My life

My life as a mother is a far cry from my expectations. When I came round after the emergency Caesarean, my child had vanished. He was in intensive care at a neonatal ward in a different hospital, and it took days before they let me hold him. My baby was brain damaged, they said, and the doctors didn't expect him to survive. They kept him there for four months. Finally, he was transferred to another special-care-unit for handicapped children, where he stayed for two more years, due to his bad health.

During that depressing time, our life didn't work at all. As a result of the constant feelings of loss, I longed for the day when I could finally take him home; however, that only brought a new set of problems. For instance, I isolated myself and alienated a lot of my friends while others withdrew all by themselves. My marriage broke up. I lost my job, my sleep, and everything else resembling a normal life. My whole identity had fallen apart.

In spite of this turmoil, I didn't perish. Miraculously, I managed to mobilize a source of inner strength, which most people unknowingly possess. Gradually, I accepted my situation and learned to master both the role as the mother of a severely handicapped child and my new role as an involuntary user of the welfare system.

Through the assistance of social services, I was allocated a handicap friendly apartment. I made arrangements with a lovely foster-family who relieve me regularly. Most importantly, I went through training as a psychotherapist, which gave me a lasting vocation as a counselor for other parents with physically and mentally challenged children.

Now the meaning of my life is to teach distressed parents how to look after each other and create a worthwhile existence for both child and parents. At seminars in the US and in Denmark where I live, I draw upon my hard-earned experience to give parents of physically and mentally challenged children the strategies to cope with and to find fulfillment in a radically changed life!