Visiting With a Parent That Has a Sick Kid????

In talking to a few well-meaning folks I've learned a few things that parents of chronically sick kids or handicapped kids DON'T want to hear.

1.  We'd actually rather you not ask.  Just don't.  If we want you to know, we'll tell you.  If we've invited the conversation, or started it, that's fine, but please don't look at a child and say, "What happened?" or, "Whats wrong with him?"  Have some sensitivity.  You'd actually be surprised how often people feel entitled to ask these questions.

2.  Yes, we generally know things could be worse.  Our kids could have a worse affliction or be dead.  We know that.  We don't need to hear that.  We love our kids enormously, and are thankful to have them in our lives.  We thank God for them daily, in the same ways you thank God for your children. 

3. If we are having a bad day, a good way to help is to listen.  Let us cry.  We are not having a bad day because we are ungrateful, we are probably having a bad day because our child has received yet another diagnosis, our child has visited the lab yet again or we have been on the phone with the insurance company.  Again. (I speak for myself here, but I am generally too busy to wallow in self-pity.  When I have a bad day, it is uaually when my child has been poked and prodded.  Again.)  We just want to be heard, sympathized with and maybe understood.  

4.  Don't try to pin an illness/handicap on the parent.  We do that enough.  I guarantee that.  It's pointless.  Was it the medication we took while we were pregnant?  Was it a premature birth?  Could we/should we have insisted on different care for them as an infant?  We've already asked those questions.  We are plagued with them.  They are all pointless.

As with everything else in life, you don't know unless you've walked a mile in their shoes.  Don't judge.  Please.  Pray for us. Pray that we'll have the strength to see our child through this illness/handicap.  Pray for our child.  Pray that God will be glorified through this illness/handicap.  Pray for healing.  Pray.  Don't judge.

I have a child with a serious chronic illness that is generally internal, but his immune system is attacking his skin now and he has outward signs of being ill.  I have friends with handicapped children.  Beautiful, wonderful children.  Some with autism, one that had a stroke in-utero, others with significant disabilities.  And, all of these parents are amazing!  Several of us have had encounters this week with people doing one of the above.  It makes dealing with our children's handicap/illness that much harder.