Additional Needs...

On Mar 6, 1:37*am, "MatSav" matthew | dot | savage | at | dsl | dot |
pipex | dot | com wrote:
I've noticed we have a fair share of regulars on this group with
"additional needs". Not "disabilities", but "additional needs".
Not "special" needs, either - just extra requirements. We've got
vision and hearing impaired, we've got mobility impairments. Then
we've got people like me with "hidden" requirements - I'm
epileptic. Is there something about additional needs which gives
rise to more empathy with animals than 'normal'?

Newsgroups are a great social leveller. Unless someone reveals
their additional needs, nobody need know about them - all we see
is the written word, and some people here are very good with
words :-)

--
MatSav

I think some of those "hidden requirements" give rise to more empahty
*from*
the animal, and a special bond. My nephew has had puberty-onset
epilepsy and is
now 40. This just always amazed me....he lives next door to his
parents, and when
he went into a seizure, the little dog would run over and get the
parents. No one trained
him to do so. It's like he just took it upon himself to become a
service dog of sorts.

Sherry

Sherry wrote:
On Mar 6, 1:37 am, "MatSav" matthew | dot | savage | at | dsl | dot |
pipex | dot | com wrote:
I've noticed we have a fair share of regulars on this group with
"additional needs". Not "disabilities", but "additional needs".
Not "special" needs, either - just extra requirements. We've got
vision and hearing impaired, we've got mobility impairments. Then
we've got people like me with "hidden" requirements - I'm
epileptic. Is there something about additional needs which gives
rise to more empathy with animals than 'normal'?

Newsgroups are a great social leveller. Unless someone reveals
their additional needs, nobody need know about them - all we see
is the written word, and some people here are very good with
words :-)

--
MatSav

I think some of those "hidden requirements" give rise to more empahty
*from*
the animal, and a special bond. My nephew has had puberty-onset
epilepsy and is
now 40. This just always amazed me....he lives next door to his
parents, and when
he went into a seizure, the little dog would run over and get the
parents. No one trained
him to do so. It's like he just took it upon himself to become a
service dog of sorts.

Sherry


That is remarkable. Animals can and do think. MLB

my best friend for years was my cat Siomon, it was because he gave me
attention without expecting anything in return that i credit what little bit
of warmth i can show to others. My parents were perfect parents, and as an
adult i know they raised me correctly, but some of the things that happened
to me as a child, would have rendered me completely unable to trust had it
not been for this cat, Lee
wrote in message
...
Christina Websell wrote:

It could be, as Lee says, that animals are very accepting of us and give
unconditional love, but that is more likely to foster a love of animals
in
people who have had their "disabilities" from an early age and are
rejected
by the local children, especially so if they have to go miles away to a
special school - they have no friendship group nearby to draw on.
Children can be very cruel to other children they perceive as different.

I didn't have physical disabilities as a child, but I did endure quite a
bit of social ostracism at school, and my life at home wasn't much better.
So animals became the only creatures it was safe to love, and I poured
my heart into it. As a kid, I was just as attached to our family dog as
I was to the cats. But cats had a certain mystique that I found alluring,
probably because while they might give unconditional love, they don't give
unconditional *attention* the way dogs do. And lord knows I sure needed
attention as a kid. The dog we had was wonderful, just a happy, friendly,
loyal, and good-tempered animal. But whenever a cat would grace me with
some attention, it was really something special.

--
Joyce ^..^

To email me, remove the XXX from my user name.

On Mar 6, 10:18*pm, Sherry wrote:

now 40. This just always amazed me....he lives next door to his
parents, and when
he went into a seizure, the little dog would run over and get the
parents. No one trained
him to do so.

A friend of mine with moderate epilepsy says there's a sort of stage
where he drifts off and if something stops that he doesn't have a
seizure. On more than one occasion as he's been at the drifting off
towards a seizure one or both of his cats who are normally lap fungi
of the highesr order have clawed and bitten him, which snaps him out
of it. Not the most pleasant of awakenings but it works and it's
better than having a fit. No-one taught them to do it they must have
worked it out by observation. Once he nearly drifted off in the bath
obviously not the best place to have a seizure and one cat leapt into
the bath and bit his nose!

Lesley

Slave of the Fabulous Furballs

wrote:

A friend of mine with moderate epilepsy says there's a sort of stage
where he drifts off and if something stops that he doesn't have a
seizure. On more than one occasion as he's been at the drifting off
towards a seizure one or both of his cats who are normally lap fungi
of the highesr order have clawed and bitten him, which snaps him out
of it. Not the most pleasant of awakenings but it works and it's
better than having a fit. No-one taught them to do it they must have
worked it out by observation. Once he nearly drifted off in the bath
obviously not the best place to have a seizure and one cat leapt into
the bath and bit his nose!

Wow, great kitties! I know people train some dogs to warn of seizures,
but I don't think cats can be trained to be reliable that way. He just
has a couple of volunteers.

--
Joyce ^..^

To email me, remove the XXX from my user name.