Here is a letter written by the mom of a young man with a disability to the family who provides shared-parenting for him.
Autumn, 2003
From one Mom to another Mom,
I have just been given a really
unbelievable gift and I wanted to share it with
you because I knew you would understand.
Moms have a special relationship
with each of their children. We "know" everything
about our children. Each child is unique and cannot
be replaced. From the moment we feel that first
kick we are bonded in a way that can never be
broken. The love we feel covers each freckle,
each strand of hair, and each bruised knee. We
experience the joy of watching our children laugh
and grow. We also cry out in pain and anger when
they are sick or are suffering. Our tears fall
on the child who is sick. When a mom sees her
child suffering, she feels the pain strike deep
within her own heart and sometimes she feels helpless
to heal the suffering.
I, too, have shed many tears over
my son, Scott. He is a wonderful young man who
has his father's sense of humor and gentleness.
He has the gift of creating things out of wood
- he is a carpenter. However, he has also experienced
more than his share of suffering during his 31
years of life. As his mom, I have watched Scott
suffer with intractable epilepsy, mental retardation
and psychosis. I cannot possibly count the number
of times he has fallen with a seizure or experienced
a horrible side effect from a medication. We have
followed the advice of physicians from five major
medical centers. He is on multiple medications,
has had a corpus colostomy, and he also has a
vegus nerve stimulator. Yet with all of this,
he is becoming more medically complex, has seizures
on a weekly basis and his psychosis robs him of
engaging in the most simple pleasures of life
that all of us take for granted.
Over the years, Scott was institutionalized
for three years, and he has lived in shift staff
group homes for the past fourteen years. I wanted
him to live in the community, but experience with
shift staff settings convinced me that what he
really needed was another "mom" who would know
him, care for him and empower him like moms do!
I needed to know that his care would be consistent
and that one person would be accountable for the
quality of care he received. I knew in my heart
that such people existed and I watched as others
were matched with a new family, but I really had
almost given up hope that it would ever happen
for my son. I even had a psychologist tell me
this summer that I needed to give up on the idea
because Scott's behaviors were so difficult and
his care so complex that no one would ever accept
him.
Well, that man was wrong!!!! Right
after that meeting with the psychologist, I was
introduced to a "mom" and her name is Rosa Linda.
She wanted to do foster care because, after many
years of working in institutions with shift staff
settings, she was frustrated over the quality
of care individuals were receiving. Rosa Linda
and her family have accepted Scott into their
home and love him. She and I coordinate his care,
laugh about his habits, and go to doctor visits
together. She advocates for Scott. An example
is when Via Trans made his trip too long between
his day program and her home, she called and made
a new schedule. This means that for the first
time in 30 years, I am not the only one who is
trying to make the system work. She calls me when
she sees Scott trembling with a seizure in his
sleep (something we moms see). She calls me when
he has a behavior that is unacceptable and we
determine how to proceed. She is empowering him
to do new things, and when he comes home on weekends
he is calmer. He loves the dogs and birds at "the
other house." On a recent Sunday afternoon, he
asked, "When can I go back?"!!!!
So
now you know, the gift is "shared parenting."
My heart is overflowing with gratitude for this
gift of love. Yes, Rosa Linda is being paid to
do a job as a foster mom, but it is how she does
it that is the gift to us. She sees as only a
mom can see what this person needs. She loves
and values Scott and wants him to be all that
he can be.
My dream and expectation is that
for any mom who needs one, each can find a foster
mom like Rosa Linda for their most precious child.
Liz Newhouse
EveryChild, Inc., Board Chair
