Mum Life

Waiting for beach days ☀️🌡️🏝️

Please if anyone can help us in Cyprus we'd be so grateful 🙏🏽

Hi everyone,.we have an urgent request!!!. The wheel has come off my grandson's walker.(See profile pic) and unfortunately trying to get anything done quickly in Cyprus is totally impossible!!!!!
It's his only way of getting around and he has a school performance in Wednesday evening which he is so excited to be a part of.
Here's the request.... Does anyone have a spare walker to loan us for a few days please?! 💚 The earliest that the medical shop will see us is Saturday!!!! 🙏🏼..
Please only respond if you personally have one. Thank you.

What a wonderful day out we had Petrides Farm Park today 🐴🐓🦆🦚🪶 So much to do, fantastic service, and incredibly inclusive for those disabilities 🙌🏼👨🏽‍🦽♿

This though came to me a couple of months ago, which I posted on my tiktok. With all the goings on at the moment I thought I should repost. What are you thoughts? 🤔

The Myth of the “Spoiled” Disabled Child: How Misunderstanding Creates Harm

Parents of disabled children hear a lot of opinions. Unsolicited advice. Judgment disguised as “concern.” People insisting they know what your child needs better than you do.
But one of the most damaging beliefs we still fight is the idea that disabled children are “spoiled.”

That if a disabled child receives comfort, accommodations, regulation, or proximity, it’s indulgence. That if they need more, it’s because their parents “give in” too easily. That if they melt down or struggle, it’s because the parent didn’t hold “firm boundaries.”
And for many families, this myth doesn’t just come from strangers—-it comes from professionals.

It happened to us.
When Noah was three months old —an actual infant — his very first therapist told me something I will never forget. She said that Noah needed to be punished for not participating in therapy. Punished. At three months old.

She warned me that if I didn’t withhold comfort during his sensory-induced crying, he would “grow up thinking he could call the shots” or “abuse caregivers.” Her idea was that comforting him would “spoil” him, and that responding to his distress taught him he would always get his way.
She genuinely believed a disabled infant could be manipulative.

That shows exactly how deeply the “spoiled disabled child” myth runs.
The problem isn’t lack of experience — it’s the assumptions behind it.

Assumptions like believing disabled kids choose dysregulation, that they weaponize their needs, or that their distress is a negotiation tactic. It forces disabled children into able-bodied frameworks their brains and bodies cannot follow.

And it leads to real harm, like a professional thinking a disabled baby needs punishment instead of protection.

Here’s the truth: you cannot spoil a child functioning at an infant developmental level. A child at that stage cannot manipulate, strategize, test boundaries, or understand cause and effect. Their “wants” and “needs” are the same thing: regulation, comfort, and safety.

Comfort is not spoiling. Comfort is care. Comfort is regulation. Comfort is survival.

Disabled children are labeled “spoiled” more often because their needs look different. Their support is more visible. Their accommodations exceed what strangers consider “normal.” People see a parent stepping in quickly with comfort and assume indulgence. They see accommodations and call it “extra.” They see sensory distress and call it a tantrum.

But outsiders don’t see the neurological reality behind it. They don’t see the sensory overload that feels like pain, the developmental delays that make communication impossible, or the cognitive limitations that prevent self-regulation.
Disabled kids aren’t spoiled. They’re working harder just to exist.

The world expects disabled kids to behave like neurotypical children while giving them none of the same tools. A child functioning at the level of an infant may never be able to self-soothe, delay gratification, or regulate independently. Demanding those skills from a brain that isn’t wired for them isn’t discipline — it’s cruelty.
Meeting their needs is not giving in. It’s parenting.

Holding them. Soothing them. Adjusting environments. Anticipating sensory triggers. Protecting them from overwhelm. These are not indulgences. They are lifelines.

Disabled children are not spoiled. They are misunderstood. They are mislabeled. They are judged through standards that were never meant for them.

When a disabled child needs more, it is not entitlement. When they rely on comfort, it is not manipulation. When parents adjust life for them, it is not coddling.

They are not spoiled —they are supported…

And if Noah’s early therapist taught me anything, it’s this: the real harm doesn’t come from “spoiling” a disabled child. The real harm comes from refusing to meet their needs because someone else is uncomfortable with what those needs look like.

Stacy Warden | Noah’s Miracle
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