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Claire Dees has spent two years teaching her son Blake to put on his shoes. Blake has autism. That means Claire spends far more time with him, than with her other children.
Since she was five, Blake’s 21-year-old sister Jennifer has lived with the outbursts and the chaos of an autistic brother. She says, “I remember Blake being very loud at night. He didn’t sleep at night so neither did the whole family.”
Blake once ripped apart his brother’s science project. Claire says, “We laughed about how most people say their dogs ate their homework. And you can just say, ‘My brother ate my homework!’”
Experts used to worry kids like Jennifer would suffer from stress and a lack of attention. Dr. Peggy Gallagher, an associate professor in special education says, “Actually what we are finding now over the past 10 years, 15 years of research is that there’s really some real benefits to having a child with disabilities in the family. The kids report that they are more compassionate, more caring.”
Experts say disabled kids can teach their siblings how to love someone who is different.
“They sometimes look funny, and they act funny, and they are a little funny in public, and it’s embarrassing. A kid can who can deal with that, maybe being embarrassed, might have a much easier time later on in life,” says family counselor Cheryl Rhodes.
Jennifer says, “Having lots of crises all the time…I don’t know it just makes you a more even person, more easy-going.”
Blake would yell and shriek, bang against the wall, and yet Jennifer and her brother fought against sending him away. Claire says, “We’ve had very rough times where we’ve said ‘We don’t know if we can keep him here anymore. This is really hard to do.’ And one of them would speak up and say, ‘Oh, no! We’ll help. We wouldn’t want him to ever have to go somewhere’”. |
