special

Since having a kid who other people categorize as Special, I have come to loathe the word.  I used to feel much more ambivalent.  It was present in my childhood as either a slightly embarrassing compliment from relatives or teachers or as a taunt from other kids who didn't understand me.  It was, a few times, hurtful, but mostly just an occasional reminder that I wasn't the status quo in my classrooms.

Now, it's used to describe my kids' education, my kids' peers, my kids' difficulties.  It represents his differences from everybody else.  Special needs, special education, special services, special classrooms, specials.  Oh, how that word rings in my ears, mocking my attempts to show off my beautiful, smart, amazing child to the rest of the world.  It could be worse.  I just wish that labels weren't so prevalent and so quick to pile up on kids who may be affected by them for the rest of their lives.  I wish my kid could be known by his name, not his abilities/disabilities.  If I had a vote, I would write in "Alternative Education" as a replacement for "Special Education".  It seems less loaded.  More realistic and less candy coated.  Special as a word to describe kids who have extra difficulties, worries, hardships, challenges seems to be trying to turn something people are uncomfortable with (being obviously different) into something warm and fuzzy to make it more palatable.  But using a sweetened-up word doesn't make being different less scary or loaded with negative feelings and images.  It's just more off-base.  More dishonest.

Not too far in the distant past, I turned down a diagnosis for G "just so he can get the insurance coverage."  It's a hard situation to have to choose between labels, and help paying for services to help your kid.  We could afford to pay ourselves so I chose not to have (in our case) unneccessary labels tied to my kid.  The thing that amazed me the most about that particular story though, was when I told another evaluator about it several months later and she expressed in disapproving surprise that she'd never heard anyone say they were doing the same thing.  I'm betting she's met others.  They just didn't tell her about it.  I will go out on a limb and say I don't think many parents like labels and diagnoses put on their child, and even less so if they aren't accurate or descriptive of the actual kid.  I don't mean that they aren't useful, important, helpful and neccessary in many cases, just that sometimes they aren't.  It shouldn't be taken for granted, like it has been a for us a few times.

The combined classroom (kids who are receiving special education services and kids who are "normal" in the same class) G's in now is a gift to everyone in it.  The Autistic kids, the kids with partial deafness, the kids with Cerebral Palsy, my son with Auditory Processing Disorder- they are learning so much from watching and interacting with the unlabeled kids.  And those regular ed. kids- they are learning so much from the kids who are in special ed.  Learning from one another, learning about one another and ourselves, learning how we are all similar and all different- I wish we all had as much ample opportunities for these things as the kids in G's class.  That really is special- the way I think the word should be used.  Important.  Worth recognizing and striving for.