Unto us a child is born: the trials and rewards of parenthood for people with learning difficulties

Tim Booth and Wendy Booth

Australia and New Zealand Journal of Developmental Disabilities, 20(1), 1995, pp. 25-39.

Very little is known about the lives and struggles of parents with learning difficulties. Although high rates of parenting breakdown are reported in the literature, research has so far failed to represent their real-life experience of parenthood. Drawing on personal stories from a study of twenty families, this paper explores what it means to be a parent with learning difficulties and looks at the joys and heartaches that parenting brings.