In this episode Chris brings talks to two people that have firsthand experience when it comes to what it is like for parents that have children with special needs. We have cohost Cortney who has been raising her own children with special needs and Chris’s wife who has been working in a government agency that specializes in working on early intervention for kids that have special needs. One key they cover is the need to understand that each child as completely different needs and you have to take the time to work with them.
Tune in to see the Mental Toll of Parenting Children with Special Needs Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Listen for the following takeaways from the show:
- To start the show, they define Special Needs and what they include.
- This is the NC Infant and Toddler program that is talked about on the show – www.beearly.nc.gov
- Children can come to that program through the parents, doctors, or other government agencies.
- Early intervention is important to help the child, but when a parent is told the “bad news”, it is tough for them at first.
- Parents will go through a grieving process when confronted with the news.
- It is a journey when you commit to getting through the challenges.
- Life is manageable but it can be lonely.
- Every stage in their life is another step that you have to reprocess.
- Human beings have an amazing ability to cope as things come up.
- At the end of the episode, they go over things you can do that help parent cope when raising kids with special needs.
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Episode #179 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to yet another edition we’ll Through a Therapist’s Eyes. I am Chris Gazdik a therapist since 1995 here to share with you thoughts about therapy, but we have actually a group. Today, Cortney, you’re back with us. Hello.
Cortney Donelson: How are you? I’m doing great. How are you?
Chris Gazdik: I’m doing pretty well.
I’ve kind of excited about this show for a specific reason that I think is pretty cool. You are going to have to turn in tune in rather than turn and tune into the YouTube version or the Facebook version it’s alive because we have actually for the very first time I am married and she is here.
Lisa Gazdik: I’m here.
Are you doing Lisa?
I’m good. That’s cool. Thanks for having me.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, this is going to be fun. We are going to be talking about, like I said, parents with special needs kids is the [00:01:00] focus today. So I’d like to say this is a perspective of a therapist and, and crew today in your own personal car or personal time in your home.
This is not to delivery of therapy services in any way. And still have that book out rediscovering emotions and becoming your best self. So you get a whole crew today that is going to help us all, truly figure this thing out together. The human, emotional experience, Cortney, before I forget, how do they find you?
I like to make sure that they can get with you while you’re on recording with us. So thanks. Yeah. B V O CEM
Cortney Donelson: C E M. That’s right. And the website is yourvocem.Com. It’s a writing services company. I offer ghost writing, editing, beta, reading, those types of things. I want to help people get their stories out.
That’s my jam.
Chris Gazdik: Elisa knows I can’t spell. Is that fair? You could be honest.
Cortney Donelson: Oh yeah. We’re totally honest. [00:02:00]
Lisa Gazdik: Hey, did he? He struggles it’s okay. So
Chris Gazdik: true. And she is an awesome editor. She edited my books. I really appreciate your, your work with that. Looking forward. If I haven’t scared you off to do the next book with Cortney.
So your editing needs ghost writing. She is absolutely awesome. Awesome. Awesome. At what she does, I mean that I’ve grown to know her for how long now? A couple weeks. Yeah. A couple
Cortney Donelson: of years. Yeah. Well, thank you. I appreciate the, the good word right there.
Chris Gazdik: Absolutely. Neil, you can give me just a bit of a head nod.
I think we’ve been playing around with this announcement. Are we live for a red bubble? Okay. So it is live and active, active. We can we we’ve now got the emblem speaking of spelling and handwriting, this guy actually digitized my, my handwriting. I don’t know how that’s going to look. You got to check it out on red bubble.
You know, you hit me right through a therapist size or no. W what did we do? Let’s figure this out together, right? [00:03:00] Yeah. The second one, let’s figure this out together. And he told me to write on a piece of paper, took a picture, digitize it, and put it on like cups and stuff. So, and I’ve seen it. It’s actually legible.
It is actually, so we’re, and we’re going to add a lot more quotes and things. So to put on various things like I think it’s really cool. I’m very excited about this, so you can check it out. We’ll have a link on the web. Throughatherapisteyes.com and you get like, you know, therapy journals that you can write things down.
You got a phone covers, you’ve got, you know, notebooks and magnets. A lot of people love t-shirts with cool phrases on it. I was literally just talking to a client the other day about it. So I’m really excited about it. I think, I think people are really going to enjoy it. And the brain brainchild of Neil brought out a jigsaw puzzle.
Right. I don’t know if I told you this, Lisa. No, he’s got a, he’s got a jigsaw puzzle that says let’s figure this out together. Is that not? I think that’s catchy. I think that’s catchy. So what I have cool things on there, [00:04:00] so we really appreciate you listening. We appreciate you being with us through the years.
Now we can say to episode, what is this? Almost 180. Wow. Crazy. That’s crazy. So I get to give a big qualifier here to start. Okay. I’m going to look into the camera and I’m going to own the reality that this here top. I have complete weaknesses in always have I, I don’t know why, but I really kind of want you to know from the get go, which is one of the reasons I thought Lisa would be awesome for the show.
And I’m so excited. Thank you so much, by the way. You’re welcome for being here. I really appreciate you doing this. Because I, I needed help with this one. I mean, there’s set definitely several topics from time to time that I bring guests and people on because you know, developmental disabilities and special needs learning disabilities, especially D particularly learning disabilities.
I don’t think it’s my weakness. I think it’s like [00:05:00] our human weakness. I don’t think we understand them at all that very much. I see you both shaking your head. I mean, would you agree
Cortney Donelson: from a parent’s perspective? Yes, I would agree with you. Yes,
Lisa Gazdik: absolutely.
Chris Gazdik: It is such a mystery. I feel like in a, in a lot of ways, but when we’re talking to.
You know, I have some experience with this actually, for sure. But you know, there’s a lot that I don’t purport to really understand about this working, especially with people that have the issues now working with parents, I’m definitely a little bit more up on just to give a little example, like I remember working with a client who was pretty significantly in severely autistic.
Now y’all know what autism is. Of course. Yes. Can you imagine doing talk therapy with a client who literally uses sounds and gestures to convey what his message is? [00:06:00] That was challenging. And, and so w we’re really gonna get in tonight with the idea of like what parents are struggling with and, you know, and kind of how, how this really works on the day-to-day level.
Cause it’s, it, it can be really stressful and scary in the beginning. I’m gonna make that bold statement. So with all that being said, where, where do we go with it? It’s funny. I love definitions to start out with. So I, you know, Cortney and I were just talking Lisa A. Little bit ago to, you might be a really interesting person just to ask off the cuff, like w when you think of, and I’m really curious how you’re going to see this, when you think of special needs.
Yes. What, what type of person is that? What is special needs? What, what, what’s the, what would we like the definition of the, the diagnostic. I
Lisa Gazdik: think it would be hard to say, because I think people struggle with their [00:07:00] own setbacks. And so even if you’ve been diagnosed with something, I don’t think your diagnosis looks like another person’s diagnosis.
Chris Gazdik: And she’s also absolutely on point, right? Because you and I were talking, I mean, traditionally special needs is thought of more
Cortney Donelson: specifically and the physical sense things. You can, things you can see, you know, wheelchairs or a cleft pallet or. Down’s syndrome things that are visible to someone who doesn’t know that someone is struggling with special needs, but there are invisible, special needs.
Like you mentioned, learning disabilities and other things like that, that you cannot see, but are just as sometimes debilitating as the physical ones.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I, a Google definition, I thought was [00:08:00] interesting. A youth who has been determined to require special attention in specific necessities that other children do not.
And I actually liked the way those thoughts go broad. And that’s what, you know, Lisa, I think you, you just nailed it and it really, if you get how you put it, but like, it is pretty broad, isn’t it special needs. It
Lisa Gazdik: is. And I work with, you know, birth to three, so we more or less look at the child as to what they’re not doing.
We don’t focus on. Their disability. If, if a child comes in and they’re not talking, we don’t automatically say, oh, well, you’ve got autism. We don’t do that. We focus on getting this child communicating in any way possible. And that could be gestures. It could be sign language. [00:09:00] It could be just making noises.
Chris Gazdik: You’re one
Lisa Gazdik: I’m talking about early.
Chris Gazdik: So actually let’s, let’s get that in, right? Like who are you, why are you here? What do you do? So you work with the CDSA child developmental services administration. It doesn’t say that wrong
child developmental services. What did I say wrong? Okay. What is it?
Lisa Gazdik: Children’s developmental services agency. Okay.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, the CDSA is, is what, and what do you really do with them?
Lisa Gazdik: Well, we are an overall developmental evaluation center and we see children birth to three years old at risk for delays in their development or who have delays.
We get a lot of referrals from doctors, pediatricians, the hospital. We get referrals from parents. We’re, you know, a lot of parents [00:10:00] don’t know how to contact us and they don’t know that they can make referrals, but they can. And we see anything from. A language delay to babies who were born very, very premature.
And it’s, and again, it’s really just not looking at their disability. It’s really looking at the child and we really focus on, you know, what is the child doing? What are their strengths? And then build on that. And then, you know, working with families through coaching and building that capacity and giving the support and resources and just begin there for them.
You
know,
Chris Gazdik: it’s funny right off the get, go. I hear you talking about that. Right. And, and what about the very word Cortney disability? Right? [00:11:00] What does a parent hear? When they get some diagnosis or something. Right. Because I know, right. Like I know that’s part of what you do in you supporting people we’ll come to that early on is these are the strengths.
These are what you got going for you, you just got, you got work for, but then, you know, they go home. Right. And they talk to their neighbors or their friends like, oh my God, my kid has a disability. What does that mean? And how about that word?
Cortney Donelson: It’s interesting. You say that. So disability, when you first hear it as a parent regarding your child there’s a mixture of feelings.
I can’t even imagine. The first, sometimes the first thing, like with me the first, the first thing was relief because there was an explanation and because, okay. I know I’m, I’m. Crazy. I know that, you know, I saw something intuitively I knew there was something. And so it’s confirmation. But on the other hand, like you said, the word disability, that means they lack an ability to do something and that’s heart-wrenching and you know, [00:12:00] it’s funny that you targeted that word.
So in my previous life with my other career, I was a physical therapist. I’m a little bit of
Chris Gazdik: everything, a little bit, a little bit of everything and HR didn’t care.
Cortney Donelson: That’s right. I said that,
Chris Gazdik: oh man. Yeah. Like we, we need to
Cortney Donelson: resume. Well, my fourth career, I applied to be an FBI agent. I didn’t speak Farsi.
They didn’t want me, I’m sure a story. I don’t want to do that. So so yeah. So the other thing though, that, that really I was taught in, in physical therapy school, not to put someone’s disability or struggle in front of. The person when your work, but even, even with you’re talking about them. So I say children with special needs instead of special needs child, because I always want the child to be first ahead of whatever struggle they have.
That’s also. Yeah. And so, yeah, just when, you know, in [00:13:00] talking, so disability was was kind of a little ding ding, and, but then special needs child. I was like, Ooh.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. And I’m going to go back to my qualifier when I started off here today. Right. Like this really is. And I recognize that. And, and, and, and I, it was frustrating a little bit, honestly, to me and I don’t work a lot with, with, with that, but it’s definitely come really set that autistic kid, but it’s things like that, that boy, you just don’t realize.
Cortney Donelson: ’cause then when the kids hear that it’s just like a cancer patient. Well, no, it’s a person struggling with cancer or going through cancer treatments. And if you put the, the issue, the problem, the pathology of the disease, first, it strips them and it makes them think, oh, well, that’s who I am. That’s what I,
Chris Gazdik: yeah.
Yeah, yeah. Instead of the strengths, instead of the things you got going for you instead of your, your great parenting ability and all of this strong, yeah, man, I’m never going to say that way again again. [00:14:00] Probably won’t like five minutes. I’m going to do my best, but I thank you for that because absolutely. That’s that’s right there.
So, okay. Back back to the definition real quick, right? So traditionally, right. You do you think of things like down syndrome and cystic fibrosis and spinal bifida and th they actually put, add here, interestingly, a lot in the traditional sense of when you think of special needs, you know, but as we’ve already covered, there’s just so, so much more.
And I love the way you put it, the invisible, you know, the invisible struggles,
Cortney Donelson: you know, when it comes to add there, what, one of my children’s struggles with add, and we call, we’ve learned to call it a neurodiverse. Because there’s so much strength and good things that come out of that, having that diagnosis or having that you know, brain type of brain.
No, it, it can be a superhero. I mean, there are certain things that [00:15:00] they can do way better very well. Then, then typical neuro-typical children. I couldn’t
Chris Gazdik: agree more. Yeah. You know I talk about that a lot. I think I have it in my, in, in our flow somewhere, but we’ll do it now. You know, I heard a training or something somewhere right.
Where this But I guess clinician or assessor would do assessments for Asperger’s, which we talked off the Mic’s right. I still say Asperger’s I know you don’t have to email me and tell me, he’s like, you know, Chris it’s called the autism spectrum disorder now, and we both agree. Right. I don’t want to speak for you, but it’s Asperger’s in my mind and I’ll do that from the end of my career.
And anybody in the ethics board has a problem just call me because I see it as very different, but this Asperger’s assessment clinician would assess Asperger’s and they would look to the parent and they’d be like, Hey, guess what? Like, this is, this is kind of cool. Guess what I’m thinking, I’m figuring out.
And she would go on to talk about [00:16:00] the amazing things that ask them whose kids do. Yeah, it’s their superhero strength. I
Cortney Donelson: actually, so I owe my writing services business. I actually hired someone with high functioning autism slash Asperger’s to help me with beta reading and, and proofreading because of their hyper focus, their attention to detail their directness.
I need the honesty for beta readers. I mean, and he was fabulous at that
Chris Gazdik: point. You give a structure, you get some concrete directions and they learn it. It’ll be like clockwork every single time. And it’s amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I actually had a client several years ago. He went to you know, those escape rooms, right?
They’re awesome. At puzzles and patterns and things like that with his group party, what you would escape room and he’s like, oh, the letter is on the back of your head. And you kind of look over here at the light and you [00:17:00] pick over this picture and see the letters, tell you what part of the picture to look at.
And that’s the way you leave the room. And he’s, he’s just like fighting
Lisa Gazdik: total buzzkill.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. You know, it’s an amazing skill sets with a lot of these different particularly the individ in, in invisible ones. I love that phrase as well. So let’s, let’s transition to a little segment that really gets, I think at two, this, this really tough day, and Lisa I think you have a lot that you’ve observed over the years for sure.
The initial stages of what a parent goes through, man. I mean, the observations that you’ve had, because we didn’t talk a whole lot about it, but you, I mean, and I know you’re super humble, but you you’ve been doing this for a lot of years. Like how long Back your experience go with this man? Like
Lisa Gazdik: it’s
Chris Gazdik: almost 21.
Yeah. 21 years. And honestly you can throw in up at West Virginia, you [00:18:00] were, you were working with yes,
Lisa Gazdik: I was working with yeah. I was caring for adults with severe and profound disabilities. They were yeah, it would, there were hard days, but and then I did case management and for several years.
And so yes, I’ve, I’ve been doing this awhile.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I mean, it’s probably every bit of a 30 year career at this point. If you really did the math all the way. Shoot when I met you 1995 again, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so now you’re involved in a lot, I would say with those early moments, when when a parent is calling you or you’re, you’re meeting with them and you know, you do in home evaluations when the pandemic wasn’t going on.
Of course we’re getting back to that scene and aren’t, we, we
Lisa Gazdik: will be back into the homes hopefully by may. Yay. Yeah, that’ll be
Chris Gazdik: good. It’s so much [00:19:00] better. Don’t you think? Absolutely. I can’t imagine doing an evaluation with these emotional issues that parents are dealing with and you just looking at that daggumTV screen, it that’s gotta be
Lisa Gazdik: tough.
It is very tough. We’re still not going to be doing the hands-on activities yet. We’ll be back into the homes. So But eventually we’ll, we’ll get there.
Chris Gazdik: And by the way, we have the show links Neil have on there, how to get up with CDSA and, and early intervention services. Those are super, super important.
There’s a little plug there is, right. The earlier you get to this stuff, the better it is. Yes. Think I’m right. Yeah. You know, and, and sometimes kids are just missed which sucks for sure. Yes. So, but getting back to the early reactions, right. So I was a part of, and it was really cool. It was like an evaluations team, honestly.
It’s probably a good model [00:20:00] of what you guys do, actually, Lisa, because it was part of a, I don’t even know why I was doing, I was literally in school. I mean, super green, not knowing anything and went to this team. Where a doctor was the lead doctor. And I mean, I don’t even know. I think they had PT there and OT and all these different disciplines.
And it was, it was a total group effort to evaluate this child in, in like a room. And so I had the opportunity of being behind a one way mirror and observing, you know, how this process is done, because there’s a lot that goes into this. And if there’s one thing I think that this segment of mental health does really well is multi-team disciplines.
Is that, would you say that’s true,
Lisa Gazdik: Lisa? Yes. That’s how we used to do evaluations. We would have a speech therapist. We would have a physical therapist. We even had a nurse and at one point we had a nutritionist. So you have all these great [00:21:00] minds coming together with, you know, different ideas and aspects.
And, you know, you really felt like. You were learning so much about this child that has really dissipated. Unfortunately, I was going
Chris Gazdik: to ask you, you said past tense there.
Lisa Gazdik: Why is that? Well it’s the, it just looks different now. You’ve, we’ve got physical therapists doing overall developmental assessments.
So we contract out for providers. So we are a provider at the last resort and it’s really hard for us to keep. Those physical therapist, occupational therapist, because they’re not doing their discipline. They’re not [00:22:00] specializing.
Chris Gazdik: It’s really broadened out. It has. Wow. Okay. That’s that’s, that’s shocking actually to me in my brain.
Lisa Gazdik: Yeah, Aliyah, we actually, our social worker retired, so we need
Cortney Donelson: a social worker.
Chris Gazdik: Let’s get you in there. Yeah. So let’s get back to, to what I, one of the things I really remember learning there is this doctor gave, it, gave us all a little in-service about how to deliver bad news to a parent. Boy. I just remember being just kind of heart struck with it.
Like it was. Those are tough moments. Those are, those are tough moments, right? From the get-go of being a parent, dealing with this stuff. I mean, you got to imagine, you’re bring your baby in here and you’re worried already because the baby’s not crawling or somethings, you know, you have a sense, right. As a, as a, a mom or a dad, I will degenderize that because dads are really in there too.
Some [00:23:00] men really like, you need to know that’s we’re there and now you’re having this whole team or, or a PT person, physical therapy or somebody, and you’re getting this information and he taught us like, look, just be direct. You have to be honest, you have to be straightforward. You can’t. Sugarcoat this, or try to do too much emotional caretaking, but that’s why you have a whole team there and follow up.
And, you know, Lisa set you up with, with services and support and, you know, a lot of awesome things, but that’s, that’s a really tough thing to really do. So I’m curious, you know, as you’re doing the home visits, Lisa, and, and just things that you observe to normalize what a parent is feeling in these tough moments, days, weeks, and early months of kind of dealing with all of this.
You’ve had to have so many conversations with parents.
Lisa Gazdik: Yeah. And it’s, it’s really hard because sometimes you [00:24:00] don’t know where the parent is. Sometimes they know that something is really wrong, but they know, but they don’t want to know. It’s easier to deal with. And denial. And then sometimes you just have parents who are just so overwhelmed because not only do you have this child, you have other children.
So you’re continuing to be a mom a taxi you know, your life still goes on with this child that you just learn has special needs. And, and for whatever reason, You know, you may cope well, you may not. And sometimes we lose families all to get, we lose parents [00:25:00] because they’re, they’re not
Chris Gazdik: ready. Oh, interesting.
What percentage would you say may be, let me ask it this way. What percentage, if you will, would, would maybe bail out of services or stop services in, I know this is just spitballing it, but in your experience for emotional reasons that the, about the parents,
Lisa Gazdik: I, it’s hard to say really. It’s hard to say. Because sometimes they bail and you don’t know why they bail.
And so it’s, you know, it’s more like, are they not ready or they just ha in, sometimes parents will say, you know, we really do have a lot going on. Yeah, we, I changed jobs. I can’t find daycare. I we’ve moved for whatever reason.
Chris Gazdik: I think I’m going to make the bold statement and Cortney, I’m really curious what you think about that.
Cause we’re coming up to like, you know, what you experienced [00:26:00] yourself as you kind of already alluded to. Right? I’m going to make the bold statement that I’m willing to bet that are pretty daggum high percentage of that is like straight up grief reactions.
Cortney Donelson: I was just going to say I was just, it’s a loss and you immediately there.
There’s a death. There’s a death of what you thought a death of the future to some degree. And in some cases there’s the death of having a typical child, a quote, unquote, normal child, but I can’t stay on that. And, and so there is a grieving process and what’s the first, the first step or phase of grief is like, is denial, right?
It’s shock.
Chris Gazdik: It’s yeah. Denial. I’m going home. I can’t deal with this. It’s oh, it’s gotta be just very overwhelming, horribly powerful in just dominating worries and fears and
Cortney Donelson: well, what, what is the first thing [00:27:00] that people write or post or write or say or tell someone as soon as they have a baby right after the gender?
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know what you got Lisa. Oh,
Cortney Donelson: I mean, it’s JOy. Yes, everyone’s healthy. Everyone’s healthy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You’ll see it on all the birth posts. This is the way mom and baby are happy and healthy or what, and so that is the that’s everyone’s goal. It’s the standard. It’s the expectation.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. You know, I’ll tell you, I you’re hitting me.
I feel a little convicted there. I can really identify with, with that. I mean Lisa, you remember when Aaron was born? I mean, that that’s scared to ever believe in Jesus, out of me. I really don’t even like to go back to that, those moments because when, when our first son was born, I mean, what’d, he hit, he was born with what’s the word?
Meconium. And, and they put him in the fricking NICU. Like Joe, we got a [00:28:00] lot of nurses around here. We got a lot of people go. I mean, I couldn’t have been more freaked out, Lisa, when all that
Lisa Gazdik: was going on, it’s very scary. It’s scary. Having a child and then two, yeah. You’re like, oh my gosh. You know, because when you give birth, it’s like, you give birth to your heart and it’s a whole separate, it’s just a part of you.
And it is very scary. And I D I, I don’t know what it’s like to have a premature baby, but I can’t even imagine. And, you know, that’s the other thing is we just, we can’t assume what these parents are going through. You have no idea.
Chris Gazdik: So from a parent’s perspective, which is the focus, what we’re diving in a little bit to tonight, gosh, it is normal to feel.
Powerfully scared and overwhelmed and angry. Just pissed [00:29:00] off that I don’t get what I am supposed to get a normal, happy, healthy baby, as you said, right? Like terrifying. I mean,
Cortney Donelson: there’s a lot of angry for your child to knowing that the future that they do.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. There’s a lot that’s so, so, so if you’re experiencing this and you, you know, some people are going to tune into the show and it’s kind of like, you know, this is difficult time and I want you to feel like you’re not crazy.
Yeah. Just
Lisa Gazdik: find a, find your supports, find your solid supports, whether it’s family members or support groups. You know, sometimes you have to be careful with the internet because it will feed you a lot of junk. And like I said earlier, you know, your baby’s diagnosis looks totally different from somebody else’s, so [00:30:00] you really have to be careful.
And I always tell parents that because they, they will. And I, and I’m sure with the pandemic, you know, not being able to get out and meet and do your normal routines and activities. I think a lot of people have turned to the internet for support, and that could be so dangerous.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. It’s a really good point, Lisa and we’ll, we’ll come down at, towards, you know, the last segment that we, I wanted to focus on.
And a little bit was, you know, what do you do? And of course the question is, how do you cope? What are you doing? You hit, you know, of course she’s always on point, right? Like, you know, you hit a few of the things that my brainstorm created. I want to back up to though. You just said something that made me think of going back a little bit to like, what are we talking about here again, almost back to the first segment of, of definition, because I forgot to cover like, yeah, there’s these big ones, but what about, you know, there’s a cool [00:31:00] article quote that I had.
What about vision impairments? What about hearing impairments? W w w what about traumatic brain injury? Or as you said, prenatal stuff, there are a lot of things that go into, as you were saying, the, the summit, some of these are very invisible. These are all special needs. The child is having to cope with, and parents are having.
It’s to fear. Remember when we, we, we liked to joking and we got Aaron’s, eyesight tested, like ever, like, you know,
Lisa Gazdik: which, well, I have bad eyesight. I’ve been wearing glasses since fourth grade, but I probably needed them in first grade. I just didn’t tell anybody.
Chris Gazdik: And I had hearing deficits bad. That’s one of the reasons why my English skills struggled early on, I couldn’t hear.
And I didn’t even really know that I wasn’t hearing. Right. So there’s a lot. This is very broad. Is the scope that we’re really trying [00:32:00] to pan out. Cortney, let’s go, let’s go to, again, more of the experiences that you had just as a parent that you alluded to in, I think you said, you know, adopting kids and just break it down for what you’ve experienced, if, if you would on some level.
Cortney Donelson: Sure. So, well, both of my children were adopted internationally, so we have a child, our son from Russia. And a daughter from China. And yeah, they are. They’re super cool. And so that is a whole other, that’s a whole other podcast. I’m afraid adoption, but so both of my children kind of entered this world with trauma.
And so that in and of itself presents as a special need as well as they’re growing up because there’s loss and grief that they need to, to handle. And so, but one of my children was we [00:33:00] they were on a list of kids with special needs. So we walked into that fully knowing that there may or may not be something there because the particular country where they were born.
You can’t really trust maybe a lot of the information you’re getting. And so it was very, it was general information. It was a brain diagnosis. We had physicians here kind of look at stuff, but again, until you bring the child home and have all the assessments done, you just don’t know. And so that ended up itself requires a lot of courage.
And so,
Chris Gazdik: well, one thing real quick, right? Like there’s two things there, one you’re right. I mean, this is courageous to engage in the first place. Right. Which has its own unique experience that you’re coming at it with as opposed to what we were previously, I think kicking around. Yeah, it was right.
Cortney Donelson: Was everyone wants a healthy baby.
And so that was actually as it from a parent perspective, walking into. [00:34:00] Bringing a child into our home that was already, we knew was not quote unquote healthy. It re re received pushback from friends, family. Oh yeah. Yeah. Because you know, the idea is why, why would you want to do this? Yeah. Like this could be like a lifelong thing you don’t know.
Right. And there, there, that was concerned for us. It was their love for us. It was caring. But yeah, so we, we entered into that adoption with, you know, we’re kind of, we’re being rebellious where we’re doing something crazy already where we’re, what are we doing?
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Which is interesting. I, you know, you, you bring up the whole people’s reaction around you.
That’s a big part of the parent experience that can be great and supportive. You know, I’m not saying that doesn’t happen. I mean, people got supportive friends and family and all that, but boy, just like I made the mistake of special needs kids, people don’t know. Right. Pete people don’t really, it’s, it’s a shock [00:35:00] to your, you know, how about grandparent factors?
We don’t have a grandparent in the room, you know, grandparents are dealing with a lot of the feelings that go along with that too. So, so there’s a lot of are a lot of layers swirl around the whole social scene. Isn’t there.
Cortney Donelson: Yeah. Yeah. So we long story short, both of our children have special needs.
Okay. And both of them have completely invisible, special needs, and both of them have a list of invisible, special needs. Yeah. There you have it. So we you know, so we, we had to go through that grieving process.
Chris Gazdik: Let me ask you right quick as foreshadowing, a little bit. Is that manageable? Well,
Cortney Donelson: do you see what I look like?
I mean, I know we’re on a podcast. We have a YouTube self-care for me today was going for a walk and not showering. So it looks
Chris Gazdik: fine. People are going to tune into YouTube. Now they’re going to be like yo
Cortney Donelson: old or your [00:36:00] children. So my children now are teenagers. They’re 17 and 13, but we brought them home.
Our son was, it was three days before his first birthday and our daughter was 19 months old when we got home with her. So they were babies still young, but yeah, so, and we, you know, we had assessments early intervention. We were referred by her pediatrician. We had a wonderful pediatrician on top of everything.
We had all the assessments and everything. And so. But some of them kind of slipped through or were disguised because they have the list of, of things of challenges. And so some present very similarly to other things. So some slipped by, so we’re still learning even now, even now it’s a process, it’s a journey.
Like it’s not even going to be an overnight thing,
Chris Gazdik: but again, the hope is there. I mean, you’re sitting here, I’m sitting here.
Cortney Donelson: I had a lot of, I have my own business. I, we are, we, we have fun as a family. We, you know, it’s wonderful. [00:37:00]
Chris Gazdik: And, and, and, and I, I know somebody personally, that’s pretty close to us, you know who you are.
Sir. They’re great. Yeah. The world doesn’t end is my main point here. Like you, you get through this and then you find out, sometimes they do, they have superhuman powers, amazing things come from this stuff. I mean, the gosh, the stories are just. Tune into some of the YouTube stuff and people that are sharing what their children have done.
I mean, you’ve been doing it long enough, Lisa, and I know you’ve got flooding through your brain. I would be willing to bet like all these kids that you met and, you know, and I know we’ve talked about it sometimes, like how they’re doing now and what what’s happening and the hope that’s there, right? Like, is this hopeful?
Is this management?
Lisa Gazdik: It’s funny, I’ve been doing this for so long that I I’ll be at the grocery store and I’ll, and I’ll run into a family, which I haven’t for a long time, but I’ll run into a family and they’re like,
Don’t you [00:38:00] do
you know him? And I’m like, no, I don’t. You know, and but it’s so cool to, you know, to run into those fan.
And I do intake now for, you know, the programs. So I don’t build the rapport with the families like I used to, but I was able to see a little girl just recently that I had worked with. And it was so ironic that they were, this is bad. They were my favorite family here. And, and I, it was, it was amazing to see her again, to non-verbal, you know You know, we sh we had no idea.
Parents had no idea what was wrong. You know, some of these kids are sent away, you know, to Duke, or I had a child on my caseload one time that she had to [00:39:00] have a hemispherectomy. So part of her brain was gone. Wow. And, you know, the challenges that this family had gone through was just amazing. It was just crazy.
And, you know, I think she ended up with like a service dog. I had written a letter way after she had aged out of the program for her to receive a service dog, because I had worked with them since she was eight months old. And then they age out at three and then help them transition. So,
Chris Gazdik: which, which real quick is, is a nice little transition or not transition, but a plug we, we did, you know, these shows do bleed together.
I say that all the time. Cause we did a show on service dogs. If you go to through therapist size.com. And John a colleague of us here at Metro liner, we actively got to see a service dog [00:40:00] in action for his wife. And it is, it is, it is. It’s amazing. So I’m on this little hope bump here because these parents are smiling.
You know, these, these parents are thriving. These families are engaging. Like I really want people to hear that a you’re really not alone. There are, there are great supports that are out there. Call Lisa at CDSA she’ll plug you in and Gaston county or each county has one states across the world. These are, these are cross states across the country.
And I would imagine services around the world. Like we know autism speaks is worldwide. Now I’m willing to. Okay. Oh, good. I’m getting head nods right there. And you, you can get through this, right? So again, Cortney, is this manageable?
Cortney Donelson: Yes, it’s manageable. But there are times when it’s lonely, but it, it teaches you to look at the world from a different perspective.
It teaches you to you know, find the positivity in all things. It teaches [00:41:00] you to not take things for granted. Like there are so many good things that you learn as a parent walking through this journey with your kids. Let me frame, but I don’t want to sugar
Chris Gazdik: coat it though, Chris. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah.
Cortney Donelson: I mean, I know you want your heart. There, there is hope and there’s positivity and obviously it’s manageable. But sometimes the journey is hard for forever. For a lot of us. That’s fair. Yep. Absolutely. Because like Lisa said even if, even with people who have shared the same diagnosis on paper, it presents very differently.
So even when you join some of the support groups or talk to other families, the experiences are very different and your struggles are very different and it, it does. Yeah, I I’m, I’m, I’m a Debbie downer right now for yarn and I know
Lisa Gazdik: you’re, you’re, you’re doing reality. Yeah. It’s definitely reality. And in, you know,
Cortney Donelson: I have not lost my sense of humor.
Lisa Gazdik: That’s the best part.
Chris Gazdik: You got to laugh. If you can’t [00:42:00] laugh in life, you can’t laugh in life. I was really joining with you there. And I, and I appreciate that. And I want to honor that Cortney, because that is real and, and you’re right. I don’t want to sugar coat it either. I think that people need to understand that the ongoing challenges.
So, you know, so people that are listening that have teenagers and are frustrated in tuning in maybe two parents experience with, with children that have special needs that are, do it. Got it. Right. Okay. So this isn’t ongoing chat. You’re going to Renu grief.
Cortney Donelson: With each stage in life, each stage, you have to agree.
I, so neither of my children are currently traditional college university, four year program bound, not even two year program bound. Right. And so, I mean, even just walking through that initial high school, and one of mine is a junior, like just at that acceptance of, okay. Their path has not the same as my path.
And so every stage of life requires a [00:43:00] new perspective, a new, okay. Step back and let’s reevaluate. What’s important. What’s not. So,
Lisa Gazdik: but think about how you do that with typically developing children. Yeah, they are, they’re ever evolving. Right. So yeah.
Chris Gazdik: I can tell you this as a, as an older teenage parent family, I work constantly. seeing new stuff
Yeah.
Lisa Gazdik: Yeah. There’s some days I’m like, I think you were switch. Who are you? Where did you
Chris Gazdik: come from? Yeah. So real quick. I don’t want to lose this, this thought that, that I just lost it because I joined with you on that. And then I got it back. And I’m glad because I think this is something that I hear and I’m going to tell you, honestly, you know, we’ve got our own children with special needs, I guess you’d say.
And I think there’s a lot that, well, we already talked about that. I guess I’m talking about [00:44:00] my own naivete is a good word with the phrase and the experience that I’ve had that I hear. With children with special needs. Say often I wouldn’t change a thing if, if I could do a magic solution and make this different, like, I wouldn’t do that.
And I think that’s so cool, but I’m going to be vulnerable and really kind of say like, I, I, I can’t say that I really, to the depths of that, understand that, like I, I struggle with that a little bit. Yeah. You’re facing some things, do you? Okay. What’s up. I
Cortney Donelson: struggled because I understand where they’re coming from.
I understand it from their perspective of the reality. I mean, they are trying to sit in their reality as we all are, because if we’re, if we’re always, well, what if or if this wasn’t happening or if this hadn’t happened, we can’t live there. So I understand the perspective of saying I would never change a thing.[00:45:00]
I get that however, My, my, my kids struggle every single day with something that I’ve had the schools call me on a monthly basis for something I, my kids are in, my kids are in counseling. They’re in therapies there. Of course I would want to change that for them because it’s hard for them as an adult and a parent.
Oh, I’ll figure it out. I’ll handle it. I’m strong. I’m, strong-willed, I’m stubborn. But for them, I can’t tell you how many times both of my children have cried saying, why am I like this? I don’t want to be like this. Why can’t I be normal? And so I understand the perspective of wanting to live in the reality and saying they wouldn’t change a thing because they love their children.
I love my children, but I would want to change something for them to make it easier.
Chris Gazdik: Well, I really appreciate that. I didn’t expect that. And I expect, I really appreciate your courage and perspective with that because. [00:46:00] What I didn’t anticipate in what seems like we’re doing is giving permission to allow your real and true, genuine experience to be a part of what’s going on, including the grief and the loss, as we’ve talked about, I think, well, and ongoingly having that normal feeling that you’ve just really described so well, so that that’s okay.
And
Cortney Donelson: I am, I also understand cause I, I I’m a strong Christian. My faith is a huge part of our family and for me in my life. So I understand also that struggles D you know, build character. They, you know, they make you who you are into who God created you to be. So I understand that perspective as well.
But life itself is already a struggle. Why pile on?
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Wow. That’s, that’s really, yeah, that’s, there’s a lot there. I think I’m going to move our conversation on, because I really want a park out there because I [00:47:00] think my supposition is that people are probably feeling that a lot and it’s, and it’s not an area that they feel permission to really acknowledge and talk about.
So do like that’s awesome. Thank you for that. Right. I, I, I, I had a whole another segment that I think we’ve already kind of covered. I wanted to kind of tell the story of our other parents’ experience. Let me, let me just kind of check in with you guys. Do you think we’ve done a good job at this point or kind of what this experience is it T particularly in the initial parts and then kind of ongoing as you’re dealing with teens, and we haven’t talked too much about adult people with special needs, but you know, we’ve we’ve we, did we cover that enough?
Did we give a good description of like what maybe what a parent’s experiencing.
Cortney Donelson: I think so. I mean, for, yeah, for a single podcast. Absolutely.
Lisa Gazdik: You could talk about this all day long.
Cortney Donelson: There are so many facets,
Lisa Gazdik: so many different factors [00:48:00] and, you know, being on the early part of it, there’s so many different factors that go into that, you know, and, and having teenagers and then young adult, and then you’ve just got this ongoing stages of there’s just a lot.
Chris Gazdik: So, so what I want to do with the segment that I was going to do there is, is pull an audible in the, in the part of the section that I wanted to talk about is just this part, the reality, instead of telling the story of, of what it’s like, I really want to make a dramatic pause and a slow draw into helping parents.
Truly trust your instincts. Yeah, I do a lot in my work of putting myself in my client’s shoes. I really [00:49:00] do that. I’ve done that for a lot of years and I feel like I’ve been pretty successful to be able to understand, you know, bipolar and substance abuse families and just the whole array of things that I said I deal with.
And I acknowledged in the beginning, that developmental delays in these special needs are, is, is a weakness of mine that I’ve struggled with in that. But I would, I would imagine, and y’all are going to be able to speak to this, that there’s, there’s gotta be this huge natural doubt because I can’t be alone.
When a parent is learning of diagnosis, like Lisa, you come home and talk about some diagnoses. Sometimes I can’t even pronounce. Yeah. Literally like,
Lisa Gazdik: well, that’s, what’s good.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. But, but, but, but the thing that I’m tapping here is the doubt that you have about what, you know, like, can I say boldly that, you know, your kid better than anyone else in the world, whether they’re a professional and knows how to spell these crazy things that Chris goes, he [00:50:00] can’t even speak you trust your instincts.
Can, can y’all talk to that.
Cortney Donelson: Yeah. I’ll, I’ll talk to that. So one of my children when they were three was real quiet upstairs, so I went upstairs to check on them and they were in their room and had a big, huge. Puzzle of each state of the United States. And they had taken it apart and gotten 50 pieces of paper and we’re sketching each state outlining it, and then taking the pieces of paper and putting the puzzle itself back together from the paper, not the puzzle pieces.
Okay. And coloring them all and everything. Okay. And I walked in, they were three. Wow. I walked in, I saw what was happening and I immediately texted my husband and said, I don’t know what to do. I cannot parent this child because they are way out of my league. Right. And I [00:51:00] doubted my ability to, I knew, obviously I knew something something’s up.
This is I could, you know, I don’t know many kids who at age three would do all this and it was precision. And so I knew immediately we knew immediately something was up. And, but I doubt. My ability to, I knew it would be overwhelming to figure it out. I didn’t know where to turn. I knew it would be scary to figure out what it might be.
I knew that it would change the way I parented and I was just still learning. Yeah. Like, because parenting to be parents. Yeah. Parenting is very different for children with special needs, especially children who have been adopted. It’s a different, every everything you read in the books, you have to do the opposite.
And so it’s scary. And so, yeah, I doubted it, but I also knew something’s up and I need to act, I need to get help. I need to figure this out. So. [00:52:00]
Chris Gazdik: There’s a lot of reasons. I think I recently talked about on the show, why I say the human emotional experience, let’s figure this out together. I did literally just set that, like you didn’t say together, but we’re going to figure this out.
Absolutely hooking you up with a coffee cup and whatever you want, man, with my scribbled signatures of whatever the heck the phrase is no seriously, like, you know, this and that’s, that needs to be celebrated. Like you can figure this out with your child and with your husband and with your support systems.
There are no immediate answers. I got a list here in a second of my brainstorm of things to do and kind of to cope. And I think you guys could probably say more about that, but th th th I am amazed at human beings, ability to cope with what’s in front of you.
Cortney Donelson: To adapt, to learn to
Chris Gazdik: flexibly, move, to learn and move through the challenges that that face [00:53:00] you.
And then how about share with others so that they can kind of learn, you know, from your experiences of what I think your, I love the story because that, that’s a, that’s a very vulnerable moment, but as a great teaching moment, Cortney, that, that parents listening can tap into and gain the confidence and strength that I wanted to kind of highlight with this.
I
Cortney Donelson: did not know how strong that I would need to be, and I didn’t know how strong I was and it, you
Chris Gazdik: know, yeah. That’s a powerful statement. I’m still praying
Cortney Donelson: for strenth, by the way, I need more, but we all need that’s any parents
Lisa Gazdik: is every parent
Chris Gazdik: that’s right. Yeah. So let me just throw my, my, my brainstorm.
Let’s let’s wrap up here. We still have plenty of time. So I’m going to say, I’m not shutting this down. I think what I want to do is just like, shoot my little brainstorm that I did and talk about. Cause I think you guys are both. I mean, you’re, you’re so in touch with these things [00:54:00] and you’ve peppered in a lot throughout our conversation on how to do and how to cope.
And so just let your minds shift around and people listening, just let your minds go in a direction of what, what do you do already to cope? What, what may be your one or two things that you might be able to add? And, and y’all Cortney and Lisa jump in and add to what you experienced with that.
Because, because, because again, we can cope. We can deal with this. We can figure this out together. So a don’t be alone. I say that all the time. I know on a show, but dang, that’s so key, right? Don’t be alone. Be careful about unfair comparisons on Facebook. Lisa was all absolutely a point. Or you said that, right?
That’s a big one. Oh gosh. These comparisons, right? Okay, go
Cortney Donelson: ahead. Yeah, no, that’s a big one. In fact, that might be the main reason that I am no longer really on social media a whole lot.
Chris Gazdik: I mean, I don’t know because yeah, I just, yeah,
Cortney Donelson: cause it’s just, everyone puts out their [00:55:00] best and I, yeah, we can never live up.
Lisa Gazdik: You get in your mouth and you get that.
Like, wow. I want to be like that every single day. Well, they’re not like that every single day. This is just a moment. So yeah, but we think,
Cortney Donelson: wow, their life is great. They’ve got it all together.
Chris Gazdik: We’ll get them there on a boat and crystal blue water with amazing sunsets behind him holding each other, hugging each other, the whole family with a big fish.
They caught that looks so awesome. Yeah, it was a cool moment. But, but beyond that, I would, I would add Cortney, I think to what you’re experiencing with this being so big. I don’t think you need, let me say this very clearly. Listen, I don’t think you need social media to fall into the trap of comparing your family, your life, your situation with other people right.
Next door. Absolutely. So this is something that absolutely gets.[00:56:00] I think that’s part of what the fear is. I think that’s part of what we said the grief is and all the, all the things that go through,
Lisa Gazdik: I’ve heard moms say, oh, well, when I pick up, you know, little Johnny from daycare you know, there’s this little girl’s, she comes up to me and she’s talking sentences and Johnny’s older than her.
And he’s only has three words, boy. Yeah.
Cortney Donelson: Yeah. Oh, it it’s, it’s hard. It’s hard.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. So don’t be alone. Be careful about unfair comparisons, especially on Facebook. It’s okay to grieve. We, I think we talked about that. I would imagine that feeling of how can I go so down about what I fear, I am not supposed to.
You know, want the best for my kid. And it feels so defeated. Like those are, those are real feelings. I think Cortney, you, you talked about that earlier, right? Stay present. Be careful about getting way too far ahead of the game in [00:57:00] life. We, we can begin to imagine literally the day after Lisa’s home in your home doing an evaluation.
Well, what about marriage? What about babies? What about grandbabies? What about retirement? Oh my God. Are they going to live independently? What are they going to do? How’s this going to work? Holy cow. Hold the phone. Right? Like let’s slow it down. These ladies are like shaking their heads and nodding. It’s like, yeah,
Cortney Donelson: it’s all it all stems from fear, right?
It all stems from fear. Cause I won like I do. I wonder it. So one of my children, we will, we will have to have guardians. Once she turned white, once they turn 18 for a while, I don’t, we don’t know how long, but it’s, but it also, it kind of, you know, you have this grand plan as parents. Oh, that we’re going to be empty nesters.
They’re finally going to leave the house. They’re going to go to college. We’re going to retire and travel. And we ha we, you know, we have this expectation or idea in our mind back when [00:58:00] we were deciding to have children. And it, it just, again, it’s another grieving process to go through, but it’s also fear of, okay, so what, what will our lives look like?
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. As a parent, just as a parent and then as a parent with some special needs, I guess in our family is. I can’t tell you how many times my mind has changed directions. You Lisa, like I thought this and then no, that’s okay. Maybe this will be well, okay. Now that well, okay. Wait, I’m also a planner as am. I am a one five.
Cortney Donelson: I’m not a fly by the seat of my pants kind of person.
Chris Gazdik: I’ll say like, Lisa’s probably gonna listen at home or thinking she’s gonna, she’s gonna bubble. Yeah. One five and 10-year plan and how, you know, we, we, but we’ve put that structure. Yeah. We try to structure our life. I didn’t have it on my list, but it occurs to me like, how about be flexible?
How’s a coping skill. Like get ready to change course directions because your kid gets to be a part of what you play. Right. Which is important. Okay. Join communities I [00:59:00] had right. There’s communities. Autism speaks. I’m ignorant a little bit here. What are some examples of communities? I’m curious what you guys would.
I basically stop at autism speaks?
Cortney Donelson: Well, there are even small local communities. So in where we are in the lake Norman area of North Carolina, There’s even a small group that meets once a month on Saturdays, parents of kids with special needs. Awesome. I have not gone. Okay. Do you want to know why
Chris Gazdik: I am bated breath curious?
Cortney Donelson: Because I live every day in, under our roof. The last thing I want to do on my Saturday is go and be with parents who are struggling the same as I am. Cause it’s, it was hard for me. I was like, I just want, I don’t want to listen to everyone else’s struggles because I have my own and I don’t, you know, I want her, I want a break, but recently I’ve decided to go try one out just because I feel like, yeah.
You know, I think, I think you need some community here that people that [01:00:00] don’t necessarily understand exactly, but understand on a foundational level.
Chris Gazdik: Wow. So is that like a growth area or is that like a.
Cortney Donelson: I don’t know, or maybe things are just so desperate.
Lisa Gazdik: You have no idea. Even if you go in and you could be a solid ground for somebody who maybe is just learning, you have no idea the impact that you could have on another parents.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. That’s what I love about communities, Lisa. Yeah. Yeah. The w when people come together, eat, even just parents, like, you know, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve, we’ve talked many times, like the way we feel after people on the sidelines of a soccer team and whatever, like, oh my God, like your kid won’t pick up the wrapper.
What is the deal with the lights they’re always on? And other parents are like, oh no, it’s the clothes. And I’m like, oh my God. I know it’s the clothes. Like, it’s just so like the power of not being alone. And, and you’re right, Lisa, [01:01:00] like the, the, the impact you can have just by what you’re sharing, even what you’re sharing right now is amazing.
I mean, Yeah,
Cortney Donelson: but there are tons of groups for anything you can just yeah, you can. Yeah. You can Google it and find so much.
Chris Gazdik: That is the advantage of social media and everything. Okay. Join communities. Find the beauty in being different dramatic piles, right? Like we all have skills. I mentioned the Asperger stuff and all, it’s just, it’s your super strength.
Teach the child. Developmental awareness and answer the questions that arise. There was on my list in the quick comment about that. As general, when we talk about parenting, you know, on the show, I kind of like to highlight the best guide post I’ve been able to come with the questions and doubts of how much do I share with the siblings?
How much do I share with the actual kid themselves? I don’t want to go too much. I don’t want to make them too fearful, but I want to inform them, you [01:02:00] know, here’s the guide post I’ve come up with, make sure, first of all, make sure the kid knows. They can ask you any question that they would want to, or need to.
They got to know that, and you’re going to need to reinforce that over the years and, and several times over. But when you accomplish that, then you allow the kids questions to guide how much it is that you share, because they will continue asking questions until they get out. What they need is. Is that, does that make sense to be real quick?
Yeah. Right. Like that’s really, I think important. Be mindful to help siblings understand, especially when they’re older siblings, I mentioned, you know, the older siblings get jealous of the new baby that comes around. What about the new baby? That you’re like all fawning over and worried about him. You know, the older kids sitting around, they’re like, yo mom, dad, can we like
Cortney Donelson: throw ball?
I grew out of my shoes two years ago. that is not personal.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, [01:03:00] because you shared how you buy fake Nike. No, that was that wasn’t, you know that wasn’t you, you, you buy, Casey’s going to be mad now. She’s like I bought my kid and the kid went to school in her fake Nike’s now you buy real Nike’s don’t you?
Cortney Donelson: No, my son buys his own shoes. Cause he’s got about 12 of those Nike
Chris Gazdik: seriously, totally. With you on a joint communities. Forgive, I actually had that on my list. I did didn’t I, you did. That must be important, right? Forgive self, and take care of self needs. I don’t have time to go into the caretaking role today.
We covered a whole show on that. You become a caretaker and caretakers are best taking care of others when they’re taking care of themselves. Like that’s, that’s I think a true and important statement maintain a focus on marriage. There is a marriage like, oh, by the way, honey, easier, you know? Yeah, you got to do parenting.
You got to deal with these needs and these things, [01:04:00] but there’s also a part of you in marriage that needs to be an important focus. Trust your instincts. I mentioned that already don’t or laugh, right? Laugh. Don’t forget humor. You need so many laughable moments. Celebrate them, enjoy them that this kid is a beautiful.
Creature and whatnot. So as I went through some of those things, what did your minds do? Or is there things I missed? You know, how, how do parents cope? I mean, w how, how do you encourage validate support them as you go along your relationship with, you know, with parents or as a parent, what do you think?
Lisa Gazdik: Well, early on, I really think that celebrating the baby steps is really key and not focusing so much on the big picture because that’s, that’s very overwhelming and nobody knows the future. I mean, we just [01:05:00] don’t. So just focusing on today, or maybe tomorrow, you know a lot of these parents are going through, you know, especially if, if their child is, is medically.
Fragile, you know, they’ve got so many different doctors in their lives and they’ve got specialized therapies and they had a lot going on. So just celebrating today in the baby steps of accomplishments and, and finding the good and the day, you
Chris Gazdik: know, I really love that celebrate the baby’s steps. And I might, I might even create that together with Elisa and say, celebrate the babies steps all the way through their life.
Oh, absolutely. Right. Like how cool is that Cortney sum us up and I’ll take us out of here. We need to get out of here. Any closing thoughts or things you’re thinking?
Cortney Donelson: No, I just I think it’s important for parents to be honest with what they’re feeling and going [01:06:00] through and not try to hide it. Not try to think less of themselves because they’re going through it.
I have a wonderful support team of a best friend. Is a therapist and understands these things and works with these children as yes you do. And I I also have a husband that is a true partner with me and we, we lean on each other a lot. We have special, I, you know, stares at each other. Like, I need your help kind of stares or tag team I’m out lower take a break or whatever.
And so it actually has brought us closer together because we need each other to help. And so those single parents out there of children with special needs find someone, find someone that you can tag team with that you can partner with that you can turn to. So.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, for sure. Because single that is a whole show girl, right?
Yeah. So listen, I hope that we’ve done a job to kind of help [01:07:00] you through initial stages, understanding what you’re dealing with. You know, as Cortney said earlier, you know, in a single podcast, how do you accomplish all of that? We can take deeper dives on big, big, different, specific parts of this, but there’s, there’s a lot of hope.
There’s a lot of reality. That’s here. Understand this little child is absolutely in your home. You’ve got what it takes to be there for them, with them. And I love how Lisa created the idea of celebrating their steps throughout their whole life together. So it is an amazing journey. It’s, it’s it’s well worth it.
Let’s continue figuring this out. Right. So we will see you guys next week and take care happy St. Patty’s day. I think we’re recording this on St. Patty’s day. Yeah. That’d be St. Patty’s day. Hope you had.