When I hear that someone can 'pass' in our society I automatically assume that it's a racial or ethnic comment. Historically that is where I have heard the term used and socially I suspect that most people would do the same.
Since we have adopted kids with hidden disabilities I am seeing another way that people can 'pass' in our society and started thinking through the advantages and disadvantages of their situation. For example: One of our kids is pretty severely affected by FASD - reading and math are a real labor for him and through we are making great progress for him he is not able to compete at grade level. No way, no question about it. Except....
Last week on the CAT I learned something about him that surprised me. He can guess really well and uses clues to come to correct answers. I watched him take the grade level appropriate test and he got almost everyone right - even though he couldn't read the questions or the answers! He figured out the patterns, the key words to look for (or the beginning sound of the word he thought they wanted) and he got most of them right. This from a kid who couldn't read most of the questions. Cool and scary at the same time. I don't know how this plays out when he is older and can pass as a normally equipped adult, except that he probably wont really understand what is happening around him. Like buying a car, or a house, or all the other endless things we assume people who look normal have the ability to make good decisions about.
Passing - a blessing on one hand and a curse on the other. Both ways it's going to be a life long reality for us and a new thing to begin talking about early!
4 comments:
I'm struck by your comment as we just adopted a baby with Down syndrome, an obvious disability. She can't pass, even as a newborn. It is unreal the things that people say about her, despite the fact that she is really a standard issue newborn at this point and a lovely baby, so I'm wondering how to deal with lowered expectations before people even know her. It's striking to read your post and think about how the "visibility" of her disability may be both a blessing and a challenge.
Wow! That really interesting that he figured that out.
Ursula, Your daughter will constantly surprise people at what she can accomplish. There are some great videos at the Down Syndrome Society of Cincinnati website. (Or something like that.) Also, Baby Signing Time and Signing Time DVD's have great examples of great accomplishments by Down Syndrome kids.
Blessings to you and your family!
My aunt, a retired schoolteacher, was teaching an adult man to read. He had worked for years as a truck driver in a big city and had an elaborate code for his deliveries based on symbols because he could not read street signs.
I look at this more as a curse than a blessing. I have several kids with varying degrees of FASD and I am constantly accused of either underestimating them or being too hard on them (can't win - why play?). Only one is visibly small for his age (so I must be starving him, right?) but the older he gets, the more obvious it becomes that there is something really wrong with his mental capabilities (to others anyway, we've always known). It's becoming harder for him to pass. Two daughters try very hard to pass and can do a pretty good job most of the time if they are so inclined, but one is being home schooled right now because of her complete lack of common sense (she's 16) and the other (14) is struggling mightily in a Christian school because she desperately wants to fit in, and doesn't. She always believes she's doing pretty well academically and when she's shown otherwise, she is devastated and angry. Everyone else in society looks at them and thinks they are normal and that we should let them do all of the things their peers are doing - not the greatest idea - so we're perceived as controlling and harsh because we can't do that. It is just so hard to parent these kids who have one foot in each world.
I give you so....much credit for home schooling. I tried for 1 1/2 years with all 6 of my special needs kids and it was such a disaster. I know that we were trying too hard to do school in ways that other people would find acceptable (measurable progress) but that my kids do not thrive at, so we should try again (and will if the last few weeks are any indicator of what's to come).
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