TV Review: When Loving Your Child Is Not Enough/Make me Happier

WHICH was the most heartbreaking part of When Loving Your Child Is Not Enough? Was it when the little boy who had to help his beleaguered single mother care for his severely disabled brother, while taking dogs' abuse from neighbours, gently said that many other people had it worse? Was it when another mother told how the constant screaming from her baby, whose multiple conditions don't yet have a proper diagnosis, had kept washing over her day after day until, utterly ground down, she considered killing herself, the baby and two other children?

Or was it when 17-year-old Cameron, whose Asperger's Syndrome has changed recently from mild eccentricities to violent and sweary outbursts – to his own despair – yelped in frustration while watching old videos of himself as a toddler: "I want to be cute again! I want to be cute!"

Well, they were all pretty heartbreaking – and grim viewing – but this documentary was only a glimpse into the unimaginably difficult lives of some families caring for children with disabilities.

I was unsure at first about the choice of Rosa Monckton to present it – while she has a daughter with Down's syndrome herself, as part of the privileged Lawson family (married to Dominic, sister-in-law of Nigella, daughter of a viscount) she hardly had to face the same struggles with social services as, for instance, the woman forced to fill in forms and take samples to prove that her son needed more than three nappies a day. And then there's Monckton's perennial tabloid status as Official Best Friend of Princess Diana, her daughter's godmother and about whom she seems always ready to comment. Would all that overshadow the subject?

Actually, Monckton came across as a kind woman, constantly reaching out to the families that she interviewed to stroke them sympathetically, apparently horror-struck by what they had to deal with.

Though she talked about her own family – about times when she'd been overwhelmed by her daughter's condition and her fears that her other child would feel obliged to take on her care in the future – the focus was on the struggling families. It showed clearly how the constant responsibility could drive them to the edge and how much they needed support.

Yet David Cameron, speaking briefly about his disabled son, Ivan, who died earlier this year, and a statement from a Labour minister, didn't really address the issue, just making admiring noises and vague promises. It's all very well saying how saintly some families are, but I'm sure they would rather have some respite care than praise.

STV's new series Make Me Happier aimed to give practical help to people with various problems, from insomnia and over-eating to depression and phobias. It's fronted by Angus Purden and the ever-smiley Lorraine Kelly; the latter, you feel, could turn her relentless positivity to anything from the conflicts in the Middle East or the American healthcare reform debate and still come out of it chuckling. Wouldn't we all like to be as happy as Lorraine?

The subject of the first programme wasn't, perhaps, quite as big as that, being about a man who had managed to deal with an alcohol problem but substituted eating too much and was now hoping to start becoming more healthy. It's not an uncommon problem, especially in Scotland, and introducing this one case study to food and exercise experts was maybe an example to others.