Health, Safety, Wellbeing

If children were pets, some of us get a kitten and others get a leopard. Some get a goldfish, others a wild Amazonian discus fish that is extremely hard to look after.

Most of our children have individual traits that need to be cared for very specifically. Many of our children have special needs, special medical or learning support needs. They are frequently bilingual and bicultural, or may even belong to three or four cultures. Above all, we need to see who our children are so that they feel recognised and can recognise themselves. In the process we learn a lot about ourselves too, and we grow.  

Parenting is an incredibly individual experience.

It has a lot to do with the match child-parent. As Donald Woods Winnicott put it, we need the "good enough parent", not a perfect parent. But, what is good enough? Sometimes it´s easy, you seem to be Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Sometimes it´s just not in your nature to understand certain aspects of the child either because of your personalities or because the child is particularly difficult to understand. Usually we get a bit of everything, even within the hour!

One of the few things that really seems to work when parenting is this: you make a hypothesis, you try it out, you see how well it works and you reformulate your hypothesis with what you have learned. Far from cold experimentation, this approach is very loving, it helps us understand, to see our children clearly.

It does sound exhausting, I do realise. However, being "seen", really seen by another human being, especially when you are growing up, is one of the most marvellous things that can happen to anybody.

Sometimes we need professional help in different areas. It´s very comforting to find the right people and to know what to expect. It is essential to be our child´s best advocate at school and to be able to speak to schools in a language that they will understand and respect. It also helps alot to learn more about a child´s condition by way of a multi-disciplinary evaluation, as well as through reference books and websites, talks, seminars etc. Other times, especially when we have to create the answers, it´s essential to have support, a shoulder to lean on, a bright mind to rely on.

In Africa they say "it takes a village to raise a child". If your family and friends are not around or are not empathetic, who do you turn to?

The Madrid Parents’ Support Group is a project born from the need for creative, assertive, committed happy parenting. We hope to make it a village of parents and children, a place where we can encourage the best possible development for families. This project has been entirely promoted by an expat parent, Tanya Thompson, whose firstborn child, Arabella, has special needs. Tanya has become tremendously proactive in her child´s present and future, not accepting the status quo, necessarily, and embracing the adventure of creative parenting, learning how to navigate the different institutions where help is offered and connecting parents and professionals.

For further information

Vivienne Sarobe: 616 108 013

Tanya Thompson: 696 956 144

Vivienne Sarobe, psychologist, will coordinate the Madrid Parents’ Support Groups.

Find out more about Vivienne Sarobe at www.vsarobe.com. English, Spanish and French spoken.