Pulling off positive parenting

Embarking on parenthood, as a disabled person, raises for some, questions of feasibility, even morality. We may lack the constant reassurance most new parents get, that parenting is possible, if tough. As her daughters reach the venerable ages of nearly-three, and five, Amie Slavin finds herself wondering if society has got such matters inside out

It’s one thing exercising one’s right to be a parent, but the bottom line is that every child deserves effective parenting. My kids will only have one mum.

By default, the world worries about the things we cannot do. But the world doesn’t know the half of it. Having a disabled parent might actually be an advantage sometimes.

We recently attended a party with a buffet meal; never the easiest means of sustenance for someone with a visual impairment. (It might look like a lovely big bowl of salad to you, but to me it’s just a big bowl, and perplexity as to whether it might contain kettle chips or vichyssoise). The solution is to seek help, or hang back and hope that help will be offered. All very well, if you don’t have a voluble toddler, clamped to your upper arm, vociferously stating its non-negotiable demand for a specific food, at the double.

My toddler did exactly this, clambering onto my knee and declaring “I want an apple!”. Leaving aside the impulse to remind her what “I want” gets, I wondered whether she’d seen a bowl of apples somewhere, or whether this was a conceptual desire. The matter was soon resolved. She turned to the person on my left, repeating herself, in businesslike tones.

She has learned, not only the negative, that I am unlikely to sprint round the furniture and guests to nimbly reach some precariously balanced fruit, but the positive: I am her security and protection, and when she is beside me she has the confidence to state her needs, clearly, to someone she might otherwise be painfully shy of.

My older daughter, meanwhile, headed for the kitchen and, cutting out the “middle-mum”, was able to enquire confidently, “please may I have a drink of water?”

In public I sometimes have to lead from behind, in a way that most parents don’t. My disability makes it imperative that I give my kids the confidence and skills to succeed at social interaction on their own account, whilst maintaining their security and safety.

It’s also possible for them to have fun, learning stuff, whilst just happening to be helpful. We do sums together: I enter my guide dog’s pooing-place, armed with bags, and my kids gleefully watch, from a judicious distance, eager to count the “turd total”. I duly collect a small haul, and we calculate how many remain. We continue, in mathematical good humour, until the dog-loo is once more pristine and the kids are thrilled to the core by my disgust with the operation.

You see: it ain’t just what you got; it’s most definitely what you do with it.