Mothering

It all started with a dream.

That’s how Lucy Costa found out that she was pregnant.

Lucy was watching television with her husband, Haydn Nyman, one evening in their Etobicoke home, when he suddenly exclaimed, "I think you’re pregnant."

"I just looked at him and asked, ’Why do you think that?’" says Lucy. "I had no reason to think that I was pregnant."

During the previous night, Haydn had had a dream about Lucy being pregnant. His dream turned out to be true.

The day after Haydn’s outburst, they went to the drugstore and bought a pregnancy test. It was positive. The following day they bought another test. It too was positive. Finally, they went to their doctor, who simply confirmed what Haydn and Lucy already knew. Lucy was indeed a week and a half pregnant.

Both say that they were shocked. But after the shock wore off, they got excited at the prospect of becoming parents. Starting a family was something they had wanted since they had gotten married two years earlier. Both love children, and Lucy says she’d always been surrounded by young children in her own family.

It’s now almost seven months later. Lucy is waiting for the baby to arrive in a matter of weeks. And like any expectant mother, she has some concerns about her impending delivery and becoming a first-time parent.

"I’m worried that I won’t be able to breastfeed," she says. "And I’m worried about feeling a sense of helplessness around the baby." These are common concerns for any new parent entering an unknown situation. But in Lucy’s case, there’s an added element: Lucy has cerebral palsy, a physical disability that limits her mobility.

Many people doubt if people with disabilities can even have children, let alone be a good parent. What they don’t know is that the numbers of people with disabilities becoming parents is growing. While there can be many challenges to having a disability and raising a child, many people with disabilities are proving that they can be as good a parent as anyone else. Often they just have to be a little more creative and better planners than most people.

Tracy Odell works for the Ontario Ministry of Education and Training as the group leader of the special education unit. She has two young daughters: Katy is six and Heather is four. Having a family was something that she had always planned on doing, so when she became pregnant with Katy, she was thrilled.

"There was some surprise -- but it was just like for any parent," Tracy says.

Tracy has spinal muscular atrophy, which is a neuromuscular disability. She uses a power wheelchair and has reduced muscle strength throughout her body. At first, she was concerned that her disability would affect her ability to carry a child. But reassurances from her doctor and a specialist eased her concerns.

The next step was telling her family and her partner David’s family. Tracy says her family told her that having a baby "wasn’t too wise." But Tracy had made up her mind. She had decided that she was ready to become a mother. So she spent the next few months of her pregnancy getting what she needed for herself and the baby.

While all mothers need additional support when caring for a newborn, mothers who have physical disabilities need to ensure that they have all the backing they need so that they can look after both themselves and a young infant. This can mean any number of things -- from adaptive equipment such as a crib with sliding doors that allows a wheelchair to fit under the crib, to an assistant to provide basic physical care for the baby.

In Tracy’s case, she needed someone to help her care physically for her children. While her husband would be able to act as the primary caregiver, Tracy realized that he would need a break from looking after an infant’s many needs. So she applied to the provincial government for "nurturing assistance." Under this program, Tracy was given funding to hire someone for 21 hours weekly to help her lift, feed, bathe and dress the baby. This person did only physical tasks, and Tracy was responsible for directing her in how to look after the baby.

Other support came from a neighbour next door and Tracy’s brother-in-law, who had also become a parent around the same time as Tracy and David.

Tracy says that nurturing assistance is something that she needs temporarily. As the girls grow older and require less physical assistance, the number of hours needed from an assistant will drop. At this stage, a nurturing assistant provides help 16 hours a week.

Lucy Costa has also applied for nurturing assistance and will have some additional help from people hired through Ontario’s Direct Individualized Funding pilot project for self-managed attendant services. Under this project, she will find attendants to help her with her needs -- which will include assistance in looking after her baby.

But Lucy is still concerned that there may be many things she won’t be able to do with her baby. And she’s worried that her husband will burn out from providing help for both her and the baby.

It’s a concern that Haydn doesn’t share. He says there’s more to being a parent than physically looking after the child. Emotional support and love are just as -- if not more -- important. "Emotionally and spiritually, I know that Lucy could offer a lot more to a child than any other woman I know," says Haydn. "She’s very loving with our nieces and nephews. She relates well to children."

And as Tina Ramsay points out, every parent has a different style of parenting. Tina works as a producer for "The Disability Network," a television program aired on CBC. She’s also a new mom, having given birth to her daughter, Madison, seven months ago.

"Every parent has their own style of parenting. Just because a person with a disability may do things differently doesn’t mean their parenting is worth less," she says. "Any child needs love and respect from a parent, whether you have a disability or not. That has to be learned and not taught."

Unlike Lucy and Tracy, Tina has a hidden disability. She has epilepsy. And although she hasn’t been having seizures until recently, she also had concerns about her disability and pregnancy. When Tina’s disability was diagnosed six years ago, she was advised by her doctors that women who have epilepsy should not become mothers. She was told there were two risks: First, if Tina became pregnant while on the medication she takes to control her seizures, she risked giving birth to a baby with brain damage. And, if Tina had a seizure during her pregnancy, there was another chance that the baby would have brain damage.

But Tina says she felt more reassured when she went to a conference for people with epilepsy. One of the speakers was a woman with epilepsy and two children. There had been no complications during either pregnancy. So when Tina became pregnant, she tried not to worry about the possibilities of having a seizure.

There were no complications with her pregnancy, but a few months ago, Tina had a mild seizure. It was her first one in two years. At this point, Tina doesn’t know if she’ll have any more seizures, but she says that she’s dealing with that possibility one day at a time. In the meantime, Tina continues to adjust to life as a new mother. For her, becoming a mom has been a positive learning experience. She says that all women, with and without disabilities, have the right to become a parent.

"I think it’s every woman’s right to have a child, regardless of her disability," she says. "It’s unfair of people to say that people with disabilities shouldn’t have children."

But it’s an attitude that does exist. Tracy Odell says that when she let the attendants in her apartment complex know that she was pregnant, many were upset. They automatically assumed that they would have to look after her daughter AND provide service to Tracy. One attendant went so far as to contact the child welfare authorities because she believed that Tracy was incapable of looking after a newborn.

Tracy and her husband David have discovered that attitudes can also be a barrier in gaining wheelchair access to schools and activities in which their daughters are involved. Many schools are recognizing the need to make their facilities accessible to children with disabilities, but won’t install ramps or other accessible equipment for parents who have disabilities. This limits the involvement of these parents in school councils or parent-teacher associations.

But despite the more negative opinions of some people, parents with disabilities have a mostly positive response. And children of parents with disabilities have advantages that other children may not have. Being exposed to disability issues at an early age encourages them to be accepting of people who are different.

"I think that I can teach [my daughter] compassion for people who live their lives differently," says Tina Ramsay. "Through myself and my friends, she’ll learn that people who do things differently in their daily living are no less a person than anyone else."

And, in the end, that may be one of the definitions of being a good parent.

(Victoria Costa Nyman was born at 8:00 a.m. on February 27, 1995, after a short labour. She weighed in at five pounds, one ounce. Lucy and Haydn report that the staff at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto were "amazing." They are delighted with the new addition to their family.)

(Ing Wong is a producer and co-host of "The Disability Network" (DNet), shown on CBC. She is also a freelance writer in Toronto.