{"id":560566,"date":"2026-03-24T06:43:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T06:43:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/560566\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T06:43:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T06:43:12","slug":"disability-and-chronic-pain-made-motherhood-isolating-for-megan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/560566\/","title":{"rendered":"Disability and chronic pain made motherhood isolating for Megan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Megan Blin had spent much of her young life “pretending” she didn’t have any physical limitations.<\/p>\n

But when the 31-year-old became a mum, she was forced to accept that her disability and chronic pain was making her parenting journey isolating.<\/p>\n

“The first mums’ group I went to, I remember getting a text saying, please don’t bring your prams because we just don’t have the space,” says Megan, from the Sunshine Coast\/Kabi Kabi lands.<\/p>\n

“And I remember thinking, how am I even going to manage walking from the car to the centre without my pram?<\/p>\n

“I thought, there has to be other mums out there like me.”<\/p>\n

Megan posted a call-out on social media to find other mothers living with disability and chronic pain and was overwhelmed by the response.<\/p>\n

Her mothers’ group catering to parents with diverse needs is now the focus of university research.<\/p>\n

“The whole purpose was just to find one other mum,” she says.<\/p>\n

“And if we can make it easier for just one other mum like me, then that’s all worth it.”<\/p>\n

These are Megan’s words.<\/p>\n

I realised my motherhood experience would look different<\/p>\n

I was born with an extra vertebra at the bottom of my spine that led to a lot of back and hip instability, and then genetics predisposed me to severe arthritis.<\/p>\n

I remember my doctor saying, “That’s probably what we’d see in a 70-year-old and you’re in your early 20s.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Megan Blin could not find local support groups for parents living with disability and chronic pain. (Supplied: Megan Blin)<\/p>\n

There was always that big component of grief and uncertainty as to what the future would look like.<\/p>\n

I’d always wanted to be a mum but at the time, it was really hard to imagine what life was going to be like as a parent with a disability or a chronic illness, especially because we’re just not often exposed to that in the parenting world.<\/p>\n

Birthing classes and baby books don’t have those chapters about how you navigate this part of parenthood.<\/p>\n

My first pregnancy was really challenging<\/p>\n

I’d had a double spinal fusion about 18 months prior to getting pregnant and I also had multiple procedures to try and fix a cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leak that happened during a medical procedure.<\/p>\n

A CSF leak is considered quite rare, but it caused havoc on my nervous system.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Megan says she had to undergo surgery on her hip after her son was born. (Supplied: Megan Blin)<\/p>\n

I was living with chronic daily migraine \u2014 I was having about five attacks a week \u2014 and some of them were lasting multiple days.<\/p>\n

I was really worried in my first trimester about how my pregnancy was going to pan out, knowing that I had nine months of this ahead of me.<\/p>\n

When I asked my midwife in my first appointment, “Are there any support groups or resources for mums like me?” the answer was just “no”.<\/p>\n

I started to realise how different my pregnancy and probably my experience as a mother might look.<\/p>\n

Breastfeeding was trial and error<\/p>\n

When I had my son, I got to the point where I was considering stopping breastfeeding.<\/p>\n

Breastfeeding aversion explained<\/a><\/p>\n

Anger, dread, anxiety, guilt, worry and disconnect are just some of the feelings described by women who experience breastfeeding aversion response.<\/p>\n

I know a lot of mothers can struggle with breastfeeding, but when you have a health condition, it just adds these extra factors.<\/p>\n

There was stress around knowing what medications I could safely take for my pain and where to source that information from easily.<\/p>\n

The feeding positions that the beautiful midwives showed me, they just weren’t really compatible with my back and my hip, so I had to do a lot of trial and error.<\/p>\n

But it was a simple suggestion from a friend who said, “Get a memory foam pillow because it can support the weight of the bub.”<\/p>\n

And that was the game changer for me.<\/p>\n

Have you experienced challenges as a parent with disability? Share with us here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There has to be other mums like me<\/p>\n

I was so excited the first time I took my son to a sensory class.<\/p>\n

The whole group was sitting on the ground, and I remember being halfway through, I was in so much pain, and I just couldn’t really interact the same way those other mums were.<\/p>\n

Or we’d be at a playground where there’s soft sand and my heart would sink just a little bit because I knew my son wanted so desperately for me to take him there.<\/p>\n

But I just knew my capacity would not allow me to do that.<\/p>\n

I finally found my village<\/p>\n

When I posted a call-out on Facebook for other mums with disabilities and chronic pain,\u00a0the response was beautiful.<\/p>\n

So many mums wanted to join my mothers’ group, but there were others who were saying how much they would have appreciated a group for them when they were younger mums.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Megan hosting her first mothers’ group, catering for parents with diverse needs. (Supplied: Megan Blin)<\/p>\n

I remember just walking away from our first meeting feeling so relieved and excited for the future.<\/p>\n

We’d all had such different diagnoses, but a lot of the shared challenges were the same.<\/p>\n

We also wanted to talk about the things that were working, what were the successes in our lives, because I didn’t want it to just be about the struggles, it’s also about the beauty of it all too.<\/p>\n

I’d finally found my little village to help us.<\/p>\n

And I can easily say, these are the best years of my life so far.<\/p>\n

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