A Child's Growing Up with a Parent Who Has Multiple Sclerosis: Theories and experiences

Abstract

Some theorists have provided insight into the phenomenon of disability, and others have provided conceptual notions of childhood. Still others have provided theoretical expectations of what life is like for a child when mother or father has a disability or chronic illness. When children whose parents have multiple sclerosis described their own experiences, much of what theorists had postulated was a poor fit with children's responses. This paper will explore differences between children's descriptions of life with a parent who has MS, and the theoretical expectations of what their lives should be like according to previous literature. The paper concludes with the suggestions that historical sociology, with its recognition of both agency and structure interacting over time, may be an effective way to understand anyone's place on the disability/empowerment continuum, and may serve to illuminate the pathway of children with disabled parents in particular.