Learning Disabled Parents & the Impact on Protecting Learning Disabled Children

Parenting the child with a learning disability can lead to significant distress among not only the individual parent but also upon the family structure. For many parents, the stress associated with a learning disabled child often result in loss of intimacy and connection between parents, even deteriorating marriages in the process.

In some communities, children with learning disabilities are finding they are subjected to adverse outcomes when compared to other children with the same degree of learning disability. The outcome for some children may be associated with the lack of support and resources available to the parents. In fact, children in homes where there is a lower socioeconomic status, where there is lack of nutrition, lack of healthy parental role models and even evidence of abuse and victimization, many children with learning disabilities suffer far worse outcomes than their peers.

In many states, there is a push to regulate the control over which child protective service agencies have in the cases of children with learning disabilities. With the support of the Department of Health, states are now offered guidance in the training and education that should take place within and among social work settings. Rather than pulling children with learning disabilities from homes with few resources, social workers are now encouraged to assist parents in improving their parenting skills and, ultimately, improving their relationships and financial outcomes. Providing resources, it is felt that parents can become better at parenting children, especially those with learning disabilities.

In cases where a parent is also learning disabled, there may be a tendency for state officials to step in and intervene in the care of the children. As a concern over welfare, many children find they are often moved into the home of other family members, or into the home of foster parents, when their learning disabled parent is no longer able to care for them.