ABSTRACT
The challenges that parents of disabled children face should not be underestimated, but we must also familiarise ourselves with the work of scholars such as Challela (1981) who claims that any birth is a crisis experience in which many parents find themselves with no previous experience or expertise. In other words as Murgatroyd and Woolfe (1993) write, ‘the birth of a child usually represents an important transitional event for a family, with a relationship and structure not being the same again’, (p. 86). Caplan (1968) believes that birth creates an upset in the everyday equilibrium of life. Whilst many parents would challenge Caplan's notion of birth as a crisis, for parents of disabled children, the trauma of the event is undeniable.
