The excerpt below is from our livestream “Supporting the Duchenne Family” with guest Dr. Molly Colvin. Dr. Colvin is Director of Massachusetts General Hospital’s Learning and Emotional Assessment Program (LEAP) and Assistant Professor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School. Click here to listen to the full episode.
When we talk about solid family functioning, I think it is important to note, that while there may be one parent who’s sort of taking the lead on Duchenne, there really is a team.
I’ve talked with single parents and it’s incredibly challenging. Actually, it’s often moms again who are with their child. We need to talk with those single parents about how important it is that they do have a community, whether it’s their sister or brother or their mother or their best friend. They need somebody – at least a couple people – helping to bear the experience with them so that they’re not isolated.
Whether you have a partner or not, you’re going to encounter overwhelming days. And you’ve got to ask yourself, “What am I going to do to just let everybody breathe a little bit?” And I think that is OK. You know – at least in my house – that’s a mac and cheese night. You know what I mean? Where you’re just like, “I know I planned to make dinner, but I just can’t today.”
It’s so important to give yourself permission to take it easy or to have pizza that night instead of everything else that you wanted to do – it just can’t be pizza night every night. I think that’s the other piece.
So the next day, take a deep breath so you can actually go through it again and do it better.
