Trust

Eleven years ago, a few families, one conductor, and a non-profit agency all trusted me to make a leap and start a little Conductive Education program. Here we are now, and Anne and her family have pulled up their Manitoba roots and made the leap out to B.C. to build on that trust. Susie Mallet in Germany, and Andrew Sutton in England fanned the flames of that idea; and I am very very very very happy to report that Moving Ahead Conductive Consulting is getting busier each month: and Purpose Conductive Education is proud and happy to offer more CE to families this Spring, and this coming summer.

It's nothing short of amazing. And I believe that more amazing things are coming. A resident conductor is incomparable to itinerant conductors. INCOMPARABLE, and that is a thing one can trust. Zsipp-Zsupp!

There's a bump on a blog, in a hole, at the bottom of the sea.

Put a trademark on the sun,
Copyright sit, walk, and run;
Give me a break, for shame for sham
and twist a good thing into a scam.
Price it past nonsense and schedule it wrong.
Bureaucracy listens to its own song!
But a piece of wood, a little tape,
a sniffling parent sitting agape
at five minutes' wonder, so long awaited.
Something's seriously under-rated!
And flim and flam fill out their papers
while Pumpkin teaches unteachable capers
to overly-strapped-in specialty types
still rubbed ignorantly with baby-wipes.
O Canada, O modern man,
is this what we think when we ask if we can
drain more dollars from that CP stuff?
I say forget it; we have quite enough.
That boy, that child, that girl with the glasses
deserves more than the funding of special needs classes;
though less when you look at it honest and true,
I dare say not yet, what we mean to do.

Hmm, I think I've just about had enough . . .

Well, I don't mean to bring anyone down; but holy smokes, I don't think I can take it any longer. Talking about conductive education; screw that, I'm not even talking conductive education, I'm just talking about my son's ability to stand up and how to assist him to continue using his legs; generally speaking.

Nobody cares! There are the few, my friends, Pumpkin, a few others; but the "professionals"? Anyone 'certified' who actually wears the badge and talks the talk of "working with these kids"; well, hmmm, one might as well go outside and ask the seagulls if they've seen the first robin of Springtime yet.

In the meantime, and despite it, the first Spring Session of Conductive Education since 2008 is rolling out the drooly carpet in mid-March. Nice to know that some things don't have to go the way of the Dodo bird. Hoping and praying and talking too much isn't necessarily my idea of a nice tradition. Assembling the plinth tables, getting some more whoopee cushions, signing up a few volunteers, and running to the coffee shop to the tunes of a small learning group singing the potty song: these are fine traditions and I will be practicing them again soon, with a sense that everything is alright in the world.

Zsipp - Zsupp, join the group!

Best explanation ever!

Viktoria, the conductor, has explained CE better than I've EVER seen, heard, or read. Thanks, Viktoria! Follow the link below.


http://www.exceptionalfamilytv.com/blogs/families/janet/conductors-point-view-conductive-upbringing

Spring Break session is on.

In addition to all the work Anne is doing now, she's gearing up for the spring break session at Purpose. Check the website for details.

http://www.purposesociety.org/conductive/conded.html

Minnesota!

Wow, just great being home for the holidays. Temperatures ranging from -8C to 1C, snowbanks piled up to five feet high everywhere. Glistening white snow, and all the houses of my friends and families that aren't tweaked in the least for a boy with CP. Wow. I didn't realize just how much Roxy and I have planned everything around Blue and his "situation."
So, to make it a little easier for us, we used a kaboodle of our 'Avion' points to pay for part of the hotel; and here we are on night 3 of 11 in a small, fully furnished hotel. I must say, the things we're learned over the years about food prep, facilitated movement, and communication; it all comes into play now almost somewhat desperately.
It was most interesting to see my nieces stand respectfully around, watching Blue sitting on my lap as if he were some fragile creature. Nobody really loosened up until I began rolling about in the living room a little with Blue. What can a guy do? Last time we visited without Blue,making the impression that we can run, jump, and play about like a typical Aunt or Uncle. This time, we're with Blue; and everyone has to kind of start over again re-learning who he is and how we is with him. Very interesting. I probably shouldn't even be blogging here, because how that process is working out is something I can't really explain yet.
All I know is that it filled me with peace and happiness driving my Dad's mini-van back to the hotel and looking across so many snow-covered yards to see Christmas trees lit up and sparkling in the front windows of so many cozy homes. Just having all three of us there to enjoy it was/is wonderful. Ahhh. Home.

Goldfish Again

Holy smokes, would you ever think your friendly, little, "community" tank would become a place of predation? No. But the goldfish, being the biggest fish in the tank, and hungry all the time, began eating the other littler fish. Ha! Am I surprised? Not a whit. IF the goldfish serves as a metaphor for conductive education (because it survived every other fish as the tank cycled through its various concentrations of biology)then what else would one expect it to do?

Being surrounded by a lot of bureacratic brown-nosers and wimps extraordinaires - the goldfish probably said to itself, "Right. Well, if this is as far they can go, I shall eat them." Seems fair to me. But, what must I do as the keeper of these stupid fish? After three had been eaten, I had to do something, and in true form, there's no way I am going to give over the goldfish. I bought a "divider." The goldfish remains in the same tank with the others, but there is a big plastic, permeable wall keeping it away from the other fish.

Maybe I should follow through and get rid of all the other fancy, wimpy, loser fish and give the whole tank to the goldfish. If it is to serve as an allegory for my journey with CE, that would be the way to do it. On the other fin, if it is to serve as an allegory for this odd world in which I swim, I ought to rename all the other animals after the various 'therapists' involved in my son's life. And sadly, I continue to protect them from the consuming power of conductive education because politics demands no less. Humiliation, separation, and loss: but none of it matters in the end because my boy is sleeping peacefully in my arms during those afternoon naps. My God, if Anne-Christiane wasn't here, I'd go nuts. Truly, round-the-bend, bonkers: nuts.