Welcome to Holland

"It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts."

Emily Perl Kingsley's poem "Welcome to Holland" helped me understand the parent perspective of children with disabilities more than any other text.  Having a son who was born with Down syndrome, Kingsley says in the poem she is often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with special needs.  She compares the experience to packing and preparing for a trip to Italy, but then ending up in Holland.  Just as you prepare for a trip to Italy by learning Italian, buying guide books, and making plans, you make many expectations and plans for your future child.  You expect them to be healthy, to walk, talk, and play sports just like everyone else.  Ending up in Holland means that the plans you made for Italy cannot happen the way you thought they could.  Even though parents are not grieving a death of their infant, they are grieving the loss of the life they imagined for their child.  Kingsley shows that it is normal to have these feelings of loss, and this pain will never go away completely.  Despite this pain, however, parents can learn that there is a beautiful and happy life their child can live, even if it did not align with the expectations they had originally planned.

*If you click on the right side of the blog on my full profile, I have attached an audio clip of a song based on this poem by Will Livingston.

http://www.our-kids.org/Archives/Holland.html