This poem by Mark Bird offers insight that is helpful to me as I reflect upon labels people may impose on us that fosters an "othering" -- making someone "the other." This seems profoundly different from diagnostic terms that result in appropriate and helpful healthcare. And, for identities we may choose for ourselves to express who we are. I am mindful of the ethic of human rights and dignity that Eleanor Roosevelt gave to us and the world in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: self-determination. The nuances between these are helpful as we seek to understand ourselves and those in our lives and families.
We can ideologically say that we want no labels, but realistically and practically, as a financially poor single mom of a now adult son who has Asperger’s and Schizophrenia, I am thankful for the last 24 years of diagnostic labels that allowed him and continue to allow him to get the therapy, education and health care he needs at no or low cost. The willingness of a society to see the value of my son and appropriate the cost of 24 years of helping this toddler move through his journey to adulthood and beyond is human civilization at its best. And in a country of over 330 million people, this level of care is not possible without the education of and acceptance of difference and diversity that first comes with diagnostic labels, or as I call them, hooks you can hang your beautiful hat on for all to see.
So true, the classifications can help with all of the support. Now to universalize our care of everyone. To humanize rather than other. See the gifts of the difference and honor them.
I am the label
someone stitched
into the seams of your soul
many years ago ~ Mark Bird.
_____________
This poem by Mark Bird offers insight that is helpful to me as I reflect upon labels people may impose on us that fosters an "othering" -- making someone "the other." This seems profoundly different from diagnostic terms that result in appropriate and helpful healthcare. And, for identities we may choose for ourselves to express who we are. I am mindful of the ethic of human rights and dignity that Eleanor Roosevelt gave to us and the world in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: self-determination. The nuances between these are helpful as we seek to understand ourselves and those in our lives and families.
We can ideologically say that we want no labels, but realistically and practically, as a financially poor single mom of a now adult son who has Asperger’s and Schizophrenia, I am thankful for the last 24 years of diagnostic labels that allowed him and continue to allow him to get the therapy, education and health care he needs at no or low cost. The willingness of a society to see the value of my son and appropriate the cost of 24 years of helping this toddler move through his journey to adulthood and beyond is human civilization at its best. And in a country of over 330 million people, this level of care is not possible without the education of and acceptance of difference and diversity that first comes with diagnostic labels, or as I call them, hooks you can hang your beautiful hat on for all to see.
Jan, I appreciate your sharing your life experience of raising your son, what you have learned, and what you have to share with us.
Thank you for your kind words.
So true, the classifications can help with all of the support. Now to universalize our care of everyone. To humanize rather than other. See the gifts of the difference and honor them.
Christine, your words " to meet what's difficult without becoming it"....
And then "Almost"..
Feeling " it " yet , almost, the possible, keep on doing "it".