SCHUYLER'S MONSTER: Advocacy

Transcript:

Rob: You as parents and family of broken children and disabled family members, you are the absolute best advocates for your loved ones. And that's hard. It's hard because it's... we want to defer to experts. Julie and I were both music majors. We had no experience with children. All that we knew was what we, what we felt in our gut about Schuyler.

And, you know, the experts and the doctors, they've been amazing, they've been great for us. But the one thing that they can't do is they can't tell the future. And we want them to, we want to hear that everything's going to be okay.

But the future's not written. You're writing the future, and your child is writing the future. And if you feel like the information you're being given isn't correct, isn't right, you have to go with that instinct. Because nobody knows your child like you do, nobody senses the things that are true and real about your child like you do.

There were two points in Schuyler's life that had we followed the advice we were given, by experts, and really "expert" experts, had we listened to that advice, Schuyler's life would be nothing like it is now. It was the fact that we didn't, we didn't feel right, and that we, we kept pushing for better answers that we finally got them.

So believe in yourself. That's hard, but it's absolutely vital, and in the end, in the end you'll be so glad that you did.