R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Being a modern day Mum to any child right now is challenging. There are pressures all around you; pressure to appear as the perfect mother, pressures to return to work and contribute money to the household, pressure to stay at home and never miss a scrape or bump. The debate of stay at home vs. return to work will most likely never be settled but it's particularly important for parents of special needs children to acknowledge how much we already work. One thing that seems to be missing for a lot of mothers is respect. Respect for themselves and acknowledging how much we do work, and are not paid or recognised for it.

Take your average 40 hour a week job, I dare say that most mums who return to the workforce don't take on full time work, but let's just take this example for simplicity. Currently in my situation, my son attends an 18 hour Early Education Program Due to rising fuel prices and the stress of driving back and forth, it is easier for me to not come home during his school time. Now since teleports don't exist, I have to drive him there. Early morning traffic means it usually takes me about an hour from door to door and in the evenings, about 45 minutes as peak hour hasn't come into full swing yet. So for a three day a week program, we're already sitting at 23.5 hours. Alex has Occupational Therapy once a fortnight for an hour, so let's just simplify that to half an hour a week; 24 hours plus travel time equals 25 hours. We have recently  started an ABA program. So far the sessions have been 1.5 hours in duration, and then we have our ABA homework. I've decided to aim for an hour a day, so over the course of a week, that adds up to 8.5 hours a week. So now we're at 34.5 hours a week including travel. Weekly speech therapy bumps the total up to 36.5 hours a week. I spend about half an hour a day doing Alex's readers which brings it up to 40 hours, and I haven't even touched the housework!!

Let's not forget that stay at home mum's don't get sick leave. If we're sick, we have to either suck it up and carry on or find someone else to take them to therapy. We get no long service leave, no pay and no recognition; and let's not forget the snide comments like "it must be so nice to stay at home and play all day".

Recently on our trip overseas I felt so embarrassed and degraded when filling out forms on the aeroplane, when  I wrote in the occupation space 'mother'. Is that all I am? Someone's mother? Don't I deserve a little more credit than that? I know what they were really looking for; 'home duties' or the like, but I refuse to write that. I think from now on, I'm going to give myself a little more respect and write 'volunteer therapist'.