National Research Center for Parents with Disabilities

Unmet Needs of Mothers with Disabilities (Plain-Language Version)

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A mother using a wheelchair alongside the river with her young child holding his backpack on her lap

The Disabled Parenting Project (DPP) has hosted two Mother’s Day Twitter Chats. In 2016, 152 people participated and there were 900 tweets. In 2017, 83 people participated and there were 377 tweets. Each Twitter Chat lasted an hour and covered many important topics. One of these topics was the unmet needs of mothers with disabilities.

Supports and Services

Several of the mothers wish that there were more supports and services for parents with disabilities.

  • “In-home assistance, affordable care (true w/ any parent), financial support w/out fear of losing benefits.”

  • “Not aware of Lamaze classes for disabled pregnant mothers, aftercare/homecare w/ disabled providers as part of team.”

  • “Natural supports often come from an integrated, inclusive community. These helps all families.”

  • “We also MUST have better policies. Parenting is an ADL [activity of daily living] and caregivers should be able to support.”

Information and Resources

Many of the mothers thought they needed more information and resources about parenting with a disability.

  • “Checklists for daycares/pre-schools on how to be physically and attitudinally accessible for disabled parents.”

  • “Would love more resources on prospective disabled parents so I can learn about the experience when considering pregnancy.”

Adaptive Parenting Equipment

Some of the mothers said that they needed more adaptive parenting equipment. “Adaptive equipment” describes tools that people with disabilities use to make things easier for them. An example would be cribs that wheelchair users can put their babies in more easily.

  • It’d be fabu to have a company that modified equipment. I’ve seen directions but I’m not able to do crib mods [modifications] myself.”

  • “We need adapted parenting equip made to scale (and not medical). The 1 stroller/1 mom stories make the news but we need more.”

 Download PDF | Original version