Sunday's Boston Globe featured an article titled "A Parental Juggling Job: Workplace Stigmas Add to Struggles of People with Disabled Children." If you're a parent raising a child with special needs, it makes sense to tell your boss and work colleagues, right? Maybe, but maybe not.
In a survey of 400 parents, "27 percent of parents caring for children with serious emotional and behavioral disorders have been terminated because of related work disruptions....Because of the demands of care, nearly half of the parents had to quit a job to care for their children, and 11 percent couldn't find work."
And that's not all: "While such parents tend to face greater stigma than those whose children have physical disabilities, both groups often have difficulties finding and keeping work because of their child's condition....More than a fifth of families raising children with disabilities live in poverty, compared with nearly 13 percent of families raising children without a disability, US Census data show."
I don't know if there's a legislative solution to this -- it's more about understanding and accommodation for good employees, but I guess the ability to offer that flexibility differs depending on the industry.
1 comment:
I could write a book on this topic. I do parent coaching for families with kids with disabilities and the poverty is staggering. The county will pay for respite if you meet the criteria for being in crisis but you can't use respite so you can go to work. I was lucky that my daughter was diagnosed while in typical childcare and they would never think of turning her away after getting to know her.
An advocacy group did a phone experiment here where they called childcare centers and asked if they had vacancies. They called the places with vacancies the next day and mentioned their child had a disability and the responses ranged from "We don't have vacancies" to "We don't take those kids". I counsel the parents I work with not to ask permission for their child with a disability to do anything that typical kids are doing. I tell them to show up, ask some questions, tell them what accomodations are needed and pay the enrollment. I know it is not that easy but if the parent starts out by acting like their kid belongs there then that is at least half the battle.
This topic is very important to me. I am saddened by the extreme poverty I see in the autism community. These parents have to choose being poor so they can get the services they need. There is something wrong with the American Dream when the only way to help your child is to choose poverty.
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