I will never forget the day we decided that maybe we should send her out of our
home for residential treatment. I had gone for a run that morning and was sitting on
a bench by beautiful Lake Michigan. I was crying my eyes out when a friend of mine
walked by. And for some reason, my guard was down, and I poured out what we
were thinking about. My friend proceeded to listen with love, and then she told me a
story about her own life. She told me a story about a dog.
Welcome to Take Heart. A podcast about creating space for connection, hope, and
joy as a mom to a child with disabilities or special needs. We want you to feel
connected and encouraged as we navigate this messy, emotional, and joy-filled life
together. Hi, I'm Amy Brown. And today, you're listening to episode 157.
We are talking about being misunderstood. This is something we feel deeply as
special needs parents. We have all had experiences where people just don't get it.
Whether it's the stranger at the grocery store who says that child just needs some
discipline or a lady at your church, your mom, or even your best friend. These
situations can be hurtful and can cause us to feel alone. Now, people say a lot of
weird and hurtful things, and they just don't get it. It's easy to stack up all those
negative experiences, the slights, the misunderstandings, and think that nobody will
ever get us.
I could give you a list of things people have said to me over the years about my
children. I could probably fill several podcast episodes about ways in which they said
things that were not funny at the time, but we laugh at now, or I felt alone or hurt by
the comments made about my children. But I want to take a little different approach
today. Instead of focusing on the things people say, which, let's admit, they say some
dumb things, why don't we focus on our own reactions?
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After years of negative comments, we expect to be misunderstood; we just expectit.
And we become easily sensitive to what others say. But in this process, we maymiss
the potential connections. Some people won't get it, but if we put up a wall, the
people who might get it are also shut out. So my question is, have we become too
sensitive? When people say something that hurts us, are we quick to take our ball
and go home? Can we keep trying for connection by telling our story and letting
people in?
Here's an example of something that happened to me. Several years ago, our
daughter, who has reactive attachment disorder and fetal alcohol syndrome, was
raging and out of control in our home. Our house was chaos. There was no way to
protect everybody. My husband and I had tried everything. We'd gone to every
treatment, every therapist, every psychiatrist. I will never forget the day we decided
that maybe we should send her out of our home for residential treatment.
I had gone for a run that morning and was sitting on a bench by beautiful Lake
Michigan. I was crying my eyes out when a friend of mine walked by. Now, this
person was not someone I was super close with, but she was somebody who was in
my life and kind of knew what was going on to an extent, a small extent. And for
some reason, my guard was down, and I poured out what we were thinking about.
My friend proceeded to listen with love, and then she told me a story about her own
life. She told me a story about a dog.
They had a dog that they needed to put down because this dog was causing havoc
in their home, and this dog wasn't able to live with them anymore. Now I know what
you're thinking. This woman really compared your child to a dog. Yeah, that's what I
felt at first, too. How in the world could you compare those two things? And I'll be
honest, I cast a very judgmental eye over that conversation. But in truth, something
about that conversation
Helped us to decide to send our child to residential treatment. Now, I'm not
comparing my child to a dog, just to get that clear. And I will admit I initially saw that
conversation in a negative light, but I think I missed the glimpse of understanding.
This friend was trying her best to take something she understood and connect it
with my life. So what if instead of having our defenses up, we look at conversations
and say, where's the connection? How is this person trying to connect and
understand me? And how can I not be so easily offended?
Now, I'm not talking about abusive people, people who say hurtful things and
continue to show up in our lives during this. I'm not talking about those people. I'm
talking about people who are trying their best, and maybe their comments just don't
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land or seem insensitive. If we give these people a chance, they may turn out to be
our allies, our friends, and our biggest support. But we have to let the walls down and
let them in first. So, practically, how do we do this? Well, like I said earlier, we have to
have an open mind and look for the connection.
We've all had the experience of this comment. Someone looks at your Facebook
page and says, I could never do your life. It seems so hard. You make me just
exhausted looking at your post. Okay, we've all had that comment, and I get it. That
comment makes us feel isolated and more alone. But what if we changed our
perspective and looked for glimpses of connection and beauty? What if we changed
our thoughts to something like this? At least this person is looking at my post, or at
least this person knows something about my life.
And maybe they're praying for me. What else could we say to a comment like that
instead of just being offended? As I said before, some comments that are rude need
to be dismissed, but I think people are trying really hard to understand. And we just
have the mindset, well, they don't get it, but how can we expect them to get it if we
don't tell them about it? And we may miss an opportunity when we have that
mindset. We need to offer grace to the people in our lives who attempt to
understand.
We do ourselves and those in our lives a disservice if we put up walls. Friend, fear
loves to isolate us and keep us from connection. But we were made for connection.
So next time, instead of assuming that once again, we will be misunderstood, let's
look for the thread of connection, however thin it may be. If we don't change our
perspective, we will start seeing everything as negative.
How we see things largely determines whether it gives us joy or makes us pull back.
So, how you see things matters. Number two, let's all calm down. When the
comments come, what can you do to calm down and take a breath before you
respond? How can you calm yourself so you can be in a state of mind to share your
life with others? Sometimes, we need to take a deep breath; other times, we need
others to help us calm down before we can respond. My friend, Jamie Harper, writes
on Substack, and her Substack is called A Curious Pursuit of Christ.
And she recently wrote an article that really stuck with me. She's talking about
co-regulation and how we calm ourselves. And she says this: unless there is a
non-anxious presence in the room, we will all spend our time reacting rather than
co-regulating. The truth is our brains will either continue ramping up under the
perceived threats, or we can calm one another down if just one person remains
connected to his calm core self. This is co-regulation.
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If we have regular spiritual rhythms, we will have the skills and the tools to calm our
emotional mind into a wise mind under dire and painful circumstances and help us
create a healthy life. But what if we don't have anybody to help us calm? We need to
remember this. Jesus is the most self-differentiated, non-anxious presence in every
room. I absolutely love that sentence, and I'm gonna read it again. Jesus is the most
self-differentiated, non-anxious presence in every room.
He is the good shepherd who looks in adoration at his sheep. I think all of us can turn
to him for co-regulation. With time and practice, we can all imagine looking at
Christ's beautiful eyes rather than the problem before us. Maybe this is what it means
to fix our eyes on him." End of quote. So let's calm down. Let's take a deep breath.
Let's pray. And let's be present to the person in front of us. And hopefully, we can help
that person understand and build a connection. And finally,
Keep telling your story. It's really up to us, and I'm sorry to say that because, well,
that's one more thing to add to our list. But we can't do without a connection. So it is
up to us. And how do we expect people to understand if we don't tell them? So tell
your story again and again. Our stories are important. When we honestly share our
stories, we learn from each other, we gather strength, and we come away
encouraged. But most importantly, we feel less alone.
Now, you don't have to tell the whole story. Not everybody needs to hear that. And I
don't know about you, but sometimes I feel like if I start talking, I will never stop
talking because so much has happened. But you can give people glimpses of your
life, glimpses that help them increase awareness. And guess what? You don't have to
do all the talking. If there's a blog post or an article that really describes your life or
resonates with you, give that to your family and let them read it.
Let them listen to our podcast. If there's a podcast episode that just really hits you,
send that to your friend, your pastor, your mom, or whoever you want to understand
your life, a copy of our book, The Other Side of Special. You don't have to do all the
talking. You can let us do it for you. Voices that you respect. I'm not trying to be all
Pollyanna about this, and I don't promise the world will finally and entirely get you.
But maybe these steps of looking for connection, calming down, and telling our
story.
Our steps to help us be less misunderstood, steps to lead us to more connection and
community. And it's definitely the first step to being seen. And when we are seen,
well, that makes all the difference. Thank you so much for listening to this week's
episode. Are there emotions that you are trying to navigate and would like to hear us
talk more about specifically? Was there something specific you will betaking away
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from this week's episode? As always, we love your feedback and would love to hear
from you. Please find us on Instagram at Take Heart Special Moms.
Or email us or leave us a comment on our website. takeheartspecialmoms.com
