Advocacy wasn’t something I planned to learn. It found me.
It found me in school meetings where my child’s needs were misunderstood. In forms that didn’t quite fit. In systems that expected sameness where difference lived.
At first, my voice shook. I questioned myself constantly. Was I being difficult? Asking for too much? But over time, I realised something important if I didn’t speak up, my child would be expected to adapt to a world that refused to adapt to them.
So, I learned.
I learned the language of reports and plans. I learned how to say no and how to say this matters. Advocacy taught me resilience in a new way not the quiet kind, but the steady, grounded kind.
It also taught me to advocate for myself. To ask for understanding. To stop apologising for needs mine and my child’s.
I am still learning. But I no longer mistake silence for strength.
