How to Help Your Child Understand Their Disability

Children all over the world live and thrive with disabilities, yet face daily prejudice and inequalities that go unaddressed. They’re also more vulnerable to bullying in school. All too often, these challenges extend into adulthood—85 percent of adults with developmental disabilities are either unemployed or underemployed. Though a seemingly intimidating conversation, it is important for parents to teach their children with a disability how to love themselves in a world that literally at every turn–tells them the opposite.

My daughter, Callie has a lower limb amputation and walks with the help of a prosthetic leg—a disability that puts her at risk of high unemployment when she becomes an adult. She is also the inspiration for The Princess & The Prosthetic—a brand I founded dedicated to inspiring others to embrace their own perfectly imperfect fairytale. A key aspiration of our brand is to advocate for people with disabilities and to empower everyone—regardless of ability—to love, accept, and embrace who they are, just as they are.

I wanted to share some ways parents can empower their children with disabilities to do just that.

Walk the walk

As a parent, you have an opportunity each and every day to model self-love and acceptance for your child, but you can’t do that unless you first love and accept yourself. And yeah, I know, that’s easier said than done. As a parent that has Type One Diabetes, it doesn’t do my daughter any good if I go around spouting negative talk about my own disease. I have to show her how I embrace it, how I navigate life with all of the nuances of the disease, and how it’s a part of my story but not my entire story.

We all have insecurities and odd little things we wish we could improve about ourselves and our lives. But focusing on all you have—all the beautiful blessings of your life—versus what you don’t have, can help you find joy and gratitude for all you are. And that speaks volumes for your disabled child.

Accept your child just as they are

As parents, we all have dreams for our children’s future. And it can be challenging to realize that some of those dreams may look different or may never come to be because of our child’s abilities. I struggled with this for years. I grieved for the life I thought Callie should have and it wrecked me to my core. Eventually, I had to realize that I was mourning a version of our lives that I had made up in my head and that I had our very real life in front of me to deal with. We had to figure out a way to help Callie not only navigate this life, but THRIVE in this life.

Once I gained this realization, my focus flipped to empowering my daughter with the skills she needs to successfully navigate her disability and make the most of her strengths like giving her physical and occupational therapies, doing therapeutic horse-back riding lessons to strengthen her core, and signing her up for archery in a league with other kids with disabilities. All of these activities helped to make her stronger, build her self-esteem, and create relationships with people just like her. Callie and I had to learn how to accept our challenges, navigate life with them, and make the best of our lives where we were and with what we had.

Double down on your child’s strengths

Nurturing your child’s strengths is very important while explaining their differing abilities (we call this doubling down in our home). Children with different disabilities have amazing gifts. Identify their interests and strengths and take every opportunity to nurture them through classes, therapies, and community activities. Those strengths will be fundamental to their self-esteem and ability to thrive in the world.

As human beings, we all have different strengths and weaknesses, and it is important that your child understands that. We each have different sets of skills, levels of knowledge, attributes, and talents. Celebrate the fact that people have different things that they are good at and things that are harder for them. I can speak to a crowd of 10,000 people with no problem but ask me to make a change in an Excel file and I’m sweating–the perfect examples of strengths and weaknesses. Elevate your child’s strengths to the greatest possible extent and teach them what they need to move effectively and or manage sensory challenges—such as visual supports, walking aids, or sensory monitoring cues.

Most of all, always remember to praise and celebrate every achievement. Every victory, no matter how small, deserves your respect and attention. You have to be your child’s biggest cheerleader and hype squad. On the flip side, you must also support and encourage the child when a failure occurs (because they are going to). It is important to recognize when your kiddo is trying their best in the journey rather than focusing on them getting things right all the time. Sometimes the effort is more important than the end result. Without failure, they cannot learn, grow or improve. Model that it is OK to mess up, and help by providing feedback, tips, and insights that allows your child to move forward more effectively.

How to talk to your child about their disability

Knowledge is power. And the more you can help your child understand who they are, the more empowered they will be to navigate life—just as they are. I guarantee you that your explanation of your child’s disability will land much better than anyone else’s, so pay attention to your child’s interest in understanding themselves and why they may be different and provide honest answers.

Your child is going to notice that they’re different from their peers. And children, eager to fit in, may frown upon those perceived as “different.” As a parent, you’ll eventually want to explain and teach your child what being disabled means, but do so in bite-sized chunks that they can handle. I love using books, dolls, toys, and movies to aid in the discussion.

Early on Callie started asking, “Mom, why is my leg different? Kids ask me what’s wrong with my leg.” That was my cue to start discussing her disability diagnosis more in depth and arming her with what it means for her life. I gave her this information in the bits and bites she could handle and used books to help her connect the dots. This process fairly simple and we made sure to sprinkle conversations about her disability through out the days when she was younger. I had to be consistent. Even now, we are still finding occasions and situations that come up where we have to help Callie navigate accepting her disability. She wants to fit in, struggles to fit in at times, and sometimes struggles to find her “people.” I had to encourage her to form friendships with those who accept and value her right back.

Resilience is key to successfully navigating your child’s disability. Awareness and support are crucial for your child. Understanding who you are as their parent and how to overcome obstacles is an important step toward learning and growing. Reevaluate how you teach your children about their differing abilities at every age and help them to continuously recognize and celebrate their differences.