Parents’ Personal Rights

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Besides the legal rights outlined in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), parents have the right to be parents and to approach the early intervention process differently than professionals do. To encourage families to develop self-advocacy and take control of their lives, professionals must acknowledge that parents have the following personal rights (Ferrell, 1985).

The Right to Feel Angry

Little in life prepares someone for parenting a child with special needs. The anger parents feel often comes from not being able to control, or change, the situation. Professionals can help parents manage their anger by getting them involved with the intervention/teaching process or by systematically directing the anger toward securing what they consider the best services for their child (Raver & Kilgo, 1991).

The Right to Seek Another Opinion

It is considered good practice to seek a second opinion with major medical decisions. Parents may choose to exercise that prerogative if they do not like a diagnosis or intervention plan. It is unwise for professionals to take this search for information personally. The process of searching for answers can afford parents a small sense of control over their lives, can allow them to learn more about their child’s condition or needs, and may facilitate adaptation and empowerment in the long term.

The Right to Stop Trying

Parents must learn to protect their time and energy for the sake of their family. Even though from a professional’s point of view, a suggested activity may take only ten minutes a day and be easily incorporated into the family’s daily routines, for some exhausted parents, it may still be impossible some days. Professionals must respect parents’ right to decide how time with their family will be used. Parents are attempting to balance their attention among all members of their family, not just their child with a disability/developmental delay. Fortunately, after some time off, many parents find new energy to return to the tasks that were postponed.

The Right to Be Annoyed with Their Child

No quality relationship is without its difficult times. The parents of a child with special needs may feel guilty for feeling disappointed or irritated with their child. To manage stress for long periods of time, parents need to be able to express their feelings and understand that their feelings toward their child will not always be all good, or all bad. Their child is a child first and a child with a disability/developmental delay second. All children can be annoying sometimes.

The Right to Be a Parent

It is unrealistic to expect parents to support their child’s development all the time. Families need time to relax, to play without a goal, and to simply enjoy one another’s company. Some activities that professionals suggest may not be natural for parents and may make them feel more like teachers than parents. Openly communicating to parents that having “up” and “down” days is all part of the adaptation process may help parents better understand the ebbs in their energy.

Early childhood special educators are treated with respect and dignity; parents deserve nothing less. Few say that parenting is easy, but most would agree that the majority of parents do the best job they can with the circumstances they face at any given moment. The efforts necessary to maintain family life can be overwhelming. Some parents become overstressed. A mother of a toddler with a disability had this to say:

Sometimes I feel I can’t go on. [begins to cry softly] I am so tired and so sick of being pleasant and brave. Sometimes I just want to lock myself in my room and send everyone away—my husband, the kids, the therapists, and all those doctors we see every year, even when we don’t want to. I want sympathy...and I get mad when I get it. I really want Stephanie to be normal. Who is going to do that for me?