choices.

parenting is hard.  knowing what is best is hard.  push backs from the world around, the experts, the blogs, the strangers who comment, they are hard.  we do our best to choose what works for our children.  we parent Abigail and Shilo differently.  they are two different beings. 
these past few weeks I have been confronted by outsiders with the questions.  the why homeschool for Abigail?  a professional telling us we are 'limiting' Shilo by choosing not to push speech therapy and oral communication on her.  I stood my ground. 
and then I went through my days watching my girls.  wondering.  did we make the right choices?  are we doing anything well for these two little that we are trying to parent, and raise, and love to pieces?  are we being selfish in our choices?  are we limiting them?
and like the amazing little beings they are, our girls show us, and remind us why we have chosen the what we have, and why it is right.  for now.  getting to send Abigail out into the snow this morning, before we started school work, all bundled up, and full of light and laughter reminded me how great it is that she still gets to spend so much time playing.  we can get all of our school work done, and she can have lots of time to run, and play and be six.  and that is a beautiful thing for her.  and for me. 

almost ready to play.

and shilo.  and language.  and limits.  oh, if they could only see what we see.  a little girl who crawls over and asks for music, and then does her best to fingerspell, 'lecrae.'   three.  my three year old is trying to spell.  and then she tells me, amidst wiping banana in her hair that the banana she is eating, is a fruit.  and indeed, it is.  and i'm blown away that a little girl who can't speak many words, can communicate things to me that I did not know she even had in her little brain.  as if those reminders weren't big enough, weren't sure enough for us to know that we made a choice that took the limitations of speech away, and left her with language, we find her signing, in her sleep.  yes, people who use sign language as their first language do indeed talk in their sleep, with their hands.  and, it had never occurred to me.  but, the beauty and greatness of it left Jason and I laughing and full of joy.
parenting is full of choices.  there are some absolutes.  there are things that are never okay, and things that always are.  and most of us are limping our way along trying to figure out if we are doing, or saying anything right.  we're full of guilt, pain, and shame from the days we have been less than stellar in the parenting department.  we put the pictures out there for the whole world of the things we are doing well.  and, we watch those around us trying to measure up as better or worse. 
when my parenting and my decisions are called into question I quickly become defensive and snarky.  you see, most of the things i'm doing with, for, about, my children, those were things we decided with deep love for the ones who we were deciding about.  questioning those things feels a lot like questioning whether my love for them is.  and it is.  so i'll do my best to assume that your choices come from a deep well of love, the exact same place mine do. 

new labels.

the battles had been many that day.  i was out of patience.  my voice, my reactions, became louder, and angrier with each outburst.  this time i carried her up the steps as she flailed and screamed.  i put her in her room and shut the door.  i began to walk down the steps, sat down, and just started sobbing.
i never wanted to be a parent who yelled.  especially not as much as i do.  what had happened to me?  those first few years with her were so easy.  she was compliant.  she was loving.  and now it seems that more often than not, she is a screaming, crying, mess.  what did i do wrong?
a few minutes later i heard her door open.  she sat down next to me on the steps, and laid her head on my arm.  'sorry mama, for my fit and my bad attitude.'  that, that's the little girl i know.  the one who lives life full of passion.  the little girl who wants to be a doctor so she can help people.  the one who rushes to her sister's side as soon as anyone comes close to her, and has to know what the doctors are doing to her sister when we go to appointments.  she's in there.

in our world we know what constitutes a big deal.  we don't freak out too much.  we embrace and love quirky.  our girls are healthy.  they have disorders.  they have medical things that hang over our heads.  but, in a world full of bigger things, harder things, and scarier things, these things are very small.  it's important to know this, and to remember this.

but, also in our world, i was at a point where i felt completely at a loss for how to parent well.  the things that used to work, no longer did.  and after multiple months of battles with my big, i sent our family doctor an e-mail sharing what was going on.  she set up an appointment with a neuro-developmental doctor.  and we waited.
i researched, talked, and learned a lout about sensory integration disorder (or sensory processing disorder) in the meantime.  i filled out some paperwork through the center where big was getting speech therapy, and got a call back that she definitely met the criteria.  so i studied her more, read more, and tried to figure out her quirks.
she is a sensory seeker.  she needs to jump, chew, touch, squeeze, move, swing, anything that gives her senses lots of input.  so we have worked hard to do this.  things got better.  not great.  not perfect.  but better.
and tuesday, we saw the new doctor.  and i shared our concerns, our thoughts, our desire to help her, and us.  there was an eval before he came in to see us.  and then he sat, and listened to me for five minutes.  he was talking, looked at me, and said, 'ive been in the room for five minutes.  she hasn't stopped moving yet.  i don't doubt the sensory stuff.  the signs are there.  but, your daughter has adhd.
nothing changed from the moment before he said, until the moment after, with abigail.  she was the exact same kid.  she isn't harder now because she has a new label.  she isn't less capable of learning.  part of the reason we chose to home school her is because we knew if we sent her to kindergarten that this would come up, and we didn't want to medicate her.
but, there was that moment where things were confirmed.  and i felt a little sad for abigail.  because the label comes with a stigma.  she doesn't even know that this label exist yet. she definitely doesn't know she has this label. i hesitated to share it publicly because of the stigma.
i want to be an advocate though.  i want to advocate that my daughter's hard wiring in her brain being different does not make her defective.  it makes her creative.  energetic.  full of life.  and yes, sometimes it makes her defiant.  we know that we cannot allow the behavior issues to disrupt life everyday.  so we are implementing some changes.  we are seeking the help we need to know how to best parent her.  we are researching dietary and natural things that might help us along the way.  and, for now, we are foregoing any medicine.
we love our full of life big.  we love how much energy she brings to everything...even if papa says, 'taking a regular, smiling picture of her is like trying to take a picture of bigfoot.'