Parenting Special Needs magazine

Becoming a parent changes everything. When a child comes along priorities and day to day habits change. If that child has special needs it can quite literally transform your life, plans and livelihoods.

Chantai Snellgrove, founder and editorial director of Parenting Special Needs magazine, is a good example. She has a successful career in graphic design, marketing, advertising and publishing but when she realized her daughter had special needs she saw a need for a one-stop resource for information, strategies and personal stories for building community among parents of kids with special needs.

From that idea her free on-line magazine was born! Only offered on-line due to publishing costs and wider availability, Parenting Special Needs is a very professional, colorful and beautifully designed bi-monthly. Obviously, much thought and focus was put into making the magazine attractive and appealing.

Snellgrove sees the mission as quite simple,

Our mission is to provide parents of special needs children, of all ages and stages of life, both information and inspiration. Through Parenting Special Needs, we've created a world that provides practical tips, shares life’s lessons, tackles the challenges and celebrates the joys, of one of life's greatest gifts.

In an interview in her hometown paper, TCPalm, Snellgrove explains,

"Our hope is that by raising awareness and bringing some of these things to the forefront. We also educate and raise tolerance and acceptability for anybody with different abilities."

As a parent of a special needs daughter, she understands the feelings of isolation many parents have. Therefore with her magazine she wants to inform and raise awareness not only for parents but also family, friends and teachers on how to positively deal with the struggles of having a special needs child.

"My goal originally was to help the parents," she said. "In helping the parents, I think you also have to educate other people. There's a lot of information out there, but if you don't ask the right questions, you don't get the answers," she said. "A lot of parents were out there floundering."

A unique element of the magazine is how they actively recruit parents to share their stories with written submissions as well as their very popular “Proud Moments” section. Anyone can submit a moment of achievement and pride related to a child with special needs. These touching portraits of real life are little diamonds. Anyone who reads them would find commonalities and inspiration for their own journey.

Be sure to check out Parenting Special Needs magazine. It’s free!