This week, I found myself comforting a friend in our local coffee shop. We were talking about our eldest children - her son and my daughter - and the fact that they are both carers for younger siblings with specialist needs and wise and compassionate beyond their years.
What brought tears to my friend's eyes was the thought that neither of them may have the chance to have a school photo taken with their younger sibling - an experience that many of their friends have enjoyed and, quite rightly, taken for granted.
I empathised with her, but for once I was the one telling another parent of a child with additional needs that things can - and will - get easier.