31 for 21: Day 17 Living Life....

one way that we as parents of children who have special needs advocate for them is simply by living our lives as we would if our child didn't have a special need!   we don't "hide" our children, as parents' were encouraged to do merely 30 years ago....or so i thought.   i recently had a friend tell us that when her 10 year old daughter was born.....read that again....10 year old daughter.....just 10 years ago....she was offered the option of putting her away somewhere.   I WAS SHOCKED that as recently as 10 years ago that was still considered an appropriate reaction to a child with Down syndrome.   unbelievable!  
my friends doris and ray told me that when their son mark was born about 33 years ago they were offered that option.  this young couple, in their early 20's, who had never even heard of Down syndrome, knew nothing about it, were asked if they wanted to "put him away."   their first born child.... they told them that "no, he is not a puppy....we will be taking him home!"   and that's what they did!




i'm sure that it was hard for them back then; i'm sure they had lots of stares and comments..... we still get stares, don't we?     and as awkward and frustrating as they can be, we must still continue to "live life" with our kiddos.   folks need to see that our family is just like their family.....we do fun things together, we discipline kids when they have fits, we comfort crying children......just like they do!  






so today's pics are from a favorite pastime of ours....eating frozen yogurt!   last week we were able to have a brief  visit with ethan over in pensacola while tim had a meeting, so the boys and i enjoyed a visit to the new yogurt place...... yummy!