![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/GettyImages-2218407364.jpg\" "\\"A")
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
A Miami filmmaker in \u201cThe Glass Child\u201d gives voice to the sibling living in the shadows, whose emotions can be complicated and easily dismissed.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dan Kitwood<\/p>\n
Getty Images<\/p>\n
World Mental Health Day brings global attention to mental health awareness and the importance of creating greater understanding and support for those living with mental health conditions.<\/p>\n
But greater understanding requires more than simply talking about mental health or knowing the names of conditions. Sometimes it requires seeing an experience through someone else\u2019s eyes \u2014 a willingness to recognize what another person may be carrying, even when that struggle isn\u2019t immediately visible.<\/p>\n
That is why I created \u201cThe Glass Child,\u201d a film that takes its title from the term \u201cGlass Child Syndrome.\u201d It describes someone whose needs were overlooked due to their parents being focused on a sibling with a chronic illness or special needs during their childhood.<\/p>\n
I am a \u201cglass child.\u201d Growing up with an older autistic brother, my parents prioritized him over me. That experience shaped my understanding of family, love and emotional survival and left me navigating feelings of guilt, shame, frustration and longing.<\/p>\n
Those feelings can be difficult to acknowledge, particularly as you grow older. How do you admit feeling resentment towards your sibling when you know they can\u2019t control themselves? How do you ask for understanding when your parents have repeatedly chosen to misunderstand you?<\/p>\n
Bottling up that kind of pain can create cycles of isolation and internalized guilt that affect relationships and self-worth. \u201cThe Glass Child\u201d explores that complicated space \u2014 the anger, fear, resentment and longing that can stick with someone years after their childhood \u2014 along with reconciling old wounds to take the first step towards healing.<\/p>\n
I made the film while studying at Miami Dade College. As a filmmaker in my 20s, choosing to write a film about myself was one of the most vulnerable things I had ever done. I was taking something I had struggled to articulate privately and asking my classmates, actors and eventually an audience to step inside it.<\/p>\n
Few stories give voice to the sibling living in the shadows, whose emotions can be complicated and easily dismissed. Ultimately, \u201cThe Glass Child\u201d is about visibility, validation, and emotional honesty. By telling this story, I hope others who have felt invisible within their own families can now feel seen and understood, and that those who haven\u2019t lived this experience can better understand those who have.<\/p>\n
My film will be shown in Miami on Saturday, Oct. 10 \u2014 World Mental Health Day \u2014 as part of NAMI Miami-Dade County\u2019s Reel Minds Mental Health Film Festival at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex. Film has a unique ability to connect us to experiences beyond our own and make visible struggles that can be difficult to put into words. The eight films being presented give the audience a chance to see the world through someone else\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n
My hope on this World Mental Health Day is that stories like mine can inspire greater understanding, empathy and connection and help us see the struggles that may be hiding in plain sight.<\/p>\n
I\u00f1aki Amechazurra is a Miami-based filmmaker and graduate of Miami Dade College\u2019s film program. His short film, The Glass Child, is an official selection of NAMI Miami-Dade County\u2019s 2026 Reel Minds Mental Health Film Festival and will be shown Oct. 10. Visit namimiami.org<\/a> for more information.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Miami filmmaker in \u201cThe Glass Child\u201d gives voice to the sibling living in the shadows, whose emotions…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":423242,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[225,227,226],"class_list":["post-423241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hialeah","tag-hialeah","tag-hialeah-headlines","tag-hialeah-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=423241"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423241\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/423242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=423241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=423241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=423241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}