Help for the siblings without the disorder

By Jennifer Bechdel
December 30, 2007

Parents of children with mental disorders can sometimes become very absorbed into reading up on the best new innovations in therapies and medications available to treat their children’s mental illness. They may spend a great deal of time researching and testing different therapies in order to find which one works the best for their child. I have no doubt that some parents are very committed to treating their children’s mental illnesses in the best possible manner. However, sometimes these parents may find it easy to spend less time and efforts on their other children; the one’s who aren’t suffering from a debilitating mental disorder.

Today I found an interesting article on the Time website titled “Autistic Kids: The Sibling Problem”, which discussed this very issue. The author is the mother of two children, one of which has autism. She had the following insight about the challenges faced by the sibling of an autistic child;

The “typically developing” siblings of autistic children are, in fact, the furthest thing from typical. Often, they are wiser and more mature than their age would suggest. And they have to be, given the myriad challenges they face: parental responsibility; a feeling of isolation from the rest of their family; confusion, fear, anger and embarrassment about their autistic sibling. And on top of all of it, guilt for having these feelings.

A number of suggestions were offered up in the article, most of which were gleaned from professional sources involved in the study of autism. However, most of these suggestions could probably be applied regardless of the type of disorder one was dealing with. The top two suggestions; Educate your other children on the illness and let your children meet other siblings of those afflicted with a mental disorder.