10 Tips for Parenting a Child with Special Needs
Written by: Kim Garvey Hoehne, MA, BCBA 1 Understand that there is no such thing as a perfect parent. At the end of some days(notice the plural), you will feel like you made all the wrong decisions, feel guilt for giving in to stop the tantrum, etc., and that is OK. What is important is that when you go to bed for the night, forgive yourself and try again tomorrow. Your child needs you to forgive yourself so you can stay strong for them. 2 Foster and encourage your child’s independence at every level. Kids with special needs often take longer to learn independence, leisure, and daily living skills. Many parents feel they need to do everything for their child since they have special needs; but if you don’t teach them to do it for themselves, who will? 3 Communicate, Communicate, Communicate…. It is vital that everyone working, educating and parenting/caring for your child all be on the same page when it comes to teaching new skills and decreasing unwanted behaviors. One suggestion is to start a yahoo newsgroup for all your child’s therapeutic team, school team and family/caregiver members. This will help keep everyone on the same page and communicating regularly. 4 Use visual supports and/or choices to help support language comprehension as well as transition difficulties. Visual supports will vary depending on the level of your child and can vary from hand drawn pictures to words or sentences. Having a visual to support the difficulty with your child’s understanding of language will help keep them calm as well as help them learn to pair what you are saying with what they are seeing – a very therapeutic opportunity. 5 Catch ‘em being good! If you want more good behavior and less bad behavior, then give them praise and attention while they are engaging in desired behavior. Also use the ratio of 1:4; for every one time you attend to your child for an undesired behavior, look for four other opportunities to praise and provide attention for positive, good behavior. Try it!! 6 Stop asking your child soooo many questions – yes, really!! When parents are trying to teach their child to talk more, many will rapidly fire a bunch of questions while engaging in activities like reading a book, driving in the car, etc. Instead of asking your child a question, make a comment without requiring a response. Soon enough, your child will begin commenting back and you will see an increase in spontaneous language. 7 You know your child best! If something doesn’t feel right, go with your gut. Just because you are working with educators, therapists, doctors, etc., doesn’t mean they have all the right answers. If you don’t feel there is a good connection between a professional and your child, do something about it. You should NEVER feel or be told that there is nothing else that can be done with your child’s slow or lack of progress. 8 Don’t take anything for granted! What one child may learn in 1 week or month may take another 6 months to a year. Celebrate small successes. Parenting a child with special needs is like running a marathon in baby steps. Keep your eye on the finish line; just accept that it is going to take you longer to get there. 9 Seek help through books and classes with your parenting skills. Parenting, itself, is difficult; parenting a child with special needs is even more difficult. Parents who are confident with their child, and with their parenting, will be better equipped and empowered to handle any situation that may arise. 10 Learn about your child’s strengths and weaknesses, learn about the core deficits that your child has that warranted a ‘special needs’ label and learn about child development. Why? Some problematic behaviors are common during certain years (e.g., temper tantrums are common for children ages 2 to 4). If your 5 year old is developing around a 3 year old, then you should expect to see the ‘common tantrum’, if your child is 15 and is developing around an 8 or 10 year old, you shouldn’t expect to see the ‘common tantrum’ and thus, the behavioral problem would warrant different intervention recommendations.
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