Speaker 1Hello and welcome to the How Not To Screw Up Your Kids podcast, the bucket-emptying episodes. I'm your host, Dr Mary Han, psychologist and parenting expert. So, pour yourself a cuppa, find a comfy seat and enjoy the conversation. Today's bucket-emptying episode, I think, is a really important conversation that we ought to be having and I know that Cathy's going to do a fabulous job at answering this particular question. So, let me introduce Cathy Ray, journalist and author and mum of two disabled kids. Welcome, Cathy. Thank you.
Speaker 2Hi, pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1Amazing. Now, I've got the question for you in terms of this particular episode is, how do we empower young people to view their disability as part of who they are and not a
Speaker 2limiting factor? It's a really good question and it's something that I think about. I think about it so often because I have two disabled children. I'm disabled myself. My children are seven and ten. My ten-year-old in particular is of an age where, you know, I mean, all kids experience this. They just want to fit in. They don't want to stand out, you know, and as I said, all kids experience it, whether it's disability-related or related to their hairstyle or the latest gadget that kids have got or, you know, how long they're allowed to stay up before bed or how much screen time they get. They all want to fit in. Right? In some way or other. And there's, there are, even if you fix one thing, there's always going to be another thing that their friends are doing that they're not doing and they want to be able to fit in. And I kind of view disability as one of those things. Arguably slightly more important than screen time in terms of conversation. But yeah, like it's, it is one of those things and it's something that I think when I first started parenting, I was very keen to, you know, make sure that I was able to fit in. And I think that's something my kids really accepted and loved their disabled selves so that they would never feel like that. But as I've grown as a parent, I've come to realise and appreciate that life isn't always like that. And that actually, it's much more realistic to have a very up and down journey with your disabilities and with how you feel about them, especially as a child. And especially in that period of life where you're not, you don't feel confident to stand out. And so I think reducing the expectation, both on children and on adults, to teach them to be totally okay with themselves is, is important. My book, How to Be Disabled and Proud, I was very, very keen to have this subtitle, or at least kind of sort of okay with it, because I wanted to acknowledge that actually it's very, very, very hard to be proud of being disabled when you're a child. And that's okay, because I. Wouldn't expect anything less in a world that treats you so harshly. And so, and there's a bit in the book, actually, where I have my amazing illustrator, Jaleel Hudson, plotted like a graph. And I was like, this is how I feel about disability on any given day. And it goes up and down like this, right? Because maybe in the morning I've fallen over and I fall over more often because I'm physically disabled. And that's been really embarrassing. And I hurt my knee. And then in the afternoon, a little old lady patronised me, patronised me, patronised, patronised, I don't know. Anyway, whatever, patronised me. And then later on, some school kids laughed at me. And at each of those junctures, I felt a bit not very good about being disabled. But then at other points, I like connected with one of my disabled friends, and we had a really good giggle about something. Or, you know, I experienced like amazing. joy when I saw another disabled friend doing something that they really loved. Or I went swimming, and I absolutely love swimming as a disabled person, because it's such a freeing and like beautiful form of accessible sport for me. And so those kind of things make me feel great to be disabled, you know, and, and that can happen in any one given day. So I think, yeah, it's really, really hard, first of all, or impossible even to, for a disabled child to be frustrated. Yeah, it's really, really hard, first of all, or impossible even to, for a disabled child to be frustrated. be frustrated by being disabled and so as I said before you know we all want to fit in right and one of the things that disability can do is it can mean that we are limited in how we interact and join in with activities with other children so let's say for example when I was a kid I was terrible at football and that's because I can't run fast I've got very poor coordination and very poor balance and so I was very very bad at it and that used to really frustrate me and then and there are millions of other examples just like that for people of all different disabilities and I think we don't we don't want to have to do things differently but I think one really important thing that helped me and that now actually is really really helping my kids is connecting with other disabled children and doing these things with them as well because so often we are the only or one of just a couple disabled kids in a class and maybe maybe or physically disabled kids in a class maybe they're disabled in a different way to us and so we don't have this crossover and we're the only kid that is bad at football and that feels rubbish and we just wish that we could play football with somebody else who was on a level playing field and being able to connect with disabled sports groups and disabled activity groups and disabled social groups is so so important and so key not only for being able to interact with people that have a range of disabilities but also just for feeling like we can be part of something in more of an equal kind of way I think that's really really key and I think it's really helped me and it's really helped my kids to appreciate that they are actually really really good at something and I think that's really really key and I think it's really really good at loads of things it's just that they are comparing themselves to unrealistic standards for who they are I think we have a very narrow view of what the being the best actually is capitalism kind of teaches us that achieving well and being healthy is the epitome of being a successful person and this is then reflected down through the education system as well and we only have to look at a school's time schedule to discover the number of competitive sports or achievements or activities a child of the month a kid of the week who got 100 in their spelling test it's just endless kids are constantly being pushed to be the best they can be but as I said we have a very narrow view of what the best actually is and very few people are actually are that and so I think if we taught children to value and if we ourselves as adult worked on valuing people's achievements and contributions regardless of the fact that we were the best in the world we would be a lot less pressure and a lot less grace and a lot more celebration and yeah and the other thing I just want to say is for this give them my book disabled kids need to read how to be disabled and proud so that they can learn to feel more comfortable in who they are and yeah and that they're not broken or even limited I kind of reject the word limited in a way because we're all limited in some ways actually and we just yeah we're all limited in some ways and we can all do other amazing things so you just have to figure out you just take it might take a bit longer to figure out what your amazing things are
Speaker 1yeah and I think what what's important that I would add to that as well that you've sort of touched on is that fundamentally that when we're talking about disability we're not just talking about the obvious fit in it when we're looking at physical disability that it is actually it's the seen and the unseen and as you kind of rightly picked up with your with your ten-year-old there is so much pressure and so much desire within our young people to fit in to be like others to see others reflect to see themselves reflected amongst the people that they are that they are with and actually I would almost argue that your book is a book that every child should be reading every child because actually we all experience as you've sort of rightly said on the previous podcast episode is that we all experience a period of disability whether it's we've got the the usual autumn you know vomiting virus and we're you know we have a disability in that we can't take care of ourselves we can't eat and other things we all experience it and actually I think reading the book every child reading that book and working through it I think would do a lot to allay these this notion of I'm just not as good as x or y at a b c or d
Speaker 2yeah exactly I think also we have to look as adults and as caregivers and parents we really have to kind of examine why we want our children to do well or to be the best or to be you know or to keep achieving keep pushing up keep pushing up like what what is what is that in our in ourselves why do we feel a little bit disappointed when they're not doing that well in school or when they come last in the race or when they're not doing that well in school or when they come last in the race or when they come last in the x y and z you know and quite often we project a lot of you know maybe unhealed childhood trauma and things like that onto our kids and we want our kids to be better versions of us but our kids are not are not there just to you know fulfill that to to heal us right they're not there to heal us and I think that's kind of worth kind of reflecting on as well that's something I always struggle with as a parent you know I I think it's natural to want your children to not to experience any hardships you have faced and one way we try and deal with that is to try and make them better than us so that they don't experience those hardships but what we actually should be doing is trying to remove those hardships in the first place and and
Speaker 1I think you you raise this really important point about expectations and reducing our expectations in you know in terms of any aspect in terms of our expectations of who they will become as a result of the challenges that we faced or who they will become as a result of the resources that we have available for them and in terms of reducing the burden that they're going to have on themselves and I think that's something that I think we're not going to experience this constant up-and-down feeling about themselves and it you know rather than us expecting them to feel great all the way through it's about managing our own expectations in the same way I think we forget as parents that we also
Speaker 2experience ups and downs in terms of how we feel yeah it's it's that's normal that's what life is right it's what life is and I think we know and that it's okay it's okay not to feel okay and it's okay to feel okay um yeah
Speaker 1and it's normal they're not the only one experiencing this step that these absolutely
Speaker 2and again it's not exclusive to disabled children you know all children experience those
Speaker 1feelings oh Kathy thank you so much yet again for an incredible episode we will be sharing the links to Kathy's book in the show notes so do go out and get that one I think it's a really great read for all children um so I would highly recommend it I am very fortunate enough to have my very own copy and I think it would be really good and worthwhile for you to do the same so as ever if you have enjoyed this episode I would be eternally grateful if you could rate follow and review this podcast so that others can find us and we can spread the love so until next time you
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