Living in a rural area comes with a litany of of struggles for disabled children, especially economically. I am an economics major with a severely disabled child that doesn't take kindly to strangers, therapists, or anyone but family unless you want to build a multi year relationship with him. There have been so many therapists leave that he doesn't trust them and will be physically and verbally aggressive towards caregivers without established trust with him. Furthermore, trust for a level 3 ASD child doesn't come easy or fast due to the severe lack of communication and social delays present with his diagnosis. Please consider these struggles with families that have children with disabilities, living in a rural area. Treating families that are already struggling and don't get enough economic help is demeaning and does not give the dignity needed. SNAP allows you to pick the foods tailored to your needs, why can't caregiving be given the same dignity and understanding?

Helping disabled children and listening to their stories through them or their families is vital to making sure rules are not being made by people that don't know what it's like to live with a child with a severe disability. There are countless studies to show how those with intellectual disabilies have a higher cost burden than those without disabilities. Specifically there was one study done by the CDC that I will cite for you all to read about the added costs and burdens on our families. "In conclusion, regardless of specific estimates, individuals identified with ASD incur substantially greater healthcare costs than neurotypical children. Other societal costs associated with ASD include outlays by school systems and families and lost productivity associated with unpaid family care and the employment limitations experienced by adults with ASD, all of which are important areas for research. Appropriate treatment for ASD is an important policy concern, particularly given that healthcare expenses are only a small part of the societal costs associated with ASD (Amendah et al. 2011; Buescher et al. 2014;Lavelle et al. 2014; Rogge and Janssen 2019)." https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/105696

Please, if you don't listen to the families, listen to the studies done by the government and/or other researchers that have their work published and cited.