Special Siblings: Growing Up with Someone with a Disability, Revised Edition  Press Release                  by Mary McHugh, Brookes Publishing, September 2002, 241 pages; Reviewed by Robert A. Naseef, Ph.D.    

It’s been called life’s longest relationship, and our bond with our siblings usually is just that. Who else could witness our joys and sorrows and put their arms around us through all of life’s seasons? With whom else will we share such conflicted feelings of love, hate, rivalry, and reconciliation for so long? To a large extent the biblical tragedy of Cain and Abel haunts every family and every generation. Therefore learning to navigate and face these intense and uncomfortable feelings is a passageway to a healthy adulthood.

As if hurt, resentment, anger, and rage aren’t enough, the family crucible is even more complex when a sibling is born with or develops a disability. Parents struggle to be fair to the special and unique needs of each child. Typically developing children watch their parents struggle and feel their own grief as well for what might have been—along with embarrassment and guilt. In the new revised edition of Special Siblings: Growing Up with Someone with a Disability, Mary McHugh helps readers to understand that life’s inequities are unavoidable.

"Children who grow up with a brother or sister with a disability learn early that life is unfair," says Mary McHugh, an accomplished writer and the sibling of Jack, a man with cerebral palsy and mental retardation. "They have to learn that often the child with the disability must come first; they must face the fact that not everyone will want to be their friend because of the sibling with the disability; they must learn to accept that people will often stare at their brothers and sisters…. My advice for them is all these things are hard lessons to learn but they make you strong enough to deal with anything life presents you with when you are an adult."

McHugh’s research for this book included interviews with more than 100 siblings – in their teens, 20’s 30’s and 40’s – of people with special needs in an effort to understand her own feelings. Her inquiries show that they share more than a brother or sister with a disability. "Growing up with a special sibling makes you compassionate and kind to every human being you meet; it makes you a good problem solver; it makes you tolerant of religious differences, racial differences, other disabilities, old people, etc. It often makes you an achiever who works to make the world a better place.  In short, you will probably be the kind of person other people want as a friend."

As Don Meyer, director of the Sibling Support Project, at Children’s Hospital of Seattle writes, "In her remarkably wise book, Mary McHugh masterfully blends her experiences and the experiences of others with insights from clinical research. Although McHugh doesn’t shy away from the troublesome aspects of sibling relationships, Special Siblings also describes the remarkable attributes seen in many brothers and sisters of people with special needs."

Throughout the book, as Brookes Publishing outlines, McHugh explores the spectrum of feelings— from anger and guilt to love and pride — and helps readers understand the issues siblings may encounter in