<p>I was thinking about this exact point, and wondering what my friends who have extremely disabled kids would say about this discussion.</p>
<p>One neighbor whose 18 year old son is at home instead of school this year because he wrapped his car around a tree one morning in broad daylight(no drugs or alcohol) and is now payalized and brain damaged. </p>
<p>One old friend whose 25 year old son is on the extreme end of the autism spectrum, along with extreme challenges mentally, ongoing seziures, etc. He has a two word vocabulary, will always be in diapers, and will be dependent on his parents and siblings for his entire life.</p>
<p>Is there a relationship there? In the give and take we normally assume of relationships, it is pretty one sided. There is love, but much of the parenting involved with these young men is pretty job-like. Managing medicines, physician visits, therapies, the minutia of the daily grind of parenting a child who will be with you, unchanged, forever, is not what most of us can imagine.</p>
<p>These families don’t have the luxury of discussing the fine points of “is it a job or a relationship.”. It is both, it is neither, but quitting is not an option.</p>
<p>eastcoascrazy, I think about that all the time as well. A friend of mine has a 25 year old son who I guess would be considered a higher functioning individual. However, he will never be able to drive, has many hygiene issues and I think will probably always live with his mom. And she does it all alone, because his father left the family. He has a great love of music, so she brings him out to as many live shows as possible in our area. He can be very annoying to some, because he sings along loudly, among other things. People judge her harshly for not “controlling him,” and I confess to being irritated at times, but not when I consider that for her, this is a life sentence. </p>
<p>I have often thought that although we as a society have elevated “Motherhood” to some kind of saintly status, actual, real-life mothers are scorned.</p>
<p>I couldn’t agree more. When I think of all the worry and agony I went through when D was young - all the times I berated myself for working or messing something up - I feel sad. I feel sorry for the insecure mother I was back then. </p>
<p>The mommy wars are/were pointless. The anger, the guilt-slinging, the moral superiority on all sides - who needs that?</p>
<p>Woody, working out of the home parents have no monopoly on guilt. I’ve known plenty of SAHMs who felt they were depriving their kids in some way by not having them in daycare, by not having more money, by not having the exposed to different caregivers. We mothers are spectacularly creative in finding reasons to feel guilty.</p>
<p>Oh, and I also commute with someone who works part-time. She makes herself crazy because she thinks she doesn’t do either employment or motherhood to the fullest. So none of us ever give ourselves a break.</p>
<p>I’ve stayed married to same guy but tried all the different combinations of motherhood and work – part time, full time, stay at home not working, full time from home, half-and-half, etc.</p>
<p>In all honesty, I think I worked a real job outside the home because I felt as if that was what I was suppose to do because I had a good education and was trained to do that job. Looking back, I honestly regret some of the stressful times this meant for our family. I look at my 401K and the money I put there is nice but I think it’s questionable if it was worth it. Empty nester now and wish I could go back and just slow some of the hectic times down.</p>
<p>I am interested to hear more from poetgrl on this point:</p>
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<p>I’ve always thought of my daughter and me as being in a relationship, though not as equals, which has occasionally been an issue for her. She’s a great kid, but she’s stubborn and not one to accept my authority without question. Once when I told her to do something she replied, “Why? And if you’re about to say, ‘Because I’m the mommy and I said so,’ I’d like a better reason than that.” </p>
<p>In any case, my daughter and I may have related differently in part because I am a widowed mother and I raised her on my own from the time she was a toddler. I’m not discounting the involvement of a couple of terrific long-term boyfriends, family members and friends, mind you. I don’t mention my status so people can feel sorry for me, but only as a preface to saying that my own experience raising a kid (which was occasionally quite challenging) makes me disinclined to judge the choices any other mother has made or had thrust upon her.</p>
<p>There have been days when I literally thought dealing with my kids was torture. I could make a list. The first example that comes to mind is when D2 was 20 months old, we were at a hotel restaurant and my husand had food poisoning. She was an out of control shrew and I wanted to crawl in a hole. The time when my son had an accident at age 4 and was in ICU with all sorts of tubes and wires and we thought he might die and certainly be brain damaged. I defy anyone to tell me that’s not torture.</p>
<p>It all starts with the inflicting of intense pain (birth)
Being worked past the state of exhaustion
Deprived of sleep
Loud noises inflicting mental and physical pain
Coercive persuasion
Something that causes mental or physical suffering (watching yoru kids make bad decisions)</p>
<p>musicamusica said this: “D is an adult who constantly keeps me updated on her life. I am a mother who needs to keep her mouth shut when it comes to D’s life and well being. At this point, I am still a mom but it’s certainly not a job…it’s more like torture.”</p>
<p>She did not say that being a mom was torture. She said that keeping her mouth shut, in other words, letting her adult D run her own life after all those years of advice and input was torture.</p>
<p>I couldn’t agree more. Like the time I was scrubbing vomit out of S’s brand new bedroom rug at 4 am in the morning. He was watching me, so I told him: some day, you’ll do this with your little boy. You know, just to give him something to look forward to.</p>
<p>I have a hard time getting my 17-year-old out of bed in the morning. The other morning, I went in a second time and he insisted I hadn’t been in before. When I told him I indeed had, his reply was, “You suck at getting people up.” So I threw water on him. His father and I have now told him that it is HIS job to get himself up, study, etc. He now has two unexcused absences on his record for the week since that change in policy.</p>
<p>Being a mother is harder than being a structural engineer. I speak from experience.</p>