Thursday, January 7, 2010

Sometimes I wonder

There are days where I wonder if I'm missing something because I'm on a different path. Being a parent of a special needs child really does make me a special needs parent.

Last night I watched the video of the Christmas play that Amanda was in last month. The school does a nice job of recording the production so the parents can actually watch, and not play cinematographer.

On stage were more than 100 kids who were reciting lines, singing and dancing. Amanda moved and danced some, didn't really try to sing, and mostly just had googlie eyes for the boy next to her. It was easy to see that Amanda was different than the rest of the kids. There is nothing wrong with being different, in fact she was the cutest one on the stage. But it did leave me wondering about the parents of the other kids.

Did these parents listen to there kids singing the same songs over and over again for weeks? Did they have to work the play into the rest of the family schedule because their other kids were doing other events?

We just have Amanda, so our world is isolated by her needs, abilities, and limitations, and while I don't begrudge her or anyone else these circumstances, I do wonder what it would be like to have baseball practice or scout meetings, camp outs and ski vacations where I had to work to keep up with a child instead of providing so much of her mobility.

Again, I'm not sad, just sometimes I wonder.

1 comment:

Azaera said...

Though Skyler isn't very old I kind of wonder the same thing from time to time. I am always stricken when babies make eye contact with me from across a room. For some reason it freaks me out, as though I forget that "normal" babies can see so far away because Skyler has become my normal. I often forget that he is in fact different.