Preparing Him to Live with Others

When you discover that your child is retarded in intellect, it offers little comfort to know you are not alone.
In the early years, you think no other couple has faced such misfortune, and so you feel cut off from the circle of parents with normal children.
Before his birth, you probably never noticed that mental deficiency can appear in any family, that it exists in every country in the world, among every race, the rich and the poor, the powerful and the humble, the educated and the illiterate.
As you slowly come to understand this, you begin to think the situation would be easier for families unlike yours. If you hold a prominent social position, you imagine that simpler people bear it more easily because they lack your ambitions for him. If you are self-taught, you tell yourself that educated people find answers to all the "whys" that torment you about your child. If you live in the country or a small town, you think the problems are easier for city dwellers, where surely there are more resources to help him. If you live in the city, you think a limited child would certainly be more at ease in a rural setting. If you have lived without faith until now, you assume it is easier for the "pious" to accept such a blow from fate; if you are a religious person, you tell yourself an atheist would understand such a "punishment" better...

If we can make him content, calm, well-behaved... people will welcome him more readily and with pleasure

If we can make him content, calm, well-behaved... people will welcome him more readily and with pleasure
The truth is that all parents are traumatized and terrified when they see that the child in whom they placed all their hopes, for whom they dreamed great things, will clearly need help for life.
It is natural and normal not to accept reality as it is, to try to convince yourself and others that the child is healthy. For any parent it is terribly hard not to watch with joy and a little pride as your child grows, not to see him keeping pace with his peers. Terribly hard to think that the dreams you had before his birth will never come true.
Parents naturally work to guide a normal child's development and make him a useful person, as peaceful as possible in human society. It seems no less necessary to give every possible help to a child with mental handicap, to bring him as close as we can to that goal within the limits of his condition. If we can make him content, calm, well-behaved, clean, docile, people will welcome him more readily and with pleasure. Everything will be easier at home too, and the whole family will live more peacefully and with greater calm.
A well-behaved child draws more goodwill than one who is rude. The friendship he receives matters greatly to his character; it gives him that precious sense of being loved. Relatives, acquaintances, neighbors—they too must learn to relate to him. This is why every mother of a visibly retarded child asks herself a hundred questions about how to tell others, how to warn them.
Until parents are at peace about their child, they cannot speak of him to others. Until you accept his limits, you believe no one but you can understand your problems. If you cannot be objective, you will always try to build a wall of secrets, embellishments, even lies around yourself—wasting enormous energy on it. And you see this wall threatened the moment someone simply asks how the child is doing; you fear some hidden agenda in that innocent question. If someone asks without ulterior motive what age your son is, you feel deeply wounded. All of this pushes you away from others. This harms both the family and the child because you deprive him of the social contact every person needs to develop and grow. (...) So long as you refuse to acknowledge that something is missing in your child, you will try to paint his condition in a better light to others—pointlessly, because they have almost certainly already noticed, perhaps before you did, that the child is different. We are always more objective about other people's children than our own; we see their faults more clearly than our children's.

The friendship he receives matters greatly to his character; it gives him that precious sense of being loved.

The friendship he receives matters greatly to his character; it gives him that precious sense of being loved.
Experience shows that children with mental deficiency, if well-behaved and accustomed to kindness, develop good character and become very likable people. Once people know them, even slightly, they soon abandon their prejudices. Perhaps you will need to speak with a neighbor about your son's condition, his limits, your sorrows and worries. He will do the same with his own children so they understand and treat him rightly, so they can help him and, if needed, protect him.
This applies to relatives too. Here, calm parental behavior makes all the difference. You can avoid unnecessary shows of pity if you yourselves recognize that your son is not merely a burden, but that he, like any child, brings you joy as well. When relatives see your positive attitude toward your handicapped child, they will feel less obliged to offer unsolicited advice. Uncertainty, tension, and conflicting opinions will fade. The suggestions from neighbors and relatives—to try another approach or consult another specialist—will no longer shake the hard-won acceptance you have found in the inevitable.

Until you accept his limits, you believe no one but you can understand your problems

Until you accept his limits, you believe no one but you can understand your problems
And then relatives—grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins—become a tremendous help to him. They can care for him sometimes, giving you the relief you so badly need.
Do not be afraid to accept a little help. Do not turn away the desire others have to lend a hand and the goodwill they show you.
It is so important for your child to spend time with other people, not only with you. These moments of separation are invaluable for his future.

From Mon enfant n'est pas comme les autres, Guide pour les parents, les amis, et les responsables d'enfants débiles mentaux by Maria Egg, Delachaux Niestlé, 1963/73