The Issue

I didn’t leave my job because I wanted to—I left because I had no choice.

My son is autistic, nonverbal, and has extensive daily needs. He requires full-time care, not just supervision. And like so many other parents raising disabled children, I don’t have a village who can be hands-on every day like I am. No backup sitter. No flexible workplace. Just me.

Many of us are single parents. That means everything falls on one person: dropping off, picking up, feeding, bathing, regulating behaviors, managing appointments and therapies, and trying to make ends meet. When you’re the only one doing it all, it’s nearly impossible to maintain a job—especially when school or therapy hours don’t align with work schedules.

And truthfully, we don’t always feel safe sending our kids off. Some children are removed from schools due to behavior. Others are placed on public transportation or buses with aides who aren’t properly trained or don’t understand autism at all. Many of our kids are nonverbal, and that alone makes it terrifying. They can’t come home and tell us what happened. So we’re strict. We’re cautious. Because we have to be.

People say, “Can’t you work from home?” But they don’t understand. Even when we try, there are meltdowns, stimming, sensory overload, and aggressive behaviors throughout the day. We’re constantly redirecting, de-escalating, cleaning up, calming down. There’s no guaranteed 30-minute block where we won’t be interrupted. We are doing the work of multiple professionals—alone.

Some of us want to work, but not all jobs accommodate our reality. Once we leave the workforce, there’s no safety net. No paycheck. No transition plan. Programs like SSI help the child, not the parent. Caregiver pay? In most places it’s either non-existent, inconsistent, underfunded, or unavailable. And even where it exists, it doesn’t cover rent, utilities, gas, or food—the basics needed to survive.

The Reality

It’s time to recognize that caregiving is work. We didn’t stop working—we just stopped getting paid for it. But income protections alone are not enough. Families like mine also need protections from being punished when we fall behind.

If a parent can show they are out of work because they are providing full-time care to a disabled child, there should be safeguards in place. There’s no amount of “hustle” that can fully cover all these necessities plus the child’s needs. No utility company should be allowed to disconnect service. No landlord should be able to evict a special needs family without first offering grace, flexibility, or government-backed assistance.

On top of that, many programs designed to help families are defunded, underfunded, or run out of money long before families actually receive support. By the time we apply, we’re told there are no funds left. That leaves us trapped—forced to choose between caregiving and survival.

That’s why we are demanding more than short-term fixes. We are demanding long-term protections against family displacement.

The Solution

Families raising disabled children need guaranteed access to stability. That means:

Automatic qualification for subsidized housing programs. Parents who are full-time caregivers should not spend years on waitlists.
Access to housing vouchers or reduced-rent programs, so we can afford the basics while still caring for our children.
Grace laws preventing disconnection or eviction for families proven to be out of work due to full-time caregiving.

These protections are not about luxury. They are about survival. They are about protecting the children who need stability the most from being retraumatized by housing loss, utility shutoffs, or constant instability.

The Call

We’re not asking for handouts. We’re asking for dignity, survival, and recognition. We’re asking for laws that reflect the real-world cost of being a full-time caregiver and prevent families like mine from falling off the financial cliff.

Caregiving is work. It’s time the law acknowledged that—and protected the families who are living it every day.