Ever have a fight or argument with your kids that’s so bad you think it can’t be fixed?  Ever have a day where the divide gets bigger, and the behaviors get worse, but you don’t know how to fix it?

That’s what happened one Mother’s Day weekend in 2007 to the Gale family.  A non-compliant 9 year old sparked Scott Gale into an argument, words exchanged that were not good, and a fun family outing was ruined.

Mr. Gale didn’t leave it there, though.  He knew that he couldn’t go on this way with his children; it was pushing them apart.  Aware of how little time he had left before his eldest son became a teen, he did something about it.

After reading lots of parenting books and guides, he stumbled upon an idea after playing fantasy football.  He was reading his league’s constitution – a document designed to remove “confusion and emotion from the decision-making process” – and it hit him!  What his family needed was a constitution of its own!  (See? All the time your hubby spends doing that is not necessarily wasted!)

In “Your Family Constitution: A Modern Approach to Family Values and Household Structure,” Mr. Gale guides you step-by-step through his failed attempts, earliest successes, and the entire process by which his family designed its constitution and how they manage it through the year.  What I got out of it was a lot of practical advice, in terms of:

• How to calmly and thoughtfully plan disciplines and rewards that allow children to blossom.
• Ideas for structures (the constitution, meeting) to keep the rules up-to-date and fair.
• Strategies for eliminating tension, arguments, and day-to-day stress.

I really enjoyed this book and, like I said, easy read – large print, lots of heading, cartoons salted throughout.  This is a great read, and very guy-friendly too.

That leads me to this week’s giveaway! After sending a review copy, Mr. Gale kindly offered to send 2 copies of “Your Family Constitution” to two lucky winners.   Here are the rules:

To enter, you must leave a comment with your email no later than midnight, Eastern Standard Time on Monday, 11/23/09.

For additional entries, you may do any of the following AND comment what you did:

• Retweet for ONE additional entry. (Please provide your tweet link!)
• Subscribe (new subscribers only) for ONE additional entry.
• Blog about this contest for ONE additional entry.
• Get a friend to enter for TWO additional entries.  (Please let us know who your friend is in comments).

Good luck!  I look forward to seeing your entries and hearing your thoughts on this book!

Will put up a fresh post and contest in the morning. I’ll have 2 guest posters this week – thank God! And yes, I’m way behind in posting Halloween photos but they’re coming t0o.

Hope you are all well!

I am affiliate of this program because I believe it, and you can go to the site or sign up through my sidebar. Good luck!

…and a lack of gratitude. Because really, women can blame PMS all we want, but we are the ones in control of the bitch gene. And given the super-crap year I had before the last few months, it’s time to step up and acknowledge my blessings:

1. An awesome, 100% supportive husband;
2. Two beautiful, healthy children who are actually sweet and well-behaved;
3. Amelia in a really great school that is great for her;
4. Zoe’s vocabulary suddenly blossoming and sleep coming nightly;
5. A lovely family;
6. Fabulous neighbors and long-time friends;
7. Facebook & Twitter & my blog expanding my contacts, reach and friendships;
8. A job, work, ambition, a novel shaping, a career coming together;
9. The Yankees won the series; and
10. I won a contest – jewerly en route!

I’m gonna go for broke and say that’s the tip of the iceberg.  There are good days ahead for my family and I’m embracing them, giving God all the thanks, even while I’m shifting my spiritual gears again still trying to find my way closer to Him.

Happy Friday folks! Share your abundance with us too. peace out!

-g

I’m thrilled. She really wants to speak and is picking up a new words maybe weekly.  You have no idea how thrilling this is, dumb as it sounds…

On top of this, there are no end to the ugly statistics like 80% of married couples that have a child with autism get divorced, and those numbers go up for multiple special needs children.  Or, that yet another casualty of our failing economy are marriages, with money still topping as the #1 factor in divorce.

And yet, I’m not worried.  Chris and I have been living together since 1992, and we married in 1998.  We have suffered multiple illnesses, particularly a stroke that nearly killed me, 2 high risk pregnancies, 2 miscarriages, 2 special needs children, job loss, debt, no insurance, relocation, deaths, family squabbles – and yet, I feel that we are stronger than ever.

So I have to ask myself: Why do we have such a good marriage, especially when we don’t do these things that are “recommended”, like weekly family meetings, retreats, going through a relationship book together, etc.?  I have some ideas:

• Respect. It really bothers me that some people think the Bible says that women want love, while men want respect.  Actually, scratch that, it burns me because I really want to be respected by the people who love me.  I’ve been loved by lots of dear, well-meaning people who had little to ZERO respect for me.  Chris completely respects me, and I respect him, no matter what faults he has.  (None of them are all that bad, frankly.) Never, ever say something bad about your spouse to others either, that’s critical. Total, mutual respect is essential in the marriage, because without that you can’t have…
• Communication. By “communication” I mean you can have differences without a screaming match or thrown objects and hurt feelings.  This took a long time for us, as I’m a highly volatile woman (or rather, used to be) and it was a steep learning curve.  Sure, we argue but we talk and more often than not,  listen to each other.
• Lighten up. It’s a marriage, a union where 2 people come together to make a better life.  Stop stressing over every moment who forgot to do what chore, or the bills you can’t make magically disappear, or the fact that when one of you commutes, coming-home-time can be ugly.  Make time for fun, inside or outside.  Make time without the kids, too, every week, even if you just put on a video for them and snag some “alone” time. Remember that your partner does not (and should not) define you, nor should your marriage define you.  You find a piece for yourself, but make sure your spouse has a piece for him- or herself too.  And one more thing..
• About the whole Christian “submission” thing: I’ve blogged about this before. This little piece of Biblical scripture (”wives submit to your husband”) is argued, debated and, I would venture to say, hated by every straight wife out there.  Get over it.  Men and women are slightly different, and if your guy needs to feel like the king when he’s at home, what’s the big deal?  Around here, I get treated like a queen, so why not?  In fact, the more respect I give him (see the first bullet), the more I get from him.  If it still bothers you, do some research about the psychological and historical factors behind a man’s need to provide to get some clarity.  (I’m such a geek, stuff like this always helps me!)

Bottom line?  Put yourself first, and your partner a VERY close second.  Be considerate, respectful, and thoughtful.  If you’re going to do something, will it be something your spouse hates?  Do you really need this thing?  If so, can you position or compromise it so that he or she benefits somehow too?

Share your tips for a better union in the comments!

I received this book at the beginning of the summer, while life was somewhat laid back, and before all the tension of extended school, new school, meetings, IEPs, and more work than I’ve had in a summer season. Without further ado, allow to review “Don’t Swear with Your Mouth Full! When conventional discipline fails unconventional children.” The I read the subtitle, I thought, Wow, that applies to my household!

I have good children, but their behavior breaks down when I’m home alone with them.  In the crazy time between work and dinner, behaviors ramp up as I try to find time to unwind, clean up, and start dinner so I was eager to this book. It explores, in great deal, conventional discipline techniques, particularly time outs, and why they might not be working on your child.  In the past, a few minutes in the corner made her contrite and she would not repeat the behavior the rest of the night or maybe even for a week or two.

Since the summer, she’s been pushing boundaries and time out’s are increasingly ineffective.  Just last week she put herself in a time out to escape real discipline. Enter Dr. Chugh’s book.  It introduces the idea of using an unpleasant discipline so that the child will remember and avoid it.  Back in the day, when you messed up you got put to work: hard, awful work, just like the scene in “Little Mermaid 2”, when the king makes Ariel clean all the barnacles off of, well, half the sea floor it seems.

A key element of this punishment, however, is that it must relate to the “crime”, and it is also critical that your child feel like they can control their time out length. The best punishment I could think of was to make Amelia understand was to clean the playroom, which is usually a disaster. Amelia has been hitting, and at first, I was stumped by how to make two seemingly disparate things connected, until a week ago. She was in a “I don’t wanna” mood.  The family room and playroom lay in ruins, the sink was full of dishes, and I had  to cook.  I needed help – and there was only one person around to do that.  After a few attempts to bribe Amelia into cleaning up toys, I threatened a time out, with a countdown.  When I got to “3”, approaching her to lead her into time out, she landed a firm “smack!” on my arm.   I marched her directly into the corner, and rather than set a timer or keep her there indefinitely, I told her, “If you clean the family room and toy room, you can come out.  Otherwise, stay in the corner.”  This was appropriate because she hit me because she was disobeying my order to clean her toys, and because she was in control of when and how the punishment ended. After a few minutes, I asked her if she wanted to come out.  She nodded as I reminded her what she had to do.  She got up and went into the playroom as I supervised her clean up.

Success!  While I still have a lot of disciplining choices to make, I recommend this book to parents. Not only does Dr. Chugh explore the techniques of disciplines and come up with new, helpful ideas, he also offer suggestions for corrections, tips for talking to your child about discipline, and specific ideas for toddlers and teens. Take your time in reading it and digest it, then come up with a plan that works for your child.  Dr. Chugh very kindly answered some of my questions personally, and you can visit his site as well at www.carychugh.com.

And I know I should vote, every year, no matter. Yes, I looked through the candidates late, and yes, it’s a busy night (V! World Series!), but it must be done.

And hectic mama can do it, so can you. It’s all about your future & your kid’s future. Don’t like it? Change it. Think the opposition will make it worse? Then vote. No excuses, and don’t play the “I don’t do lesser of 2 evils game” like I used to. JUST. VOTE.

This year, we sent her, as mentioned, to a brand new charter school, and it took a while for them to catch up with all the administrative functions to figure out that Amelia needed a new IEP, because the kindergarten one had recommended her placement in an “autism classroom” and they did not have one. Seven Gen only supports full inclusion at present.

So into the frey we jumped.  I admit, jumping first, thinking later is pretty much my M.O. so I didn’t mind at first.  Unfortunately, the teacher and I had already mis-communicated while we set up the IEP meeting and I was still burned by last year’s and an equally unsuccessful IEP I had for Zoe in September.

I panicked, but I picked up the phone.  Would the behavioral specialist make it? Could I get a hold of the advocate I used last year?  What was full inclusion anyway?

I did my homework and spent 5 minutes – that turned into 10 thoughtful, planned minutes – thinking about what I wanted for Amelia for this year, for school, and for her future.

I’m glad I did, because as the 2 co-directors, the 2 teachers, my 2 associates and myself sat around the table last Thursday, I was up first.

“Ms. Badalaty, did you want to start?”  Oh yea!  I told them that I had 3 major concerns:

1. Reading was a top priority (I believe it opens the door to all other kinds of education)
2. Math was going to be difficult, as it traditionally is for people with Down syndrome.  Here they leaned forward – most didn’t know this.  I recommended some literature, and the advocate piped in to say her organization had a library. They were PSYCHED to hear that!
3. Strengths-based education is a BIG interest of mine, so given that she is so taken with nature, can we integrate that even more for her?

This was a pretty long discussion, maybe 30 minutes.  They were actually thrilled that I was a hands-on parent (later, I even asked for tips on how I can help more with her education since I’m not good with teaching).  Then we went through the boring paperwork with all the details and I chimed in where I could, as did the Behavioral Specialist and the Advocate.

It was a TWO hour meeting, but I shouldn’t be surprised.  We covered a lot of ground, including oral fixations, getting Amelia comfortable when she’s sitting at the table (she doesn’t have to – at this school, you can stand or sit on the floor too), and putting her closer to the teacher.

The best part? I asked for some advice on toys/games because of Christmas and her birthday approaching.  The special ed teacher gave me good ideas, and then I told her that Amelia loved taking photos and was good at it too. After a while, I literally saw the lightbulb go off above her head and she said, “She can be the class photographer!  No one takes photos on the hikes, unless a parent is there, and then she is dying to look at the photos!”

Wouldn’t that be fantastic?  She’s trying to work it in, I assume I’ll hear something when she does!

I’ll be doing 2 more IEP posts, so watch for my discussion of a bad IEP, and how you can protect yourself and your child before stepping into that meeting.

Nearly 7 years ago, I had a baby with Mosaic Down syndrome.  My husband and I did not know what this meant, nor the difficulties that lie ahead, nor the pain we’d suffer in adjusting to the news those first few months.

But now as I witness Amelia growing and thriving, my heart fills with joy every single time I see her, and cannot even begin to tell you about the gifts she has brought into our home.

Six years ago, another mother had a baby with Down syndrome. Andrea Roberts and her husband also shared the pain and loneliness that Chris and I experienced.

The difference? She channeled that pain and did something.  Reece’s Rainbow is the organization she started to help parents cope with having a baby with Down syndrome.  In 2 short years, it grew to a program that helps people adopt children with Down syndrome who have no families all over the world.

After viewing the site, I went to the adoption page for girls, and in every child, I saw my daughter’s eyes.  I wept thinking about how these kids have no parent to love and guide them, missed out on early intervention, and have a slim shot  at becoming the productive and contented members of society that I know most of them can be.

I know it because I’ve watched how our love and guidance, combined with early intervention and lots of resources have helped our two disabled children flourish in their own ways.

How can you help?

First, I recommend you:

• Watch their video, and note that these kids are institutionalized at age 4, living “on borrowed time, unwanted, unloved, hungry and alone“.
• Visit their site.

Then, if you feel moved as I did, you can do somethings:

• Pray.  Something anyone can do.
• Donate to Reece’s Rainbow.
• Help out their Angel Tree project.
• Go to their blog and download badges for your blog.
• Sponsor a child for adoption. Each child can have a fund of their own.  It’s very costly to adopt, especially out of country, and while many want to adopt, few have the means. Here’s where RR can help.
• If you are considering adopting a special needs child, or know someone who is, spread the word.
• Contact Andrea and let her know other ideas you have for helping her cause.

If we all pull together, we can help these children and they can grow in to the beautiful meant-to-be people that God intended. ‘Nuf said…