Worries of Raising Kids With Disabilities

 

 

Hi,

It’s Jeff.

To continue the blog, Worries of Raising Kids in a Foreign Country, that I wrote 2 weeks ago, I actually have one more major worry of having a kid.

That is, what if the baby Mizuki and I have is born with disabilities.

 

Mizuki was born healthy.

She lost her mobility since she turned 2 years old.

Doctors could not identify the causes of her mobility impairments.

She just could not walk since November 1988.

I never thought about having kids with Mizuki when we first started dating back in 2007.

I was 21 years old and I had never thought about having kids.

The first thought of forming a family with Mizuki came to my mind in 2008, when she first visited my parents in Taiwan.

My mom knew that she was more than a friends but my mom had not called her by her name.

My mom refers to Mizuki as “a friend.”

It was a lot to take for my mom to find out that her first son’s girlfriend is a wheelchair user.

I have heard from my sister recently that it was difficult for my mom to accept the truth that I have married a Japanese woman and she is a wheelchair user.

My mom had pictured that I would have married a regular woman, had 2-3 kids and stayed in Taiwan forever.

It was the first time I started to picture having a family with Mizuki and compared it with the ideal life that my mom had pictured.

No kids was in that picture at the time.

 

Few years later, my mom finally asked the forbidden question, a question that she had been holding on in her mind, a questions that has been hidden somewhere in my mind but I had not had the courage to confront.

“What if you kid is born as a wheelchair user?”

my mom said bluntly and worriedly.

This simple question shocked me and I was not able to reply to my mom at the time.

I kept the conversation with my mom  to myself for some time. 

 

March 11, 2011, the massive earthquaked hit Japan and paused almost everything.

Mizuki and I discussed many important things and I decided to move to Japan.

In order to persuade my parents that moving to Japan was the right choice for me and Mizuki, Mizuki planned to wrie a Chinese letter to my parents.

 

We were discussing what we should cover in the letter with Mizuki and I decided to ask her the forbidden question.

“What if our baby is born as a wheelchair user?

My parents are concerned about that…”

I asked on the phone.

 

Mizuki was on the other end of the call.

“My doctor told me that my kid would not inherit my mobility impairments.”

Mizuki replied calmly and slowly.

“………”

The silence continued for some time.

“It is not fair you ask me that question.”

Mizuki replied with tears.

“It is possible that you could have a kid with disabilities with other women. If our kids is born with disabilities, you cannot contribute me to that.”

Mizuki continued with more tears.

“What are you going to do if our baby is born with disabilities?”

 

Mizuki woke me up with this question.

Mizuki got the point.

I could have a kid with disability with any other women.

That is something I have no control over and I can not blame her for that.

Soon after I changed my thinking I realized that if my kid is born with disabilities, it is not necessarily a sad thing.

He or she will still be my kid and will have my full love and attention.

 

As a matter of a fact, Mizuki has experience to overcome her mobility impairments and live her life fully.

I am confident that she can be a very good mom guiding our kids to overcome disabilities and live their lives fully.