Reflections from a Different Journey : What Adults with Disabilities Wish All Parents Knew (Hardcover)

by Stanley Klein (Author), John Kemp (Author), Stanley Klein (Author), John Kemp (Author) "DURING THE EARLY 1950s, a young New Zealand woman pushed her baby's pram down Auckland City's Queen Street..." (more)
Key Phrases: kids with disabilities, disability culture, adults with disabilities, New York, Gallaudet University, New Jersey (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Offers parents of children with disabilities inspiration and advice from those who've been there

Reflections from a Different Journey presents 40 stories by successful adults who grew up with disabilities. They provide insights into what it is like to persevere in the face of community prejudices, and what it takes for families and children with disabilities to work together toward fulfillment.

While there are many books for parents on raising a child with a disability, this is the first to help them learn from people with disabilities, and to help children face the unique challenges and rewards of growing up with a disability. Reflections from a Different Journey will also encourage and inspire older children and adults with disabilities, other family members, and education and health care professionals who serve these families.

From the Back Cover

Title: Reflections From a Different Journey

Author: Klein

ISBN: 0071422692

Category: Parenting

Trim Size: 6 x 9

UPC: 639785385547

Price: $18.95

[Inside flaps]

Most parents of children with disabilities lack personal experience with adults with disabilities. Hearing from people who have lived the disability experience can provide all parents with essential information about the possibilities for their children. Reflections from a Different Journey comprises forty inspiring and realistic essays written by successful adult role models who share what it is like to grow up with a disability.

Compiled by two award-winning advocates for the disabled, each eloquently written essay is an insightful source of wisdom, inspiration, and emotional support as well as a rare glimpse inside the lives and minds of people with many different disabilities--cerebral palsy, Down syndrome, autism, learning disabilities, deafness, blindness, mental illness, developmental disabilities, spina bifida, muscular dystrophy, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, congenital amputation, and chronic health conditions.

In preparing their essays, the authors were each asked to write about something they wished their own parents had read or been told while they were growing up. The essays, which demonstrate that, first and foremost, people with disabilities are human beings with the same needs and desires as people without disabilities, are arranged thematically:

• "Love Me and Accept Me as I Am" essays express appreciation for parents who provided unconditional love and a sense of belonging and accepted them as whole people--including that part of them considered to be a disability.
• "Parents Are the Most Important Experts" essays describe how their parents addressed their unique needs and became the most important experts in their lives.
• "Parental Expectations" essays present different approaches to expectations and standards and encourage every child to have hopes and aspirations.
• "Sexuality" essays explore how all children need to talk about and learn about intimacy and sexuality.
• "Education About Disability" essays explain why it is important for parents and children to learn all about a child's disability and how to facilitate necessary accommodations so that each child can enjoy a full life.

The foreword is written by Marlee Matlin, the Academy Award{-}winning actress who is deaf. The afterword is written by the book's coeditor, John D. Kemp, a successful attorney and advocate for the disabled who was born without arms and legs.

Brimming with a wealth of life-affirming lessons, Reflections from a Different Journey offers many specific suggestions for parents and family members of people with disabilities, older disabled children, and education and health care professionals.

Stanley Klein, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist and frequent speaker to parents and health care and education professionals, has worked with children with disabilities and their parents for fifty years, and has received numerous national awards for his work. A cofounder and former editor in chief of Exceptional Parent magazine, Dr. Klein has coedited The Disabled Child and the Family, It Isn't Fair: Siblings of Children with Disabilities, You Will Dream New Dreams: Inspiring Personal Stories by Parents of Children with Disabilities, and From There to Here: Stories of Adjustment to Spinal Cord Injury. He lives in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

John Kemp is a successful Washington, DC, attorney and lifelong advocate for the rights of people with disabilities. He is a frequently sought-after speaker, giving up to fifty keynote presentations each year. Kemp has been recognized for his work on behalf of people with disabilities, including service as the 1960 National Easter Seal Society Poster Child, 1991 membership in the Horatio Alger Award of Distinguished Americans, the Freedom of the Human Spirit Award from the International Center for the Disabled, and an Honorary Doctorate of Laws and the Distinguished Alumni Fellow Award from his alma mater, Washburn University Law School.

[Back cover copy:]

[category] Parenting

"As the mother of a son with profound physical disabilities, I want every parent of a child in similar circumstances to read this remarkable eye-opening book. The lessons it brings from adults with disabilities are essential to giving our kids the start they deserve and to understanding how close their hopes and aspirations are to kids we see as 'normal.'"

--Judy Woodruff

"Advice to parents about how to raise and guide their children with disabilities is rarely offered in such a compelling and insightful way as it is in Reflections from a Different Journey. Nobody says it any better than people with disabilities themselves when topics such as risk taking, social acceptance, envisioning a life of greater independence, and all the challenges confronting any parent arise. These essays will educate, inform, and entertain every parent who wants to know how to be the very best parent he or she can be."

--Senator Robert Dole

"The significant education for those helping, supporting, advising, and motivating people with disabilities is in listening to them. These writers with disabilities are brilliant in portraying their lives with pathos and even humor. Professionals and parents trying to achieve equality for people with disabilities must read this masterpiece."

--Henry Betts, M.D., former medical director and CEO, Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago

"A fabulous contribution to the field of disabilities. Parents everywhere need to read this book. Everyone involved with children with disabilities needs to read it. It answers so many questions about what works and what doesn't. And it answers the questions in the most reliable manner--in the voice of the son or daughter."

--Patricia McGill Smith, Senior Policy Advisor, National Down Syndrome Society

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (March 12, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071422692
• ISBN-13: 978-0071422697
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #322,073 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book changed my life, August 10, 2004

By	J. D Skintges (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book changed my life. I grew up with a disability and have been an advocate for years. This book gave me a huge sense of pride to be a member of the disabled community that was never there before. Many of the stories reflected my parents and my struggles and triumphs, the every day life of growing up with a disability. Many of the authors echo the advice I give parents. The book reminds me how important all our stories are and I find myself wanting to write mine.

I tell everyone I know or meet that they should read this book. I bought many copies of the book to give family members, friends and colleagues. I want everyone who knows me well to read it so they can have a fuller understanding of life with a disability, that I'm neither to be pitied nor thought extraordinary.

So I recommend this book to you if you want a picture of life for 40 people who had disabilities as children. Read this book if you want help to think about your own children or your children's friends, read this book if you want a human picture of families where one or more children had a disability. Read this book if you want to know the success stories of these 40 people.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Journeys in reality, July 20, 2004

By	N. Danielson - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The simple but real situations of growth and maturation are easy to read and flow from one essay to the next. The perspective of the "children" is an essential piece of the puzzle when you are raising a child with a disability. As a mother of 2 such children I value the insight and hope these essays give me.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "Reflections" Is For Everyone, October 18, 2004

By	Chris K. Olander - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"Reflections from a Different Journey" is one of the best books I've ever read. With grace and kindness, the authors selected by John Kemp and Stanley Klein give parents the wisdom they need to understand and nurture children with disabilities.

This isn't just a book for parents--it's a book for everyone.

Buy it for yourself or someone you love.

Chris K. Olander, Executive Director Emeritus, The JM Foundation and Milbank Foundation for Rehabilitation