• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
The Couples Toolkit Logo
  • Home
  • About
  • Services
    • Family Therapy
    • Couples Therapy
    • Uncoupling
    • Individual Therapy
    • Grief and Loss Counseling
    • Children of Divorce, Young and Adult
    • Transitions in The Coupledom
    • Empty Nest Couples Counseling
  • Blog
  • Parenting Adult Special Needs
  • FAQs
  • Contact
  • Show Search
The Couples Toolkit
Hide Search

Blogs

Aiming high to achieve what matters most: Connection; Communication and Mutual Respect

Haunting Scenarios: 7-28-11

Haunting Scenarios: 7-28-11

By Jill Edelman . 07/28/2011

Supermarket Couples: The images of elderly moms and middle-aged special needs adult children walking down the aisles of local markets always haunted me. Long before I had my own special child, I would see these twosomes and wonder what would happen to this special adult when their parent died? It all seemed so sad and depressing to me. Was this projection or was I accurate in picking up a despair and impatience on the parent’s part? Or exhaustion. I will never know but that image served as an incentive many years later for me to actively seek a future for our daughter that would not be dependent on parental care.

Isolation and Loneliness: I suspect that the despair I imagined in them, I had felt inside myself at times. Though never “special needs” I did marry late and know loneliness and the lack of a partner. Perhaps that predisposed me to think that these mother/child couples were despairing as well. I am relieved that I dodged that bullet for all of us. The special needs world has morphed and improved in some regards, inclusion being one of its greatest blessings. My children and their peers have shared classroom space and hallways in the company of challenged classmates. Seeing a disabled adult in a supermarket aisle is neither a novelty nor alarming for them. Despite these gains, the new trend is towards less government funding and the recent political and economic climate is frightening. Our daughter is now dependent on the decisions of politicians who are strangers to her and obsessed with defeating their rivals.

New Scenarios To Fear: This is a new fear. We dodged one big bullet, but will there be others to hit at the core of our daughter’s future stability? I don’t know. But I do know that though we got her “here”, I am not certain that the world will let us keep her “here.”

Fingers Crossed: We are the lucky ones, so far. She is the lucky one. But this country is moving more towards relinquishing the helping hand to those less fortunate and that is a new haunting scenario for me.

©Jill Edelman, M.S.W., L.C.S.W. 2011

Developmental Disorders, Parenting Adult Special Needs: One Day At A Time, Special Needs, Special Needs Parents

Enjoyed it? Share this article on

About Jill Edelman

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Categories

  • 9/11
  • Addiction
  • Admit Imperfection
  • Adult Children of Divorce
  • Aging
  • Betrayal
  • Blended Families
  • Children
  • Communication
  • Conflict
  • couples therapy
  • Denial
  • Depression
  • Developmental Disorders
  • Differences
  • Divorce
  • emotions
  • Envy
  • Grief
  • Have That Conversation
  • Holiday Pressures
  • Holiday Toolkit
  • Holidays
  • Infidelity
  • Intimacy
  • Jealousy
  • Listening
  • Look and Words
  • Loss
  • Lying
  • Menopause
  • Mental Illness
  • Most Popular
  • Narcissim
  • online dating
  • Pandemic
  • Parenting
  • Parenting Adult Special Needs: One Day At A Time
  • passive-aggressive
  • Personality Styles and Disorders
  • Reactions
  • Religious Choices
  • Role of Denial in the Coupledom
  • Separation
  • Sex and Intimacy
  • Sexual Assault
  • Sexual Orientation
  • Shared Life
  • Sibling Order
  • Similar Vision
  • Special Needs
  • Special Needs Parents
  • The Coupledom
  • The Senior Coupledom
  • The Singledom
  • Third Option
  • Tiger's Tale
  • Tools
  • Triangle Traps
  • Truth as a Trust Builder
  • Truth Takes Courage
  • Uncategorized
  • Viable Relationship

Recent Posts

  • The Pandemic Coupledom 2021: Reinventing the Meaning of Us
  • Pandemic Wisdom For The Coupledom: The Chance To Be Swaddled Again
  • Coupledom Crossroads: Empty Nesting in the Age of Netflix
  • The Hot Potato of Blame Game
  • Humor in Couples Therapy

Most Popular Blogs

The Passive-Aggressive Punch: The Silent Code of Anger In The Coupledom

Bully Wives? Yes, But They Don’t Know It.

Can You Say No To A Narcissist? Co-Narcissism and The Coupledom

Follow Me

This Crazy Quilt: Parenting Adult Special Needs One Day At A Time


Follow @couplestoolkit

Subscribe to The Couples Toolkit Newsletter
  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Related Posts
The Pandemic Coupledom 2021: Reinventing the Meaning of Us

The Pandemic Coupledom 2021: Reinventing the Meaning of Us

Pandemic Wisdom For The Coupledom: The Chance To Be Swaddled Again

Pandemic Wisdom For The Coupledom: The Chance To Be Swaddled Again

Coupledom Crossroads: Empty Nesting in the Age of Netflix

Coupledom Crossroads: Empty Nesting in the Age of Netflix

Read More Posts
The Couples Toolkit
Icon
Contact Info
Call: (203) 984-1517
Email: jill@thecouplestoolkit.com

Icon
Office Address
9 Shady Lane,
Redding, CT 06896
Icon
Office Hours
Flexible – In person, Phone, Zoom or FaceTime Sessions.

Facebook Twitter

The Couple's Toolkit © Website Design & Development by SHJ and Omaginarium