Avoid the Guilt Trap

One of the common threads shared by parents of children with disabilities is the feeling of guilt for advocating for your child. Peter Atwood, a fellow advocate and education attorney for families said it well in the following:

“I guess another thing about the guilt trip is that human beings are not created for the convenience of school districts, nation, states, or other institutions whose only justification to exist is that they should serve the needs of human beings. And the various district people will not die, or even cease to get paid, if they have to break their heads over how to give your kid what is needed.

It is actually to the advantage of the state to do for your kid what is needed now anyway, rather then to be stuck with a non-functioning individual later at far greater expense.

And finally, if we sacrifice for one another, we're not doing anyone a big favor. We all need at various times to be cared for and rescued by others. No one has made it on his own. None of us could even find our own way to the breast when we came out of the belly. When we get help for our kids, those that help are doing no more than what they have needed or will some day need for themselves. We're not doing anyone a favor when we act with mercy, except ourselves, since what goes around comes around. We're just paying our insurance premiums.

Get over the guilt thing. As a parent of a child with a disability, there is ample opportunity to beat yourself up about SOOOOO many other things. Whether you are the best parent in the world or the worst, it is the district’s legally mandated responsibility to educate your child- not yours. Working with lots of kiddos in the foster care system, I have proven this over and over to district’s.”

If worse comes to worse, do an open records request of the Special Education Director and Superintendents salary, contracts and expenses as well as district legal fees, and when they remind you of how much they do for your son, remind them how much of yours and everyone else's taxes do for them.