A mother and daughter pair in front of me this morning on the train reminded me of the challenges and sacrifice of a parent with a special needs child.
The girl is a young adult. Think she has sight, hearing and speech difficulties. Possibly also slightly low on intelligence but more or less quite normal.
So mummy was rubbing daughter's fingers with thick cream because she has bad eczema. Daughter looked at mummy with her smiling eyes and kissed mummy twice on the train, expressing her thanks in the way she knows. When mummy was about to leave the train for work before daughter alighted at a subsequent stop, they conversed in sign language and daughter lovingly nudged mummy to quickly get off the train before the door closed. They then signed to each other again - one still in the train and the other on the platform, oblivious to the wave of busy commuters trying to get on and off the train.
To think that both mummy and daughter were sad to leave each other for a few hours; even if this was probably a daily routine.