point where fundamental assumptions would be challenged. They accept that their relative with an incurable disability is valuable and that the disability has benefits and isn't all bad, but don't challenge the idea that disabled people should be prevented.
The medical literature says that parents of disabled people have 'chronic sorrow', so that while they can reach some degree of acceptance of the disability, they are never able to completely move on because their child is a living reminder of their grief. Birthdays, seeing a normal child that reminds them of how their child might have been, all sorts of things open up the mourning again. It's like a wound that closes over but never heals.
However, I doubt the anti-cure parents of autistics, such as Kathleen Seidel, feel 'chronic sorrow' about their children being autistic. And I know for a fact that many Deaf people with Deaf children don't feel any grief at all about their children being deaf - in fact some mourn having a hearing child. It seems to me that 'chronic sorrow' only occurs if you have not completely accepted the disability, but simply found a way to live with something you still consider a bad thing. If you let go completely of your longing for a normal child, or never have that longing in the first place, you will not have chronic sorrow. Chronic sorrow occurs when you are living a situation that society's assumptions considers intolerable and you have found a way to cope while still accepting society's assumptions.
Ettina
This reminds me of my opinion on PKU. As I learnt more about untreated PKU, I realized just how valuable these people are. But still I didn't think people should feed PKU babies phenylalanine. I have since asked myself why, and now I am 'pro-choice' on the matter. I want people to be able to choose freely whether to give their PKU baby phenylalanine, instead of the automatic and societally enforced choice being 'no'.
While volunteering with autistic kids, I met a number of parents who seemed to instinctively view their child(ren) as fundamentally different and valuable in a unique way, while still saying that autistic kids should be cured and not thinking of it as destroying who their children were.
It seems to me that oftentimes, people who, through no choice of their own, ended up with a disabled family member reach some degree of acceptance (which is necessary for them to ever be happy again) but they stop at the point where fundamental assumptions would be challenged. They accept that their relative with an incurable disability is valuable and that the disability has benefits and isn't all bad, but don't challenge the idea that disabled people should be prevented.
The medical literature says that parents of disabled people have 'chronic sorrow', so that while they can reach some degree of acceptance of the disability, they are never able to completely move on because their child is a living reminder of their grief. Birthdays, seeing a normal child that reminds them of how their child might have been, all sorts of things open up the mourning again. It's like a wound that closes over but never heals.
However, I doubt the anti-cure parents of autistics, such as Kathleen Seidel, feel 'chronic sorrow' about their children being autistic. And I know for a fact that many Deaf people with Deaf children don't feel any grief at all about their children being deaf - in fact some mourn having a hearing child. It seems to me that 'chronic sorrow' only occurs if you have not completely accepted the disability, but simply found a way to live with something you still consider a bad thing. If you let go completely of your longing for a normal child, or never have that longing in the first place, you will not have chronic sorrow. Chronic sorrow occurs when you are living a situation that society's assumptions considers intolerable and you have found a way to cope while still accepting society's assumptions.
Ettina
Labels: assumptions, autism, deafness, disabled parents, idic15, normal parents, parent allies, PKU, volunteering
posted by Ettina at 11:05 AM
1 Comments:
You know it is strange... I have a disability that left me partially paralyzed in my legs since birth, and I find myself in the "parental" role because now that I see my friends dating, getting married and having kids and leading these lives that are so foreign to me, I am the one mourning the life I'll never get to have.
And I don't know how it will ever be different.
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