#her experience with autism was this kid at our church growing up who did NOT mask (looking back good for him lmao) and was just very...

[bunnyb34r]

AHSGDGDGDGDG my mom just said she didn't know that autistic people knew they were different 😭 ma'am....

We were talking ab masking and how my cousin thinks we BOTH have a nervous laughter tic, but it's just that my brain mirrors people in social interactions and that I'm like "oh she's laughing, smile and laugh too" internally bc I have a hard time reading when something is actually supposed to be funny opposed to me THINKING it's funny and being WRONG.

Like agdgdgdgdgdg yes we KNOW we're different. Obviously not every single autistic person will know/knows yet, but yeah finding that out is a common experience for autistic kids especially. Might not know WHY they're "different" from their peers, but generally it's known that shit isnt lining up the way it should.

[kainumbernine009]

I literally cannot do anything else until I get this out.

I’m... really not okay.

And when I say that, I’m not mentally unstable. I say that because I’m tired of waiting on empty promises, I’m tired of never having money in our account, I’m tired of living in a fucking city where half of the white people fucking worship the ground Trump walks on, and where most of the gay community has so much messy drama that it’s worse than middle school. And I went to a rough middle school.

I never talk about my past, because I don’t like to. It sucked. HARD. Being and only child in my family was nothing less than torture, especially as a closeted queer person. We grew up in the white Christian part of Nashville that dominated Music Row in the 90′s and early 2000′s. I played basketball with Alan Jackson’s daughter, and being around famous people was just no big deal. But, my parents decided to leave Nashville after my dad lost his job at TPAC, and we moved down south an hour to the town where the KKK got started (Pulaski, TN).

I had maybe two non-white people in my private Christian school growing up. I was never afraid of Black people, but my parents showed their racist asses quick when we moved there. The KKK has never left America, guys, no matter how many articles you read or studies you do. From 2005 to 2009 I saw a white town show its very worst to the Black community. I’ll never forget the first time I saw a march for “White Christians for Purity” the summer before Obama got elected. The disgust I felt inside was palpable. I had all kinds of friends in school, and I didn’t give TWO SHITS who they were or what they looked like... but I saw children my age, being brainwashed by their parents, that “white” is “right.”

Ever since then, I have been learning and growing about the issues of race. I remember my white classmates using the N word and getting away with it. I remember hearing about the principal at the high school punishing all the Black kids but not the white kids. I remember being invited to a church south of town that was a historically Black church, and how nice the ladies were to me for coming.

But I’ll never forget the racism that the religious groups promoted there, especially First Baptist Church and the 12 Tribes. I’ll never forget how FBC told me that my friend was going to Hell because she killed herself. I’ll never forget my mom telling me not to marry a Black man because of “impure genes.” I WILL NEVER FORGET THE INJUSTICES I SAW WHITE PEOPLE DOING TO BLACK PEOPLE THERE. NEVER.

And thank God, I have shaken the burden of religious guilt, but I still fight against this mentality. I live in a place that’s usually not even 10 minutes away from Trump-humping, sister-fucking, meth-addicted Confederate cunts in any direction. And we’re even closer to the rich white people who silently supported him, upset that their taxes would go up because of Biden.

And in the past four years since Trump got elected, I’ve gotten married, graduated college with honors, started my own photography business, and was making more than my husband there for a minute. I did my own taxes, marketing, editing, and everything. And then I came out as trans.

I lost everything.

I lost my studio. I lost friends. I had rumors started about me. I had people post hate messages on my wall. I had people at my drag shows tell others not to tip me, for whatever fucking reasons. I’ve had bosses give cis people jobs over me, and I’ve had government workers give me second looks when I hand them my license.

It. Fucking. Sucks. To. Live. Here. Like. This.

Oh yeah, did I mention I’m also a witch/medium? I’ve talked to dead people before and have told their relatives things I shouldn’t have known otherwise about their grandparents. Like, this information doesn’t even exist on Google. And I’m attuned to reiki. I’m always aware of what’s happening on at least SOME metaphysical level. This is a gift that I’ve had to go through life developing and learning about myself, with no one’s help but me.

I didn’t even know until I was an adult that I have autism and ADHD.

I’ve taken bullets from people who were about to kill themselves. I’ve yelled at 5th grade music classrooms for doing racist dance moves and appropriating Native Americans (I have a degree in Music Education K-12). I’ve consoled kids in classrooms who suddenly have panic attacks. AND I’ve told horny teenagers to stay in their fucking lane and respect the girls around them. I’ve apparently been an inspiration to those around me, but inspiration NOR exposure pays the bills. I’ve already had COVID, and so has my husband, but I knew that after graduating college that I would never have a fulfilling life being a music teacher in Tennessee’s public schools.

And now that we have COVID, and an orange, small-dicked, pedophilic, rape apologizing, dirty, crusty white president who STILL REFUSES TO CONCEDE, who is DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR HAVING HIS FOLLOWERS SEND DEATH THREATS TO MY FAMILY, I really don’t know what the fuck else to do other than go burn down all the houses I know of in North Georgia that belong to these Christian sex cult pedophiles and call it a day. My girlfriend unfortunately was born into one of those families, and I know just how bad it can get. In fact, her dad’s lawyer threatened me with blackmail earlier in November, so that was fun!

And now, on December 11, 2020, I’m still sitting here in the same fucking house, doing the same fucking things I’ve been doing all year - trying to get a job and failing horribly. I’M SICK AND TIRED OF THIS COVID BULLSHIT AND OUR INCOMPOTENT CUNT OF A PRESIDENT! And there’s only ever one other person I’ve ever called a cunt... my own mother.

I’ve lived in many places. I’ve met many different people. I’ve made mistakes, and have grown, but there’s one thing for damn sure that I always make sure to do, every single fucking day.

I ALWAYS try to do better.

In addition to this, I treat everyone with the same amount of respect, unless they have done something directly to me to negate that. If I know that someone believes in something that directly harms me or my family, I don’t even associate with them. I don’t spend my energy on things that don’t need it. And everyone else should, too.

The problem with some of y’all is that you care about the wrong things. Like will Becky text me back or did I get front row seats to that concert, or did I slave my life away to capitalism just so that I can own a Mercedes and have my friends jealous. I’ve had way too many dear death experiences to know that EVERY single fucking day is a gift. EVERY day.

I don’t want to be remembered first for the art I create. I want to be remembered for my character. I want to be remembered as the courageous person who never backed down in the face of adversity. But when you live in a place that already hates you and that is against you, that’s really fucking hard. Trust me. My marriage went from a cis straight passing couple to a white gay passing couple. I’ve seen how people’s attitudes changed around me as I transitioned. I know what it feels like to slowly lose a piece of your privilege you were born with.

So yeah, I kinda get a little fucking upset when I see people saying All Lives Matter, or when I see doctors refusing to treat trans patients in pandemics, or when I see cops YET AGAIN harassing Black people only a few blocks away from my house for no other reason than racism. And at this point, anyone who thinks they know me but only knows what people think they know about me can suck my entire ass and eat ten dicks. I don’t give a FUCK about who you are or what you’ve done. If you treat me or other people with no respect for no reason other than to be an asshole, you’re just plain shit. If you SERIOUSLY believe every little rumor and lie that someone tells about me before meeting me, fuck you AND the horse you rode in on.

What I can’t stand is people doing or saying things just to get a rise out of me or others. I thought we left petty shit in high school. Some of the people that “know” me really need to fucking grow up and grow a pair and either say what they want to my face, or stay mad. I’m tired of playing fucking petty games with y’all. We have a whole ass pandemic to solve.

So here’s the ultimatum... if you agree that Black Lives Matter and that queer people deserve basic human rights, EVEN THE ONES YOU HATE, then that’s the bare minimum to even be a decent person. If you can’t even do those things, then I don’t fucking know what else to say to you.

So NBC, maybe not have John Mulaney joke about my license debacle with my gold van on SNL, and Seth Meyers... maybe HIRE ME INSTEAD of Mulaney because clearly y’all don’t know about the south as much as I do? Oh, and that gazeebo joke with Lee University... I caught that. I may have autism, but I’m not a fucking idiot. I mean. I’m funny when I’m given the chance. And yeah, I’m on a watchlist, but who the fuck isn’t these days? At least all my secrets are out for the world to see, and I have a bangin’ tattoo.

I’m tired of everyone being like “omg, I’ve seen what he can do, it’s fantastic!” or “omg you’re so funny haha” and bragging on me and then NOT FUCKING HIRING ME. I’m TIRED of waiting on something that’s clearly at this point never coming.

I don’t even have testicles, and my balls are bigger than most of the cis men I have EVER met.

So, if you want to help me, or hire me, or get me out to an audition... I’ll be there. But until then, I’m so fucking MAD at some of these producers. Yeah, my mom is a cunt, but she worked in various forms of digital production from the 1980′s until she retired this year. She taught me SO MUCH about directing, writing, shooting, and more. I know how these things are supposed to run behind the scenes. I know what the fuck I’m doing, and I don’t take constructive criticism like a bitch. I actually WANT to be criticized, so I can do even better.

So PLEASE, for the love of Christ... y’all need to get your priorities together AND PLEASE STOP LEAVING ME OUT OF THE LOOP WITH THIS BULLSHIT. Grow a fucking pair and either call me, email me, or leave me alone. It’s really not that fucking hard. Looking at you, Lorne Michaels.

Oh and someone tell my husband what the fuck’s been going on because I’m tired of him gaslighting me about it.

[erraticfairy]

Inside Schizophrenia: Childhood Schizophrenia



In this episode of Inside Schizophrenia, our hosts tackle the topic of early onset – or childhood – schizophrenia. Host Rachel Star discusses her personal experiences with schizophrenia symptoms as an adolescent and Dr. Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich from Harvard Medical School discusses some of the latest research. Listen in now!

About Our Guest

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD is Director of the Developmental Neuropsychiatry Clinic at Boston Children’s Hospital and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School. He did his undergraduate and medical school at Johns Hopkins, his residency training at UCLA, Stanford, and Boston Children’s Hospital. He has extensive experience designing and running clinical trials and other scientific studies with children who have psychiatric disorders co-occurring with developmental disorders or epilepsy. He has also assembled collaborations to develop computer applications to help patients and families facing serious psychiatric or medical illnesses. These include a series of computer games and technological toys designed to build emotional strength in patients as well as typically developing children. Most recently, he has brought together a multidisciplinary effort to study childhood psychosis and the developmental antecedents to Schizophrenia at Boston Children’s Hospital.

Computer Generated Transcript for “Childhood Schizophrenia” Episode

Editor’s Note: Please be mindful that this transcript has been computer generated and therefore may contain inaccuracies and grammar errors. Thank you.

Announcer: Welcome to Inside Schizophrenia, a look into better understanding and living well with schizophrenia. Hosted by renowned advocate and influencer Rachel Star Withers and featuring Gabe Howard.

Rachel Star Withers: Hello, listeners, could a change in your schizophrenia treatment plan make a difference for you? There are options out there you might not know about. Please visit oncemonthlydifference.com to find out more about the benefits of once monthly injections for adults with schizophrenia. Welcome to Inside Schizophrenia. I’m Rachel star Withers here with my co-host Gabe Howard and, Gabe, I’m so excited about today’s episode because we’re going to be exploring schizophrenia in children, sometimes known also as early psychosis, childhood schizophrenia, very early onset schizophrenia, and schizophrenia childhood type. So you get all those written down?

Gabe Howard: It’s amazing to me that there’s all these different names for what is essentially the same disorder. You can understand why people are having a hard time understanding what’s going on when we have five names for what is effectively the same thing.

Rachel Star Withers: And it has been changed over and over and confused with other disorders. Yeah, and that’s kind of what we’re gonna get into is how it’s all meshed together and it’s hard to tell what is what.

Gabe Howard: Before we get into all of the research and the technical side, and of course coming up later on in the show we have an expert who’s going to answer some of these questions for us. I have a question for you, Rachel. Were you diagnosed as a child?

Rachel Star Withers: I was not. I was first diagnosed when in my early twenties when things were like really spiraling out of control. When I was growing up, and I grew up in like the Deep South, very religious, and in the country. So it’s not like I didn’t really grow up around other kids. Like I did but it wasn’t you know like a city sort of situation. So I don’t think my parents really knew how a kid was supposed to act. There were no big warning signs with me.

Gabe Howard: Did you have hallucinations when you were a child?

Rachel Star Withers: Oh yes. As long as I can remember I’ve had hallucinations and the first ones were I always saw faces. And things like faces in the trees, in the carpet, just in the wall, the ceiling. They would appear and like always scary faces. It’s not like happy. No happy butterflies. They were like kind of demonic, frightening creatures which goes back to being in the religious south. You know when I did tell people about it, they’d be like, “Oh well, that’s Satan manifesting.” Okay, yeah.

Gabe Howard: You told adults, “Hey I’m seeing scary evil demonic faces.” And they were just like that’s normal?

Rachel Star Withers: Yeah I think it probably freaked them out or they just thought hey this little kid is just really imaginative. And you’ve been sitting in church listening to the preacher holler for the past two hours about hell and brimstone. So of course, you know, everyone’s probably seeing scary demons.

Gabe Howard: Religious stuff aside how do you know the difference between a child’s imaginary friend and a child’s hallucination? I know lots of children who have imaginary friends who do not have schizophrenia.

Rachel Star Withers: Oh absolutely. And I think growing up it kind of freaked some people out that they don’t know how to deal with it. Like if your kid is coming with an imaginary friend and you’re like oh OK you know we’ll play along. But, well yeah, when do I stop playing along? When is my child too old for this? The same thing like when is my child too old to believe in Santa? So now my kid has hit 13 and they’re still talking to somebody imaginary. Maybe? Maybe this is bad?

Gabe Howard: You raise a really good point because some of this you know that the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus.

Rachel Star Withers: Yeah.

Gabe Howard: We want children to be fanciful. They always see and hear and do things that the rest of us don’t. As part of their imagination, as part of normal development. So now you’re a parent and you suspect. So now you Google to try to get some help for your child. What will they find?

Rachel Star Withers: So scariest thing when I was researching this episode I googled childhood schizophrenia and the first thing that comes up is the wikipedia link and it’s a picture of a child holding a gun. Like I got so mad. If you would have been on Twitter at the time when this happened, I just went on a little Twitter rampage of this is stigma and ridiculous. Because for me it’s like a little 10 year old holding a gun at the camera and we just last episode talked about violence and schizophrenia and the stigma and just how people see it incorrectly. And this is like actual kids. Stigma towards kids in mental health. That really blew my mind that you know even on the Internet we have that stigma towards children and getting help for mental illnesses.

Gabe Howard: And this puts parents in a very peculiar situation because they’re going to look at this picture of a 10 year old with a gun and then they’re going to look at their own child and they’re going to think, “Well, all I have to do is make sure that my child is not violent.”

Rachel Star Withers: Mm hmm.

Gabe Howard: Ipso facto my child does not have schizophrenia.

Rachel Star Withers: In today’s times we have the situations of so many school shootings and I feel like you have two sides of the parenting. You have the one side that’s going to be over protective and oh my gosh I don’t want this to happen and then the other side like I don’t want to say anything and have my child labeled. So it’s either I think go crazy and get help or don’t get any help at all.

Gabe Howard: That’s really an interesting point that you make that because of the stigma surrounding this, people are afraid that if they suspect that their child might have schizophrenia, they’ll get labeled as such even if they don’t. So people will become fearful of their child. Maybe their child will lose friends, or social connections, or standing in school, things that their child needs to develop normally if they suspect their child has schizophrenia. And if they’re wrong, they’ll put their child back a little bit and that of course is assuming that parents recognize it at all. How did your parents react to that knowing that even though you were symptomatic as a child they did nothing? What was that like?

Rachel Star Withers: Well, we’ve I’ve actually never asked them that because that sounds like a really sad question, Gabe. Why would I put my parents in the spotlight? I was a little weird kid and I think all kids are weird though and I was the first child and I just I don’t I don’t blame them or anything because I feel like they were amazing parents and you know Rachel’s acting weird. Let’s let’s go outside and play and that’ll help her. So I had a very awesome childhood and things.

Gabe Howard: It’s awesome that it all turned out OK, but you and I both know that it doesn’t always turn out OK.

Rachel Star Withers: No.

Gabe Howard: You know sometimes waiting too long can lead to a not so great outcomes. We’re talking about society not helping people who are sick.

Rachel Star Withers: And I had a family situation where my mother pretty much worked from home. My father worked full time and it was just me and my little brother. So we got a lot of personal attention. So even if I had, let’s say gotten worse, I feel like people would have noticed pretty quickly. So let’s actually talk about what is childhood schizophrenia? The simple definition is it is when a child interprets reality abnormally which I think is all children. Isn’t that all of them?

Gabe Howard: Well, but it’s abnormally.

Rachel Star Withers: Yeah.

Gabe Howard: But you’re right. Doesn’t that make it difficult? You expect a child to get it right?

Rachel Star Withers: Right. Yeah. So the mental disorder of schizophrenia overall. OK. They used to see it as different classifications. Now it’s considered a spectrum disorder similar to autism. So the criteria for diagnosing a child with schizophrenia is actually the exact same as a teenager or adult. So early onset of schizophrenia is ages 13 to 18 and if it occurs between age 7 to puberty it’s childhood. So I think that’s the issue, too. We got like OK well which one is it? And then they’re also trying to just call it early psychosis or psychosis in children which is even a more bigger umbrella term because I feel like that could cover bipolar and all the other disorders that kind of have hallucinations in it. Which autism has hallucinations and Down Syndrome also. There is not a definitive test and they’ve even done studies where they think schizophrenia can appear in a child as early as three months old. I have no clue how in the world you would figure that out. Like a 3 month old is just kind of there. But I just thought it was interesting that they think that’s how young that schizophrenia can be observed in a child. The only difference is schizophrenia for children versus adults is the delusions tend to be broader so they don’t necessarily have like a voice telling them specific things to do. It’s more they’re going to hear sounds, knocking, ticking, voices that are like calling their names, that necessarily don’t make sense. The visual hallucinations tend to be like flashing lights, seeing shadow figures. So that’s always like that just sounds to me like normal kids. And my little kid comes and tells me like, oh they’re all these flashing lights it’s an alien you know attacking. I’d be like OK cute you know you must have saw that on TV but yeah.

Gabe Howard: Children just have a real difficult time processing anything as an adult. You know, take for example all of the kids cartoons that have like sexual innuendo in them.

Rachel Star Withers: Oh I remember as a young prepubescent girl like we would watch musicals like Grease and I loved Grease as a kid it was so happy and fun and I remember they showed it to us in school. And now if I watch it, I’m like oh wow that’s really inappropriate. There’s so many things in that movie, that older movie, that is just like Oh oh that’s there’s a lot of sex jokes in here and yeah we miss things as kids. Like we interpret things completely different. If you don’t understand something you just kind of either gloss over it or you make up your own reality to it.

Gabe Howard: But that’s not an example of schizophrenia that’s just an example of getting something wrong. And again that’s something that happens to adults.

Rachel Star Withers: Oh yeah.

Gabe Howard: So now we go all the way back and like you said we’re not even necessarily talking about 15 year olds, we’re talking about 10 year olds or 5 year olds.

Rachel Star Withers: And remember, Gabe, even trying to go out there and get the right facts to learn about this disorder you’re met with a lot of confusion and a lot of stigma and I think a lot of stigma also can make you feel like, “Well, if my child is wanting you know to shoot up the school like in this picture that means I’m a bad parent and I’m not. I love my child.” And it’s just a lot of confusion and I think fear when you are looking at this disorder.

Gabe Howard: And we should probably address how common this is because I imagine this is not very common which means it’s not like you can just ask your mommy group, or your father group, or your own family members. I mean where do you go to get support with the people that you know in real life?

Rachel Star Withers: One issue when it comes to diagnosing this is that schizophrenia and psychosis in children is so closely seen from the outside as also autism. So there’s a lot of kind of confusion there where a lot of kids get misdiagnosed. They put them down as autistic and they’re really not and vice versa. And with autism, children are seen to be very internal, going inside of their heads. They don’t pick up on like normal social cues. They engage differently. Schizophrenia is they withdraw. They go inside themselves. They’re not responding correctly because they’re hallucinating. That sounds exactly the same to me. I feel like if I had two kids going through two different things, but that’s how they’re reacting, I would assume they’re both either autistic or schizophrenic. But you know there’s a very big difference in what the kids are seeing. We’re talking about a 10 year old though and they’re telling me they’re seeing shadows or lights and that’s so vague.

Gabe Howard: Do you think that the public is more accepting of a child with autism or a child with schizophrenia?

Rachel Star Withers: I don’t think anyone is scared of an autistic child shooting up a school. Is that a little too hard to say though, Gabe?

Gabe Howard: No I think that it’s

Rachel Star Withers: Ok, I was just being honest.

Gabe Howard: No. I think it’s a very

Rachel Star Withers: Ok.

Gabe Howard: Fair point.

Rachel Star Withers: Ok.

Gabe Howard: You know schizophrenia like you always make the joke it’s got a Z in it. It’s a scary sounding word. When we think of autism, we think of you know cute children trying their best to love their parents. And can you kind of speak to that a little bit because you don’t have the warm and fuzzy diagnosis?

Rachel Star Withers: No. And I actually had a family member who had very very serious autism who is no longer with us who is very young. And autism, it’s a very hard thing to deal with. We go back to that spectrum disorder. There’s a big spectrum. And unfortunately my family member was very very held back mentally by it and I don’t think anyone was ever scared of him that he would pull out a gun. You know no one was ever scared like that. You were more scared for him. You felt bad, you were worried about him. Whereas schizophrenia I think you’re gonna be like oh I don’t want my kids near him. I don’t want my kids near her like that. That’s gonna be the kid that just starts like stabbing people. But there’s fear that autistic kids will be disruptive in the classroom so there’s stigma on both sides. Another thing is that we go back to that whole getting a diagnosis for my child. There’s a lot more support and just help and programs for autism, you know. So if I’m googling, you know, help with psychosis there’s almost next to nothing for children where autism there’s so many programs. There’s books, there’s these computer games, there’s just so much stuff that you like oh wow there’s a huge support community that does not exist for psychosis in children even though it’s so closely related. As a parent that would worry me too. I’d be like well if I have to get a diagnosis how about the safer one even if it’s wrong I would get a lot more help.

Gabe Howard: It’s a really good point. There’s nothing to definitively prove psychosis in anybody or schizophrenia in anybody, let alone children. It’s all self reporting. So this does make it difficult and that does mean that you know unfortunately human error can get involved and a parent can steer their child, steer their provider into the safer diagnosis and it’s always difficult to compare and contrast illnesses. I don’t want anybody to think that we’re saying that autism is better than schizophrenia or vice versa. It’s just a conversation about how society is seeing these illnesses and why it makes it difficult to get the right diagnosis and the right help for a child when there’s all of these external factors.

Rachel Star Withers: And coming to getting the right help, right now with psychosis for children with schizophrenia the only help, the only treatment is the exact same thing for adults which is antipsychotic medications and which have really intense side effects. A lot of them aren’t allowed to be given to children to start with. But a lot of the side effects I have now, I would not wish on anybody else, but especially not a child. So you have that whole thing playing as well. OK, if I give my child this certain things might become a lot worse. And your other treatment options are going to be like social programs, individual therapy, a lot of family therapy so everybody in the family can kind of jump in. The treatment isn’t really a specific, OK I just give them this pill every day at this time and everything’s going to be OK.

Gabe Howard: Well let’s talk about that for a second because as you know in adults, there’s a lot of controversy about whether or not people should take psychiatric medications. There’s lots of scary stories. And now we’re talking children. So now a parent has to decide if they want to give psychiatric medications to their child knowing that adults are having this giant discussion. What is that like for a parent?

Rachel Star Withers: For just me, and you’ll hear other schizophrenics say it too, it is as if you’re playing Russian roulette with medication. So you’re constantly having to try things, adjust levels. And now we’re dealing with a child who isn’t very good at voicing what’s happening and that parent is going to have to be like really on top of things and charting and it’s just a lot. Because it’s going to fall on the parents when it comes to psychosis in children.

Gabe Howard: And it’s more likely than not that their friends and family in the general society is really looking down on them. Oh you don’t want to raise your child, you just want to give them a pill. This isn’t to say that children with schizophrenia shouldn’t be on medication, these are just the kids of things that parents worry about. There’s just an incredible amount of stigma in the treatment of schizophrenia.

Rachel Star Withers: Yes. And when I was researching all of this I went into researching specific therapists who deal with schizophrenia and psychosis and they’re all a lot more expensive than let’s say a normal therapist. So there’s also just the cost of all of this is insane, you know. Well one of the treatment sites suggested family therapy once a week, child therapy twice a week, you know. And we’re talking one hundred dollars a pop. Like that adds up on a family really quick. So you want to give your child everything, you want to help them. But there’s also that cost factor of trying to do all of this stuff and a lot of it’s not available in your area. If you’re in a big city you can probably find a therapist who specializes. But I mean, I’m out in South Carolina. No one came up on my google search.

Gabe Howard: And I think that it’s also important to remember that families are all structured differently. For example you can have a single parent family with three children. Well that means one child is taking up the majority of not only the financial resources but the single parent’s time. And then you’ve got other families that you know are two parents with one child. Well and of course we all understand the difference in health insurance and financial resources. And as you mentioned the difference between living in a big city and a rural area and it even varies state to state.  We will be right back after this message from our sponsor.

Rachel Star Withers: It can sometimes feel like another schizophrenia episode is just around the corner. In fact, a recent study found that patients had an average of nine episodes in less than six years. However, there’s a treatment plan option that can help delay another episode. A once monthly injection for adults with schizophrenia. If delaying another episode sounds like it could make a difference for you or your loved one, learn more about treating schizophrenia with once monthly injections at oncemonthlydifference.com. That’s oncemonthlydifference.com. Thank you for listening to our sponsors message. And we’re back talking about violence and schizophrenia.

Gabe Howard: We are back talking about schizophrenia in children. Is there good news in all of this? What’s the success rate for a child who is diagnosed early and gets the intervention and help that they need? How do these children end up? Because I believe that society thinks that all of these children end up institutionalized or as criminals or in prison. What are the actual stats on this? Is there hope for these children?

Rachel Star Withers: It’s just like any other medical situation. If you have the right diagnosis and the right treatment you’re going to have a lot better outcome. Me myself like I wasn’t diagnosed till later but once I was that was such a huge weight off my shoulders for when I knew I wasn’t demon possessed anymore. Oh but like oh I have a real thing that other people in this world have and I knew how to at least had a road to go down for treatment. I knew that I needed to talk to a psychologist psychiatrist. Like I knew what type of doctors what type of medication I was going to need what type of therapy. And there is no like oh well this is the exact thing you need to do that’ll work for you because believe me over the past 14 years I’ve tried so many things and had to adjust. But at 34, about to be 34, Happy Birthday to me, things are going really well I think I’m as sane as I’ve ever been. I don’t know. But I have a really awesome life and I’m very lucky for that. So I think it’s just the outcome is whatever you want it to be. And just being able to support your child and push them to what they want to do and find ways. Yes it’s gonna be harder but you can totally find ways.

Gabe Howard: You can find ways if you get the right diagnosis and the right treatment. Just to clarify right?

Rachel Star Withers: Yes.

Gabe Howard: You can’t find the right way magically. That’s the problem with all of this misinformation and all of this stigma it lead you astray.

Rachel Star Withers: Yes, that’s correct, Gabe.

Gabe Howard: Let’s take a snapshot of your personal story, Rachel. Before you had the right diagnosis, before you had any treatment whatsoever, you went through a lot. Tell us what happened before diagnosis to help you with your hallucinations.

Rachel Star Withers: I remember multiple times in my life growing up in the church, going to different church leaders over me youth pastors things like that and talking to them about what was happening and a lot of the times they would just pray with you and suggest you know what to read in the Bible and that was it. And it kind of escalated to the point where I was at a Christian school at age 17 and they actually did an exorcism on me and it was not as cool as the movie. My head did not spin around and I didn’t you know throw up puke everywhere. So little let down on the build up of that, just saying. But that’s really scary that they did that to a 17 year old but that was their way of helping me. And they absolutely knew. I mean we’re not talking I was in the sticks, we had the Internet starting and this was a very large school.

Gabe Howard: I love your sense of humor and I love the fact that you’re well enough to look back and you know handle these things the way that you do. But if we’re being honest this could have turned out significantly worse for somebody in your position a vulnerable person with an untreated mental illness.

Rachel Star Withers: Yes I have a great sense of humor. I tend to be very upbeat about schizophrenia and mental disorders because so many people aren’t. And inside I might not be like super happy but this is my way of dealing kind of thing. So I did want to point that out there just as I make jokes about these things and other people might have went through them and think this is not a joke. Just so you can understand. But that was really hard, that exorcism. I didn’t talk about it for over 10 years because I was so embarrassed like who in the world has an exorcism? But I just did not want anyone to know. So it’s not that that didn’t affect me. It affected me really bad for a lot of years. And it took a long time to deal with that. So yes if you have people that are trying in their own ways to help but are actually hurting it really can set anyone back that has any sort of medical problem not even just mental.

Gabe Howard: And just to be clear it did not help with schizophrenia.

Rachel Star Withers: Yes to be clear my exorcism did not work and it was three days long. OK. So this was not an hour situation like in the movies. Got to wrap those up quick. A three day long exorcism and my hallucinations came back the next day and they pretty much gave up on me. They said I let Satan back in.

Gabe Howard: Ok. So there was a lot of blaming of the person?

Rachel Star Withers: Oh yeah.

Gabe Howard: Who was sick. And none of this, and I don’t think you think so either, we’re not trying to shame religion or shame religious people, this is just an example of where people didn’t understand and they used what resources they had available. But they did the wrong thing. They didn’t use a medical based model to treat you because you didn’t have a diagnosis. They didn’t know what to do. Now let’s compare that to what happened when you got to a doctor. How did your life change after you got a diagnosis and you moved forward?

Rachel Star Withers: Anyone out there who you know is looking to get a psychiatrist psychologist looking to go down this road you might have to shop around. I do want to say that because I’ve been to so many different therapists and medical professionals across the board. If you do have to find one that works for you. But the good thing is that you at least have a game plan. So I knew right away like OK I’m going to go I started talking to a psychologist that psychologists put me in contact with a psychiatrist and them working together put me on a medical treatment plan. In addition to this talk therapy that I was doing so yeah. And it was OK if that didn’t work this week then we need to work on something else we need to change something. Not, all right, we give up, we tried that one thing.

Gabe Howard: And that really is the difference. You now had a treatment plan. So as scary as it is to take your child to a doctor for this the treatment outcomes are significantly better. And as people who listen to all of these episodes know and people who know your work, Rachel, you really do have an exceptionally high quality of life. I mean you were in the movies for Pete’s sake.

Rachel Star Withers: I was, it’s pretty cool. I think now, Gabe, is a perfect time to bring on our guest. Today we’re talking with Dr. Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich. He is the director of the Developmental Neuro Psychiatry clinic at Boston Children’s Hospital and an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Welcome, doctor.

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD: Thank you, Rachel.

Rachel Star Withers: So at the Boston Children’s Hospital in the Developmental Center, what is it that you do?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD: I’m a child psychiatrist and I evaluate children thought to be having very serious psychiatric problems then treat them. Hopefully you get them feeling better and back on the developmental on their developmental course again.

Rachel Star Withers: So when you say psychiatric issues, what would some of those be?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD:  I would say since 2001 or so I’m mostly concentrating on children who are showing early signs of psychosis. Those are the children that are generally my new patients in the last I guess eight years since I’ve been working in this area. I would tell you that I’ve never worked harder or seen children who were more having more you know more severe problems and yet sort of the partnership with the families and and the kids themselves is really very strong. We’re all pulling together trying to help them feel better. And also I’m involved in research to try to understand why this is happening to them and find ways that are more effective than what we have now to really get them back to feeling better and back on a different developmental trajectory.

Gabe Howard: Rachel and I were just having a big discussion about parents are afraid of this diagnosis. They’re afraid of psychosis because society is afraid of this in adults and nobody wants to stigmatize their child with this. Are you seeing that in your practice where parents are rejecting the diagnosis or not wanting to work with you or are fearful of it?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD: Actually by having the kids come to see me often the parents are looking for an answer and have self blamed or blown off by the professionals often before that. And part of that is because psychosis in children is very confusing and difficult. A lot of kids will have just as far as normal development will occasionally have think that hear a voice their name called developmentally normal fears and and whatnot. And then distinguishing those from psychotic symptoms is hard and it’s something the field has been grappling with. So the kids are often been complaining of intrusive voices and images that are really scary and frightening and distressing to them for a long time. First of all, they also feel a stigma and often don’t tell anyone about it for a long time and then when they do tell their parents about it and the parents go to get evaluated an evaluation often as child psychiatric professionals we try and find any possible other explanation. In truth it is hard to distinguish what is a psychotic symptom. You know for instance voices telling the child to harm themselves or telling them terrible things about them from developmentally normal things and also symptoms of other disorders that might look like that. So childhood schizophrenia is narrowly defined exactly like the adults late adolescence of early adult onset illness. It is rare in children but children having psychosis that’s impairing and distressing is still rare, but that’s that much more common than schizophrenia. And so the other part is how you distinguish that from normal imaginative play, imaginary friends, just transient misperceptions that children have, nightmares, and how you see which those from normal developmental phenomenon from psychosis and then within psychosis you know which kids will go on to have schizophrenia versus some other sort of psychotic illness that may or may not last.

Rachel Star Withers: Talking about these kids, what are the ages that you see experiencing childhood psychosis, and what’s your earliest age that you’ve seen?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD:  Typically the kids that have been getting referred to us because we’ve been concentrating on very early onset. So in about 20 percent of people with schizophrenia and with psychosis in general will have the first psychotic episode in adolescence after the age of 13 and probably closer to 16, 17, 18 and those are called early onset and that’s about 20 percent of everybody with this problem. Very early onset, which would be under the age of 13, is much rarer. And we’ve been concentrating on those kids because they’ve been getting referred to us at Children’s Hospital. So I’ve been mostly seeing kids who have the onset before the age of 13 but again that’s a rare event that because we’re a tertiary care center, these kids get sent here. We’ve enrolled in our research studies for the genetic study over a hundred forty of these kids and actually counting the studies we’re doing with biomarkers before that, closer to two hundred kids. Their ages, again because I’m selecting for kids, it starts under the age of 13 really are typically nine, ten, eleven, twelve but we’ve had I saw a kid this week who at age four went from having a touch of mild autism and they’re very verbal or engaged kid who would tell you lots of stories through a period of hallucinations. They were very frightening to him and basically have a deterioration in his functioning to the point now where he hardly talks and his interest in play and engaging people has markedly decreased. That’s an unusual case. And we see maybe five or six kids like that. More typically their onset is between eight and 13 so it seems like a very heterogeneous group. And the genetics are very heterogeneous and marked by a lot of very rare genetic events, more so than what you see in typical late adolescent young adult onset psychosis.

Rachel Star Withers: If there are parents out there and they’re suspecting that their child may have a problem with psychosis, what do you suggest that they do?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD:  Well I would take them in to be evaluated by a professional and I’d also observe carefully, write down with observations that they have that are making you worry about this. If the child’s behaving oddly it is really helpful to get a video of that. So that a professional in office can view it with the parents to try and figure out what’s going on. And then depending on how gradually it happened etc., there might be some neurologic work up that has to happen. So again depending again if there’s been a very abrupt onset then we’ll worry about things that can look like schizophrenia but are autoimmune disorders antibodies attacking the brain relatively infrequently but those are things you don’t want to miss. The metabolic problems that need to be diagnosed in them could be treatable and so it’s important to take and get an evaluation. This should be a strongest consideration of medical or neurologic causes along with the psychological psychiatric evaluation. So it likely would be best to have someone who has a lot of experience evaluating childhood onset psychotic symptoms to really take a look and see. How typical is this because of how those sort of problems versus very frequently it might be not that. It might be misinterpreting things that are either due to another problem like a major depression or anxiety disorder or sometimes also just developmentally normal things. So I think getting an evaluation would be important and careful observations would be very important when it comes to treating the child.

Rachel Star Withers: Are there side effects with medications that we should consider?

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD:  There’s two issues with them and they the antipsychotics. As you mentioned they have side effects. The flattening and how people just feel sedated. They’re not fun to take. You know people often will take the medication because you know because I’ve learned that if they don’t they’re tortured by these terrible psychotic symptoms voices. But then the medication themselves do feel make you feel flatter and duller and harder to enjoy things and whatnot. You know it might be on the whole a plus if you’re getting rid of voices constantly telling you terrible things and whatnot. The things that are most difficult about, especially the second generation antipsychotics, is the weight gain and metabolic problems. So they increase appetite, some more than others, but they also increase appetite and make it harder for kids and for everyone who takes them to keep their weight healthy level. And so the kids will gain weight and then you know and then we worry this is going to put them at the longer term risk of Type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome and all the complications of obesity. So that’s actually the biggest problem is those side effects. To families, by the time they come to see me they are ready and they want some help. The other problem is these medicines always that they’re not completely effective. They’re treating symptoms or not treating the underlying cause. And so while you might be able to get hallucinations and delusions under control the other symptoms having to do with decreased motivation, decreased concentration, decreased ability to get up and do stuff. But those are really still there and we haven’t found any way to treat those. Part of the research that we’re doing is you’re looking for these rare genetic causes because the hope is if we understand the genetic cause we go from the gene to knowing what the gene makes to knowing what that protein does. And we could do these amazing things and it would sound like science fiction even ten years ago where we can take his blood cells and turn them into neurons and study the neurons in a dish and try to understand what’s wrong with the neurons and then screen lots and lots of medicines to see if any of them will reverse what is wrong with the neurons. So we’re looking for new treatments that might prevent the symptoms from coming up to begin with and be more effective and reverses symptoms than previous occurred. What we have now which would lessen symptoms but they don’t get at the underlying cause. The parents are usually willing to go with the medication in these events. They’ve seen a child suffer for a long time with very significant serious symptoms. We saw that with ourselves in terms of can we do this with a medication which has less side effects? We’ve had kids respond to Prozac family medicines where classically myself they would have needed an antipsychotic. Some of them will respond to that and that’s great. You have a lot fewer of those problems I just discussed. But often they do need the antipsychotic and then we had to work hard to maintain their weight at a healthy level. They should be getting exercise and then the other treatments of psychosis which are beyond medication which have to do with helping the school understand the child and how to teach them and support them. And then the people that are looking into things like cognitive rehabilitation and whatnot, trying to get back to normal functioning that might have been lost as a psychotic process took hold.

Rachel Star Withers: We were talking earlier in the episode about seeing this from an everyday person’s point of view but seeing it from a scientist’s point of view now that’s really awesome. Thank you so much for coming and sharing that with us, sir.

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD: Thank you. Just for raising awareness because I think that one of the things that I think is really hard about this is lack of awareness and lack of understanding in our society. This makes it harder for kids to get the treatment, makes it harder on families who end up getting feeling blamed and whatnot for something which has a large component that’s biological and causation. Not in their hands.

Gabe Howard: Thank you again. We really appreciate it. And we’ve learned a lot.

Joseph Gonzalez-Heydrich, MD: All right. Thank you so much.

Gabe Howard: That was really awesome and I am so thankful that we had somebody from Boston’s Children’s Hospital associated with Harvard Medical School. They really do great research and they’re looking into schizophrenia to make life better for. Well frankly everybody with mental illness because this is this is cutting edge and this is important. And I’m so glad that he was willing to take the time. Rachel, how did you get him to do this?

Rachel Star Withers: Well he was talking about some of that research there that they did on genetics. They’d actually contacted me a few years back and I’ve been involved in some of those genetics programs. He was speaking about as far as them looking up the different I guess deleted chromosomes. That’s over my head. So what I thought was so interesting was actually hearing that side and him talking about the genetic side of things that most of us don’t, even like even doctors, it’s a lot over their heads and that’s I mean.

Gabe Howard: I know it’s we think that it’s only over our head it’s fascinating that this is so complex that everybody is struggling with it.

Rachel Star Withers: Exactly. But we do need to strive to be educated because there’s a lot at stake in this and constantly stay up to date. This isn’t something that, okay, I know all about schizophrenia now, goodbye. Like there are so many emerging things as they’re working on all the genetic side of it but also medications being developed therapies so we all need to stay current and the different treatments.

Gabe Howard: As somebody who experience symptoms as a child who is now an adult, was there anything that he said that was surprising to you?

Rachel Star Withers: He didn’t hit on it much but when he said the youngest age was four, that’s so young to me. How did how do you distinguish at age four what’s pretend and what’s not? And so it fascinates me that they’re able to do that. That they’re able to figure out you know the difference between which kids have autism, which kids are just over imaginative, and which kids have psychosis. It fascinates me.

Gabe Howard: I was really surprised by what he said about the parents because a lot of the things that we hear and read is that parents are just really rejecting this idea and they’re fighting hard against it and they’re scared to get help and all of those things are true. But his perspective is different. He said that by the time that they reached him they’re desperate and they’re scared and they’re looking for answers and that’s something that I hadn’t considered. How did that hit you as a person living with schizophrenia?

Rachel Star Withers: I really like then that he said that because it made me think Oh yeah. Because that’s kind of how I was. I didn’t know what was going on and I was desperate for help. At first I was I couldn’t find like a good counselor because I didn’t know I needed a psychologist. And I could just like as he was talking I could picture myself being in that situation of just I’m so worried. No one is helping me. I don’t know what to do and the fact that it’s about your child is so much deeper.

Gabe Howard: Are you encouraged by the amount of research and about the amount of knowledge that is going on in the country right now?

Rachel Star Withers: I found it so encouraging that he was able to tell us all these different projects that they’re working on all this different research that’s currently being done all these different like kids they’re looking at and trying to help. That’s incredible to me. And that gives me so much hope a lot of times when you do get the diagnosis of schizophrenia or another mental illness. It’s just like Oh no your world is ending and it’s just a lot of fear and I just like that he had so much hope for the future where this was all going. It wasn’t you know him talking at the research it wasn’t like Oh well give up guys. It’s like things you’re finding out that are different, that are new and I love that. So how I’m being treated right now could be completely different in two years who knows what could happen. And that’s so encouraging to me.

Gabe Howard: I liked his overall message of, listen, this is a medical illness and you need medical treatment because we’re doing medical research and we’re constantly learning and we’re constantly growing and we have a plan and if it doesn’t work out we’ll make another plan. And I think that’s very very important especially for people wrestling with whether or not to have their child diagnosed or to see a doctor. I really hope that people can listen to that and really hear that there’s so much going on and the outcome is a Rachel Star life right now. The outcome is adults living well in spite of their illness. And I think that that’s a really really valuable and important message for a parent who’s struggling whether to take the next steps.

Rachel Star Withers: And just on that note not even just so much living well but being able to live a lot of times when you have this diagnosis it’s hard to even consider the future at all. It’s hard to picture yourself alive next year. And for me I don’t know that gave me like some amazing hope of what he was talking that I don’t have to like be so worried about the future I don’t have to worry that you know my brain’s just going to fall apart and I’m going to end up in a mental institution like that’s that was just so cool though that he’s saying like all the different changes that are coming.

Gabe Howard: I think that that’s incredible. Rachel, where do you as a person living with schizophrenia fall on this? What’s your takeaways?

Rachel Star Withers: If this was the situation of my child had schizophrenia if I had a child, I would want them to get the best treatment possible and I would strive to help them in any way. I personally would still want them to have an amazing, awesome, cool, normal childhood. I wouldn’t want to just be like, Ok well, I’m dropping you off at the hospital see you in six months. But for me and people out there who might be scared of getting a diagnosis you can get a diagnosis you do not have to tell the world. I do know we’re on a podcast about it but you can’t keep it quiet. But don’t let the stigma and the fear hold you back from getting your child help or getting your self help. Thank you everyone for tuning into this month’s episode of Inside Schizophrenia. Subscribe, Like, and Share this episode on social media. My name is Rachel Star and I will see you next month.

Announcer: Inside Schizophrenia is presented by PsychCentral.com, America’s largest and longest operating independent mental health website. Your host, Rachel Star Withers, can be found online at RachelStarLive.com. Co-host Gabe Howard can be found online at GabeHoward.com. For questions, or to provide feedback, please email talkback@PsychCentral.com. The official web site for Inside Schizophrenia is PsychCentral.com/IS. Thank you for listening and please share widely.

from World of Psychology https://ift.tt/2YSlimA via theshiningmind.com

[ixvyupdates]

Here Are 4 Tips to Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves

Raising two kids has taught me a lot about how to help children become their best selves. Four key themes have emerged in my years as a mother, and I believe they will be helpful for all the parents and educators out there, the people shaping the lives of our children.

1. Speak an affirmation statement to your children

Affirmation is a strong encouraging proclamation. Positive talk molds the emotional well-being and beliefs of your children.

Imagine that you are 4 years old. Your mom and dad tell you how dumb you are daily. Flash forward a decade and you’re a high school freshman who’s only heard negative talk for 10 years. Your parents have not affirmed your intelligence, have not confirmed your ability to do and now you do not believe that you can achieve greatness.

My daughter was born to a mother who was an addict. I met her three weeks after her birth, and she needed four more weeks in the hospital to get the drugs out of her system.

God told me to find a scripture to speak over her and I have spoken it for four years. Psalm 139:14 states, “You are fearfully and wonderfully made.” It means that God made you full of life and you are unique, special and made with purpose.

I have spoken that phrase to her consistently since she was three weeks old—after hearing me do it, my husband started doing the same. She now says it herself and is full of joy when she says it. I have affirmed that she is a special, delicate, wonderful person. A lot of folks told me she would experience many difficulties because of what she was predisposed to. But I do not allow her beginning to define her identity.

So I want to ask that every parent find an affirmation statement to say to their children. I found mine in my faith and if you are not a person of faith then find an inspirational quote that aligns to your values.

2. Read and converse with your children constantly

My husband and I are constantly conversing with our children about various topics. I also read to and with them as time permits every week. As a working parent, I find it difficult to carve out the quality time, so I have learned that the car is my classroom.

My daughter can identify the letter Z—the first letter of her name—on any license plate because I am constantly pointing it out. She and I chat about brushing her teeth, washing her face, the outfit she will wear, the snack she will have in the morning, where we are going in the morning, the traffic, etc.

Essentially, we talk from the time she wakes up until I drop her off at daycare in the morning. Why? She needs to hear as much language as possible so that her brain is stimulated and ready to learn.

I will admit that I do not talk to her as much on my way home because I am exhausted but I do ask her about her day before I go silent or put on music, take a phone call, etc. She also brings me a book to read to her a few times a week and she thinks she can read because some of the stories are very familiar to her.

3. Do not put limits on your kids or allow others to do so

My son is on the autism spectrum—likely Asperger’s—which means his social skills are not natural to him like you and me. Therefore, because I recognized early that he had a deficit, my husband and I filled the gap with as much as possible.

Well meaning people gave me a laundry list of what he would not be able to do (tie his shoes, ride a bike, care for himself, do anything that was not dependent on my husband or me). He’s proving them wrong.

My son has had an individualized education plan (IEP) since he was 4 years old, and he has progressively built his independence through school. We have moved from him having a one-on-one aide in first through third grade, to a shared aide in fourth through sixth grade, to a resource class in seventh and eighth grade and to only social work and counselor support for high school.

My husband and I put him in Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, a small groups at Rush University Arts Center, a small group with a speech language pathologists to teach him social skills and a computer coding class with BDPA at Roosevelt University.

On his own, my son has joined at school the Anti-Bullying Club, Math Club and this year will be entering his second year as a debate team member. Yes, debate team. My son, the boy who so many people said wouldn’t be able to communicate, is no longer afraid to speak in public. He’s doing so well that, when he recently went to a 10-day summer camp, I only got two phone calls with a request.

My son can have a conversation with anyone because my husband and I did not allow people to put barriers around his abilities. Yes, he still needs some social development and social skills growth, but I am confident that he will be fine.

Please know that although I did not have an affirmation statement for my son, I did constantly talk and read to him and I did not allow people to tell me what he could not do. When a parent gets a diagnosis of autism and they start to lose hope, I encourage them to expose that child to as much as possible and see what the outcome will be.

I was (and am) stubborn, I did not buy into what autistic kids cannot do and I did not buy into what effects drugs have on kids. I push my kids as far as they can go and not as far as someone says they will go.

4. Share and live your values and traditions with your children

Recently, my husband and I have been talking to our son about what we value as a family. We wanted to know what he sees as the principles we live by, standards of behavior and what is important to us. He can tell us what they are.

My son shared that faith, education, family time and finances are important to our family. My husband and I agreed. We are Christians so we attend church on Sunday, we pray as a family and we read the Bible.

I am an educator and my husband works in a high school so we expect that our kids will be third-generation college students.

We spend time together as a family on weekends, family vacations, dinner time, driving, etc. We had a blast on a recent family vacation in Tennessee.

We are good stewards of our money. We do not have cable television, I do not buy my kids the latest clothes and shoes because I value experiences over things. We go to dinner a couple of times a week, my son is in summer camp, we have checking, savings, mutual funds, retirement funds and more.

My son went to camp this summer for 10 days by himself and he had $50 to spend and he only spent $20. Why? He said that he does not like giving away his money too quickly because he wants to save it.

Remember that you are your child’s first teacher. What impression are you leaving on them as they grow and develop into adults?

Photo by Eye For Ebony, Unsplash-licensed.

Here Are 4 Tips to Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves syndicated from https://sapsnkraguide.wordpress.com

[alexrascanu]

How to Reach Your Potential: An Interview with Sarah Chaudhery

Sarah Chaudhery is taking part in the "How to Reach Your Potential" initiative, a series of 100 interviews with leaders who inspire Alex Rascanu and whose insights can help you reach your potential.

About Sarah

As a 6-year veteran of the Canadian National Rowing Team, Sarah Chaudhery’s (nee Bonikowsky) athletic career includes silver and bronze World Cup medals, two National Championship titles, a fourth place finish at the 2008 Olympic Games and a bronze medal at the 2011 Pan Am Games. Now practicing as a paediatric occupational therapist, Sarah is passionate about encouraging all people, regardless of age or ability to pursue their dreams both inside and outside of sport. Sarah recently published a book about her Olympic experience titled, “The Justified Jock: Faith and the Olympic Journey.”

Check out Sarah’s website and book at www.thejustifiedjock.com, and connect with her on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Alex: What is your life’s purpose?

Sarah: Above all else, I believe that every person was created for a purpose. The goal of my life is to find the ways I should be putting my beliefs and my faith into action. If I haven’t made a difference, lived in truth, loved others, and answered my callings, then I haven’t really lived.

Alex: What are the three things you’re most passionate about?

Sarah: At the core of my being, faith is what gives me my purpose in life. If we don’t have hope, we don’t have anything. Often people asked me how I got through Olympic training, competition, huge highs, and even greater lows. All I can say, is that training at that extreme level, broke me down to the point that I literally had to rely on God to get me through each day. It’s what brought me back to my faith.

Secondly, my family! Both my husband and daughter reinforce that purpose and drive. I feel so blessed right now!

Thirdly, I have always had this deep-seated burning desire for real justice and opportunity for people with different abilities. I grew up with a close family friend who has autism, and one of my first jobs as a teenager was working with a boy with Down Syndrome. Those two people changed my life forever!

Alex: How do you stay healthy? What’s your main health-related goal?

Sarah: Oh man… this is hard for me to answer right now as I re-develop this whole side of my life. Exercise used to be such an extreme for me. It bothered me that Olympians were praised for their dedication and commitment, but at the same time the level of activity is at such an unhealthy extreme. Exercise became something that was always quantified, judged, and measured (literally) to the minute. I had to record how many minutes each day I spent in different heart rate zones, and had to make sure I spent 18 hours a week at my base cardio level. That didn’t include sprinting workouts, weight training or pilates. When I retired from rowing, I struggled with really bad migraines. If I didn’t work out fairly regularly and intensely for the first 3 years, I would get these crazy migraines and not even be able to go to work (once for 3 days straight!)

Staying healthy for me has been finding the balance of new motivators; new sports (I have always been crazy about cycling… even before rowing!) and setting new goals that are healthy and appropriate. Then I had a baby and had to change all of that again. Now I’ve gone back to work and had to change it yet again… I’m still learning what healthy looks like with a little person and a job in the mix! I can’t just workout when I want to anymore. Everything has to be planned for! It took me a long time to accept exercise in little pieces. For a long time, if I couldn’t workout for at least an hour, it didn’t ‘count’ for me. And because it didn’t ‘count’, I couldn’t even get started. Now my mindset is like, “Okay. If we go to the park after work, I can put my daughter Zoë in the stroller and I can run there. Maybe today we’ll go to the further park.” I also use an activity monitor to track steps and stairs, something, which I used to think, was ridiculous. But I find it helps me make small choices about taking the longer route, or taking the extra stairs, or parking further away, and hopefully that counts for something, right?

Alex: How do you build wealth? What’s your main financial goal?

Sarah: I think the smartest thing I did was setting up an RESP for Zoë right away and shifting almost all of her baby bonus money into it each month. A little bit goes into our TFSA (we figured that buying a house was worth it for Zoë too!) It took me a long time to start my own RRSP, (I wasn’t eligible as an amateur athlete) but now that’s an automatic withdrawal too. I think if you can make it automatic, then you don’t ‘miss’ the money as much. We also believe strongly in giving at least 10% of our income back to church, and support other charities and causes that are important to us throughout the year. I worked for 3 years in a totally charitable organization, and I raised a lot of my own salary through donations. It taught me that there are different types of investment. At the end of your life, you want to know that you invested in other people. It’s really the best way to maximize your impact. We can’t all be the hands-on well builder in Africa, but think about the change you can affect in a whole community through those that are the hands and feet on the ground! So I guess what I’m coming around to again, is that sense of purpose. If I feel that I have been able to achieve my purpose, to take care of my family and to take care of others, than that’s money well invested!

Alex: How do you balance work and family life?

Sarah: Well… I’m sacrificing a bit of sanity right now, that’s for sure. I have a flexible work schedule, but my husband works the longer hours in the job with the steadier income and benefits. I really admire his ability to just do his job! He’s been at his company for 20 years now! I usually work from about 9:30 – 3:30 (I work in a lot of different schools) and then try to get Zoë early from daycare so we can have some quality time at home together. After she goes to bed, I do my paperwork each night from 9pm – midnight. Sometimes I feel like I’m burning the candle at both ends, but at the same time, I’m also the most productive and creative at night. I kind of enjoy the quiet of the house when everyone’s in bed.

Alex: How do you enjoy spending time with family and friends?

Sarah: My favourite day of all is Saturday morning! My husband Joe makes us breakfast, and we do the crossword together like a bunch of nerds, and Zoë sits on his lap and colours. Oh, and there’s lots of coffee. That’s heaven to me! Also, I grew up in the Mono Cliffs Provincial Park. My family does a lot of hiking together. The Cliffs are very central to us!

Alex: What has been the most fulfilling role you’ve ever had, or the most fulfilling project you’ve been involved with so far?

Sarah: Oh man… that’s a hard one to answer for me. The Olympics defined and changed my life forever in ways I could never have imagined. But at the same time, the experience and the end results were tough. We were fourth in 2008 by 0.72 of a second. Any one thing could have changed that day and we would be medalists.

Next I moved into a role that was definitely a calling and a passion project. I was the Director of Operations for More Than Gold, and facilitated involvement of hundreds of volunteers, churches and organizations in the 2015 Pan Am Games. That was fulfilling and immensely challenging. I learned so much that I will take with me forever. A Director of Operations has to know so many things! I felt vastly underprepared, but the outcomes were so amazing to see.

But now, I feel like I am really living out my dream. I’m finally satisfying that inward, burning desire to work with kids with different abilities that has always been inside of me. All of my kids are so unique and funny and different. Because I work in paediatrics, I see a lot of kids that are still undiagnosed. We are all trying to figure out how to help them be their best, and we aren’t limited by a whole lot of extra info or opinions. It’s a privilege to walk this part of a kids’ life with them.

Alex: What’s one career planning lesson that has made a significant difference in your life?

Sarah: When I retired from sport, all of my coaches were telling me how well set up I would be to find a job. Everyone was telling us that Olympians had all of these great qualities that would make them amazing candidates for any job. All of this is true, however it didn’t play out like that, and doesn’t for most athletes. We sacrifice a lot of real-world experience for sport, and many athletes have put off education as well. I was trying to move into the healthcare field, but I had spent two more years after I graduated, trying out for the 2012 Olympics, and had this gap of practical experience. No one cared about the Olympics… just that I didn’t have 3 – 5 years of direct experience. I put out 50 resumes and didn’t even get one interview.

I learned that careers are just like sports too. You have to build up from the bottom. It’s hard. Experience matters, and you have to earn it. There are no shortcuts. Within my career now, I am very excited about all of the professional development opportunities that are coming up. There’s so much room to grow, and I’m so passionate now about becoming a really good, confident and effective therapist. But they are all skills that need to be practiced!! It was really, really hard to come to terms with being at the very top of one part of my life, and then the very bottom of the next. But if you aren’t willing to acknowledge that, then you might not even get the opportunity to take that first step where you need to start.

Alex: What would you like your legacy to be?

Sarah: I hope the people that I’ve interacted with, and kids that I’ve worked with, will come away with a feeling of hope. I want people to think, “Wow, she really got me. She really listened.” I hope I can continue to start fresh with each person, and never be the person who limits their abilities, but instead lifts them up. I want them to have the same sense of hope and purpose that I’ve found!

Alex: Thank you, Sarah, for taking part in the interview! Thank you for your openness and insights!

Did you find one or more of Sarah's insights helpful? Are there any ideas or resources that came to mind as you read the interview? Please share your thoughts and feedback in the comments section below, and consider sharing the interview with a friend via social media or email.

Also, consider checking out the How to Reach Your Potential interviews with Trina Boos, Hamza Khan, James Tjan, Vlad Rascanu, Drew Dudley, Alexandru Holicov, Andrew Mizzoni, Christa Dickenson and Louise Adongo. Thank you.

[starrycrusade]

Why I Hate School

I know I should be grateful for the education that I have received. I know that many will just view this as the whinings of a teenager. I know that others have it worse than I do. I know. 

I just need to vent a bit. 

I have been going to the same small, private school since 1st grade. It’s all I know. I’ve had the same classmates for 11 years. I’ve had the same teachers for 11 years. I’ve had the same administrators for 11 years. I know this school better than most. 

These past 11 years, I’ve made some observations: 

1. Gossip spreads like wildfire. Most of it starts out as truth, but as time goes on it turns into a big lie. 

2. If you aren’t in a clique, you don’t have friends. Even if you are the type of person that is friendly with everyone, you don’t have friends. 

3. The teachers are either amazing or terrible, depending on whether or not they like you.

4. 75% of classwork is busywork, and is completely unnecessary.

5. 75% of homework is busywork, and is completely unnecessary. 

6. You can work as hard as you like, but in the end you and the person who didn’t work at all will get the same grade. 

7. Discipline is relative. If you are a good student you will get punished more than a student who gets in trouble more often.  

8. Carpool is a lie. One parent ends up driving every one else’s kids. It’s never fair. It’s just like having a bus, but free.

9. Everyone was “best friends” with students, alumni, and teachers that died. 

10. There are very few boys who you can date because most boys either have a girlfriend, are socially awkward/ complete jerks, or are gay. Seriously, you would be surprised at how many gay couples can be found in a Christian school. 

These are but a few, but I don’t want to bore you. How about a real life example? 

The worst experience I’ve had at this school (by far) was my 5th grade/ 7th grade teacher. Thankfully, I don’t have any classes with her, but I still have to see this woman everyday. 

It all started when I got sick during school. I was in 5th grade, and I was mortified when I came in from lunch and barfed all over my desk. My teacher was pregnant at the time, and when it happened she ran out of the room because she didn’t want me to get her baby sick. The teacher then called for all the other children to leave the classroom so that they wouldn’t get sick either. 

She called the janitor before she called the nurse. It was actually the janitor who called the nurse for her. I don’t remember much else from that day except that I went home early, and that once I came back, 5th grade would never be the same.

My teacher had liked me before. The class was challenging, but she was always there to answer questions. She wasn’t nasty to me, and I did not hate her. I did not understand why other kids in the class didn’t like her. 

When I came back from being sick, my desk had been moved as far away from my teacher’s as possible. She would no longer answer my questions, and when she did she complained that I wasn’t smart enough. Suddenly, my papers that I wrote were getting worse grades. 

She also had this weird policy in math where she gave certain kids one homework and other kids another. She said it was because she didn’t want us to cheat. The reality was that one homework was significantly easier than the other. She switched me to the harder homework.  Suddenly, homework that would take me fifteen minutes took me over an hour. This was just math- I had other homework, too. I started my homework as soon as I got home every day (around 4pm), but I wouldn’t finish it until 8 or 9 pm. I was in 5th grade. It’s no wonder why I would always cry on my way home from school everyday. 

I remember we had this kid in our class who had autism (my parents were close friends with his so I knew this kind of stuff), and one day my teacher spent a solid 20 minutes yelling at him. She told him he was retarded and would never have a future. My whole class watched, horrified. He was sobbing the whole time. He never came back to our school after that day. 

Eventually, 5th grade ended and my teacher left to have her baby. I was so happy to finally be done with her! But it didn’t last for long.

In 7th grade, she was hired again as a math teacher. My math teacher. I though that since 5th grade had been a long time ago, she would have forgiven the sins of my past, but no. She was just as viscous as ever. 

She still had the different homework policy in place, and I was once again put in the hard group. I think I learned most of my math from my parents that year, because she refused to answer any of my questions because I “wasn’t listening.” 

The worst part of that year was when she called me out in front of the whole class. I get it. I was in 7th grade. I was weird and crazy and still going through my anime phase. But looking back, I think this is where my social anxiety stems from. I still remember her calling me up to the front of the class (which really surprised me, since she still treated me like I had the plague) and saying these exact words:

“I don’t know why you think you’re funny. You’re not- you’re just annoying. Everyone in your class thinks it. And the more you try to fit in the worse you get. Don’t you understand that no one wants to be friends with you? Why do you keep trying so hard. You’ll never fit in. You aren’t smart. What are you even doing here?” 

When I told my parents, they must have thought I was overreacting because they said, “Just deal with it. It’s not that bad.” 

I barely talked to anyone for the rest of the year, fearing that I would just be bothering them. I lost basically all of my friends during this time. 

Ever since then I’ve had to hang out with the outcasts. I don’t feel like one of them. To me, they are hopelessly socially awkward. They’re the closest things to friends that I got. I feel like a terrible friend though. I don’t like them at all. People don’t like to hang out with me because they associate me with them. I can’t make new friends. So I just hang out with them, so that they can have a shitty friend, and so that I don’t feel so alone. 

And I know what you’re thinking, “Why don’t you just talk to your parents and have them send you to another school?” Trust me, I’ve tried. Both my siblings, who are alumni of that school, have tried for me. They’ve had similar experiences. 

My parents love this school because they want me to grow up in a Christian environment. I don’t mind that so much. But they are blind to the obvious flaws that this school has. They think that the good outweighs the bad. But it doesn’t.

Our school has basically no fine arts program. They education is second only to sports. Most teachers don’t care. Most students don’t care.Those of us who do work hard get the same grades as those who don’t. We don’t have a guidance councilor. Our school is barely accredited. The church takes all the money the school makes for its own ministries.  

I have two more years left. I really hope it gets better. 

[ixvyupdates]

Here Are 4 Tips To Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves

Raising two kids has taught me a lot about how to help children become their best selves. Four key themes have emerged in my years as a mother, and I believe they will be helpful for all the parents and educators out there, the people shaping the lives of our children.

1. Speak an affirmation statement to your children

Affirmation is a strong encouraging proclamation. Positive talk molds the emotional well-being and beliefs of your children.

Imagine that you are 4 years old. Your mom and dad tell you how dumb you are daily. Flash forward a decade and you’re a high school freshman who’s only heard negative talk for 10 years. Your parents have not affirmed your intelligence, have not confirmed your ability to do and now you do not believe that you can achieve greatness.

My daughter was born to a mother who was an addict. I met her three weeks after her birth, and she needed four more weeks in the hospital to get the drugs out of her system.

God told me to find a scripture to speak over her and I have spoken it for four years. Psalm 139:14 states, “You are fearfully and wonderfully made.” It means that God made you full of life and you are unique, special and made with purpose.

I have spoken that phrase to her consistently since she was three weeks old—after hearing me do it, my husband started doing the same. She now says it herself and is full of joy when she says it. I have affirmed that she is a special, delicate, wonderful person. A lot of folks told me she would experience many difficulties because of what she was predisposed to. But I do not allow her beginning to define her identity.

So I want to ask that every parent find an affirmation statement to say to their children. I found mine in my faith and if you are not a person of faith then find an inspirational quote that aligns to your values.

2. Read and converse with your children constantly

My husband and I are constantly conversing with our children about various topics. I also read to and with them as time permits every week. As a working parent, I find it difficult to carve out the quality time, so I have learned that the car is my classroom.

My daughter can identify the letter Z—the first letter of her name—on any license plate because I am constantly pointing it out. She and I chat about brushing her teeth, washing her face, the outfit she will wear, the snack she will have in the morning, where we are going in the morning, the traffic, etc.

Essentially, we talk from the time she wakes up until I drop her off at daycare in the morning. Why? She needs to hear as much language as possible so that her brain is stimulated and ready to learn.

I will admit that I do not talk to her as much on my way home because I am exhausted but I do ask her about her day before I go silent or put on music, take a phone call, etc. She also brings me a book to read to her a few times a week and she thinks she can read because some of the stories are very familiar to her.

3. Do not put limits on your kids or allow others to do so

My son is on the autism spectrum—likely Asperger’s—which means his social skills are not natural to him like you and me. Therefore, because I recognized early that he had a deficit, my husband and I filled the gap with as much as possible.

Well meaning people gave me a laundry list of what he would not be able to do (tie his shoes, ride a bike, care for himself, do anything that was not dependent on my husband or me). He’s proving them wrong.

My son has had an individualized education plan (IEP) since he was 4 years old, and he has progressively built his independence through school. We have moved from him having a one-on-one aide in first through third grade, to a shared aide in fourth through sixth grade, to a resource class in seventh and eighth grade and to only social work and counselor support for high school.

My husband and I put him in Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, a small groups at Rush University Arts Center, a small group with a speech language pathologists to teach him social skills and a computer coding class with BDPA at Roosevelt University.

On his own, my son has joined at school the Anti-Bullying Club, Math Club and this year will be entering his second year as a debate team member. Yes, debate team. My son, the boy who so many people said wouldn’t be able to communicate, is no longer afraid to speak in public. He’s doing so well that, when he recently went to a 10-day summer camp, I only got two phone calls with a request.

My son can have a conversation with anyone because my husband and I did not allow people to put barriers around his abilities. Yes, he still needs some social development and social skills growth, but I am confident that he will be fine.

Please know that although I did not have an affirmation statement for my son, I did constantly talk and read to him and I did not allow people to tell me what he could not do. When a parent gets a diagnosis of autism and they start to lose hope, I encourage them to expose that child to as much as possible and see what the outcome will be.

I was (and am) stubborn, I did not buy into what autistic kids cannot do and I did not buy into what effects drugs have on kids. I push my kids as far as they can go and not as far as someone says they will go.

4. Share and live your values and traditions with your children

Recently, my husband and I have been talking to our son about what we value as a family. We wanted to know what he sees as the principles we live by, standards of behavior and what is important to us. He can tell us what they are.

My son shared that faith, education, family time and finances are important to our family. My husband and I agreed. We are Christians so we attend church on Sunday, we pray as a family and we read the Bible.

I am an educator and my husband works in a high school so we expect that our kids will be third-generation college students.

We spend time together as a family on weekends, family vacations, dinner time, driving, etc. We had a blast on a recent family vacation in Tennessee.

We are good stewards of our money. We do not have cable television, I do not buy my kids the latest clothes and shoes because I value experiences over things. We go to dinner a couple of times a week, my son is in summer camp, we have checking, savings, mutual funds, retirement funds and more.

My son went to camp this summer for 10 days by himself and he had $50 to spend and he only spent $20. Why? He said that he does not like giving away his money too quickly because he wants to save it.

Remember that you are your child’s first teacher. What impression are you leaving on them as they grow and develop into adults?

Photo by Eye For Ebony, Unsplash-licensed.

Here Are 4 Tips To Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves syndicated from https://sapsnkraguide.wordpress.com

[ixvyupdates]

Here Are 4 Tips To Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves

Raising two kids has taught me a lot about how to help children become their best selves. Four key themes have emerged in my years as a mother, and I believe they will be helpful for all the parents and educators out there, the people shaping the lives of our children.

1. Speak an affirmation statement to your children

Affirmation is a strong encouraging proclamation. Positive talk molds the emotional well-being and beliefs of your children.

Imagine that you are 4 years old. Your mom and dad tell you how dumb you are daily. Flash forward a decade and you’re a high school freshman who’s only heard negative talk for 10 years. Your parents have not affirmed your intelligence, have not confirmed your ability to do and now you do not believe that you can achieve greatness.

My daughter was born to a mother who was an addict. I met her three weeks after her birth, and she needed four more weeks in the hospital to get the drugs out of her system.

God told me to find a scripture to speak over her and I have spoken it for four years. Psalm 139:14 states, “You are fearfully and wonderfully made.” It means that God made you full of life and you are unique, special and made with purpose.

I have spoken that phrase to her consistently since she was three weeks old—after hearing me do it, my husband started doing the same. She now says it herself and is full of joy when she says it. I have affirmed that she is a special, delicate, wonderful person. A lot of folks told me she would experience many difficulties because of what she was predisposed to. But I do not allow her beginning to define her identity.

So I want to ask that every parent find an affirmation statement to say to their children. I found mine in my faith and if you are not a person of faith then find an inspirational quote that aligns to your values.

2. Read and converse with your children constantly

My husband and I are constantly conversing with our children about various topics. I also read to and with them as time permits every week. As a working parent, I find it difficult to carve out the quality time, so I have learned that the car is my classroom.

My daughter can identify the letter Z—the first letter of her name—on any license plate because I am constantly pointing it out. She and I chat about brushing her teeth, washing her face, the outfit she will wear, the snack she will have in the morning, where we are going in the morning, the traffic, etc.

Essentially, we talk from the time she wakes up until I drop her off at daycare in the morning. Why? She needs to hear as much language as possible so that her brain is stimulated and ready to learn.

I will admit that I do not talk to her as much on my way home because I am exhausted but I do ask her about her day before I go silent or put on music, take a phone call, etc. She also brings me a book to read to her a few times a week and she thinks she can read because some of the stories are very familiar to her.

3. Do not put limits on your kids or allow others to do so

My son is on the autism spectrum—likely Asperger’s—which means his social skills are not natural to him like you and me. Therefore, because I recognized early that he had a deficit, my husband and I filled the gap with as much as possible.

Well meaning people gave me a laundry list of what he would not be able to do (tie his shoes, ride a bike, care for himself, do anything that was not dependent on my husband or me). He’s proving them wrong.

My son has had an individualized education plan (IEP) since he was 4 years old, and he has progressively built his independence through school. We have moved from him having a one-on-one aide in first through third grade, to a shared aide in fourth through sixth grade, to a resource class in seventh and eighth grade and to only social work and counselor support for high school.

My husband and I put him in Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, a small groups at Rush University Arts Center, a small group with a speech language pathologists to teach him social skills and a computer coding class with BDPA at Roosevelt University.

On his own, my son has joined at school the Anti-Bullying Club, Math Club and this year will be entering his second year as a debate team member. Yes, debate team. My son, the boy who so many people said wouldn’t be able to communicate, is no longer afraid to speak in public. He’s doing so well that, when he recently went to a 10-day summer camp, I only got two phone calls with a request.

My son can have a conversation with anyone because my husband and I did not allow people to put barriers around his abilities. Yes, he still needs some social development and social skills growth, but I am confident that he will be fine.

Please know that although I did not have an affirmation statement for my son, I did constantly talk and read to him and I did not allow people to tell me what he could not do. When a parent gets a diagnosis of autism and they start to lose hope, I encourage them to expose that child to as much as possible and see what the outcome will be.

I was (and am) stubborn, I did not buy into what autistic kids cannot do and I did not buy into what effects drugs have on kids. I push my kids as far as they can go and not as far as someone says they will go.

4. Share and live your values and traditions with your children

Recently, my husband and I have been talking to our son about what we value as a family. We wanted to know what he sees as the principles we live by, standards of behavior and what is important to us. He can tell us what they are.

My son shared that faith, education, family time and finances are important to our family. My husband and I agreed. We are Christians so we attend church on Sunday, we pray as a family and we read the Bible.

I am an educator and my husband works in a high school so we expect that our kids will be third-generation college students.

We spend time together as a family on weekends, family vacations, dinner time, driving, etc. We had a blast on a recent family vacation in Tennessee.

We are good stewards of our money. We do not have cable television, I do not buy my kids the latest clothes and shoes because I value experiences over things. We go to dinner a couple of times a week, my son is in summer camp, we have checking, savings, mutual funds, retirement funds and more.

My son went to camp this summer for 10 days by himself and he had $50 to spend and he only spent $20. Why? He said that he does not like giving away his money too quickly because he wants to save it.

Remember that you are your child’s first teacher. What impression are you leaving on them as they grow and develop into adults?

Photo by Eye For Ebony, Unsplash-licensed.

Here Are 4 Tips To Help Your Kids Be Their Best Selves syndicated from https://sapsnkraguide.wordpress.com