Welcome to Holland

(this is a picture from Sara & Emma's first day of school)

I haven't posted now for a few months, missed the 3rd birthday and everything. I will probably had some pictures of the bday and also Christmas later but this week brought us some changes in our family.

WELCOME TO HOLLAND

by
Emily Perl Kingsley.

c1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

I have known for a while that the girls were "behind" and different. They didn't walk until they were 18 months. They didn't say at least 50 words at 2 years. I took comfort when someone would tell me, oh that is normal for twins, or preemies, or anything. But it started to be apparent I could just hope they would out grow their delay or I could seek out resources to help them. That is what I have been up to, taking them to an Early Intervention program called Kids on the Move. They would get speech classes and home visits from there. When they turned 3 they aged out of that program and we had to go through all of the testing with the Special Education department of the local school district. These tests are long and hard and almost impossible to do by myself so I have had Nathan take those mornings off from work. I have filled out countless forms, spoke on the phone with 5 specialists for each girl, we have gone to what is called an IEP meeting--the special services/special ed planning meeting, and we have prayed. So this week the girls were classified as developmentally delayed, they are in a Special Education preschool two days a week at the local school, the same one that Hannah attends. They are in different classes, the teachers and specialists that work with them are amazing.

For someone who loves children, spent most of her adult life teaching them, and wants more-regardless of how they come, this whole process has been humbling, so humbling. I have had to turn back to God again and say "I can't do this alone. I need your help, how am I supposed to raise and help the children that you have trusted me to raise."

Welcome to Holland, and it is beautiful!