Category Archives: Advocacy

Fostering in Bradford can Answer a Call for Help

A startling 7,500 children on any given day can be in foster care across Yorkshire and Humberside. Each year more and more children enter foster care or residential care facilities. At least 890 children are currently being looked after in Bradford, UK, with 627 of these children being fostered. The numbers are startling as are…

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Now She Knows She’s Different

When Zoe was little I spent a lot of time thinking  ( and writing) about about how different she was. Then she grew, and through her grade school years blossomed with the encouragement to try and do her best as I made sure she was always included, and treated just like everyone else. Zoe will be starting…

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Disclaimer: I am writing this as a woman, so it’s going to have a womanly slant. No, I do not hate men. Yes, I know there are plenty of great Daddies who do a good job of helping out–and I salute you, Good Daddy!   I spent the majority of the past 3 weeks in…

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Attitude Adjustment

Happy November, Friends! (How did this happen? Wasn’t it just January?) The past few months have been sort of rough for us. For some reason, it seems like everything we’ve done, or tried to do, went horribly wrong. When things don’t go the way I envision them, I tend to get–shall we say–moody? Maybe not…

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The Chicken

Life sucks sometimes, right? Yeah. In the past few weeks, lots of heavy stuff has been going on (in my world and in the world at large). We’re still having testing done on Jack for school. My daughter is hormonal and vacilates from angel to devil in mere moments. I’m struggling to muddle through my…

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Antibiotics: How Do YOU Roll?

Need a little help here, PLEASE: My Big Little Man (who is smaller by 5 lbs now than My Little Man) got that back-to-school cold going around. For us, that means an imminent sinus infection as his compressed sinus cavities — a trait common to those with Down syndrome — makes him prone to this…

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Being the Parent

I sat in the developmental psychologist’s waiting room just simply observing the behavior of the parents. Some were busy filling out paperwork, one was reading a book, another was totally in to playing Angry Birds. Not a single one was watching their child. I watched these children, who were obviously there for a reason, as…

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Leaps and Bounds in Baby Steps

The Boys are swimming underwater like frogmen. Doing underwater headstands, flips and dive-toy retrieval as well as sporting an admirable breast stroke… though they clearly prefer being UNDER the water versus on its surface. (They get that from Mom and Dad being SCUBA divers, I guess.)  The Boys are competent dead-man floaters (face down in the water, breath-holding). But…

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Give ‘Em More Credit… BELIEVE!

You and I know, but does everyone else know? Our kids are smarter than we think. So much smarter than even we give them credit for. WAY smarter than what it says on their report card. And, smarter than any test can possibly measure. I know this… I KNOW IT! And, you know it too!…

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The Bubble Bursts…

Sometimes, I lose my words. Like someone popped my beautiful bubble that I worked so hard to get right. Or I feel like the sky is closing in on me. Actually, I feel like I’m the kid with the black cloud that only rains on me. (Pity party, table for 1?) So many times, on…

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