Coincidences, Blessings, Early On, and Special Ed

I once heard someone say that "Coincidences are when God works a miracle and decides to remain anonymous." I've always loved that definition, and I think it applies to a coincidence that recently occurred in our lives.

My cousin, Kim, was at her 3 1/2 year old daughter's dance class one day when she struck up a conversation with another mom. The other mom's daughter had glasses, and Kim asked her when she got the glasses and how she knew that her little girl needed glasses. The other mom answered that her daughter was born with an eye condition. Imagine Kim's surprise when she said that her daughter had aniridia! Kim said, "My cousin's little girl has that!", which surprised the other mom, since nobody's ever heard of the condition. Through Kim, we were able to exchange contact information, and we've been emailing since, whenever we both find time in our schedules to actually sit down and compose an email. :-)

What a blessing to talk with someone who knows all about this condition, and who is farther on this journey than we are! (Elizabeth, if you're reading this, thank you for being willing to share!) I have learned so much already just from the few emails we've been able to trade.

One of the many helpful things she mentioned to me in an email was "Have you received Early On services yet?" Being the newbie to this whole situation that I am, my response was "Um, what's Early On?" :-) Turns out that Early On is a service provided by your county to children ages birth to 3 years that either have development delays or have conditions that will likely lead to developmental delays. Visual impairments of any sort qualify your child for Early On.

I had been wondering how to help Elli - how to maximize her vision, how to help her as she grows to lead her life as normally as possible, etc. - but had no idea how to go about it or even whom to contact for help. Based on Elizabeth's recommendation, I referred Elli to Early On, and we had our first home visit this past Monday.

Two people from Early On came to evaluate Elli to determine if she qualifies for their services - a school psychologist (Holly), and a vision consultant (April). They spent about an hour and half here, playing with Elli, and basically seeing what Elli can do and what she can't do. They were absolutely wonderful with her, and Elli warmed right up to them both. It was comforting to speak with people who understood my thoughts and questions before I really even asked them, and who are used to dealing with visually impaired children.

They said that, due to Elli's vision, she qualifies not only for Early On (which is a once a month program), but also for Special Education, which allows them to give her 2-3 hours a week of care. As such, we will have April (the vision consultant) come into our home 2 times a week for an hour each time to work with Elli and to give me ideas on how to work with Elli to maximize and strengthen the vision she has. We will also bring Elli to a special infant "class" once a week, where she can be monitored while playing with an occupational therapist, speech therapist, etc. This will allow them to catch any delays that may occur very early, thus helping minimize any issues as much as possible. April will be Elli's primary care provider, but she will be able to call in others as needed if her vision starts to affect other areas of her life. (I have a feeling that April will soon feel like one of the family!)

Their first visit has already helped us learn so much. Here are some of the things we learned:

1) As some of you know, Elli has greatly struggled with the whole concept of eating baby food. She has always nursed well, but even though we've worked with "solids" for more than 3 months, she still doesn't get the concept. Elizabeth, in one of her emails, mentioned that her daughter had some eating issues, which is common with visually impaired children. I thought "Hey, maybe that's the problem here!" When April and Holly were here on Monday, they both nodded knowingly when I said that she doesn't eat solids well at all, and they said they could schedule the occupational therapist to come to our home and help us figure out ways to help her learn to eat.

2) Some of you also know that Elli is a very energetic child - she loves to rock, bounce, and basically move in any way that she can. April said that's not unusual in a visually impaired child - she is basically looking for additional sensory stimulation, so she rocks, bounces, etc. to receive that stimulation. She said that carrying her around in a sling, snuggling her closely, putting your hand on her back, etc. are all good ways to give her extra sensory stimulation. She said that we often have to teach visually impaired children not to rock, since that's not socially acceptable as they grow older. It was good to learn that information, too!

3) Other good news was that Elli's gross motor skills, fine motor skills, social and emotional skills, etc. are all normal for her age, and in some cases (like gross motor skills), she is ahead of the game. So basically, she is developing normally. We were pretty sure that was the case, but it was still encouraging to receive confirmation.

4) April said she can give me all kinds of information about children with visual impairments, so I know what are typical struggles for those children. That way, when we run into something (like her eating), I'll know that it's linked, instead of struggling with it for long periods of time first.

5) April also gave me the phone number for the Michigan Parents of Visually Impaired Children, which is a resource of others who have walked or are walking this road. It's always wonderful to find out what resources are available!

6) I received my first "homework" assignment from April. She asked me to take close-up pictures of the faces of family/friends that Elli sees regularly, so that we can make a book for her to look at (and chew on...LOL). The goal is to help her learn to focus in on faces that are familiar to her. So, if I come up and stick a camera in your face in the near future, you'll know why... :-) (And if I don't, don't feel offended or think you're not important in her life - I'm not sure how big April wants this book to be, so we'll start off with a few and add people as time goes on.)

So many blessings to be thankful for in this story - for Elizabeth and Kim's initial conversation, for Elizabeth being willing to share and give so many good ideas, for the Early On/Special Ed staff and for all that they will be able to do in the coming months/years for Elli as they come alongside us to help her grow, for confirmation that she's developing so well, and for the chance to get connected to others who have visually impaired children.