Recently CatholicMom.com ran an interview that I did with Ellen Bry, star of “Lost and Found Family.” Ellen is the mother of three grown children, including two sons with autism. I was delighted when Ellen took time to chat with me about what it’s like to raise — singlehandedly — two young men with special needs.

One of the greatest challenges of parenting the special-needs child is managing one’s own expectations. “There’s a kind of smugness among very bright, accomplished people, an engrained bias that being bright and accomplished is somehow being ‘better.’ When you have special-needs kids, you realize immediately that intelligence in merely another gift that you’re lucky enough to get – but not a God-given right. It’s surely as much of a fluke as being good-looking. A sharp intellect is a gift, nothing you deserve, just something you’re lucky to have. Other human qualities are more important – love, decency, compassion, goodness, and kindness. My two special-needs kids have those in abundance.” When parenting the special-needs child, love means learning to appreciate each child for who he is, rather than what he can or cannot do.

Want to read more? Just head over to CatholicMom.com and check it out. While you’re there, you might appreciate another CatholicMom.com post, “Prayer for Families Touched by Autism.”