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I've been reading quite a bit on this group, and I'm SOOO impressed with all of you! My husband and I were all set to go through foster care classes in our county. However, we've been contacted about a little girl in Thailand. She is 6, and blind. This is NOT the direction we had planned to go! I'm legally blind myself, and use a guide dog for mobility. So, I'm sure you can imagine the public response to our family as it is. I've read threads about the public's reaction to your children (I can relate). My favorite one is "Look, it's one of those blind dogs"! My typical response is " I hope not! If he's blind, we're both in trouble!". I can only imagine the reaction if we had a blind child also (not that it matters, but it can still ad stress).
I have so many questions, I don't even know where to start. How did you go about finding special resources for your child? Did you research that before you went through with the adoption? I'm wondering about school, the language barrier, social interactions, etc. I homeschool our boys, but I don't think I can homeschool her too. I really think she would need more than I can give her. She will need mobility training, and independent living skills training. Some of those things I can reinforce at home as those are the skills I use daily. I'm just so overwhelmed and unsure. Any advice?
Thanks!
Melissa
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HI, I did do some research. I actually adopted my daughter without any previous info on her. However a previous child that we had looked into adopting, but had fallen through (his region closed to adoptions) had a missing limb so I had researched that particular issue and found resources close to me. So when I traveled I told them I wanted to see the children with limb differences first. Then after we had her a few years, then we felt confident adopting another child with similar, but more serious missing limbs. A couple of things for you, first I would research the rules for Thailand, I don't know them, but many countries have rules about the health of the parent, the ages of the parents, how many children in the home, how long the parents have been married etc. Some countries even have rules about the weight of the parents. Now, some countries will relax thier rules a little for special needs children and some won't. So first make sure you are even eligible to adopt from there, since that would answer the question for you. Then I would suggest if it is possible to look into what resources are near you. Probably if you have any connections they could help you. Also calling the school district to see if they have anyone trained to work with the blind. Where we live if we had a blind child, they would be the only blind child in the school and even the district, so there are no brail books in the library and no teachers who know how to teach stuff the child needs to learn. However we used to live in a town that had a school for the blind that was very good. Living here I would probably not feel comfortable adopting a blind child, but living there I would. As for stares, you just learn to deal with them. Sometimes both of my kids are in wheelchairs and we get some funny looks. Last week we met up with my son's girlfriend and her mom. The girl was on crutches cause she had hurt her foot and the mom was using a cane becuase she has arthritis bad. My son was in his wheelchair and my daughter's prosthetic legs are very bright and dh has hearing aids. So we got lots of stares, we thought it was funny. You learn to have a sense of humor, which it sounds like you already have. My foreign adopted children both learned the language very quickly. It sounds like you would be an awesome mom for this little girl.
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I babysit a little girl who is blind (L) and my husband and I are in the process of adoption and are very open to special needs. What I have learned through L's parents is that even if your school district doesn't have a teacher who has worked with blind children, they do have to send their teachers to get the training. They do have to provide the resources for her to learn in the public schools! You have to be very proactive and advocate ALOT, but it can be done. I don't know what state you are in but if you happen to be in Georgia I can send you some local resources that have been such a blessing in L's life! I hope that's helpful.
Thanks very much for the info. We've plunged into this full force, and we are very excited! I'm an experienced parent advocate for my son who has CF. Let's just say that there are several medical residents who won't forget me. I'm a very tough parent when it comes to JC's care. He is not their little science experiment. Residents sometimes feel they are the greatest mind to ever grace the medical profession. They don't like it when their decisions. So, we have experience in that department. It looks like we're goint to need it.