"Kyodai children" are siblings of children with illness or disabilities.
It is said that people tend to have peculiar worries from an early age, such as being teased by brothers and sisters with disabilities and feeling biased in the affection of their parents.
This February, a picture book depicting the feelings of a young child was published.
The author is Keiko Nagai, who lives in Matsue City, Shimane Prefecture.
Based on her experience of raising her second daughter with intellectual disabilities and her eldest daughter, her granddaughter, I thought of her story.
The picture book depicts an older sister who is confused by the gaze around her towards her sister with a disability.
Through this scene, Mr. Nagai says, "I want to convey the complex feelings of my siblings, who care for her siblings with disabilities and at the same time care about the eyes of those around them." increase.
The picture book also conveys the feelings of a young child who feels biased in the affection of her parents.
Ritsumu Sakane, who lives in Okinoshima Town, Shimane Prefecture, has a younger brother with Down Syndrome.
I sympathized with the purpose of her picture book and wrote a postscript.
Ritsumu-kun was lonely because his parents' eyes tended to turn to his younger brother and he spent a short time with him when he was young.
In the postscript, he spelled out his honest feeling, "I have a lot of dissatisfaction, but I still love my younger brother."
(The video is 4 minutes and 44 seconds. It cannot be viewed on data broadcasting.)