Views from Our Shoes: Growing Up With a Brother or Sister With Special Needs

REVIEW: Views from Our Shoes: Growing Up with a Brother or Sister with Special Needs, $24.43I have two children. My oldest is a 9-year old girl who is neurotic-typical but experienced trauma a few years back which triggered a variety of mental health issues, including PTSD, and anxiety. My youngest is a 6-year old boy medically diagnosed with ASD plus sensory processing disorder and expressive speech disability. My daughter is in therapy to help her deal with the anxiety and stress she is still processing from her traumatic event.Among the stress of this past event, my daughter also has the stress of dealing with a special needs sibling who took/takes a lot of my time and attention. She fiercely loves him and they get along swimmingly but she inevitably has more stress on her than the average sibling relationship due to her brother having special needs. It’s just a bit different.This book was specifically recommended to my daughter by her therapist because it is written by children who have lives similar to hers - they are the siblings of children with special needs. These children can and do have complicated feelings about their families but may not know how to express that. This book helps give shape to those feelings.My daughter thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. She actually doesn’t love reading, unfortunately, but she took to this book. She related to it. She even used some suggestions she was able to glean from it in dealing with her brother.I’m glad I purchased it. She is now able to refer to it as a resource moving forward.PROS: Stories short, written from the POV of children, for children; truly inclusive; helps children deal with complicated feelings and thoughts about their families; resource for childrenCONS: A bit expensive but overall worth it.Thank you for reading my review!

Views from Our Shoes is a wonderful collection of stories. I enjoy it every time I read it, and take something new from it each time. The first time I read this book, it helped me understand myself better. It helps to know that there are other siblings who have the same range of emotions towards their special siblings that I have toward mine. The essays do not hold back any feelings, which is important for helping other individuals.I would highly recommend this book to siblings and parents of children with special needs. I think that siblings, both younger and older would benefit from reading this book. Especially if they have never met any other siblings of individuals with special needs. This book would also benefit parents and help them understand the feelings of their "normal" child. Children with special needs can demand a lot of attention, and their siblings will often fade into the background willingly, and it is important for parents not to let their children do this. Even though siblings may put themselves on the back burner, it can create bad relationships among family members in the future. Views from Our Shoes would be a wonderful book for children and parents to read to help them relate to each other.

I bought this book for my 7 year old daughter, who is beyond her years, and love it. Mental health and awareness are two things that I strive to teach my daughter. Her and her brother are 22 months apart. At a young age it was hard to teach her why she couldn’t do things that Dominic “got away with”. Like, pitching a fit, throwing, making a mess, etc. This book allows her, in the small world of a 7 year old, to realize there are children that understand her frustration, that she isn’t alone. I never want her to be ashamed of her frustrations or fears. This book will give her a voice, an understand. It is perfect and a wonderful idea!!

I would definitely recommend this book! Its written from the perspective of a bunch of different children of various ages who have a sibling with special needs. The kids featured have siblings with many conditions and levels of ability, from low to high functioning, and healthy to medically fragile children. I am the parent of a child with special needs with another baby on the way. This book helped me have insight on some concerns my neuro-typical child might feel about attention, insecurities, how other people look at them and so on. It made me think of a lot of things that wouldn't have occurred to me ad was very helpful. I plan to re-read it. The kid's letters are short enough to be readable when you have time, and helps because its no overwhelming like some books about special needs can be. Its definitely worth reading.

Donald Meyer has compiled a wonderful book of essays from siblings of disabled children. My thirty year old son bought me this book for my birthday. Growing up, I too was one of these children and would have truly benefitted from anything that would have explained what happened to our family. As one of these sibs, I had to grapple with guilt, embarassment and also neglect from my parents due to the resources, both financial and emotional that were poured into my sister's handicap. My heart goes out to both parents and siblings of exceptional children. It is so much pain to bear for them and they feel even worse about complaining because they are "normal."

Excellent condition for used book

Love this book! It has been fantastic for my 7 year old son whose sister has a rare genetic condition.

I've used this with kids one-on-one if the child is upset at all the attention his or her sibling is receiving because of a special need. Helps them feel part of a special group and can help them to understand a lot more about their sibling, their family dynamics and that they are simply not alone.

Bought this for our parenting group. Spent a lot of time looking for books for a whole range of special needs and this has various ones included in it. Easy and nice to read.