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Aug 13, 2010

Social Media Introduces, BlogHer Unites

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Disclaimer: if you didn’t attend BlogHer, I apologize in advance for the love fest about to follow. It doesn’t mean that you aren’t special to me, too. You just need to live closer.
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I think that not only do I need a disclaimer to my BlogHer recap every year, but I also need my own personal disclaimer when I return from BlogHer. Something like Disclaimer: Expect me to be moody, pouty, low-energy and have at least one explosive crying fit post-BlogHer. Placate with kind words and chocolates for one week until back to normal.

Because honestly? After spending several days with friends – many of whom I only get to see once a year – I’m often hit with a mild depression when it’s over and I have to return to my normal life.

This year, on the last day of BlogHer, I sent out a tweet that simply stated: “I don’t want to go back to my real life tomorrow. I like my virtual life & friends too much. #BlogHer10” 

Soon after, one of my twitter followers responded with, “@mommystory That’s kind of a sad commentary on social media.”

I was puzzled. Clearly he didn’t get it, and it forced me to think about what I had written and why I felt that way.

It wasn’t a sad commentary on social media at all. Instead, it was a sparkly, shining example of the good that can be found in social media, all brought together in one conference.

My “real life” is filled with a lot of ordinary, with a smattering of extraordinary here and there. I do a lot of mundane tasks each day: I go to work, I do chores, I drive my kids to and from activities, I buy groceries, etc. I don’t get the chance to talk to representatives of major corporations or government agencies on a regular basis. When I buy my groceries at Kroger, the cashier doesn’t care what I think of the store’s expansion of their organic section. I doubt my daughter’s school principal will want to make a video of me sharing my views of the district’s special needs program to then present to the superintendant.

But with social media, my little voice is given a megaphone to be heard loud and clear, and no louder than at BlogHer, where companies and bloggers come together. I was interviewed by three huge companies at BlogHer this year (two of the videos are online), and had the chance to speak with several more. My feedback (along with that of other bloggers) a few years ago helped guide a company to create a better product that they presented to us last year at BlogHer. When Aaron was laid off in 2008 and we found ourselves without health insurance, CNN contacted me and our story was one of several that would be an early warning of what was to become the recession.

Our voices do have power, especially when used together. At home I may be a shy nurse, going back and forth to work and quietly raising my daughters in Columbus, Ohio, but with social media I have the opportunity to yell and be heard around the world. I am a smart person with good ideas (not trying to brag, I swear) and my voice shouldn’t be limited to Columbus, Ohio. With social media, it doesn’t have to be.

As for missing my “virtual” friends, I’ll just say that it’s very possible to miss someone you see once a year just as much as someone you see every day. In my “real life” I do have a few best friends and several other good friends that I share many interests with. But the majority of my real life connections are based primarily on geography. The pool of potential friends and acquaintances is limited by distance and location.

I grew up in a small Ohio town and making friends in my early years was terribly hard. I had little in common with my classmates and just didn’t fit in. But what could I do? There weren’t that many other kids my age, leaving me with a couple of friends who had some shared interests and otherwise a class full of people who simply didn’t understand me.

Online, though? My social net is so, so wide. You can bet that I’m going to find other moms who understand what it’s like to have a child on the spectrum and who also have a love of showtunes and Lady Gaga. (And maybe have even dressed up in renaissance clothing, too.) The pool of like-minded (or at least complimentary) individuals is exponentially larger. I can find my tribe beyond the boundaries of city limits and miles.I now have friends in California, Florida, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Canada and everywhere in-between.

When I’m at BlogHer and can’t make it across the lobby of the hotel in under an hour because I keep running into people I love, I’m reminded of how thankful I am to social media for introducing me to these intelligent, interesting and strong women (and a few men). The hugs I gave out were absolutely genuine and from the heart. I treasured each spontaneous conversation I participated in, soaked in my time strolling New York with women I usually only see through a computer screen. When my schedule forced me elsewhere, I felt awful saying goodbye to whoever I was with, worried that we wouldn’t get another chance to chat that weekend.

It didn’t matter that we met online – in person we were like old friends, completely comfortable with each other with no pretense of formality. After all – we’ve already bared our souls on our blogs, right? If anything, this was a chance to deepen friendships, sharing personal stories that are too personal even for our blogs. And once those connections are made – sharing love, heartache, tragedy, hopes, fears – you don’t want to let go.

So yeah, I didn’t want to leave BlogHer. I didn’t want to put down that megaphone. And I didn’t want to leave good friends behind with only the hope that we would see each other again soon – maybe next month if they live in or near Ohio, maybe at another conference, maybe next year or longer.

I only wish I could find a way to merge my virtual life into my real life, but I doubt I can put up a good enough argument for everyone to move to Ohio. These voices, these personalities – who would want to leave them all behind?

So maybe my twitter follower misunderstood me. I do love my friends and family in my “real life” and I’m glad to be back to some of my routine (not the chores, that’s for sure), but four days is not enough time to cram a year’s worth of opportunity and friendship into face-time.

It was an awesome BlogHer. And I can’t wait to see all of you again soon.

Photo credit: Jenna Hatfield

  Photo credit: Michelle Lane

 (and everyone else I didn’t get photos with!)
Filed Under: BlogHer10, me me me · Tagged: ,


Aug 3, 2010

The Doctor’s Bill Hurts More Than The Shot

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Being without health insurance at the moment, we’ve put off a lot of routine care because we simply can’t afford the bills. Vaccination boosters can wait, yearly check-ups can be put off, and if anyone gets sick, I can put my Super Mom-RN skills to use to determine if a trip to the doctor is really necessary.

But when the school sends home a form requiring a medical professional to sign off that your child has had a physical in the past year and is healthy enough to attend school – and said child can’t attend school without this signature – then you have to bite the bullet and make an appointment.

Mira had her doctor’s visit yesterday, what would have been her three-year-old well-child visit, now more like her three-and-a-few-months well-child visit. Her doctor is actually a nurse practitioner (yay for supporting my fellow nurses!), and Mira spent all morning excited about going to the “dot-torz oh-hice!” Or at least she was excited until we got there and the nurse asked her to take off her shoes to be weighed. Then the wailing started.

Thankfully, the tears stopped when the nurse practitioner came into the room. Our NP is very friendly and outgoing, and Mira quickly recovered herself and became the show-off ham she’s known for. The NP pointed out that Mira is continuing the tradition of Amazon warrior princesses in our household – 95th percentile for height – no surprise there. If she continues on this growth curve, she’ll likely be 5’8″ or taller as an adult.

There were no surprises at this visit. Mira still has speech apraxia. We knew that and she’ll be getting therapy through the school in the fall. She has sensitive skin and a sensitive tummy, which we’ve been aware of since birth. She has a persistent junky cough that is likely just allergies as her chest is clear – the NP’s stethoscope findings matched my own from home. She’s bright, overflowing with energy, and completely healthy with no serious medical concerns whatsoever. And that’s essentially what was noted on the paper required for school admittance.

In other words, we didn’t need the NP to tell us any of this. We just needed her signature.

And then we paid $110 for that signature and 15 minutes of time that only confirmed what we already knew.

Ouch.

I think my checkbook needs a band-aid and a Thomas the Tank Engine sticker now.

Filed Under: daily life, growing up, Mira, money, school ·


Jul 29, 2010

Disturbing School District Priorities

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There are times when I will defend our local school district. Aaron is a product of that district, and had a (mostly) positive experience with it, and so I often make an effort to remember that when others bad mouth our district as being poor and not living up to the standards of surrounding districts.

After all, this was the district that helped us diagnose why Cordy wasn’t like other kids her age. The special education office worked so quickly to get her enrolled in preschool and provided services to help her adjust to the world she was so apart from. Her first preschool teacher is a woman I will forever speak fondly of, a woman I’d gladly consider to be a part of our family, and when Mira qualified for special needs preschool, I immediately asked for her to be placed with this teacher for the upcoming school year.

The principal at Cordy’s current school also worked with us to make sure that Cordy wouldn’t have to go to her “home” school for kindergarten – a school we know nothing about – when she wasn’t selected for any school in the lottery, including her current school. A quick e-mail to the principal pleading our case, and a seat opened up for her. After all, the principal has been just as charmed by Cordy as everyone else who spends time with her.

But the district isn’t perfect. I truly wanted Cordy to be mainstreamed this year – placed in a classroom of her “typical” peers where she would inevitably struggle with social rules and routines, but would hopefully be surrounded by a supportive team who would help her learn and grow and rise to the challenge like she always does. However, it wasn’t the recommended choice and Cordy will instead spend kindergarten in a special needs classroom with some “inclusion” time allowed in the mainstream kindergarten class each week.

I struggled to be convinced of why this was the best option for her. Her team gave us such glowing reports at the end of this school year: she no longer qualifies for speech therapy. She’s academically at a kindergarten level already and they recommend testing her for the gifted program next year. She’s still uncoordinated and does need assistance with some fine motor tasks, but she’s improving. Why should this child be in special needs?

She has trouble adjusting to a change in routine, they explain. The normal pace in a kindergarten class may be too fast for her. (A kindergarten class has a fast pace? Remember when we spent kindergarten learning to cut with scissors and had nap time?) She’s sensitive to some sensory stimuli. She would require too much attention from the teacher, and there are too many kids in the class for the teacher to spend a lot of time with her. Yes, if she had an aide she would probably do well, but that just isn’t possible.

It doesn’t make sense to me. What I hear is: our schools are overcrowded and our teachers are spread too thin already. And I also hear, loud and clear: your daughter would do well in a mainstream classroom, but we won’t pay for an aide for her to make this possible.

I’ve tried so hard to rationalize this information. I know Columbus City Schools is cutting corners just like every district to save money. They closed several schools this year, shifting the students to other schools to save money. And at the end of the school year, 133 teachers in the district were laid off. With this poor economy, other staff received no raises, but at least they were able to keep their jobs. A levy was passed in recent years, but apparently it’s not enough to help the school district.

I try to remember that Cordy isn’t the only child in the district, and that the cost of an aide for a child like her might be too much for the district to handle.

And then.

Then I read the news about the school board voting last week to give the superintendent of our school district a raise – a raise far larger than any teacher or staff member in the district is receiving. For the next four years, she’ll receive annual 3% raises along with a retroactive 4% raise that she deferred last year. Her total salary at the end of the four years will be $217,000, making her the third highest paid superintendent in Ohio.

This is not a reward for a stellar performance. The test scores for our district are abominable. (And the average high school student in our district probably couldn’t tell you what abominable means, other than something to do with a snowman, or spell it.) The superintendent is getting a raise for a graduation rate that has made an “improvement” to 73.9%.

I don’t see the reason in it. Schools are closed, teachers are laid off, they threaten to scrap bus transportation for some students, and yet the person who has the least to do with educating children gets the largest pay increase?

On a more personal note, the district can’t provide my daughter an aide in the classroom to give her the legal right to a “least restrictive environment”, but they can make sure their superintendent is the third highest paid school administrator in the state?

I really feel the district has a screwed up sense of priorities. I have no doubt in my mind that the teachers are doing the best they can with the resources given to them, but the school board and administrators aren’t properly appropriating those resources. The teachers need more help. They need fewer students in a class, and aides to help out students who are academically ready for their grade, but might need some assistance with adaptive skills and transitions.

If Aaron wasn’t laid off in May, we probably would have enrolled Cordy in a private Montessori school. After all, she’s doing extremely

But, like the teachers in the school district, we also can’t provide the best for Cordy because of money. It sucks.

The plan at this point is to be the best advocates we can for Cordy this year, watching her progress at school closely and pushing for more integration and moving away from the special needs classroom if possible. Assuming we’re both employed next year, Cordy will then go to the Montessori school for first grade. Seeing the superintendent get a large raise when teachers are laid off, classrooms are stuffed full of more students, and when my daughter can’t get the most appropriate education because it’s not in the budget has completely turned me off from this school district.

I want to support public schools. But I can’t support a school district that I feel doesn’t use its money properly. I will vote against the school board members who voted for the superintendent’s raise, I will not support this superintendent, and should the district cry “poor!” and put another levy on the ballot in the next few years, I will not forget the actions of the district this year when I cast my vote. And I will find another district, or save all we can for a private school, for my children where I feel they will get the best education possible.

Filed Under: Autism, big issues, Cordy, rant, school ·


Jul 26, 2010

Single Parents, I Salute You

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I don’t know how you do it.

Seriously.

You all deserve a medal. Or a hug. Or a national holiday in your honor, with guaranteed babysitting for the day so you can lounge poolside and have a margarita without worrying if your kid is too close to the edge of the pool.

I’m just finishing up a six day solo-parenting gig and I’m exhausted. (Aaron was in California at San Diego Comic-Con, where ironically the weather was much cooler than the melt-your-face-off heat wave we had in Ohio.) I love my children dearly, but nothing tests your love for your children quite like 6 days alone with them.

Actually, it wouldn’t have been so bad if I wasn’t on a nocturnal schedule due to my job, and my children weren’t on a beat-the-rooster-to-the-punch schedule. This equated to mommy dragging her tired self downstairs before the sun was up, making them breakfast, turning on the TV, and then collapsing on the couch while promising extra gummy snacks at lunch to whichever child could be the quietest for the next couple of hours. You might be surprised how many “who can be the quietest” game rewards you can think up when you’re half-delirious from sleep deprivation.

I was raised by a single mom, so you’d think I’d have some tricks on how to do it solo. Growing up, my mom worked 40+ hours a week, cooked meals, cleaned our house, paid bills, mowed the lawn, helped me with my school homework, went grocery shopping, attended my school events, and yet somehow still had time to sit on the couch with me and watch TV in the evenings. I’m convinced she’s secretly a cyborg who doesn’t require sleep.

Yet six days proved me to be nothing like her. I was short with my girls more than once. OK, more than once each day. Maybe even each hour, depending on the time of day. At times I felt like they were trying to make me lose my temper. The house did not stay clean. The laundry did not get done until Cordy ran out of shorts to wear. Paper plates became my best friends. On the third day, Cordy cried that she missed her daddy when I yelled at her. I didn’t cry about missing him until the fifth day.

But the end is now in sight. And we did have some fun during these six days, too. We made ice cream together. We went shopping for toys and t-shirts at the Disney store in the mall. (Mira then begged to go into Victoria’s Secret when we walked past it – uh-oh.) We sat together in a heap on the couch and read Thomas the Tank Engine stories. We had dinner with grandma one night, where the girls performed the “I love grandma and mommy” dance for us. Cordy drew a picture of us with a heart above us and the words “I love you mom” written below, asking me to display it to work. (I did.) And each night I tucked each of them into bed and kissed them goodnight, reminding them that even though we sometimes get upset with each other, I will always love them no matter what.

It wasn’t so bad. But I’m still glad I don’t have to do it longer than six days. And I’m looking forward to getting my time away at BlogHer next week.

Filed Under: Aaron, being a mom, daily life, domestic zero, memories · Tagged:


Jul 21, 2010

An Early Love of Reading

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Earlier in the summer, I was invited to visit the Columbus Metropolitan Library to learn about their programs, specifically their summer reading club. This was something the girls were only mildly excited about, because going to the library is a semi-regular occurrence for them. But little did they know that was the day the library was kicking off the summer reading program, and there were all sorts of special events going on at the library all day to celebrate.

Now, we don’t just have any old library here in Columbus – we have the TOP library. Columbus Metropolitan Library was named the top library of 2010 by Library Journal, along with several other honors they’ve received before. Our library is awesome – the diversity of their offerings is unmatched.

Cordy and Mira were both excited to sign up for their first summer reading club. Aaron signed up, too – adults are welcome to participate. Cordy already had a library card, but Mira got her first library card that day. (And wouldn’t you know it – it was PINK.) They each received a sheet to track their progress and selected several books to start with.

For the next few weeks, this was how we usually saw Cordy at home:

Yes, it’s a comic book, but there are words, so it counts!

Her nose was buried in a book, trying to earn time to get another box marked off of her sheet. But Mira wasn’t slacking, either – she brought me book after book and begged me to read until my eyes crossed.

And with only half of the summer complete, they have both finished their summer reading club tracking sheets. Aaron took them to the library on Saturday to turn in their tracking forms, and each girl received a library tote bag as her reward. They now use those tote bags to take library books to and from the library.

I’ve been thrilled to see Cordy’s interest in reading develop over the summer. I think she’s a stronger reader now than she was at the end of the school year. She may have trouble with social skills in kindergarten, but at least I feel confident that she’ll do fine with her academics this fall.

There’s still time to get your child enrolled in a summer reading club. Even if you don’t live in Columbus, this is something many libraries do each summer. Even my small hometown library had a summer reading club when I was a kid, although back then I had to give a verbal book report to the children’s librarian to earn my stamp. (You kids these days have it soooooo much easier! *said in my best old person voice*)

And if you have more time for reading that doesn’t involve navigating to Facebook, check out any adult reading club activities your library might have as well.

Locals: should you happen to live in the district of the Columbus Metropolitan Library, be aware that a levy to help fund the library will be on the November ballot this year. This will replace an expiring levy and help fund new services, as well as bringing back Sunday hours to the suburban branches. Don’t forget to vote for this levy!

Full disclosure: I was invited to come to the library as a special guest, and received a very nice presentation about all of the library’s services while my children were entertained by library staff during storytime. I received no compensation, other than the time of the Executive Director and other staff. Our family loves and supports our local library, and encourages you to love and support your local library, too!

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Filed Under: Cordy, daily life, growing up, Mira, reviews ·