4 Things My Mommy Imagination Ran Wild With

The boy had a sleepover at grandma’s last night and I almost feel like a new woman! For such a tiny person, he sure does take up a lot of space in the bed. Yes, he very often sleeps in our bed. When I was pregnant, and even after he was already here, I swore that I would not be one of those parents who would allow their child to crawl into bed with them, no matter what, but real-life has shown me that sometimes no matter how sure you are in your mind that you will be one way, your kid decides otherwise for you.

Here are 4 Big Ideas I had going into this baby thing that didn’t quite turn out how I imagined:

1.  He would have the most comprehensive & complete baby milestone book on the face of the planet – I imagined myself writing down the date and time, right down to the very second, that my boy hit every milestone. (I briefly considered using latitude and longitude coordinates to precisely identify the location the "first" took place but scrapped that idea when I remembered I have no clue how to figure that out.) His first smile, the first time he sit up on his own, the first projectile poop (That one was on daddy. Yes, on daddy. Twice. In the same day.) 

I envisioned this cutely decorated scrap book filled with snapshots and notes that we could look back on together when he was grown. Currently, he is 20 months old and I have one picture marked “first time drinking from a juice box” that I just tagged a few days ago in my pictures folder on my laptop. Don’t get me wrong, I have a bunch of photos and videos of him doing things – you know, important things like batting at a fluff on the carpet with his back to the camera – saved on my hard drive but they are in random order with no tags or captions. There’s a picture frame on his wall with a cutout for each month and a big one in the center for the 1^st birthday picture. I managed to put in photos that I guessed were months 1-10 just before his 1^st birthday but am still missing months 11 and 12. Maybe I can get around to it before his 2^nd birthday.

2.  Each person would sleep in their own bed – I know there are some moms (and dads, too) who think the best place for the parents & children to sleep is in one big, comfy bed. I do not subscribe to that theory. Unfortunately, my son does. They call it a “family bed”; I call it “I’d rather sleep on the couch because it’s more comfortable than my own cramped bed”. Up until he was about 11 months old all we would have to do is lay him down in his crib for naps and bed time and he would happily soothe himself to sleep. Out of nowhere, the script was flipped. I can almost hear the sound of a record scratching in my head when I think of the 360 he made. It began with him crying to be picked up. Ok, we decided, we’ll let him ‘cry it out’. But he would cry until he threw up. Eventually, he would skip the whole crying part and stick his hand down his throat to induce vomiting. This kid cuts right to the chase. We moved his crib to the foot of our bed, hoping being close to us would be good enough but no, he’d rather be scrunched up in bed with mommy & daddy. Wait, who am I kidding? The only ones scrunched up are mommy & daddy – baby is sprawled out like a king while we try not to fall off the edge of the mattress he's relegated us to nightly!

3. He would sleep through the night after he turned 1 – 

I really figured that by 13 or 14 months old, he’d be sleeping through the night. My zombie eyes and foggy brain prove otherwise. Up until about 16 months he was still taking 3 bottles a night! I’d like to say that I trained him to not need any milk through the night but truthfully he just grew out of it himself. What he does still do is wake up and insist on climbing into bed with us. You see, we transfer him to his crib after he falls asleep on our bed. But when he wakes and realizes he’s been moved, he screams and cries until he can get back into our bed. We must have a magical mattress because there’ve been times where I’ve woken to find him asleep, upside down at my feet. He’d climbed out of his crib onto our bed but didn’t quite make it to the top! He’s so sleepy, all he needs is to be in our bed, even if it is by daddy’s stinky feet (my feet do not stink).

4. We would eat veggies and healthy food every day, all day – Yeah, right. When I was a kid, my

mom had to tell me that every meat I was presented with was chicken, I wouldn’t eat anything dark, all the crust had to be removed from my bread & no vegetables or fruit (aside from bananas) would pass my lips. As I got older, I was known as the “Chef Boyardee Girl” because that was practically all I would eat. Then I went through a mashed potatoes-only phase. You could say I was a slightly picky eater. Turns out the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree. I’ve read articles that recommend camouflaging veggies in foods kids love naturally. So being the crafty mom I am, I try to give him mac & cheese with broccoli mixed into it. It’s kind of amusing to watch him take a bite, chew it up a bit then let it dribble out of his mouth, down his chin and onto his belly, all the while eyeballing me with that “Go ahead. Test me” look. I’ve occasionally managed to trick him if he’s really hungry but usually you’ll find me trudging back into the kitchen to get him real mac n’ cheese.

Yep, things rarely turn out as how we imagine them. Especially when there’s a kid with his own ideas involved!

What are some things that you expected that didn’t quite turn out the way you thought it would?

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What A Learning Disorder Is

WHAT’S A LEARNING DISORDER?

Today, boys & girls, I want to discuss what a learning disorder (LD) is.

If your kid doesn’t do well in school; if he can’t focus on a task; if he is always tapping his fingers or pencil; if he continually talks to other students in class during work time; if he never seems to be able to complete his homework; if he fails pretty much every test he takes, he may not be a Bad Kid. He may actually have a learning disorder.

LD is an umbrella term that can encompass many types of learning problems. It has NOTHING to do with INTELLIGENCE or MOTIVATION. In other words, if your child has a true LD there is no amount of punishment that will motivate him to “do better”. Taking away all his video games and all extra curricular activities just for the sake of punishment will not help. 

An LD is not just about reading or numbers. It can also cause problems with reasoning and speaking. Your son could be looking right at you when you’re explaining something to him but he can’t grasp what you’re saying. Not because he isn’t paying attention but because his brain is different from yours. A kid with an LD might love to read but can’t do simple math. He might grasp the entire periodic table and know how each element interacts with the other but cannot understand what you mean when you say, “You need to finish up before dinner time.”

WHAT A LEARNING DISORDER IS NOT

I can remember times in elementary school where I just couldn’t get what I was being taught. 5^th grade science was the worst. I just didn’t enjoy it and couldn’t be bothered to study it so needless to say, I didn’t score so well on the exams. But it wasn’t because I had a processing disorder or an LD. I just really hated science. A learning disorder is totally different. A kid with an LD isn’t dumb or lazy. They are wired differently which means they don’t take in information the same way as kids without an LD. You can’t be expected to follow a recipe if it’s written in Swahili (and you only know English) so how can you expect for your child with an LD to learn how to add or spell or to tell the difference between stratus clouds and cirrus clouds if you’re trying to teach him the same way kids without LD’s are taught?

YOU GIVE IT A TRY

Let’s try a little experiment, shall we? Think of something you enjoy. It can be anything.  Are you great at cooking? Math? Gardening? Super. Now go to a foreign country and sign up for a class in their language and see how well you do.  My guess is, not that great. How do you think it would be, to sit in a classroom with someone speaking at you in a foreign language & where everyone else in the class is getting it? Would you be anxious, trying to pick up on what they’re doing, what page they’re on, what they’re writing and reading? Would you be bored, not being able to understand the words that are coming out of the instructor’s mouth, so you start daydreaming or gazing out the window? Would you be irritated, trying to figure out what the hell is going on, your fellow students getting obviously annoyed that you keep looking over their shoulders or asking questions?

And that’s in a class that’s on a topic that you ENJOY.

Imagine how it might be for a kid who deals with these emotions on a daily basis, in a place they have come to hate and feel uncomfortable in because it’s all a foreign language; a place where they have become hated because they don’t follow along easily or are disruptive in a class that teaches them nothing.

HOW CAN YOU TELL IF IT’S A LEARNING DISORDER?

OK, so you’re not sure if your kid has a learning disorder. Here are some signs at different ages that may clear it up for you: (the following chart was found at Helpguide.org) 

Preschool signs and symptoms of learning disabilities

§  Problems pronouncing words

§  Trouble finding the right word

§  Difficulty rhyming

§  Trouble learning the alphabet, numbers, colors, shapes, days of the week

§  Difficulty following directions or learning routines

§  Difficulty controlling crayons, pencils, and scissors or coloring within the lines

§  Trouble with buttons, zippers, snaps, learning to tie shoes

Grades K-4 signs and symptoms of learning disabilities

§  Trouble learning the connection between letters and sounds

§  Unable to blend sounds to make words

§  Confuses basic words when reading

§  Consistently misspells words and makes frequent reading errors

§  Trouble learning basic math concepts

§  Difficulty telling time and remembering sequences

§  Slow to learn new skills

Grades 5-8 signs and symptoms of learning disabilities

§  Difficulty with reading comprehension or math skills

§  Trouble with open-ended test questions and word problems

§  Dislikes reading and writing; avoids reading aloud

§  Spells the same word differently in a single document

§  Poor organizational skills (bedroom, homework, desk is messy and disorganized)

§  Trouble following classroom discussions and expressing thoughts aloud

§  Poor handwriting

GET HELP

If you think your kid has a learning disorder, please get help for him NOW. It’s important to note that people with LD’s are usually just as smart as anyone without an LD. Don’t let your personal feelings on what it will mean to YOU if your son or daughter is diagnosed with a learning disorder. Denying that there is a greater issue (like a disability) at hand because you're afraid of how you will look to other people is selfish and wrong. Give your kid a chance to learn and to grow!