Children of Mentally Disabled Parents: “They Perceive Their Childhood as Normal“

People with mental disabilities are often labeled as “eternal children.” When they become parents, their environment challenges whether they are up to the task. But what do the children think?

01/05/2010

Dietke Sanders; © private

Dietke Sanders, a graduate psychologist, investigated the situation of children with mentally disabled parents in her research project. REHACARE.de talked to her about reversed roles and proud children.

REHACARE.de: Mrs. Sanders, when people with a mental disability have children, those children are also mentally disabled - that is the stereotype. Is this really true?

Dietke Sanders: The risk that offspring will be delayed in their development of course exists. Often every little peculiarity in the child is immediately connected to the disability of the parents, but this is not necessarily the case.

REHACARE.de: What is?

Sanders: For the most part, the parent’s living environment is responsible: Before and during pregnancy people with learning diffuculties are very poorly informed. Baby classes are often not geared toward their needs. Communication with the parents should be simpler. If somebody explains to them how a baby is changed, they should also show pictures, do some practical exercises and repeat things several times. This way, people with learning diffuculties would understand better and be better prepared for parenthood.

REHACARE.de: The older the children get, the more there will be situations where they outmatch their parents. How do children experience these moments of role reversal?

Sanders: Often, it’s not actually a complete role reversal. No matter what handicap a mother has, she is always going to be the mother. You can practice with her to assert her authority when she tells the child to clean up his room.

REHACARE.de: At the latest, during school time a difficult phase begins. Parents with mental disabilities cannot always help their children with their homework and during parent-teacher conferences they don’t understand everything.

Sanders: That is why mentally impaired parents don’t like to go to their children’s school. The language at school is too bureaucratic. Parent-teacher conferences are too difficult and too much information is conveyed. People with learning disabilities are easily overwhelmed. What is more, many teachers are prejudiced and are not as responsive in discussions as those parents require.

REHACARE.de: So it’s mostly about the solidarity?

Sanders: Yes, through others, the students learn to get to know themselves better and they realize their strengths. It’s all about creating key experiences together at school and then applying them in your everyday life. It’s important that they experience those happy moments also in a physical way and embed them in their memory.

REHACARE.de: So what can be done?

Sanders: For one thing, the school system needs to adopt a simpler language. This would already help parents with learning difficulties a lot, because they would be able to understand many things better. Apart from that, good assistance for the entire family is important. This could be grandparents, other relatives or even family friends. Sometimes children search on their own for some type of second family – people who can offer additional support and encouragement.

REHACARE.de: Despite receiving offers of help, children of mentally disabled parents often have to take on responsibilities much earlier than others. How do they deal with this?

Sanders: Children also learn a lot through this, they are emotionally and socially very competent. In addition, they often appear to be very persistent and self confident and represent their family as such to the outer world.

Grandparents can support children
of parents with learning difficulties;
© Beeck/Pixelio.de

REHACARE.de: Aren’t there situations when these children reach their limits?

Sanders: Of course they do. Each time things get personal, it is quite hard for the children, like when they make new friends and they ask about their family. That is when the children ask themselves whether they should tell the truth or lie.

REHACARE.de: So the children are ashamed of their parents?

Sanders: Yes, sometimes that happens. And then they are ashamed that they are embarrassed, because they don’t mean anything bad by it. But when they bring their friends home for the first time or their parents meet the parents of their friends, they are not sure what the others might say.

REHACARE.de: How do children deal with the fact when their parents are excluded from society?

Sanders: It varies a lot. Some deal with it very well, others suffer more. Since there are so many prejudices, many children often only accent the positive. They don’t dare to talk about the things that don’t work so well in their family, since they might hear: ”Well it’s obvious that your parents are not good parents.“

REHACARE.de: Do the children themselves get teased or excluded by their peers because of their family situation?

Sanders: Yes, unfortunately that still happens. Even so, you should not make generalizations here. For example, a girl felt uncomfortable at one school, because she felt excluded. When she switched to another school, she quickly made great friends. They already had experiences in their life, which not everybody makes. That’s why they were more sensitive and open toward the girl and her family.

REHACARE.de: As we get older, we are able to judge things better, because we gained the necessary distance. How do adolescents perceive and judge their childhood in hindsight?

Sanders: The adolescents don’t perceive their childhood as unusual. Compared to other families they obviously notice differences, but they perceive their childhood as normal, since they don’t know any other life. Your own life actually always seems normal. Still, children of parents with learning difficulties are subjected to enormous pressure from an early age on to prove themselves more than others. When they reach certain goals like graduating school or obtaining a professional education, most are especially proud of themselves.

This interview was conducted by Nadine Lormis and translated by Elena O'Meara.
REHACARE.de