Finding childcare for your children is even more difficult than finding a smooth street in Montreal, harmony on social networks, teachers in schools, nurses on the North Shore, cheese in the Cheez Wiz or humility in Donald Trump.
So imagine finding childcare for your disabled children. They may receive their first old age pension check before you find it.
Thirty years ago this year, four young women put into practice the maxim “You are never better served than by yourself.” They created a service for themselves, and even for others, called J’me une place en daycare. A Montreal resource for parents who want their children aged 0 to 5 with motor disabilities to attend daycare.
When these parents try, alone, to find childcare, most of the time, they encounter a legion of refusals…
“This is not our calling. »
“We would like to, but we are not equipped for that. »
“We are full. »
” Good luck ! »
Their luck is JMFPG. Yes, I know, the acronym takes up space, but that is precisely the mission of the organization, to find space. When desperate parents call on J’me une place en daycare or JMFPG, they are no longer alone. One of its workers goes to their homes to hear their needs.
When we are apart, each case is a separate case. Then the body goes into solution mode. JMFPG creates a large chain of support, involving parents, the daycare service and the health network.
When the daycare accepts a child experiencing motor difficulties, the worker also goes to the facilities to help the team adapt the environment. In short, we help the parents as much as the childcare service, all of this, of course, for the greatest good of the child.
In 2023, J’me une place en daycare supported 134 families; 89% of children joined a daycare service. A success rate of 89%, not many organizations can boast of that.
How did I discover this great work? A few days ago, I received in my email box at The Press a sending from Nathalie Dubeau, one of the JMFPG speakers, happily asking me to write the members of her team a card for their thirtieth birthday.
I contacted her, was impressed by all of their achievements, and wanted to write them the most beautiful holiday card ever, to help them help. Because their cause is vital.
As Martin St-Louis would say, you never know how high someone’s ceiling is, whether it’s Lane Hutson’s or a disabled child’s. One thing is certain, when a disabled child is included in the world of children without physical limitations, it stimulates him, it gives him wings and his ceiling becomes the sky.
It’s not just children with disabilities who benefit from this inclusion, other children can be inspired by them to push their own limits.
Because all humans have limits, struggles, mountains to climb, disabled or not. To live with people who cannot run away from them, who have to face them, in our face, is a plus. The roles are reversed. It is the disabled children who show them the way, who push them to surpass themselves.
A doctor has already said that everything happens before the age of 6. The mission of I make a place in daycare will not only help these children during their early childhood, it will help them throughout their existence to find their place in life. The precedent being accomplished. A barrier being removed.
And children who include children with disabilities in early childhood will become adults who include adults with disabilities in the larger world.
In short, a small place in daycare, a giant place in society.
Happy 30e birthday to I’m getting a place in daycare. The four young women of 1994 are now sixteen, still young women. Yes, they are all women. Kindness is such a feminine word.
They deserve to be named: Christine Duquette, Valérie Benoit, Isabelle Charbonneau, Nathalie Dubeau, Caroline Girard, Amina Lakhdar, Annie-Claude Rostenne, Maude Lalumière-Cloutier, Annie Chagnon, Véronique Lizotte, Claudia Lizotte, Marie-Ève Hudon, Isabeau Lalonde, Nadine Joseph, Nahomie Guerrier and Stéphan Soumah.
A card is all well and good, but it would also take a gift. You can get involved, become a member, volunteer, make a donation. Times are tough for associations that do good1.
And the speakers’ personal gift? It’s the smiles of children and the relief of loved ones. It’s when parents write to them that one evening, when their multi-disabled son came home from daycare, they found in his backpack an invitation card to go to another child’s birthday.
There are some birthdays that change a life.
There are birthdays that change lives.
1. Consult the J’me a place en daycare resource site