Additional Needs

Her Sister’s Greatest Admirer

Posted by Rochelle Carter on 17th July 2020 Additional Needs, Advice & Support, Disabilities

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Day after day she sees her sister wearing AFOS on her feet, she sees her standing in a standing frame, sitting in a supportive chair, walking with a walker, having to be physically moved from room to room and so on. She has attended numerous of her sister’s physiotherapy, conductive education and hospital appointments.

She has seen these things since the day she was born. She knows no different.

She accepts everything about her sister, looks up to her sister and wants to do everything her sister does. She is her sister’s greatest admirer.

She climbs in her sister’s equipment and tries to put the AFOS on her own feet.

She, already, at 1 years of age, watches everything we do to help her sister. She wants to share food with her and hold her cup to help her to have a drink. She tries to help buckle her sister into her equipment. She joins in with therapy. She takes it upon herself to walk up behind her sister in her walker, her Scooot and her standing frame and help her to move around the house and from one side of the garden to the other side.

She is too young to understand her sister is disabled or understand why our house is full of the equipment that her sister is entirely dependent upon, but by the time she is old enough to understand, it will not matter. She has already built up a perception of her sister and understanding the disability her sister has will not change that.

She will be her sister’s loudest cheerleader, the one that always makes her sister smile and laugh, the one that will always be right by her sister’s side, the encouragement to keep her sister pushing through and the one that picks her sister up when she falls down.

Yes, she has joined a family who has to spend a great deal of time doing therapy but also a family who will teach her what unconditional love and acceptance are, how to be compassionate and how to have a strong heart.

She will be the reminder for us to take a break from therapy, to have fun, to go out together and explore the world and make memories together as a family.

She was the final piece of our puzzle and our family is now complete.

She is Isla.