MCN. The American journal of maternal child nursing
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To describe how mothers of children with physical disabilities identified their parenting strengths and weaknesses, encouraged their child's social skills and learning, nurtured and disciplined their child, and perceived their parenting successes and problems. ⋯ Nurses need to understand the complexity of the parents' straddling their roles and tasks. They can provide needed emotional support by allowing parents to express their fears and feelings in an atmosphere of nonjudgmental acceptance. Nurses can prepare parents for anticipated grief work, reassure them that their experiences are expected and normal, reinforce their use of normalization strategies, and help them separate their own from their child's issues and feelings.