Why This Professional Counselor Hates Special Needs Moms Memes

Last week, I was included as one of the four top finalists in the Indy Week’s Best Therapist in the Triangle. A huge thank you to everyone who voted for me!

So, fair warning that it’s probably over-confidence in the wake of that recognition that’s given me the guts to write this post. This is definitely one of the more controversial opinions I’ve ever put out on the blog!

A few weeks ago another counselor asked what I wished would change about disability culture. Because yes, that’s really how therapists talk to each other when we get together to socialize.

Without missing a beat, I replied “Special Needs Moms Memes”.

In case you’re unfamiliar with this social media phenomenon, here are a few choice examples:

There are so, so many others, and there are a few things that these memes tend to have in common:
• Words like superpower, superhuman, and superhero get tossed around like confetti
• They often refer to Moms only
• These memes often trivialize any ‘normal’ parenting tasks/worries/habits and make them sound absurdly simple

As a therapist who helps people with disabilities and their family members, I find these memes to be at best unhelpful.

More often though, I find that they are actually truly damaging to people with disabilities and their parents, and to their parents’ would-be supports.

Here’s how:

Special Needs Moms Memes Foster Isolation

In my counseling practice I offer therapy to special needs parents. They often feel worlds away from the life they lived and the friends they had before their child was born. I hear them use the same words over and over to describe where they’re at as newly-minted special needs parents:

• “incompetent”
• ”incapable”
• “isolated”

Special Needs Moms memes imply that there ARE differences between Special Needs parents and ‘normal’ parents. The two main differences usually hinted at by the memes are:

• That no one else could possibly understand the demands placed on Special Needs parents
• That Special Needs Parents have ‘superhero’ level parenting skills and capacity to love

Imagine that a mother has just learned that her soon-to-be-born child will have Down syndrome.

She comes across a meme letting her know that she’s about to enter a world that none of her friends or family can understand. It’s implied that she’ll be expected to dominate all the challenges with Hulk-like strength and grit.

It’s easy to see how that mom might start questioning her own abilities. She’ll begin pulling away from her friends and family in anticipation of what’s to come.

Of course I don’t mean to imply that an internet meme can or should shape someone’s ideas about themselves as a parent.

Why special needs moms memes are impactful

But what’s so powerful about memes is that they’re highly targeted, easily digestible, not-attention demanding little bits of eye candy. They’re everything the average social media browser is looking for.

These snippets stay with us. Especially in times when it’s too difficult to really spend time challenging our negative thoughts and beliefs. Difficult times like when you learn that your child will have a disability.

Back to our soon to be mom of a child with Down syndrome. Suppose her sister or best friend saw the meme. She’d be reinforced in her worry that she doesn’t understand what the new mom is going through. She’d believe that she couldn’t possibly do anything to lend support or offer advice to someone who is now a ‘superhero’ Special Needs Mom. Sadly, she’d be wrong.

Special Needs Mom memes encourage a divide. They promote the idea that there are really only two kinds of parents: Special Needs Parents (who are clearly amazing) and everyone else (who don’t know how good they have it).

It goes without saying that these memes are extremely exclusionary to fathers.

Special Needs Mom Memes are awful for kids and adults with disabilities to read

I’m always encouraging my counseling clients who are special needs parents to think about how they want things to look 10, 15, or 20 years from now. I do this to highlight that if they aren’t making steps now in the direction they want to wind up in, they’re not going anywhere.

This time, though, I want you to imagine that a young adult with disabilities sees a meme like this one.

If you’re a Special needs parent of a very young child, you may not imagine that your son or daughter will use social media one day. I want to assure you, odds are that they will at some level.

Say they come across this meme:

As the memes go, this one is pretty harmless on the surface.

But here’s the thing. Most of the parents I know who have kids with disabilities just want their kids to be treated like regular kids.

If you want others to treat your child like just a normal kid, then you have to see and refer to your child as normal.

Seeing memes like this, a child or adult with a disability will question if they were awful kids who were difficult to raise.

Notice that I don’t say ‘might’ or ‘could’.

I’ve talked with enough adults and teens with disabilities who’ve had this exact experience. They feel worthless and guilty, and might even question if they deserved to have been born. I know that you don’t want your child to feel this way. Especially not just because you had a rough day and chose to fire off a quick meme to deal with it.

Which brings me to maybe the most important reason of all that I really detest Special Needs Mom memes as a trend…

Creating or Pinning Special Needs Mom memes isn’t really helping anyone

When you create a meme or just pin or like one, you get a momentary rush of relief. But what you’ve truly done is try to patch a gaping, bleeding wound with a tiny little Band-Aid.

It’s good to want to heal what’s hurting, but you’ve got to use the right ointment.

Maybe that means calling a friend you haven’t spoken to in ages to vent. Maybe it means joining a support group, or meeting with a therapist. Perhaps all you need is a night out with your spouse to talk honestly about what’s been hard.

I often surprise Autism parents when I recommend that they get to know Autistic adults. It can help to talk with them about their experiences growing up, and what they wish their parents had done differently.

Before you write me off as someone who can’t take a joke, know that I get that memes are just supposed to be funny, easily forgotten distractions. The issue for me is that there is a growing divide between ‘special needs parents’ and ‘other parents’.

So, I invite you to share your perspective – Special Needs Mom memes; are they helpful, funny, and honest to you? Or do you, like me, find them to be unhelpful and sometimes damaging?

Leave a comment and speak your mind.

Keep reading

Other posts you may be interested in