Years ago when I started a handful of special needs parenting support networks and sites it was a different world.  The social climate was very different. I'd blindly take on strangers onto my personal social networking.  I believed if they found me whether that be through mutual friends, Noah's blog, or social networking or my various groups and sites that they'd find commonality, advice, comfort and assistance.  I figured if you had a child with a disability you were naturally a part of my tribe. But, I was so wrong.  Just because a person has a special needs child, doesn't automati ..read more

Luke, as most growing children do have an innocent curiosity about them.  He thinks absolutely nothing about blurting out "tell me about Noah's first Christmas" at the dinner table - nor should he.  A question that shouldn't be a big deal for most, feels like being hit with a giant unexpected boulder out of nowhere.  Those questions - those unexpected questions that you just either aren't prepared to answer or don't want to answer, or even a mixture of both.  Chris took the lead, much to my relief.  I didn't know where to start.  The pain inside me says let's skip to the easy parts ..read more

I hear your stories.  You see they often echo some versions of mine.  I sit beside you in the pain, the loss, the grief, the sadness and that longing that things were different. It's a side of the holiday season no one discusses.  In a time where we are supposed to feel magic, joy and happiness we're feeling regret, blame, misplacement, worry and fear and broken-heartedness. I sit beside you as you tell your story about how you tried to pick out the perfect Christmas tree and how forlorn and beside yourself you were because your child had no interest in it.  How you sat with your tea ..read more

Today marks the one year anniversary of the brutal and vicious attack of one of our beloved Cairn Terriers, Brystal Sonoma.   She was in the comfort and safety of her backyard when a coyote jumped the fence.  Brystal is such a soft soul.  Both of our cairns have qualities specific to my personality (as most dogs do).  Hollie Edelbrock is brave, protective, loud, loyal and loving.  Brystal is tender, wants to make friends with everyone and anything, she wants to lick your wounds, and is a natural healer and most of all trusting.  That trust allowed her to fall pray to a Coyote.  Hollie ..read more

Maybe it's part of the human condition that purposely tries to block out all the bad.  If we dwell too long in the hardship then we lack the ability to properly move forward.  But occasionally, as life often does - it will remind you time to time of the past.  Sometimes you have a profound appreciation for how far you've come, the obstacles you've conquered, pride in perseverance - and other times sadness that you ever had to be in that position in the first place. I've been on this special needs parenting journey now for more than a decade.  The past and present both bumpy.  In the ea ..read more

I was really excited to watch the new series Raising Dion on Netflix.  Besides personally knowing the little girl who plays a supporting role in the show, I was very pleased that the show cast a character that both has a disability in real life and in the series.  Sammi Haney, plays a little girl named Esperanza, who is a friend of the main character, Dion.  The premise of the show is a boy that has the sudden onset of super-natural abilities, and the complexities of having those "super powers" as a child learning to navigate them, and how his widowed mother learns to cope with her ..read more

I don't think many people relish change.  But in the land of special needs sometimes the word change can send shivers up and down your spine as you anticipate the shrill and shrieking of your child with special need's screams if the unfamiliar gets yanked out from underneath them.  I kind of feel that same way with Target's new store make-over.  It seriously feels the moment you walk through the doors like someone put you inside a snow globe and shook it up while you're spinning around dizzy.  What the hell? feels like an understatement.  People are raving about how some Target store ..read more

Perhaps it's been too long since Noah was really sick and I just became too comfortable in stability. Or maybe I try to purposefully block out the scary dark corners of his fragility so that I'm not overly frightened of what I know could happen in situations like these. I knew something was wrong by the sound on the monitor. That gasping, choking, blockage of airway sound that he makes. I ran as fast as I could, leaping over a dog in the dark hoping I could get there faster. It wasn't fast enough though, whatever had caused the airway blockage whether it be secretions or acid re-flux or ..read more

Mommy Groups.  I think sometimes they can be the root of all evil.  Social media has developed into a very ugly thing.  It's of course sprinkled with hints of positivity, sometimes camoflaughed good intentions, and even sometimes idiots in disguise.  A forum where everyone thinks they know it all, and are quick to cast stones.  I used to be a bigger participant than I am now in support groups, mommy groups or special needs groups.  Now I am merely mostly a fly on the wall watching the mud slinging back and forth. Sometimes I roll my eyes behind a computer screen at what people find c ..read more

When Noah was a baby he cried for 18 hours out of 24.  He was so distraught as a baby.  I'd bounce with him on an exercise ball to offer him vestibular input, listen to the radio in a desperate attempt to soothe, walk with him, hold him, rock him in my arms, lay him in a bouncy.  I'd do anything and everything and yet he still cried.  The first year was hard.  Until one day he discovered the world of Elmo and Sesame Street and just like that a light bulb went off for him and we found something that offered him comfort.  The TV.  I thought I was going to lose my mind.  You could so muc ..read more