Category Archives: Skill Development

Staying Sane While Raising a Bipolar Child

She stomps out of the room, each firmly-planted step shaking the floor. Tear-stained, she plunges her face into the pillows on her bed, where she screams and cries. As she starts to calm down, I feel the adrenaline retreating into the places from which it flooded my body. Breathing, relaxing myself, I tend to her…

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The Lost Voice

This morning when I dropped Peanut off for school I realized I didn’t have her iPod Touch. She uses her iPod touch to communicate at school and over the last several months it has been a great way for her to participate in class. This isn’t the first time I have not had her “voice”…

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Complacent?

I scrambled up the hill to my daughter’s “old school” to pick up my son from his “new class.” My daughter attended this school from Early Intervention through Kindergarten before being moved to our neighborhood school for first grade. I know most of the Early Intervention staff pretty well, and I know the IEP process…

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MAY 6 SEMINAR: Meeting the Educational Needs of Children with Down Syndrome

REGISTER NOW! MEET AND DISCUSS EDUCATIONAL ISSUES AND BEST PRACTICES WITH OTHER LOCAL MOTHERS OF CHILDREN WITH DOWN SYNDROME! 1-day Seminar THIS Friday, May 6 @ Queens College, Flushing, NY Meeting the Educational Needs of Children with Down Syndrome   Amazing Opportunity to see Dr. Sue Buckley, Researcher with Down Syndrome Education International, present the best practices…

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Our Role & words hurt

So I was thinking, draw 3 circles on a piece of paper. One inside the other, so really you have 3 cirles around each other(as pictured)   The inner circle is our children, this is their culture of being a child with special needs. The middle circle is us, the parents. We’re not in the…

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Neighborhood Friends

One of the things I love about our neighborhood is all the kids on the street. It’s reminiscent of when I was a kid and would run the neighborhood from morning till dusk, riding my bike or roller skating or playing a neighborhood game of hide and seek. True things are a little different now….

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Feeling Like a Wimp Here

This will be short because my finger is hurting. It happens to be the index finger on my right (dominant) hand…perhaps the finger I use most…or at least I’m noticing how much I use it now that it’s hurting. You know how that goes. I think it is some sort of tendonitis or repetitive stress…

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A Typical Growing Up Moment?

Happy belated Passover & Happy Easter to those who celebrate these beautiful traditions. I wish you all peace in the world, in your homes and in your hearts! This isn’t just another post about potty-training, per se. It’s an OMG they’re growing up post about the challenges of being potty-trained-ISH and independent toileting. Last Thursday,…

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learning…

Learning…I’ve not written about homeschooling yet so I thought maybe this would be a good time. Homeschooling isn’t so typical for us, we have many challenges to get over. We do use therapies as part of our daily routine (even if we are still on sabbatical from professional therapies at our local hospital). We do…

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How to Handle a Fluke…

I arrived a few minutes before the bell that ends the school day. I realized that one of my friends was trying to get my attention and directing my gaze down the outdoor corridor outside my daughter’s classroom. I saw my daughter walking toward me with another friend of mine – fortunately one that has…

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