Any Glass Kids in Your Family?

 Any Glass kids in your family?

Glass children aren’t children who are fragile; they are kids who are invisible.  Often in families with children with disabilities family time and resources are consumed with meeting the needs of the child(ren) with disabilities.   Typical kids in the family can feel the responsibility to reduce their own needs so that all of the needs of the child with the disability can be met.

Typical kids are very sensitive to the needs of their parents and their siblings.  They can feel that compared to the needs of the child with a disability their needs are insignificant. Because of these feelings, Glass kids see their role as supporting the child with special needs and do not feel "worthy" of family time or resources to meet their own needs.  They can be very quiet.

There hasn’t been much research done on how all this impacts those glass children.  

It is not unusual for the typical child to be given responsibilities to compensate for the special needs child issues.  The typical child has to accept when the special needs child breaks a toy or disturbs a friendship. Their feelings about these losses are minimized in comparison to the child with disabilities.  Glass children can feel they were robbed of a childhood because of the times they had to step in the place of the parents.   Or that they could not have special trips or special toys because the resources went to the special needs of the child. Glass children may not be able to have a pet because the special needs child has medical issues that prevent a pet.   The Glass child often feels the responsibility to protect the special needs sibling from taunts or unkind words from the plain children at the school.  These children often feel they get the love that is left over, except there frequently isn’t any love or energy left over.

Then there is sometimes the expectation that the typical child will provide care for the disabled child after the parents have died.

Glass children grow up to be caregivers who expect little from others.  They are givers who are deeply in need of being care receivers.

Having a child with special needs is very challenging for a family.  Perhaps it is most challenging for the typical sibling who feels both responsible for the special needs child but also envious of the love and attention every kid wants, and it’s all going to the special needs child.   Sometimes Glass kids are only seen when they are being asked to be adults at an early age.