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How caring for a child with a special health care need affects the family Illness in a child can debilitate a family. And if its chronic and long term then the pattern of life in the family can be affected a lot. The functioning of the family tends to run around the child. Schedules, eating habits, the way the house is constructed and run, even the way the family vacations are always dictated by what the child needs and is capable of doing. Siblings can become very resentful of the special child.
Parents will give a great deal of attention to the child with special needs. Sometimes one parent is the prime care giver and may be resentful of the other parent. Their relationship gets affected. While a child with special needs can bond parents together, it can sometimes drive them apart too. [ 1 ] Parents may feel angry with health care providers, themselves, each other, or the child. The emotional distress involved in providing care can also make it difficult to form a deep attachment to a disabled or seriously ill child.
The child as well as the parents will need emotional and social support. A commonly needed resource is respite care (someone to take temporary care of people with disabilities, enabling their families to take a short break from the routine of care giving). [ 2 ] It may also be necessary to attend to a family emergency or even take a much needed vacation. Having access to respite care can make the difference between a stressed family and a rested one. Another need is recreational and leisure activities that the family and child with special health care needs can do together. In America, where single parent families are increasingly becoming the norm, it can take a terrible toll on the family. The person affected need not be a child; it can even be a parent as in this case.
A lawyer daughter had to erode her savings to take care of her mother who was invalided by a stroke. The lawyer had to go to work to provide for her family. She hired a caregiver to take care of her mother. And had to alter her mothers bedroom so that she could have partial movement in a wheel chair and special appliances in the bathroom which were of convenient height and ease of use. And carve out chunks of time to take her mother to hospital for periodic check ups. Besides borrowing a convenient van to transport her in her wheel chair.
All this ate into her retirement money besides her regular income. And left her with a situation where she couldnt fund her daughters college expenses. Besides the financial burdens, the grandmother being an independent lady was desperately unhappy at being unable to communicate and living like a vegetable and kept urging her daughter to put an end to her life. Could she do it and live with her conscience was a dilemma the lawyer had to face?
All three generations are put in a fix not of their making and out of which there is no easy escape or right solution. Bibliography: [ 1 ] - The Merck manual Online Medical Library, February 2003, Social Issues Affecting Children and Their Families web [ 2 ] - Respite Opportunities, Children with special Healthcare Needs, web
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Research essay sample on Wheel Chair Health Care