Monthly Archives: July 2014

The pressure to be the perfect mother

July 28, 2014homemaking, homeschooling, parenting, personal developmentAvivah

>>You know, parenting is so all consuming and I never feel I’m doing as well as I’d like. But I look at you and so many times, you’ve got it nailed down. Even if you don’t show us your every mistake, I think you are doing an awesome job, and I really appreciate that this specialist bothered to acknowledge it, because you know what, almost all of us want to hear it at least now and then after we’ve poured heart and soul into something for so long.<<

I often feel like I’m not doing as well as I would like – thoughts like this sneak in pretty regularly!

I don’t have it all nailed down, far from it.

I see a lot of people online who seem to be doing a lot more with their kids than I do with mine. Parents who are more focused and goal directed, parents who provide their kids with T21 with more cognitive/physical support, parents who offer their homeschooled kids more active support in following their passions, parents who do more of everything, parents who have more of everything.

But my kids weren’t sent to those parents; they were sent to me. Perfectly imperfect me.

My message on this blog isn’t that I’m awesome and I’ve got it all figured out, because I haven’t.

If there’s a message I want to share, it’s that you can be lacking and inadequate, you can fall short and doubt yourself often – and your family can still be pretty darn wonderful.

When my oldest daughter was diagnosed with an eating disorder, I felt I had totally failed. It was as if all the good things I had done for years had never happened. I stopped writing about parenting, I stopped doing parenting consultations and I stopped trusting myself as a parent.

My husband spent four months in the US with her as she went through treatment, and one of the first things he told me when he came back was, “None of what you did all these years was wasted, it’s all still there inside of her. She’s an incredible girl and a lot of the credit for that is thanks to what you gave her.”

I didn’t see it at the time, but he was right. She had a big bump on her life path, but the person she was, the relationship we had – it was just temporarily obscured. It wasn’t gone. When the sun came out again, everything was better and brighter than before the dark clouds of life covered it all up.

So your family can turn out great with the efforts you worry aren’t enough.

And you, right now, as you are – you’re wonderful. The perfectly imperfect mother who never does all she wants to do. That’s a hard one to believe, isn’t it?

We have to learn to recognize what we do, validate ourselves, pat our own backs. Sometimes we get a little bonus when someone from the outside appreciates what we do, and that’s really nice. But we have to live with ourselves every day and that means we have to consciously reprogram the thoughts in our mind that can grind us down and make us feel we’re not enough, we’re never enough, and we’re never going to be much better than we are right now no matter how hard we try. All of that is a lie.

Countering this lie isn’t a one time lesson. I can’t write about this in the past tense as something I’ve worked on and surmounted, because this is a constant daily effort – to appreciate myself as I am when I’m having an adequate day, or especially when I’m having a much less than adequate day, not only on the days when I can check off every item on a long and detailed to-do list. To value myself as a human be-ing, not a human do-ing.

It’s about progress, not perfection.

It’s about learning to love ourselves, learning to nurture ourselves and appreciate ourselves as we are right now – just the way we love and nurture our children.

Avivah

Breakthrough meeting at Yirmiyahu’s two year assessment

July 27, 2014parenting, Trisomy 21Avivah

Today Yirmiyahu and I went to his two year appointment with the child development doctor, his speech therapist and his physical therapist. We have these appointments about every six months. You may remember that I haven’t enjoyed these meetings in the past and even though our interactions have improved, I still had an apprehensive feeling when thinking about this meeting.

I was thinking about how to approach the meeting and decided it’s important at this point to share with them a bit more of what I do with Yirmiyahu, beyond what they directly ask me about.

The doctor started the meeting with a smile, saying she heard that I’m teaching Yirmiyahu several languages (ie English, Hebrew and sign). She asked me what words he knows and I began listing them. She was happy to hear that I use sign together with speech (not to replace it), and asked me what signs he knows and if he uses them independently to communicate.

We were talking while Yirmiyahu was walking around, squatting in place, asking me for a drink and drinking while standing. They watched him playing with a doll imaginatively rather than copying what he was shown. In response to her questions, I detailed some examples of how he follows instructions and shows comprehension of what he hears.

When he pointed to their computer and indicated he wanted to climb up to it, I explained he’s used to sitting with me at the computer and asked if they wanted to see the program we do together. I had brought my laptop along just in case it was relevant, so I pulled it out and turned on the early literacy program (Brillkids) that we do daily. This is a fantastic program that Yirmiyahu loves – he comes to me several times a day and signs ‘words’ to ask me to do this together with him. Seeing a demonstration of what Yirmiyahu does at home was more valuable for them than hearing about it, and they could also see how attentive and engaged he was by the words and pictures.

I feel like this appointment was a game changer. The doctor didn’t refer to Down syndrome even once. She didn’t grade him and tell me how he was doing compared to other kids. She didn’t talk about delays, she didn’t pressure me about putting him into a special needs daycare. She didn’t tell me I need to come for more frequent therapy. She didn’t say anything like, ‘kids like him’, ‘special needs’ – it was just about him as an individual.

After all the assessments were finished, the doctor said to me, “You’ve obviously been very successful with him.” In the past I would wanted specific feedback on what she meant by that but today I just said, “Well, he’s an amazing boy!” And then she replied, with something I never expected to hear, “Yes, he is an amazing boy, and you are an amazing mother.”

And then she repeated, “You are an amazing mother.”

There’s a saying, “Don’t quit until the miracle happens.” Well, this is how I feel about my interactions with the child development team. I stuck with them, they stuck with me, we kept trying to communicate and we’ve gotten to a good place of mutual respect and appreciation. It’s been a journey.

Avivah

Kids with Down syndrome are smart!

July 20, 2014Trisomy 21Avivah

Recently I was speaking to a mother of a child with T21 who is a few months younger than Yirmiyahu who asked me how he’s doing. I told her he’s doing great – cute, smart, communicative, etc.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “Mental retardation is the definition of Down syndrome. How can he not be mentally retarded?”

It’s so obvious to me that Yirmiyahu isn’t retarded that I didn’t even know how to respond for a moment. Then I told her, I don’t accept the limiting definitions by medical professionals as fact; this is what they think they know now and it will continue to change with time.

Earlier in the 20th century, it was believed people with T21 had an IQ of 20 – 40, would never speak or read, probably not walk. By mid century, parents of a child with Down syndrome were told his IQ would be between 40 – 60, he would walk and talk but never live independently. Now parents are told their child’s IQ will be between 60 – 80 and he will have a mild to moderate intellectual disability.

Did the children change over the course of a hundred years? No. What changed was how people treated them, and this was based on their expectations which were set by the definition of the diagnosis.

Less than a hundred years ago, they were hidden away, institutionalized from birth. Of course their development was limited. The support people with T21 are receiving continues to improve and accordingly, outcomes are much better.

In another twenty years, it’s very likely we’ll be hearing kids with T21 have IQs of 80 -100 or more. (Though it bears mentioning that IQ tests are a very limited and inaccurate way to judge a person’s intelligence and capacity for contribution.) If you wait for studies to tell you how bright your child can be, you’ll have wasted your child’s growing up years.

Well, I’m not waiting for the studies to catch up with what I already know.

I can see what people with Down syndrome are accomplishing now, people who are now in their twenties and thirties. They have graduated from regular (ie not special ed) high schools with a full diploma, gone to college and earned college degrees. They are athletes, activists, business owners. They are married and living independently; some are parents. They are living happy, healthy, full lives. They’ve challenged what we assumed was true of people with T21, shown us what’s possible and set the bar higher for the kids in this coming generation.

I’m going to make the non-scientific assumption that all of these people had parents who believed in them and didn’t let the beliefs of medical professionals of the time determine their view of their children.

Currently I know of many children with Down syndrome who are reading at the age of 3 or 4, speaking two (or more) languages and reading both languages! Does that sound like a lack of mental ability to you?

I told the woman above, if you treat your daughter as if she’s mentally challenged, that’s how she’s going to be. I told her about my experience at the Feuerstein Institute, when at his six month evaluation they told me they rarely see a baby with T21 at the level he was at. This mother asked me what I did. I don’t think I’ve done that much; the main thing, I think, is that I’ve never believed what the doctors told me when he was born.

Yirmiyahu is a bright boy and I treat him as such. He doesn’t have to prove that he’s intelligent for me to treat him that way, any more than any of my other kids had to prove themselves. Will some things take him more effort and time to master? Probably. Does that mean he’s not intelligent? No. Am I more conscious of providing him with good quality input? Absolutely.

We can’t limit our kids because of a diagnosis. We can’t let professionals limit our kids because of a diagnosis. Kids with Down syndrome have amazing potential and it’s unfair and damaging to view them through the lenses of outdated medical information.

Avivah

How to keep toys from taking over!

July 14, 2014frugal strategies, homemaking, homeschooling, parentingunico blocksAvivah

>>Can you post a picture of the toy storage unit you put back together? Still wondering how you keep all the games, toys and supplies organized and accessible in a limited space.<<

The most helpful thing I’ve found for keeping toys organized in a limited space is getting rid of what you don’t really get a lot of use or benefit from.

A while back I went through all of our toys. Most of what we brought with us to Israel was board games and learning manipulatives but it’s amazing how easy it is to accumulate stuff! I began to take note of which toys my children played with most, and no surprise, I once again saw the 80/20 rule in effect.

In this case that rule means that 20 percent of toys will be played with 80 percent of the time, and 80 percent of toys will be played with just 20 percent of the time. And that means, that your space is mostly taken up with toys your kids rarely use! If you can figure out what is getting the most use and significantly scale down the rest, you’re on your way to an organized play space!

I took note of what toys they used the most, and began a big giveaway pile of all the rest. This cut down on the storage space needed quite a bit! I strongly recommend that everyone go through this process; not only does it help you keep your house cleaner, but more importantly, it helps the kids get more enjoyment from what they have. It allows them to focus without the distraction of toys they don’t use cluttering up space. Most of our learning manipulatives fall into the category of being used 20 percent of the time, but these are worth keeping around for when we do use them.

Here’s the cabinet that I use for toy storage – it has two internal shelves and two drawers.

We keep the games and puzzles on the shelves inside – the games to the right are smaller boxes and there’s another pile behind each of those.

This drawer is for Yirmiyahu’s toys.

The bottom drawer is where I now keep the printer and laminator, which were taking up prime space by being kept out all the time. I tend to use them heavily all at once and then not at all for long periods of time, so it makes more sense to take them out when I need them than to leave them out all the time.

By putting the printer and laminator in a drawer, it makes space on top for things that I want to keep visible and easy to access – learning manipulatives and several more toys.

For those who are wondering what kind of manipulatives are included, here you go!

Left to right – pattern blocks (2 boxes), base ten blocks, cuisenaire rods, assortment of mostly card games, flash cards, tangrams (2 boxes); bottom left – geoboard, 100 number tiles, word cards with plastic letters, dominoes, teddy bear counters.

We have several boxes of toys that we keep in the closet opposite this cabinet. (Bottom, l – r – Lincoln Logs, Legos; top l – r – Morphun blocks, toy animals; tall box is a ball and stick construction activity).

Below you can see the wagon of building blocks for young children, next to it a huge box of building blocks for somewhat bigger children (and next to that a couple of toys the kids found being given away).

Our boys love building toys – it’s what they use 80 percent of the time – and this is where I invest most of my storage space and money.

Last year someone gave us a starter set of Duplo blocks, Lincoln Logs and Mega Bloks, and this is what my boys would play with every single morning. The only problem was that there are three of them and there just wasn’t enough for them to play together so there was usually some kind of conflict. When I cleaned out all the toys that weren’t getting much use, I determined that if I had an opportunity, I would add on to these toys that already got so much use rather than get more kinds of toys.

Now, eight months after that decision, I’m amazed at how the opportunities to add to the toys that mattered most to them have all somehow come around!

A friend was clearing out her toys, and I bought a mega blocks wagon and blocks from her. That doubled our collection of these building blocks for young children.

Then, someone else was downsizing her toy collection and was selling Lincoln Logs, so naturally I bought that! And that doubled our Lincoln Log collection.

The other two toys I wanted to get more of were Duplo block and Legos – Duplo because we didn’t have that much, Lego because they were ready for the challenge of more detailed building but we had only a sprinkling that my kids found being given away. But both of these were really expensive and here in Israel, the price is double buying them in the US. Not happening.

In the winter my mom traveled to the US and asked what the kids would like. I told her if she wanted to get them Lego, they’d love it! She was able to find some great smaller sets on clearance at Walmart.; my in-laws also got them a mid sized set.

I also ordered a Duplo compatible block made in Canada that was half the price (Unico blocks, 250 blocks for $50), and my mom brought back a box of them. I was so happy with these that I wanted to get more, but they’re bulky and it’s not the kind of thing you can ask anyone but your mother to bring for you. 🙂

Then this spring a blog reader told me she was coming and would be able to bring things for us. I ordered two more boxes of Unico blocks (thank you, SH!) and this was the best money spent ever. They play with this all of the time, and there’s plenty for them to all play together even when friends come over.

Organizing things in this way has helped us maximize our space and keep clutter at bay. I hope you find some of these ideas helpful in your home!

Avivah

Helping kids deal with rocket attacks on Israel

July 10, 2014food preservationAvivah

I got a worried email from my sister a couple of days ago, who has been following the latest news in Israel.

The latest news is that the internationally recognized terrorist group, Hamas, has been shooting hundreds of long-range rockets into Israel. As I write this morning, 365 rockets were shot into Israel in the last 72 hours.

This began with southern Israel and is spreading throughout the country, to the Jerusalem and Tel Aviv area. As of yesterday the first warning sirens were sounded in the northern part of the country as missiles reached the Haifa area; in the past missiles to this part of the country came from Lebanon further north of us, but for the first time these are being shot from the south. We’re seeing rockets with a very far range.

Miraculously, no one has been killed. Truly a miracle. However, there have been people who were seriously injured.

Hamas terrorists are using their citizens as human shields, deliberately encouraging people to flock to buildings that the Israeli army has warned them in advance to evacuate (this link is to a video in Arabic by terrorist leader clearly saying this is their strategy); the Israeli army aborted the planned strike as a result of the presence of civilians. This article in Slate details Israel’s effort to spare Gaza civilians and calls it ‘exemplary’. Meanwhile, the social media is being flooded with images of Arabs who were killed in Syria with claims that these are current pictures of the work of the Israeli army in Gaza; the notoriously anti-Israel BBC has said these are fake.

As for the millions of Israeli citizens who are being targeted…you won’t hear much about them in the media outside of Israel.

I’ve been thinking about how to present the rocket attacks to my kids – which I didn’t do an especially good job about so far – and now how to prepare them in case rockets are shot into our area. It’s a balance to give them information but not to unnecessarily frighten them.

Here’s a song that was created by someone who saw that thousands of children in southern Israel (which has been targeted with rocket attacks for years) were very traumatized.

I’m impressed with the simple genius of this song, to turn a terrifying situation into something a child can deal with, and to help them release the fear and anxiety. If you’ve ever heard one of these warning sirens, you know that just hearing one of them makes your stomach drop and your heart begins pounding. That’s aside from waiting to hear the ‘boom’ of the rocket when it hits and then the all clear.

I’ve practiced drills with our kids a couple of times and hope that going to the bomb shelter won’t be necessary. But for those in different parts of the country, this is already a reality and particularly for those who are experiencing rockets landing in their close vicinity, it’s terrifying.

This morning I saw this list of 7 positive group bomb shelter activities. (Some people have homes with specially built safe rooms but our apartment was built a couple of years before this became standard building practice.) These can just effectively be used with your children as with a group of strangers in the bomb shelter; they are all activities that encourage a positive energy and focus on something good.

I think the best thing for kids to have is a calm parent or teacher since they take their cues from us. Easier said than done, right? So helping our kids deal with this means finding a way to deal with it ourselves.

I like the above song because it gives a parent a concrete tool to help a child deal with the situation. I decided that telling or reading a story would be most centering and grounding for me and my kids, after saying some tehillim (Psalms) together. If we had to stay there for longer, then games would be helpful in spending time together in a relaxed way.

Our kids need us to help them stay calm, to give them the message that they’re safe and we’re there for them. Listen to them talk, encourage them to draw or write down their feelings. Don’t minimize this because you’re uncomfortable or so afraid yourself that you think that letting them share their feelings will make them more afraid. Remember, they’ll take their cues from you. The message you want them to get is, it’s scary but they are safe, that whatever happens it will all be okay. You’re taking care of them. This is our job especially at times like this, to be the emotional rock for our kids to lean on.

My ds15 heard a rocket land near where he was at the time and he told me he can’t believe how Israelis go on with their lives as if everything is normal. Well, unfortunately for our beleaguered little country, being attacked by hostile Arabs is normal. Israelis have developed the attitude that we have to go on with our lives, that to live in fear is letting terrorists win.

If you’re in Israel:

Do NOT share details of where you hear a rocket land. We don’t want them to know where they are landing because this helps Hamas shoot more accurately.
Do NOT mention hearing planes going overhead.
Do NOT talk about where our soldiers are being deployed.

You know the saying from WWII, “Loose lips sink ships”? It’s like that. PLEASE – I know it’s scary and you want to share with your friends, but tell them in person, not on FB or other social media. They are being monitored for this information and we don’t want to give information to people who will use it to hurt us.

Friends of ours in Baltimore began the Shmira project, where people around the world are paired with active combat soldiers in the Israeli army to pray, do good deeds or learn Torah as a merit for safety for that soldier. Sign up here.

If you have a smartphone there’s an app called Red Alert: Israel that you can download. It will notify you when a rocket is being shot, giving people in communities closest to the danger zone just 15 seconds to get to safety. For those of you not in Israel, you can use these seconds to pray for the safety of those being targeted that no one is harmed.

The Israeli army has just called up 40,000 reservists, which means that many, many young children are saying goodbye to their fathers right now. So much courage from so many people in such a tiny country – our men, their wives and mothers and their children – we’re all one big family.

It’s hard to talk about this conflict without feeling frustrated and confused that regardless of how much terror is inflicted on the Jewish state, it is painted as the aggressor. Why would people support evil when the facts are so clear, my older kids want to know (and what most adults are trying to wrap their heads around)? To be very simplistic, it’s hard to deal with bullies when they control the world’s oil and everyone is dependent on it. Better to look the other way so you don’t see what they’re doing, so you don’t have to take action. Because ignoring evil makes it go away, don’t you know?

When I begin to feel upset or fearful about the injustice of the world, I take a deep breath and remind myself Who is running the world, and remember what we’ve seen time and time again – and I pray that we continue to merit this protection in this latest wave of attacks on Israelis.

Hodu laHashem for being our iron dome and protecting us constantly from the incessant life threatening rockets that continually rain down us. We are aware of your constant guidance and thank You with all our heart! Please continue to be for us a shield from harm and forever protect us from evil. Aliza Gable Lipkin

Please pray for peace, for safety and for a quick end to this most recent war of terror on Israel.

Avivah

Like Stars on Earth – movie

July 7, 2014homeschooling, parentingAvivah

Like Stars on Earth is a movie made in India, about an eight year old boy who has dyslexia. He also has a creative and artistic mind, which no one is able to appreciate. All they see is a kid who won’t perform to their standards, and his self-esteem becomes more and more battered until he eventually almost totally shuts down.

This is a long movie, 2 hours and 40 minutes long. It builds steadily as it brings you into the world of the boy and increasingly are able to view things through his eyes. The version below has been dubbed into English spoken with a Hindi accent, and this sometimes makes understanding exactly what is being said a challenge.

From a parenting perspective, you see what happens when a parent imposes separation as a punishment onto a child, when closeness with a parent becomes too much to bear and something to be avoided. Since every person has an innate need to attach, the child in this situation – as with any other situation – attaches to someone else who replaces the parent as the primary relationship. But there’s much more to note about these relationships than just that.

One powerful message in the movie is towards the end, when the father tells the teacher that his wife has been reading on the internet about dyslexia, and explains that he wants the teacher to know this because it shows they care about their son. The teacher replies that love is about accepting someone as he is.

The movie is based on a true story. I already said it’s really long but I found it a worthwhile use of time. There are so many messages to take away from this film, about learning differences, inclusion, teaching, parenting – each person will take away something else for himself. For me and my kids, I anticipate it will be a reference in conversations about education and other relevant topics for a long time to come.

Avivah