Christine McGuinness has revealed that ‘felt like a carer not a mum’ during the first four years of her children’s lives. Her twins, five-year-old Penelope and Leo, were both diagnosed with autism in mid-2017 and Christine has spent the months since campaigning tirelessly for the condition, which has a broad range of symptoms. ‘It’s been different than other parents,’ she says, ‘the first four years certainly – I feel terrible saying this – but I felt more like a carer not a mum.’ The twins were both non-verbal leading to Paddy and Christine visiting a pediatrician who after several months helped to diagnose the twins. Christine admitted at the time that but has since dedicated herself to raising awareness for others parents.
Read more: https://metro.co.uk/2019/04/12/paddy-mcguinness-wife-christine-felt-like-carer-not-mum-autistic-children-9178745/?ito=cbshare
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Christine McGuinness has always been open about what it's like bringing up kids with autism.
The 31-year-old, who is married to TV presenter Paddy McGuinness, is mum to three gorgeous children - twins, five-year-old Penelope and Leo and three-year-old Felicity.
Christine has now revealed that she felt more like a carer than a mum during the first four years of her children’s lives.
Her twins were diagnosed with autism in mid-2017 and Christine has spent the months since campaigning for the condition.
She said, ''It’s been different than other parents. The first four years certainly – I feel terrible saying this – but I felt more like a carer not a mum.''
The twins were non-verbal so Paddy and Christine visited a paediatrician who helped to diagnose them.
Christine said, ''I’m always still surprised, I get so many parents asking how I talk about it so openly but a lot of autistic children grow in to autistic adults being non verbal, and if they can’t speak for themselves only we can do that as parents.''
She continued, ''It just makes sense to teach people about this condition because it will help my children when they are older. When they first got diagnosed, we realised this is a life-long condition, there’s not cure and nothing to fix it.''
She added, ''I thought, “am I going to be a full time carer forever?” They have one to one support at school so I suppose they stand out, but the school is wonderful they just accept them.''
The twins have completely different symptoms - Penelope ''didn’t want to be held as a child or comforted’ but she has improved and now ‘loves a cuddle''.
Christine said, ''She is brilliant but she tenses a lot with excitement and walks on her tip toes and lines things up.''
We applaud Christine for speaking out so bravely about this - hopefully her words will help others who are in the same position feel less alone.
