School

Quinn is an AMAZING child! She has so much to offer the world! She has had such a hard life. Some days I am in awe of her strength and her courageous outlook on life! She never gives up! she never feels sorry for herself! she never lets anything bring her down! she is always smiling, always happy, always making other people feel as if they are worth the world to her! Quinn's personality could move mountains. I know this about my child, but I am also her mother. I'm so bias! But to be able to hear from the mouths of those around her that she is the SAME way when I'm not around to protect her, to advocate for her, to be her voice... makes me feel so very proud.

I expressed in Quinn's IEP meeting at the start of school how I did not want her disabilities to affect her academically. About how I knew that she has the ability to learn and grow like any other child, but I didn't want her to be treated any differently academically just because outwardly, she looks like she might need some help. She is allowed to be in a mainstream classroom with an aide, who would help her move around and keep her focused on her work. I knew that there was a large possibility that she could have some learning disabilities, but I did not express this in the meeting because i wanted them to be able to identify them if they were there, not to be looking for them just because I mentioned I was worried about it.

When Quinn started Kindergarten, I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't worried about her. Worried in so many ways. Quinn goes to school in a wheelchair stroller. She is connected to her feeding tube and a stomach drain the entire time that she is in the classroom. She is also connected to her oxygen for most of the time. She has 3 tubes hanging off her body. Her formula stinks... horribly. She has to wear pull ups due to accidents and she is obviously slower than any of the other children. She requires regular pulse ox checks and blood glucose checks. she sometimes needs to leave early and spend time in the nurse's office. Sometimes, her body is too tired to participate in recess and PE. I do my very best to keep her looking and smelling like a normal kid. I have her wear long shirts to cover up her pull up and I spray her down with smelly good body spray and lather her in smelly good lotion every morning. As well as put a dryer sheet in her backpack to mask the smell some. I worried about how she would do academically. I worried that she would have a hard time making friends or that she would feel like an outcast. I worried that she would feel different.

Quinn has been having some trouble in school with breathing and has needed to sit out a lot for recess because of this. Her oxygen gets too low. Her aide is trained to recognize Quinn's symptoms and to read the pulse oximeter accurately. Quinn's sats have sometimes been sitting in the 70s and the aide said that when her sats are low, it is very evident in her demeanor, energy, and on her face. she gets very pale and she gets really dark circles under her eyes and her breathing changes (symptoms reported by her aide). This worries me a little that school is taking a lot out of her, but turning the tank up enough to bring her saturations back into normal range seems to help her. Thankfully, she does have oxygen to help her during these times. She is also pretty exhausted when she gets home. Draining her stomach does work for her very well, but she does still come home complaining of some stomach pain and she does still get distended easily. She is exhausted too when she gets home, but we really expected this.

So, when Quinn's teacher called me this evening, I was expecting the worst. I was expecting to hear that she was struggling to keep up with the children, that she was feeling different, that she was not talkative and that she was not doing well academically. I was expecting for the teacher to express concerns about how Quinn is fitting into the mainstream classroom. Much to my surprise, this conversation went a completely different way! She said that Quinn has been one of the strongest academically. She is recognizing her ABC's and 123's. She is able to count the numbers very well. She is retaining information! Her aide even said that she thinks the reason that Quinn is somewhat slow with her work is because she is bored. She said Quinn already knows what is being taught and so she feels that Quinn is bored, which is why i see her come home with incomplete work, but a bunch of doodles all over the paper. ( this to me is unacceptable anyway and Q knows it, but still makes me proud! ) She also said that she fits in very well with the children! She makes new friends every day! She is involved in a "girl's clubhouse". Apparently, these girls made friends and they all sit under the playground thing and hang out during recess. They are very good about helping Quinn when running around. Quinn is definitely slower than the others. The other day, they were all holding hands and trotting in a big line. Well, they were moving too fast for Quinn and Quinn fell down really hard and popped her feeding bag open and had to go home from school early. Apparently, the entire classroom was very worried about her because she never came back after she went to the nurse's office. Sometimes, the children inquire about her attachments, but they never make fun of her for it. They are just genuinely curious and most of them know that Quinn just needs extra things to help her be as healthy as they all are. So today, I lay my worries to rest.

I am so proud of my baby girl! She is truly an amazing human being! She has a heart of gold, and I do hope she keeps it forever. She has a voice that she knows how to use. She has the strength of 10,000 men. She has a powerful presence and she will always persevere. I love my kid and I am so proud to be her mommy!