Disability Now article - The Growing Pains of a Disabled Parent

No one warns you how hard it is to be a parent, let alone the parent of a disabled child. 

I was talking to another parent of a disabled child the other day and I basically admitted I 'wing' it - I try things out, see if they work and if they don't move on to plan B, C, D... til I find the solution. 

Sure, there's some input from the 'professionals' from time to time but the bottom line is that the 'winging' it that us parents do is the only real way forward.  He totally agreed, saying he did the same, which was somewhat reassuring!

My latest Disability Now article about the trials and tribulations of being a disabled parent of a disabled child is now up on their website:

http://disabilitynow.org.uk/article/growing-pains-disabled-parent

A Special Kind of Mum - BBC THREE programme preview

Check out my preview of the BBC THREE programme 'A Special Kind of Mum' which goes out at 9pm on Tuesday 26 March and is repeated a couple of times after that, see preview for details:

http://www.disabilitynow.org.uk/article/preview-special-kind-mum

Worth a watch I'd say as the issue of disabled parenting doesn't get a lot of coverage.

Article about Young Disabled Campaigners in Disability Now

Have a look at the article I wrote for Feb 2012 Disability Now magazine about young campaigners, as mentioned in my previous post.

They are a fabulous bunch of young disabled people:

http://www.disabilitynow.org.uk/living/features/meet-the-future-young-campaigners-on-show/

If you get the chance the article looks even better in the printed version....

New Year New Motivation

I love the beginning of the year as I'm all motivated. In fact I've been so busy my New Years Resolution of making sure I write one blog entry a month [surely I can do that?] nearly fell by the wayside...

Already this year I've written a great article about young disabled campaigners for Disability Now, it great because it features some fab young people who have already done a huge amount to try and improve the lot of disabled people, the youngest started campaigning at 10 years old. How's that for inspiration.

The only shame of the article is that it won't reach a wider audience as it's the sort of thing I'd love to see the Guardian going for, showing the wider public how positive and brilliant young disabled people can be. They are as far from loitering around street corners, moaning, scrounging benefits [as the Daily Mail would have you believe] as you can get.

I've also been doing a massive clear out, there's not a drawer, cupboard or box in my house that I don't know the contents of now. What I love about doing this is not just the recycling and decluttering element but finding things I'd forgotten I had. The whole process has made me feel very positive and sorted in more ways than one.

This feeling also ties in with the fact that I have after over 7 years of primarily looking after children embarked on a course, just for me! It's a Certificate In Counselling course, the idea is to see whether I like studying again and if I like the subject of counselling, then if I do I could potentially take it further.

Even after just a few weeks of the course I'm really enjoying doing something new, and that together with reading a book about being more assertive could possibly mean I end up a whole new woman by the end of 2012, watch this space.

Britain's Missing Top Model - Vacancy Filled?

Just to say my comment about BBC Three's 'Britain's Missing Top Model" series is now on the Disability Now website:

http://www.disabilitynow.org.uk/shooting-disability

Not totally sure about the headline or byline but I didn't write them!

Looking Up book review for disability now

Another of my book reviews has just gone up on the Disability Now website:

http://www.disabilitynow.org.uk/entertainment/arts/book-review/?searchterm=looking%20up

It was quite a refreshing read as the author who broke his back falling out of a tree wasn't one of these spinally injured people who then wanted to conquer Everest, trek across a desert or sail round the world, he just wanted to get some sort of life back....

Disability Now article on BBC Three's series in the making - "Britain's Missing Top Model"

Here's my latest article published on Disability Now website and in April's edition of the magazine:

http://www.disabilitynow.org.uk/latest-news2/media-watch-section-test/ground-breaking-or-car-crash-tv

The series hasn't even been made yet but is already causing quite a stir....