Parenting Disability: Me as an orthpedically challenged child – Guest Column by Payal Kukreja

Our guest columnist this week is Payal Kukreja. A passionate blogger, Kukreja sees writing as a catharsis, a means by which she heals and tries to shatter the “taboos surrounding lives.”

It is said that a woman is complete when she becomes a mother but what if she wakes up to a reality which is the hardest to endure.

Amy Wright, a mother of two children, born with Down Syndrome and the founder of Bitty and Beau’s Coffee Shop in Wilmington, NC said,

“I would not change you for the world, but I will change the world for you.”

After nine months of carrying a life in her womb, she finds out that like other children, her child doesn’t fall in the bracket of normalcy. Her child has a physical or mental disability.

In this case, I was born with an Orthopedic disability – hip dislocation.

Moving on, it not only leaves the mother but also the father in a state of shock, trauma, dejection and disorientation. Since the mother has been nurturing this life all this while, she is the one who gets the immense hit.

Some parents give up due to the lack of awareness and knowledge of dealing with the situation, while some due to the anxieties and apprehensions created by society. But there are some parents who are just concerned about their child. They do not crib or whine for too long about the situation rather they believe in testing the waters and try to make their child’s life stimulating with equal opportunities.

I am blessed that I fall into the latter category. I do not only give the credit to my mother but to my father as well. He has played an equally important role what my mother has played in my life. My parents faced a lot of challenges in raising me. My developmental milestones were delayed. They were denied of enrolling me in a regular, (I chose not to use the word ‘normal’) school. I stole the share of attention which my younger brother should have got, and many such countless dreams that they must have given up just because of me. But the best part was, that they sailed through it.

They put an extra effort into teaching me everything which a regular child of my age was capable of. With a lot of running around the city, they managed to get me enrolled in one of the best schools. Just because of my parents’ will and their confidence in my abilities, I completed my education. Today I am a post graduate and an independent working lady. Whatever I have achieved, is all because of my parents.

It is rightly said, “God cannot go everywhere, so he made parents”.

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