The Foundation of Words

  A few little milestones to report, the girls and I practiced yesterday talking on the phone.  When the second daughter got on the phone she said "hello" spontaneously before I even did.  My heart leaped for joy!  Same said child also told me she loved me first the other night at bedtime.  It's always me saying I love them and then they in turn tell me.  That was the first spontaneous "I love you Mommy" ever and I'm taking  note.  They've also as of late are more apt to speak in a room of more than one person when all eyes are on them.  It still takes some coaxing but it's coming and they're doing it nonetheless. 
Little steps are the foundation to a house not built on sand.  Patience, time and perseverance will prevail but keep your actions and words kind.  Come from a place of love and not one of annoyance or shame.  I know many times I've wanted to push them so that other people could see the bright sweet children that I know them to be.  Putting that expectation on them is unfair of me because they only want to please me and if I push them faster than their mutism is willing to go at the time then I create the anxiety.   We need to ask them kindly and lovingly but firmly to be brave consistently!  I still believe by them being homeschooled and learning in real life environments it has helped us tackle the hurdles a day may pose. Consistency creates the opportunity to make the connections they need to learn that more people are kind and don't expect much out of a conversation other than the very art itself.   

I had heard the following quote in a lesson by Pastor Alistair Begg on Truth for Life the other morning and it really stirred by heart.

Just Suppose;
 If all that we say in a single day, 
with never a word left out, 
were painted each night in clear black and white, 
it would prove queer reading no doubt.
 And then just suppose, 
ere our eyes we would close, 
we must read the whole record through. 
Then wouldn’t we sigh, 
and wouldn’t we try,
 a great deal less talking to do? 
And I more than half think that many a kink, 
would be smoother in life’s tangled thread, 
if half that we say in a single day, 
were left forever unsaid.

 ~ Author Unknown


Not only hitting close to home for me, I also then turned it toward my girls.  Don't you wish we could harness the effects of being selectively mute some days, what a gift it would be?!  
    Proverbs 23:9
Do not speak in the hearing of a fool, for he will despise the good sense of your words.
Or  Proverbs 18:6 says A fool's lips walk into a fight, and his mouth invites a beating.

I've been so outspoken on many occasion that a little self restraint or tongue tied-ness might have done me a world of good!

James 1: 19 says Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.

I'm not condoning bullying by any means or my children not being able to stand up for themselves although there's value to learning that there are others out there who use words to seek out weakness.    It's my responsibility to teach my daughters there is a balance somewhere in the middle  To help them recognize and avoid the type of person who would take advantage and that they need to trust God that He has made them in His image and to listen to the Holy Spirit in such cases.
I read this morning in my devotional "Thank God for the difficulties in your life, since they provide protection from the idolatry of self-reliance."  
We can not heal ourselves or our children without the plight of God's hand no matter what we do.  It's been hard for me to trust in His good plan for them and their lives.  He has blessed them with this condition for a reason and has entrusted them to my husband and I so that we too learn a valuable lesson, to pray and trust in His reason. 
I would never intentionally keep my children from progressing away from the anxiety that they feel when out in public, however I wonder if their mutism might be an advantage one day in certain situations?
Being a parent of sometimes solemn children leads me to worry for their lives.  We as parents don't want our children to experience all the pain the world has to offer.  Of course being a parent of any child means we only want good things for their lives and so the vicious cycle repeats;  trust God.
Isn't that the greatest gift we can give to our children is the belief in Jesus and that all things are possible through Him?  

I pray that those of you who come to this page be blessed by God's plan for you and yours.  Choose your words wisely and learn to trust Him in your life and the life of your child/children.  Trusting in Him doesn't solely mean that we sit back and rely on Him to do the work He has planned for us.  It means that we ask for His guidance and trust in the fact that through our work and consistent perseverance we can get our children to a place where they can trust the voice within at all times.

 May God bless you one and all. 

The Fallout

Bullying.  One of the public schools dirty little secrets.  They’ll tell you to your face they're against it.  ”We have a zero tolerance policy.”   They’ll plaster poster boards and banners all over the walls of the school hall ways.  But when it comes to your child being in the cross-hairs…..well, personally, there’s not enough they can do short of snubbing out the little snot faced perpetrator.   A few weeks ago my husband came to me after brushing the girls teeth for bed, he said dd told him that two girls came into my dd bathroom stall and wouldn’t let her leave.  We’re talking about 5 year olds here!  When I asked her about it later she told me it really happened and when I asked how they got into her stall, she told me they had crawled under the door.  That’s when it hit home for me, I knew that instant she wasn’t lying or just telling me a sensational story.  I reminded her that telling something this serious was like calling 911, once we ring the bell, there’s no point of return.  She again assured me that this incident really happened and so I proceeded to call the school principal to spill my guts and frustration.   The principal told me how sorry she was that this had happened, that she would get the other two girls and question them but told me she’d never seen kids confess so not to hold out much hope.  This is not the first time these two little girls names have come up with my dd.  I’ve heard them before when dd comes home complaining of a bad day.  My girls don’t talk at school, they still don’t talk to one another or even to friends they might have made at school.  They have little laminated ‘help cards’ that are bunched together on a key ring that hangs from their belt loop.  They say, I’m hungry, I need help, I’m thirsty, bathroom etc.  This is how they communicate with people at school.  So even after the bathroom incident took place my dd never uttered a word to anyone or showed her “Someone is hurting me” card.  Which just broke my heart.  This child has such an anxiety of people and being in a social situation anyway and then to have two mean girls invade your privacy while you’re sitting on the toilet only to harass you and say mean things!!!!  I was livid.   The principal called me back hours later with a full report of what she could gather.  Of course it didn’t even resemble the story I got.  Those girls said my dd ‘needed help’ and they were assisting her.  When asked how did they know she needed help, there’s where the story got super sketchy.  I never did hear a convincing answer and was left to believe my dd.

This is not the first time the girls haven’t spoken up for themselves.  There was a time back in Nov or Dec of 2011 when one came home with a axillary temperature of 102.5!  Her eyes were glazed over and she was pale, cheeks flushed.  I called the school as soon as I laid my eyes on her and the teacher had the nerve to tell me she was fine when she had left the classroom for the ride home that day.  There’s no way on God’s green earth my child struck a fever that high in a short 10 minute ride home from school.  She had to have been sick for most of the afternoon and NO ONE of authority noticed.

SO here’s where I derail the whole system and homeschool them instead.   I arrived at the decision to take my daughters by the hand and lead them off the train tracks.  I’m not going to stand idly by and watch the train run them over.  I can’t in good conscious send them out into the world, the same world they’re so anxious about anyway just to “desensitize” them without my supervision.  Cognitive behavioral therapy happens at the Dr’s office when I’m in the room with them.  Until they can find their own voices, I will speak for them.  These two are my responsibility and gifts from God, I can’t entrust their safety and well being to policy and the experts advice.

So I believe God has been preparing me all along for this task.  It feels like I’ve finally rounded a corner, being a mom gives you a lot of reason to go above and beyond.  These two are so worth the effort.

A "Foreward"; looking back

I've decided to start this blog at the beginning of this journey into the unknown, uncharted territory.  At least uncharted for us.

As a new parent you have all these dreams and desires about your contribution to the raising of your children.....and then you meet your children.  

When my girls were around 1 year old we moved out of the country.   I  found myself dropped into the middle of an island surrounded by homeschooling moms.  I was fortunate enough to considered some of them very close friends.  I got to experience and see first hand how the whole thing worked on different family dynamics and personalities.  So I began to hope that one day I'd be brave enough to face my fears and homeschool my children.  

I had noticed since birth my girls captured a lot of attention, it was a whole "twin" phenomena that would amaze me every time I took my daughters into public.  As babies complete strangers would stop me to oogle over, touch and smile at my children.  Most of the time they were friendly uninhibited comments that meant to edify my place into Twin Momma stardom.  My children from a very early age never enjoyed the attention as much as I did.  I liked hearing how cute the were and how lucky I was.  I felt like I had won a lottery when I found out we were going to have twins!  As the girls grew I would chalk their introvert behavior to being "painfully shy".  You could almost see them physically curl their bodies into themselves whenever someone besides mommy, papi or very close friends would even look at them and God forbid, talking to them.  

When they were around 2 1/2 years old, I'd noticed they didn't have the vocabulary as other kids their age.  I know you're not supposed to compare children, but common, we all do anyway.  So at the suggestion of another twin mom I sought an early development evaluation hoping they'd qualify for the early childhood intervention and get sent to preschool at age 3.  They were evaluated and fell within the "6 month window" for their age and we were denied any further assistance other than the advice to get them tested again if I still had concerns in the future.  

By the time they were 4 years old we moved back to the United States and I finally felt it was time to enroll them in Preschool.  I felt the socialization would be good for them and after a month of attending.  The teacher told me they hadn't spoken a word not even to one another!  They were referred to a fresh out of college Speech Therapist who was working at their school.  She is the one who closed in on the girls lack of "pragmatic speech"  That one word, "pragmatic" changed our lives.  It wasn't labeled shyness anymore but a whole new world of information and understanding opened up.  

For the first time I had a word to run with, a symptom of a much larger picture.  I found out it wasn't anything that I might have done!  I wasn't a miserable failure of a mother.  I was finally feeling like a advocate once I found my direction.  

I went home with that one word and did a google search and all kinds of things came back under Selective Mutism.  I printed off what I had found and took it to the Speech Therapist upon our next meeting.  Funny thing was, she had the same website printed out.   The girls switched into the early childhood developmentally delayed preschool and started speech therapy.  That school year was spent watching and trying to figure out how we get them to communicate.  At the end of the year I stressed about them being out for the summer and not getting the stimulation of interacting with the other kids.  I sat down one day at the computer and again "Googled" for doctors that treat Selective Mutism in my area.  To my delight one popped up and she's very well respected in this field.  I felt so lucky to be so close and have access to her.  Our insurance was approved and we were even cut a break by treatment partially being covered.  Our doctor collaborated with our school at the end of their preschool year and we set into motion a plan for Kindergarten.