Class 1

How do parents and siblings respond to the presence of a child with disabilities in the family?

This question hits close to home with my family, on both sides. My dad’s side had only one thing to do at the time and on my mom’s side they had many option and choose the wrong approach.
My dad’s side of the family there were 4 kids my dad the youngest and 3 sisters. The second youngest was my aunt Marcia; she was born a downs baby. In the 50’s the norm was to institutionalize the “handicap” children. So my aunt was put in to a home and my grandparents visited her and my dad on the other hand never knew about her until he was older. My aunts were close with Aunt Marcia and took her out and made her feel like a “normal” person. I meet Aunt Marcia once, we as a family took her to pizza hut when I was about 13 that’s my only memory with her, and she later died in 2005.
On my mom’s side there are 3 daughters, the youngest is Aunt Barbra who has epilepsy. As a child she was treated special, to the point that she can’t function for herself. Personally I believe she could if she wanted to but she has never had to do anything herself. She now is 40 lives at home with my grandparents and hasn’t had an episode in over 20 years, but her speech is impaired and she thinks like a 16 yr old. She has no life and sits in front of the TV all day long and as a very poor diet. She demands my grandma do things for her and even cleans her room. My aunt comes off as a nasty person but she is just spoiled because she has a disability. My mom, my sister and I often go over to hang out with her and take her out shopping or lunch to get her out but use her disability to get things.
Both sides are extreme opposites I feel that families should include the member with the disability but not help them to the point they can no longer do for themselves. For a family with a disability there has to be a middle ground where the disability is recognized but not ignored.


What is the ecological approach?

The Ecological approach is where we see the child with exceptionalities in complex interaction with many environmental forces. (Kirk et.al 2009)
This approach is when not only is the exceptional child taken in to consideration but also the way the community, or the family but also the environment.