First, I Want To Be A Mom.

Our Role Model for October is Denise Sherer Jacobson. Denise and her husband Neil refused to allow a disability stop them from fulfilling their dream of parenthood. Both Denise and Neil have cerebral palsy and were not encouraged to pursue a "family life" when they were growing up. Denise, a writer, has shared with EP the story of how her own role models helped her keep her dream of motherhood alive.

Three pairs of sneaker-clad feet tramp up the wooden porch steps. I open the front door and quickly press the joystick of my wheelchair in reverse to make way for the three seventh-graders: my son David and his two friends, Adam and Rashad. As usual, they file in, mumble their routine hellos, and deposit their heavy backpacks.

"How did it go today, guys?" I ask from my out of the way spot. They each give me one-word answers, "good," "okay," "fine." I follow with, "Any homework?"

"No," they respond in unison.

"There are snacks in the fridge," I tell them, and they trudge off to raid the pudding cups in my refrigerator. Then they head for the basketball hoop in the backyard. I hope they close the back door after them.

Seeing past limitations

As most girls do at one point or another, I dreamed of being a mother someday. I could picture scenes where my child would come home from school with friends, have their snacks, then run and play. But I didn't share my fantasies; I was afraid people would say I was being unrealistic. After all, I had cerebral palsy. I had spent my childhood through my late teens hobbling laboriously around on crutches. I would feed and dress myself in a great deal less than lightening speed, and I knew I would probably never be employed as a radio talk-show host because of my difficulty in speaking.

"How would you ever be able to take care of a baby?" I feared the cross-examination and teasing from family and friends. I couldn't offer any tangible proof or practical answers. All I had was a gut feeling that I could do it, and the words my mother had drummed into my head to encourage me through my most frustrating efforts when I was a child: "Where there's a will, there's a way."

I knew that parents with disabilities existed, Mrs. Kirinsky, my OT in elementary school, was married and had a 4-year-old daughter. Both Mrs. Kirinsky and her husband had cerebral palsy. I remember my therapist's round face and short-cropped, reddish-blond hair. I also remembered she had a scissored gait because she wore long-legged braces. She curled and uncurled her fingers with robotic dexterity. I often wondered how Mrs. Kirinsky had diapered her daughter when she was a baby, but I was too shy to ask such a personal question.

There was also Shelley Koy, a camp counselor I had known through my teens and twenties. His parents both had post-polio--their mobility and movements significantly encumbered by their disability. How on earth did they manage raising him and his younger brother, J.J.? I didn't even know how to bring up the subject. I wasn't used to talking about such things.

The possibility of having my own family was not really discussed during my growing-up years. I played with the babies as they sat in their carriages and--to more than one mother's surprise--rocked even the most fussy baby to sleep. But, every now and then, I would overhear adults make assumptions of the future: my nondisabled sister and her peers would "marry and have kids," while I would "go to college and have a career." (In those days the two were mutually exclusive). The underlying message was not lost on me and I ached to prove that my life would be much more than what everyone expected it to be. I also felt the enormity of the burden in that, unlike the rest of my peers, I had to prove anything at all. Perhaps that's why I held on so tenaciously over the years to my memories of Mrs. Kirinsky, Shelley Koy's parents, and my mother's indelible words. That was all I had until I met Neil.

Sharing a dream

The first time Neil and I discussed the topics of children and adoption was on our first dinner date, more than 17 years ago. Since our paths had crossed frequently in New York when we were young, we didn't need to warm up with small talk. Instead, I listened to Neil talk about growing up with his parents, who were Holocaust survivors, spoke little English, and were frightened by a medical profession that had a very pessimistic view of children with cerebral palsy.

"When I was 5, a doctor recommended my parents put me in an institution," he explained as he slouched casually in his wheelchair. "He thought that it would be too much of a strain on them to raise me because of their past. So, I went with my father to see the institution." He shook his head. "It was horrible. My parents were so afraid that I might be taken away, my mom took all three of us kids to live with relatives in Florida for a year. But when I saw those kids ..." Neil's voice trailed off for a moment. "Ever since then, I've wanted to adopt a disabled child."

"Don't you think it would be hard raising a disabled kid? Having to relive some of the same things you went through as a child?" I asked.

"But I survived!" he answered with undaunted enthusiasm. "I'd make a great role model."

I didn't know about being a role model--first, I wanted to be a mom. "I've never given a lot of thought to adoption," I said, tightly clasping my hands under the table before admitting, "I've always wanted to have a baby."

"Oh, so would I!" Neil's whole face brightened. "That would be such a kick!"

I'm sure that if our parents had been flies on the wall during that conversation, they would have dropped into our soup! Both my parents and Neil's had high expectations for us to be self-sufficient--physically and financially, and, indeed, encouraged us to achieve our maximum potential. But they rarely ever spoke to us about what that independent life would include. Perhaps they wanted to protect us from the disappointments they foresaw as we entered adulthood, trying not to give us false hopes about falling in love, sex, and marriage. I'm sure, too, that our total independence was a difficult adjustment for them since they had physically parented us many years longer than they parented our nondisabled siblings. Although they were able to see success in our futures, I doubt if parenthood was a choice they had expected us to make.

Dreams become reality

The conversation Neil and I had that evening was the first of many we had over the next four years. Finally, we received the phone call regarding a 6-week-old baby boy, who was "at risk" for cerebral palsy and who needed a home. By that time, I was 36, a bit set in my ways, and not sure I wanted to take on the never-ending responsibility of motherhood. Neil and I had been married for several years and we had a comfortable life. Neil worked as a systems analyst and I wrote and consulted on disability issues. I had also lost touch with the gut feeling I had had about being capable, emotionally and physically, of motherhood. Fortunately, Neil insisted we check it out. So how could I refuse?

As soon as I held David for the first time and his eyes locked onto mine, I knew he was my son. It turned out he did not have cerebral palsy (he has minimal attention deficit disorder and language processing issues). That was over 13 years ago. There were challenging times during those years. I have struggled through 40-minute diaper changes when help didn't show up on time. I have fought off paramedics who tried to separate me from my 4-year-old son, determined to whisk him off to the hospital because they panicked over a nasty, though non-life-threatening, gash on his finger. I have ridden out the tide of tantrums over bedtimes, video games, and overdue book reports. And the teen years are just beginning!

Like all families, we will keep having our ups and downs, but I no longer have reservations about declaring I'd make a good mother. The proof is in my backyard.

Denise Sherer Jacobson is an interviewer/editor for the Disability Rights and Independent Living Movement Project at the University of California. She wrote a book, "The Question of David," about her and Neil's experiences with the adoption and parenting of their son, David. Denise and her family live in the San Francisco Bay area of California.