Others are expected and in some cases forced to adapt into their lives around what they deal with.
It's not just around disabilities, but in other walks of life too where they're expected to fit in. Society, people’s cultures, social change are all part of this scenario.
We expect others to conform, adapt to the norm. Life is hard, even harder when we're expected to run with things and physically, mentally and emotionally, we know we can't. That becomes our struggle.
With a disability everything is much harder. Around a disability, where others expect us to adapt, they're sending out the message they care about themselves more.
Yes, that's definitely the message I got growing up was that my mother's needs came before mine.
We were expected just to adapt and survive even though nobody was showing us how to do it. This is what I speak of when I'm talking about being thrown to the wolves as a child.
I'm sure that you felt the same way, where they were telling you to do things but not quite comprehending how difficult they were making it for you.
They expected us to just know how to do things, which is next to impossible when nobody has taught you how to do them. The only thing that saved me a lot of times was that I was very smart and knew how to read about certain things that I didn't know about.
I just think it was so very unfair to both of us that they expected us to adapt to their norms, without telling us how to.
Thanks Randy. Yes, you're absolutely right. Parents tend to either parent as they have been parented themselves, or choose to think about themselves.
I know from what you've said in the past about your mother particularly, she had her own struggles and therefore you were made to conform. She wasn't equipped to help you. You're smart and you worked things out.
In my own case, there were insecurity issues going on, but those had nothing to do with my not knowing what my struggles were, or the lack of support.
However, we both got to where we found ourselves, we found each other through our experiences and now are able to act as a support to each other.
It doesn't take away our experiences, or get those responsible off the hook, but it does go some way to offer an explanation of our lives. I hope it helps.