In my daughter's words

My life in school

I am writing about how I feel. Ok here it goes, when I was in class my friend was saying little words out loud about me sucking my thumb, then I felt that she shouldn’t say out loud. Because 4 people could hear what she said. Because when ever I was doing that, she keeps saying that twice everyday. And I felt like a dork. Because she is not my boss to say that. and the four people are joking about it. And it makes me embarrassed and I hide my face and started to cry. Because I do not want people staring at me. Because it well makes me cry a lot more. Every year when I was in school they does that to me a lot. I well tell you why I suck my thumb. Because when I was a baby I couldn’t hear and I well get sad easily. My brother kept stealing my paci, so I didn’t have anything to make me fell better, so I started to suck my thumb when I was little. I was lonely. Today I suck my thumb when I was tired and sad. But when I was in the bus I started remembered that the past my friends was smiling at me and I felt so happy in my life, to make me feel better. Because my friends never ever make fun of me. Because I was having fun with my friends who are nice to me. And I wish that people are nice to me from now on.

By Caroline

Take Advantage of Life for Therapy

It's the time of year when everything starts up - dance and music classes, scouts and Taekwondo.

Lucky for us, Caroline (who was born deaf) loves to dance, and so she was enrolled in dance at an early age. Last year, she decided she didn't want to take instruction anymore, but she did agree to help the younger girls' class. She helped keep the four and five year olds in line and made sure they knew their dance steps.

This year, I am making her continue her ballet even though she is not happy. I told her this was for several reasons. First of all, she's talented in dance, and she needs to do something active for exercise. Also, it's great therapy for her and even though she sings in the school choir, dance requires her body to repsond to the music. Also, ballet is hard and requires her concentration. I think it presents opportunities for her to shine, and we who are mothers of special needs kids need to acitvely look for ways that our children can shine.

It is so hard for them to shine at school where the faster, smarter kids sign up for things first and finish assignments first and don't have to ask the teacher for help. It is so hard for our children to expect anything but failure because school isn't set up for them to actually succeed at anything.

I'll tell you about her brothers next time. Unitl then, God bless you and yours, and may this year bring your children rich successes.

The Deaf One

Yes, I have a deaf child,too. She is the girl I prayed to conceive for years. We didn't realize she was deaf until she was 16 months old, and since her birth predated mandatory hearing screanings performed on newborns, that was considered early in our state.

We managed to make some progress with hearing aids and had much resistance from the school district when she was reaching kindergarten age. We begged them to allow her to continue with the special services preschool for another year (especially since her birthday is Aug 29th!). They refused. We spent months and thousands of dollars fighting for some allowances but weretold they suspected she might not be smart enough to learn to talk.

Our school district had nver taught a deaf child to talk. She was, and is, part of the hearing world. We ended up sending her to another state to a specialized school for 3 years (the last year we maintained an apartment), but a week before she turned five, we left her in a dorm.