Vanessa's Vignettes

Can Mormons have more than one wife? And do they?

2012-02-12T09:30:00.000+01:00

Here is another little Mormon Trivia for the day. I realize that there are way more important doctrinal issues to clarify than this one, but since this is one of the major misconceptions about Mormons, and crazy Warren Jeffs is in the news again, I thought it a good opportunity to set the record straight. Now please know, that the following is not an official church sanctioned message. This is simply how I as a faithful member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints deal with the issue of polygamy in our church history, and why I do not leave the church just because at one point it did practice polygamy.

So first some facts:

Yes, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints did practice polygamy at one point in their history.
Not everyone was required to marry more than one wife. It was given through revelation and commandment and usually only to leaders.
The church discontinued the practice on 26 September 1890.
The law (called the law of chastity) by which the members of the church live and are judged today is to not have sex before marriage and be completely faithful during marriage. If someone commits adultery but confesses and repents, typically they get disfellowshipped for a while (which means they are not allowed to take the sacrament, or hold any service positions in the church), or they get excommunicated (which means their names are taken off the records of the church). Depending on the severity of the sin, h/she is either disfellowshipped or excommunicated. However, the idea in this action is not to shun the person and treat him as an outcast, but to help them repent, and change their ways. Everyone who wants support will get support.

First of all the idea of sharing my husband is completely repulsive to me in my current understanding. I do however accept that in this life I do not have a perfect understanding, and so for now I would rather not worry about it. I also had issues with the patriarchs in the Bible having more than one wife, without ever seeming to explain why that was OK. Whenever I have a question such as this "Why would God allow polygamy?" I always look in the scriptures to find my answers, and then I pray about it. I recognize my answers from God in this way: I feel peaceful and clear in my mind, not confused.

There is a chapter in the Book of Mormon written by Jacob, a prophet. In this chapter he chastises the members of the church because of pride. And then he goes on to chastise them for their whoredoms. So this is what he says:
24 Behold, David and ^aSolomon truly had many ^bwives and concubines, which thing was ^cabominable before me, saith the Lord.

25 Wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a ^arighteous branch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph.

26 Wherefore, I the Lord God will not suffer that this people shall do like unto them of old.

27 Wherefore, my brethren, hear me, and hearken to the word of the Lord: For there shall not any ^aman among you have save it be^bone ^cwife; and concubines he shall have none;

OK, so here we have it. As I believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God, I can see clearly here that the commandment of God is to have only one wife. So, the question then is of course, well why did they have more than one wife in the history of the church and in the bible? Isn't that a contradiction?

A little later in the same chapter, God explains the one exception.

30 For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up ^aseed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things.

For those who are unfamiliar with scriptural language "raise up seed" means to have children, usually for the purpose of growing a population. So that tells me that polygamy is a means to an end, an exception to the law to fulfill God's purpose.

So the question to me is, what were the circumstances back in 1800's that led God to command the leaders of the church back then to have more than one wife?
The "Mormon's" were persecuted in the US almost like the Jews in Europe. There was nothing short of full blown genocide in the works with the extermination order in Missouri.

They were driven from place to place starting in Palmyra New York. Wherever they went mobs would gather, rape their women and children, tar and feather, torture, and kill their men, and burn their families alive. In addition to that the treacherous treck into unknown territory fleeing from religious persecution claimed the lives of thousands through starvation, freezing, and illness. In addition to that many of the men joined the Mormon Battalion which was a volunteer unit of the US military to assist the government in the Mexican American war, despite the fact that up to that point the government hadn't helped the Mormons in the least and put no stop to the religious persecution. Many women and children were left husband and fatherless. In order to grow His church, and help the widows at the same time, I believe God commanded the leaders to marry more than one wife. It is my personal belief that for the most part that was neither easy for the leaders, their first wives, nor for those who were given to them as wives. I do believe however that the most important thing God gave everyone is free agency. And just like we have the choice to keep his commandments now or disregard them, they had the choice back then as well to follow that specific commandment. Once the church was established in the West and had grown sufficiently strong, God revoked his commandment and had the church return back to the original order of things.

So, that is how I have come to terms with this part of our history. I hope that after reading this, you will no longer be confused on the subject of polygamy and Mormons. And what Warren Jeffs is doing has nothing to do with our church or with the will of God. God wants first and foremost for everyone to be happy, loved, and cherished.

To read the whole chapter of Jacob 2 see here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/jacob/2?lang=eng

Getting Lasik in Turkey

2012-02-02T20:36:00.002+01:00

So you're considering having your eyes fixed. DO IT! It's awesome.
You wonder where you should have it done, and want the best? Go to Turkey.
There, that was the short version of this blog post.

Why did I go to Turkey of all places? It's cheaper and they have more experienced doctors. I first found a clinic here to test my eyes for free to verify that I qualified for Lasik. I did. They quoted me about 3500 Euros in price for both eyes getting Femto Lasik with wavefront (I recommend you google Femto Lasik and the various Lasik operations. There is no point in me rewriting all the info out there.) The health insurance would cover 500 Euros of the price, but only at one of their clinics that they contract with. In Turkey I paid 1660 Euros for the same surgery, and got 3 nights at a cute hotel and a tour of the city. And the surgery was performed by one of the most experienced surgeons in all of Europe. So that's why I opted for Turkey. It was my first experience in a Muslim country. The reason it's so much cheaper is because they do more surgeries, and they pay their workers less.

So here is my experience with Blu-medi Travel. It is nicely set up. They work exclusively with Dr. Nusret Bas who has a clinic in Rotterdam and Istanbul. I chose Istanbul nonetheless because I wanted to have some alone time, travel somewhere new, and even with hotel and flight it was still cheaper than Rotterdam. I booked my flight to Ataturk (which I really recommend, because traffic is awful, especially coming from the other airport 2.5 hours away).
Charming Demet picked me up from the airport with a little sign. The driver took us to the hotel and she made sure I was set up before leaving me with the information booklet about the surgery, schedule, and some interesting sight seeing points to see.

On the day of the surgery our group was taken to the hospital around 12:00 pm. We sat around for a large part of that afternoon, waiting to get our eyes checked. We had three checks, one of which was performed by Dr. Bas himself. Then we each went into surgery one after another. I was very nervous, but once the eye drops were in I didn't feel much. Demet was there to translate in English and reassure me. The best word I can use to describe the operation itself is trippy. It wasn't really painful. They have to put a little metal brace into the eye to keep it open. That was quite uncomfortable, but again, not painful and it didn't last long. Then when the laser opened the eye I just felt pressure and I saw these cool little laser beams that looked like tiny stars. The whole experience lasted for about 20 minutes. It felt even faster than that. The most painful part of the surgery was taking off the surgical mask they put over my cheeks and forehead. It was like having my face waxed, but then again I was more bothered than others, because I have sensitive skin. After the surgery my vision was hazy. It was uncomfortable to have my eyes open. We waited with closed eyes and sunglasses, in a darkened room for everyone to finish, got our medication, a cake and juice. and got driven back to the hotel, which took about 30 minutes. I got to my room at around 5:00 pm and followed the clinic's advice to take painkillers and get plenty of rest. I slept until the next morning at 7 am. The best way I can describe how your eyes feel after surgery is this: if you've ever worn contacts before, it's like you put them in early in the morning, and forgot about them until the next morning. If you have never worn contacts: it's like having sand in your eyes. What felt best was just to keep my eyes closed. Also being exposed to cold air felt very soothing. I was practically the only one who chose to rest and stay in the hotel. Everybody else went out to eat and drink. They didn't do so well the next day (honestly who drinks alcohol the day they have surgery?) I woke up and could see. After breakfast we were picked up and driven back to the clinic for a check up with Dr. Bas. He checked our eyes, and pronounced us seeing. After that we had lunch and got a fun city tour. The sticky contact lens feeling stayed with me for three days. Now as I'm writing this it's been almost a week, and I don't feel the lens feeling anymore, but my eyes do get dry easily, so I just keep on putting the natural tear drops in.
It takes a while for the vision to settle in, I've been told, but the very next day I could see better and more detailed than I ever have before, even with glasses or lenses. I highly recommend it to anyone. The pain is not dramatic, just kind of uncomfortable.

I chose to have Femto-Lasik because my contacts were hurting my eyes, and I couldn't stand glasses. Also, with my astigmatism my contacts constantly rotated, so I could see nothing at all when they weren't lined up right, and the only company that made my exact lens prescription charged $80 for one monthly lens. Projected lifetime savings in eye care: 33,400 Euros.
I wanted to have this done when I was 20 years old, but back then the surgery was pretty new, so I thought I would give them time to practice it and figure it out, which they have. I will save up money for my boys to have their eyes done when they are 18, because it will save them so much money in the long run.

Merry Christmas! Even if you're not Christian!

2011-12-23T20:40:00.000+01:00

I vowed not to get stressed out this Christmas, and yet here I am two nights before Christmas and I am stressed out about all the things I haven't gotten to do yet, because my kids are at each other's throats and so worked up about getting presents soon, that they are just a wee bit hyper...I mean more than the usual ADHD craziness that goes on around here. The Dutch have it figured out pretty nicely actually. For Christmas here there are no presents. They do the whole getting presents from Santa Clause on December 5th. Except they call him Sinterklaas, and instead of living at the North Pole, relying on airborne reindeer hitched up to a magic sleigh for transportation and a magical bag of toys that some wormhole connects to a large stash of toys back at the pole, Sinterklaas rides a white stallion. He lives in the balmy climate of Spain, and takes a steamboat up to the Netherlands, which is commandeered by his slave boys, called black Petes (they all have the same name), who also carry the presents and stuff them in the shoes the kids leave out over night in front of their door. That way the Dutch get all the gift giving out of the way early in December and are free to celebrate Christmas as the birth of Christ.

So here I am, writing a post instead of wrapping presents, baking special cookies that I know I should probably not be baking anyway, to do a bit of stress relief and clear my mind of the thoughts that have been churning in it ever since I walked my youngest son to his class and saw the Christmas tree and the four advent candles out.
As you may or may not know the Netherlands is a fairly secular country. However, my youngest son goes to a protestant school. They pray every morning. They learn stories from the bible. We are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter Day Saints. I agree with a lot the Protestants do, but think that there is more they could know about. However, I am grateful that M can learn bible stories in school. I'm thrilled that the teachers and the whole school gets into the Christmas spirit by making cards and cookies for a Christmas sale, the proceeds of which went to a local charity. The kids help decorate the tree, they learn songs about the birth of Christ, the angels and shepherds, they give each other presents and cards, and the teachers show them how to properly shake someone's hand, and wish them merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I was further impressed by the Christmas programs they put on in their respective churches. I first attended M's and then this morning E's. Both were well attended by the parents, and everyone was enjoying their kids sing about Jesus, reenact the nativity, and randomly enough, doing choreographed dances to Jingle Bell Rock while wearing a Santa hat.
Yes, I said everyone was enjoying and participating, including the Muslims. About a third of M's school friends are Muslim and for E's school I think there are perhaps a quarter. In fact the population demographic predicts that by 2020 there will be more Muslims in the Netherlands than Dutch. Yet here they are celebrating Christmas along with their children in a Christian church. I couldn't help but think of America and what has happened to our Christian country. We have let the Scrooges take over!

Every 24th of December, whenever it was possible I watch A Christmas Carol. If you are familiar with this timeless classic you might notice that Dickens' story isn't about religion really. Sure, he closes with "God bless us everyone"! That includes every congregation, regardless of which God you believe in (or don't). Scrooge (the main character) was unhappy, selfish, and only concerned about profit and wealth. The Christmas spirits open his eyes to what he has been missing. He sees that early in his childhood he was left to study, instead of spending Christmas with his parents. He became bitter and angry. He was so concerned about what others thought of him and gaining recognition and status that he ended up thinking only about himself. The Spirits of Christmas teach him about the joy of giving to others, happiness in embracing merriment, and kindness to those in need. They teach him to open up the curtain he's been hiding behind and embrace the cheer around him. And he does and not only is he happier for it, but so is everyone else.

I feel like America has been subjected to mass-Scrooge-ing. Why do people in the US choose to be so offended by different beliefs and traditions? How come the Dutch can all gather together and have a great time celebrating a Christian tradition (technically a pagan tradition, and lets face it, in America at times a consumer tradition). Happy Kwanzaa, happy Hanukkah, happy Santa Clause day? Who cares. A party is a party. It doesn't matter whether you believe in it or not. In fact, I think that under close examination you'll find that a lot of Christians don't believe in Christ being literally the Son of God, and some celebrate Santa Clause more than Christ, and a lot of Jews keep their tradition because they are, well...Tradition (humm tune to Fiddler on the Roof opening song). Christmas is a tradition of coming together and thinking more of others. Charles Dickens got that when he wrote A Christmas Carol. If I'm invited to a Muslim Holiday, I will happily join and learn about their holiday. In fact, if I ever move to a Muslim country, I will respect and enjoy their holidays with them, and continue our own Thanksgiving and Christmas in my house. This doesn't threaten my belief. I stand firm in my faith. I have several Jewish friends from High school. I was thrilled to go to a Synagogue with my friend once, and I would still love to experience a genuine passover. So I invite you all who do celebrate Christmas: don't be afraid of offending people by saying merry Christmas. The US is a Christian country and it's their choice to take offense. We don't need to let them take over congress, hold protest marches, get people fired because of their non-belief. Don't back down because of Scrooges. Remember, in the end he changed and became the best merry-maker of all. And to you who feel the need to shoot down or glare at anyone who wishes you merry Christmas, feel the need to sue a school, county, or harass someone for not thinking as you do, I invite you to stop looking for offense where only kindness was meant. After all, people are wishing you merriness. They could instead be saying "have a lonely and miserable day off." Just because you don't want to be merry doesn't mean everyone else has to stop having parties. Take offense or take part, that's your choice! A party is a party! And if you want to be a party pooper and go around saying Bah Humbug to everything you don't believe in, I invite you to watch A Christmas Carol this year. My favorite is the Muppet Christmas Carol. Tomorrow morning I will get to watch it with the kids. And with that I leave you, to go wrap presents and practice for our caroling tomorrow night and wish you all a very merry Christmas.

Diet a religious dilemma?

2011-11-27T19:48:00.001+01:00

I think at this point I could write an opera script about diets. Or a soap opera. It probably wouldn't get very good ratings, although there would be a fair amount of drama associated. Hm, perhaps reality TV is the way to go on that.

OK, if you follow my blog at all since my passionate post about the GAPS diet and how every parent of an autistic child should immediately do it, you know that although the diet has helped us get our kids eating a greater variety of food and we have healthier options, this diet has not been working for us. Ezra's behavior is getting more and more difficult. I read through all the FAQ on the gaps diet website to find answers, I contacted the clinic of the author to schedule an appointment, and they told me that she's no longer taking patients, and to read the book and the FAQ on the website. GREAT! That was helpful...NOT.

Anyway, I still think the theory about the gut flora being out of balance is a good one, and research definitely shows that the intestinal tracts of autistic children are severely compromised. So clearly something must be done to heal and seal the gut. But I'm starting to doubt, and always have that consuming massive amounts of meat, eggs, and animal fat are really the solution. To be fair, of course Dr. Campbell-Mcbride doesn't recommend "massive" amounts, but still, that's pretty much all the kids will eat. It makes sense that the bad bacteria needs to be starved of it's nutrition source (i.e. complex carbs). But on the other hand if the body is fighting chronic inflammation, how can consuming meat and fat, which are supposedly inflammatory going to make that any better, even if they are organically raised and grass fed?

I guess my real dilemma comes from my religious conviction. I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter day Saints. I believe God reveals truths to prophets today just like he did in times of old. In 1833 a prophet called Joseph Smith received a revelation regarding the health and well-being of members. It's a code by which I live, called the word of wisdom. It counsels people to abstain from tobacco, alcohol, coffee, tea (black tea) and drugs (by the way one of the reasons we are counseled to abstain from them is not only because they can cause addiction and are bad for the body, but because of evil conspiring men. How true is that considering drug cartels, tobacco industry etc?) It also counsels people to eat liberally of plants and grains (wheat being especially good for man), use moderation on fruits, and eat meat of animals and fowls sparingly, only in winter and times of famine. This revelation isn't entirely new. The same kind of dietary suggestions can be found throughout the Old and New Testament. Now if you know LDS people at all, you know that they stick pretty well to the "don't" part, but do whatever they like with the "do". In fact, it's fair to say that sugar is the Mormon drug of choice. There is practically no social gathering that doesn't involve food. Anyway, getting off track here.

SOO, my issue has been, if wheat is supposed to be good for us, then why is my kid allergic to gluten? Or what about all the other allergy sufferers, celiacs, etc? Of course, this revelation was given in 1833 and back then wheat was still soaked, fermented, and ground in a way to make it easily digestible, not like the highly processed stuff they have today. Our environment has changed a lot since then and we have so many more pollutants and toxins our body has to deal with. And who knows that the amount of exercise and fresh air they got back then didn't fortify their immune system in a way to never bring up digestive issues. I do believe God wants us to use common sense, and our brains to figure out what is right for ourselves. After all, the word of wisdom is a guideline. But now I'm really at the point where I just can't get any further.

There are so many diets out there and they all claim to help, and often they advocate the exact opposite of each other. In fact, I think the one thing they all agree on is that all the chemical additives, food dyes, pesticides, and so on should be avoided at all costs. Which one is the right one? Feingold, GFCF, TCM, HDN, anti-histamine, GAPS, SCD, Body Ecology, Paleo, South Beach, Atkins, Vegan, Vegetarian, Macrobiotics?

I need a revelation!

Food Fights and Autism

2011-11-21T22:18:00.001+01:00

So here is a video of Ezra tonight having a hard time choosing Option number 2 (see below for explanation). Granny made dinner. When you watch the video, just consider that Ezra has eaten and liked beef in all sorts of shapes and preparation methods before, and he likes it...usually.
As most of you know we use the Son-Rise program at our house. Or at least we pretend to. Really, if you do Son-Rise it's like a life philosophy. Anyway, there is one area where I use more ABA and that is in the area of food. Sometimes I regret going this route, because as is the problem with ABA it doesn't really build relationship or teach them how to love and want to do something (i.e. eat food that is good for them).
Ezra was such a picky eater that he wouldn't accept anything at all unless he got some kind of reward or treat for it. One of the tricky things about doing a GAPS diet for both kids is that I can't use different standards for the kids. Not really. And at first it was actually my younger typically developing son who had a harder time and would throw tantrums before trying a new food. Now he pretty much will try a little bit of everything, but it still takes a while. I started using a dry erase board every time they had a tantrum. I drew a line down the middle and explained to them they had two options.

Option 1:
Cry, scream, hit, throw food, yell, not eat! -->Result: hungry, cranky, nothing else to eat, and eat whatever they didn't eat for breakfast, lunch. And they will also have wasted a lot of my time and energy, which means I won't have much left to play with them after dinner.
Option 2:
Just try a bit of everything, eat most of your food, get more yummy food. -->Result: feel full, happy, and we'll have more time to play together afterwards.

For Micah and Ezra writing things down really helps them understand better what they need to do, to arrive at the result they want. I have started applying the practice of drawing up their options into other areas of our life. I want them to learn that our actions determine our results. If I was the ideal mom I would be able to stay calm and supportive during every break down they have, sadly, I fall short of that ideal multiple times a day. I'm working on it though.

GAPS...so far no luck!

2011-11-13T19:34:00.001+01:00

We have been following the full GAPS diet for almost three months now. It seems like my life is all about food these days. I'm not even following the diet anymore myself. It is so much effort and so expensive, that I would rather have my kids eat the special food, than waste it on myself. After all I am a functioning adult, and other than obesity and mood swings, my health is fine. There is always the little mommy fear My-kids-are-going-to-starve in the back of my mind, and so when they ask me for food after finishing theirs, and my serving is all I have, I would rather give it to them, knowing that I can also survive on something else, if I need to (which is what I have been doing, and the scale is showing it). On the other hand I'm also trying to teach them that they can't just throw a tantrum and get what they want. I make it clear that what I put on the table is what they can eat, and otherwise they will be hungry. So often times, they actually end up a bit hungry, because they refuse to eat. They ask me for food non-stop. It's really aggravating. Ezra is especially obsessed with food. There seems to be no off-switch in his brain, when it comes to eating. He craves fruit like a drug addict craves heroine.

I am in the kitchen so much. I get up in the morning and spend about 1.5 hours in the kitchen. The night before I also spend about an hour after dinner making lunches and preparing breakfasts. That's not including the hour I spend in the kitchen making dinner. What on earth takes so long, you might wonder? Well, if you have to warm up the broth in the pan not the microwave, make fresh juice in the juicer, grind the nuts, and the pancake batter in the food processor, you end up having a lot of dishes to clean. Besides all the ingredients have to be homemade, so there is also a fair amount of prep work that goes into having the ingredients for the foods I make. For example nuts need to be soaked for 8-12 hours in salt water, then drained using a sieve, dried for several hours (ideally overnight) in the dehydrator, and ground into flour in the food processor. It takes organization and time to do GAPS. I'm not very organized. Still, all this work would be worth it if it could heal Ezra's stomach, his ADHD and his autism. IF...Sadly, it's not actually working. All the symptoms that should go away with GAPS are still there, and possibly worse than before. In the last two months we have seen in Ezra

increase in skin rashes
hyperactivity increase and decrease in focus and attention span
aggression and decrease in use of language
painful stomach and undigested food in poop
increased obsession with food

It is sadly possible that we just aren't doing the GAPS diet right. We are on the what is called Full GAPS diet. There is an intro-phase, and technically you shouldn't move past the intro phase until your patient has been symptom free for 6 months. I suspect that if consulted a GAPS practitioner they would point out that Ezra is getting way too much fruit and honey, possibly can't tolerate a lot of eggs, nuts, coconut, and ghee, and that we need to put him on the intro, give him meat broth before every meal, soup once a day, and highly boiled vegetables and meat, until he has sufficiently detoxed, and only then move into full GAPS. I'm also fairly certain they would point out that the non-organic veggies and fruit we feed him are high in pesticides. Dr.Campbell even mentions in her book that GAPS patients can be so sensitive to those pesticides that they really don't improve until it is all out of their diet. And my friend who also has an autistic child would point out that the foods we are giving him are high in salicylates and phenols and can cause all the above reactions. But what can I do? Micah thrives on a high carbohydrate diet. His challenges are helped with more carbs. How can I give him a banana and tell Ezra he may have boiled carrots instead? And how can I watch my child weep, when all the other kids get to have things he can't? It sucks!

Nonetheless I have to admit that in some ways GAPS is simpler than gluten free, casein free, and much healthier. I wouldn't want to go back to GFCF. At least now I know that my kids are getting a wide variety of healthy foods, versus all highly processed carbs. And once you learn about what evil corporations put into food to make it cheap and maximize profit I really don't want to feed my kids that garbage. Ideally my kids could just eat anything. Still, life is more complicated this way. Making nut butter and honey sandwiches for the kids school lunch takes over an hour (with baking the special bread, or 24 hours if you count the time it takes to prepare the nut butter), whereas I can make a sandwich with normal bread and spread in 20 seconds. I don't know what to do, honestly. The science and research behind GAPS makes total sense. It would be so helpful though if we could actually have things confirmed with true practitioners and blood tests or whatever, instead of me having to figure out everything by myself.

England Trip: Longleat and Glastonbury

2011-09-27T22:07:00.001+02:00

Longleat is very impressive. Lord Bath still lives in the palace with his family, but you can visit a section of it. It is very opulent. Lord Bath turned a great deal of his property into a massive theme park with adventure playground, train ride, boat ride, drive through safari, animal shows, and some rides.

The new meerkat walk through enclosure. I wish we could have picked one up and petted them. They're so cute.

The kids loved the train ride through Longleat.

The teacup ride.

The kids love mazes so of course we went in. We liked it for the first 20 minutes. After 40 minutes of being lost in the massive maze it was less fun.

I have an irrational fear of all things that fly around my head. I think my depth perception is a bit off and so often I duck when things are actually not all that close (much to Aaron's annoyance when we're driving in the car). During the bird show the team had the raptors fly close over our head. It cured me of my flying-bird-phobia which is probably thanks to watching Hitchcock's The Birds at a much too early age. These vultures are really massive and we did in fact have to duck to avoid getting hit.

Cute little Peter the Postman village.

One of the funnest thing was seeing the tractor with reinforced frontal steel plate ramming the rhino to keep him off the street.

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, Tigers. Lions are OK too, but love tigers more.

Glastonbury Tor. It is the highest point in the area and was used as a beacon tower.

All the way up the view was magnificent.

Never could get Ezra to look into the camera. Micah does this funny face when I say smile.

Can you see the heart shape in the field behind me?

So I asked a lady if she would take a picture of us. She was just walking up the hill. She flat out refused, and said she was too emotionally overcome by the spirit of the place and didn't want to ruin it with taking a picture. Okkk. Found someone else to take the pic.

Micah was such a trooper. He climbed the hill with his recovering leg. I was very impressed.

Glastonbury is a very quirky little town. It is rumored to be the birthplace of the potentially fictional King Arthur. All sorts of legends about Avalon and Joseph of Aramthea are told, who was supposed to have visited this place with Jesus as a little boy. Well...the jury is out on that one, but honestly, why not? I can't prove or disprove either. But I did find all the little trinkets very amusing.

Fairy wands, and elf crowns.

EWE! Just EWWWW. The nastiest thing I've ever endured.

2011-09-26T23:22:00.000+02:00

I have just experienced the absolute grossest thing in my entire life. SERIOUSLY! My stomach is still churning, and I'm feeling totally queasy. This smell is worse than my brother's size 16 athletic shoes he would wear all day with socks that probably were worn twice. In fact if an entire football team worked out and didn't shower for a week, and spent a night in the locker room with no windows open, I think you still couldn't match the stench of this. So why write about it, when all I really want to do is delete it from my memory? I guess I'm a writing paradox. What is it that makes us want to share and participate in horrible experiences. Yes, I'm talking to you writers, producers and viewers of all these gruesome murder shows like CSI, The Mentalist, Castle, Profiler, 24, or those wretched reality TV shows etc. Yes, it's interesting and entertaining but let's not pretend it isn't a bit weird that we would want to spend our evenings watching people figure out just how exactly someone killed another human being. (And just so you know I love The Mentalist and Castle).

Anyway, remember that GAPS diet thing that I'm doing, and how I'm not allowed to give the kids anything that isn't home made? Well, soy is off the plate too. It's pretty hard to make anything Asian tasting without the use of soy, but instead you can use fish sauce. Now, I've used fish sauce before in Thai dishes, and I love the little kick in the flavor a teaspoon of that stuff will add. I didn't think it would be too bad to make it myself. The recipe was straightforward. Buy 1 pound of small, whole fish, chop them up, cover with water, add a tablespoon of salt, ferment in warm place for 5 days, and then store in the fridge for several weeks. OK, done.
So today, I thought, I'll strain it just in case there is a bit of a fish smell, which doesn't sit well with my ultra-sensitive-to-smell husband. BOY, was that inspired. In fact, I'm a little worried that I won't get the smell out in time for his return. Have you ever had the urge to throw up just from a smell? Well, let me tell you, that's one experience you needn't put on your bucket list. At first, I thought, this is rather stronger than expected, but after just five seconds I realize there was no way I was EVER going to put this on my food. The smell was so bad, that me, the ultra conscious tree-hugging recyclist, miss-I-don't-let-my-kids-waste-paper-they-can-color-on-the-backside-and-I'm-sorry-we-just-killed-a-tree-for-a-scribble actually threw out the glass jar. No, it wasn't broken. It was just so awful that I couldn't imagine ever putting anything in there again. But just rinsing it down the drain didn't seem to get rid of the smell. I wiped down the granite counter top, but still the smell remained. I threw out the trash (and I really should make those guys some cookies for picking it up tomorrow), sterilized everything, but the smell kept lingering. Even the sweet sulfurous smell of lighted matchsticks wouldn't disperse it. After five matches I pulled out the heavy guns, and lighted some incense, and essential oils. AND IT LINGERED ON. To my dismay I found that the scent cloud migrated to the living room. I would have immediately opened doors and windows, but I actually had left a door open, and 50 mosquitos had invaded my kitchen, I decided that I would take care of venting the house tomorrow. I felt so sick, that I couldn't even prepare the lunches and breakfast for the kids tomorrow.
I don't care what anyone says about my kids not getting preservatives, I will never make home made fish sauce again. EVER. For the teaspoon it takes to spike meals, they'll just have to put up with preservatives.

England Pictures:

2011-09-21T23:14:00.000+02:00

On the day it rained we decided to go to the Cheddar Caves. This is where the original Cheddar cheese comes from, and believe me, it takes nothing like the stuff you buy at Walmart. Real cheddar is ripened in the caves, and tastes absolutely fantastic.

YUM, YUM, YUM!

The following pictures were taken in the city I liked the most while visiting England. This is the Cathedral of Wells.

So, personally Wells wasn't my favorite cathedral. It was beautiful, but doesn't that arch look like a big monster with a wide open mouth and an exposed brain?

I loved the assembly room. The acoustic was totally amazing.

Even the organ looked kind of like an evil bat.

Ezra was so cute in the cathedrals. He always wanted to kneel and pray. Then he took the hymnbooks to the pulpit and pretended to give talks. For the remainder of the trip he wanted to become a preacher in the cathedrals "so I can tell people what to do."

Below are pictures of the very beautiful garden adjacent to the Bishop's residence. It was very lovely.

England Pictures: Cotswolds

2011-09-21T22:27:00.000+02:00

This was the one day I wish I had planned better, but I didn't have a map of the Cotswolds. And there is simply so much to see here. If we had loads of extra money, I would have liked to do this tour which is catered by a retired professor of English History. He owns a Rolls Royce, or a Bentley, don't remember, and he just loves to drive people around the Cotswolds and tell them all about the history. Oh well, that will be for some other time. We did see some very lovely villages though.

Ah...opening doors. It's an autism thing. The kids took advantage of every red telephone box they saw.

I actually rather love this picture. The colors were so vivid.

A very hungry and disgruntled little boy.

Nice English Country home. Odd to think real people actually live here.

England Pictures: Bath

2011-09-21T22:15:00.000+02:00

I haven't had time yet to upload our vacation pictures from England. So here is our visit to Bath. Bath is a fabulous city. The Roman Baths is a very nicely presented museum. There is lots to see, and yet Bath is just small enough to spend a day walking around.

The boys in the Roman baths.

Outside the Disney store. Aaron and I were very pleased to catch some free Wifi while the boys played in the store. Pathetic, I know.

This is in the Assembly Rooms. They had a cool costume exhibit of all English movies. They had the costumes from THE DUCHESS, EMMA, and even Charleton Heston's Chariot Race Costume from Ben Hur. None of the pictures turned out though. The Assembly Rooms is where the English society used to meat and mingle. Basically it was a potential marriage market.

We had just seen two museums so we decided to skip the Jane Austen museum, and have lunch in the Jane Austen tea room instead. The boys were thrilled to get gluten free bread.

Victoria Park had a lovely playground with a merry-go-round the kids enjoyed.

The boys loved the little merry-go-round in Victoria Park and the playground.

The stunning ceiling in the Bath Cathedral.

On the double decker bus tour around Bath.

What on earth is causing it? Update on the picky eater project

2011-09-12T23:14:00.001+02:00

Hello all,

I've been cooking up a storm in our kitchen, and haven't had time to update you much on our progress with the GAPS diet.

Many things have changed. I no longer have to avoid eggs for example, and I'm building up the kids' tolerance to dairy. They can have some nuts, although they still seem to be sensitive to them. The biggest change is visible in their menu, and their food choices. Whereas they got very little in nutrition from the carb dense diet they chose for themselves, they now get a huge variety of foods packed with nutrients.

Before: Menu

Breakfast: Rice crackers with apricot jam and raspberry jam, cereal, or home made pancakes/muffins
Snack: Rice crackers, or banana
Lunch: Either pasta, fries, chips, potatoes, or rice with hot dogs or some type of unhealthy meat.
Dinner: Like lunch.

Today: Menu

Breakfast: Celery root hash browns and organic bacon
Snack: Orange, apple sauce
Lunch Ezra: Salad with steak, olives, cucumbers, carrots, and applesauce for dessert
Lunch Micah: Chicken on lettuce with cucumber and carrot sticks (which he didn't eat), dates and pumpkin seeds
Snack: Apple sauce, and Ezra ate 4 carrots this afternoon
Dinner: "Zucchini lasagne". The sauce consisted of ground beef, red peppers, tomatoes, and onions.

The kids snacked it all up and demanded seconds and thirds!

I really didn't think I would see the day where Ezra begged me to make him a salad for dinner, and then polished off the entire bowl. So one of my major goals has already been accomplished with the GAPS diet, which is to get my picky eaters to be less picky. I don't know that it was so much the GAPS diet as it was just sticking to my guns, and deciding that they are simply going to eat what I give them, and there will be nothing else. Knowing though that the food I put in front of them is not only tasty but good for them helped my fear that they weren't getting enough food. Now Micah will eat almost every fruit, and he tolerates vegetables when they're "disguised" in foods.

However, I've also run in to some difficulties. Micah still has a rash on his arms, and I don't know what's causing it. Ezra is back to being very hyper, lots of ism-ing, screaming, and being aggressive. My problem is that I don't know what is causing it. Is it the fact that he is now going to school full time? Or that the detox is working and all these toxins are being released (they warned us that could happen)? Or is it something he's eating that is making it worse? If so, which food is it? Or is it the fact that we stopped buying everything organic because we couldn't afford it? Is it the chemicals in the food?
It seems like for every solution I find, only more questions pop up. Still, I'm glad that we are eating healthier, and making better choices. Now, if only I could get the hang of preparing menus ahead of time, and sticking to a menu plan. I'm just not very organized that way. Right now, I should be standing downstairs in the kitchen making school lunches, and preparing breakfast. The one thing that hasn't changed for the better is that the kids seem to be even more obsessed with food. But at least now they're asking for stuff that's good for them.

Fun dialogue today

2011-09-03T22:39:00.000+02:00

Today was a gorgeous, sunny September Saturday. In a country where the sun doesn't shine very often I feel obliged to get out and do something when it's not cloudy or raining. Today was one of the first and only days that would be sunny and above 25 degrees Celsius. Naturally beach was my first choice. I find that often I am the one who has to come up with plans. Aaron claims that's because I'm never content with his, so he gave up and just lets me plan.
Aaron tends to be pretty tired and slightly out of humor on Saturday mornings. So after all breakfast demands had been met, Aaron disappeared back upstairs. I couldn't quite decide what I wanted to do with our day, as he would be sleeping for a while. So I asked Ezra and Micah what they felt like. This was our conversation.

Me: Ezra, what would you like to do today?
Ezra: Eat an apple.
Me: OK, and after you eat an apple what do you want to do?
Ezra: Eat a banana.
Me: OK, and after you eat a banana?
Ezra: Eat a Kiwi.
Me: (getting into the game) OK, and after you eat a Kiwi?
Ezra: (grinning) uhm,...eat an orange.
Me: OK, now seriously Ezra, what do you want to do today?!
Ezra: Mom, I just want to eat all day.
Me: Oh, never mind! You're no help. Micah, what do you want to do today?
Micah: I just want to stay inside and wear my jamis.
Me: Daddy's boy! You don't want to go to the beach?
Micah: No, I think I'll just stay home and clean the floors for you.

Chick-zza! Your GAPS legal pizza for your picky eaters

2011-09-01T20:32:00.001+02:00

This is by far my most popular dish with the kids on the GAPS diet. I could call it Chick-zza I guess. In later stages, I can probably add cheese, but now we don't get to eat that.

It has been about 17 days now since we started GAPS and it feels like I've been doing it forever. I really can't wait for the intro to be over with. I'm not even following it exactly, because I don't have avocados readily available. And the other thing that is a bit ridiculous is introducing squash pancakes, with the advice "Start with one a day, and watch for reactions". I want to know which iron-willed mother can manage to feed her kids soup, broth, and veggies for two weeks, and then give them a pancake. One pancake. I'm not that mom. I think Micah had eight pancakes the first time I made them. And was I supposed to then just freeze the whole batch? Anyway, I'm growing impatient with the intro diet. I understand it's purpose, but I really wish I had started it during vacation, because now I can't tell for sure what my kids are reacting to...the new school environment, or the food. Also, I am impatient to just move on and make different foods. I think we're eating too much meat. I can't wait to include salads. I want to have a greater variety of foods, which the intro doesn't really afford.

So my picky eaters at the end of the day are still picky. They are now eating broth without complaints, and in fact, I have difficulties keeping up with the supply, but they're still not eating vegetables unless I disguise them in some way. I'm torn between bribing them to eat, or just following the parenting rule: set the standard and don't engage in arguments. I just read on this website about picky eaters, that if you want to get your kids to eat all foods, just make what you want them to eat, and if they don't, they can choose the consequence, which is feeling hungry. You can explain to them in a loving way that they can either feel full, or they can be hungry, and then you are to not ever engage in any arguments. It's easier said then done, but I like the idea of no meal time terror.

I have to admit though that it is a tremendous amount of cooking, peeling, preparing. I wish I could just go to the store and buy everything ready made, but without all the E's and the sugar in it. I'm also struggling with living in the Netherlands right now. So many things are readily available in the States. The US is a very internet-oriented market. You can find anything online. The Netherlands is certainly better than Switzerland when it comes to online shopping, but it's still not like the US. So many things that I could get there, I can't have them here without crazy shipping costs, or they don't even export them. It's not that they don't have organic everything here, it's just that it's harder to find. Also, I'm very busy at the moment now because the publishing company that I work for publishes their annual Equestrian yearbook in October, and so I have to go in to work every day, and work evenings. At the same time, I have to cook for about 3-5 hours a day, start up the Son-Rise program for Ezra, find and interview workers, and try to spend some quality time with the kids.

To be honest I thought they would be less obsessed with food now that they're off carbs, but just the opposite is true. Instead of coming home and playing, they trail me around the kitchen asking me every two seconds what's for dinner, can I have a snack, I want this, I want that. That's why I'm happy to let them eat at school. Their teachers even report that they eat everything I pack for them. Ha! Today the mom that stays at school when they eat lunch even told me that they had to laugh at the amount of food I pack for Micah. Apparently all the other kids get two slices of bread and one slice of meat for lunch, and that's it. But Micah is eating it all. I do know that no matter how much they complain about being hungry or wanting snacks, they are getting a ton of calories, and about 150% more nutrients than before. Still, not gonna lie, I don't care for the cooking and the planning. Anyway, that said, this recipe takes about 4 minutes to prepare, and the kids love it, so I like that.

Recipe Chick-zza:

The crust is made out of ground up chicken, cauliflower, salt, and onions. Interestingly enough it doesn't taste like any of those ingredients. If you want to recreate this: just take a dinner plate. 1/2 of the plate should be chicken, 1/4 onions, and 1/4 cauliflower. You can use any vegetable you like, but cauliflower gives it the right consistency and color to fake a pizza look. For the tomato sauce I just blended up canned organic tomatoes, fresh basil, salt and two cloves of garlic. Decorate with anything you feel belongs on a pizza and is GAPS legal. Put in the oven for about 15-20 minutes. Done.

Mwahaha! Persistence paid off. Picky eater mom wins.

2011-08-25T22:34:00.001+02:00

I didn't think this day would come, and yet here we are. Ten days have past. I remember ten days ago, cooking only the foods the picky eater crew would eat. I remember what it was like to have Ezra scream at food he didn't want, throw it across the table, throw himself on the floor and have a temper tantrum for 50 minutes. I remember him hitting and pinching me for 20 minutes, screaming at me to get what he wanted. I remember both of them refusing all food. I remember exchanging TV time and honey for bites. I remember four years passing with Micah refusing every single fruit and vegetable except for grapes, and raisins. It seems impossible that these same two children issued following statements today:

Micah: My tummy hurts a bit. I think I need some more broth. Can I have some more please?

Micah: Mom, can I have some spinach juice please? Just make me some spinach juice now (at bedtime).

Micah: I had my broth for lunch at school. It was so good.

Ezra: Ooh, can I have a carrot, celery juice please? Please, mom?

And what did they have four lunch? I made them both "Pizza" again. It's basically ground up chicken, cauliflower, and onion spread thin like a pizza crust on a baking sheet. I heated it up and covered it with tomato sauce. They snacked it up. And for dinner I mixed 1 kg (2 lbs) of broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and onions with about 1.5 lbs of ground pork, added some spices, and baked it in the oven in a casserole dish (for us adults, I stuffed peppers with the filling). I presented the sausage casserole and peppers and allowed them choose. They both had several helpings of the casserole including their delicious carrot and zucchini chips.

Bottom line: it can be done. Detox is crazy difficult, but 10 days of struggles is all it took, versus a life time of carb addiction and unhealthy gut. Do they eat plain veggies...well, yes but not readily. But hey, they're eating veggies, demanding healthy juice and broth, and eventually I think they will be able to and want to try all sorts of new foods, as long as it looks good and contains a major motivating delicious word like 'sausage', 'pizza', or 'chips.

Lottery diet!

2011-08-24T23:51:00.000+02:00

Lottery diet is what I'm now calling the GAPS diet, because if we won the lottery, we might be able to continue it.
Things have been going pretty well. It's hard to imagine that 10 days ago I had to bribe my kids with toys and TV time to get them to drink their broth. I would sit in front of the TV and let them watch one minute of their show for every sip they drank. Now they actually request the broth.
Two days ago I made a recipe from the Introdiet cookbook I downloaded from online. It was total rubbish. I mean, it tasted ok, but food has to look good, not just taste good. I really don't blame my kids for balking at the site of the zucchini chicken casserole. So yesterday I ground up cauliflower, onions, and chicken breasts, added some salt, spread the whole thing onto a baking tray and baked it. I even sliced some tomatoes onto it and declared it was pizza. In addition to that, I peeled carrots, and kept peeling them to thin strips and then fried them in coconut oil, and added my new favorite salt ever, Hymalian salt. The combination of coconut, sweet, crisp, and salty is utterly divine. Not only did my kids snack up the pizza and carrots, they demanded seconds, thirds, and wanted some for lunch again today. HA! And Ezra doesn't like chicken. Well, he actually likes chicken, he just thinks he doesn't.

So if all that is going so well, what's the problem? I seem to go to the store 3 times a day now, to keep our veggies stocked. I make juice for the kids. If they don't want to eat their veggies, I give them the option of a green juice, but that requires carrots, and apples. I've added up all the receipts from since we started the GAPS, so 10 days and it added up to 540 euros. So, you can imagine why I feel like maybe we won't be able to continue eating this way. Who has 1500 Euros for food a month? We don't have enough time to start our own vegetable garden, and it would have to be a pretty massive one to supply all the food necessary. I would just buy food in bulk, but that is not something that is done here. I tried to work out some deals with the suppliers, and they just figure 'hey, this lady wants to buy my food, why should I discount it?'. So we are trying to figure out the financial aspect.

The other thing is, I really am in the kitchen a lot. I was so happy that I would now have some time to myself now that the kids are in school, and I have been busier than ever, making them breakfasts, packing special lunches, working, shopping, planning. I don't know how I did all that when they were home. So we will have to see. Perhaps we have to aim lower and just do the best we can.

Mother's nerves fried to a crisp with picky eaters

2011-08-23T09:34:00.002+02:00

Everything is fried in our house these days. My nerves, our food, and our electricity. So I was planning on keeping you all updated on how my picky eater battle is going (or should I call it turning picky eaters into veggie fanatics?), and then our DSL got fried because of some electrical problem, as did our nightstand lamps, alarmclocks, curling iron, and power cord. It's very annoying. So now, I have no internet access and am afraid to use the computer at home, because I don't want it to fry. Here I am at my work desk then writing this brief update.

It is getting harder on me. I'm anxious for them to eat the good nutrition so we can just move on and I can introduce dairy and nuts again. Imagine that. 9 days into the diet and I'm thinking about introducing the foods they had to avoid: eggs, nuts, and dairy. They are already getting some scrambled eggyolks for breakfast, and seem to do fine with them. That's the thought that keeps me going. They will be able to eat more food. Not less. Although in the meanwhile I still feel like I'm starving them, because Ezra refuses to eat some things. Here's a funny little conversation from yesterday after dinner.

Me: Mom, I feel like I'm starving my kids.
Granny: Well you are.
Me: Ugh, I'm no better than a Nazi.
Granny: No, no. You're doing it for a good reason.

I can't tell you how helpful it is to have Aaron's cooperation. The dinner tantrums continue. They are loud, desperate struggles to control what they eat. With Aaron and I both not backing down, they eventually do actually eat what we give them, even if it isn't as much as we would like. I was so worried that they aren't getting enough food, until I realized that Micah has gained 3 lbs since being on this diet, and his previous digestion which ranged between severely constipated and diahrrea has now become normal. It's working!!! I on the other hand have lost 9 lbs in the last 8 days. So it's working for everyone. Even with the little bit that the kids are eating, they are getting more nutrient and calorie dense food than ever before. I try to remember that when Ezra is screaming and pinching. And I put carrots, sausage patties, sauerkraut, applesauce and a thermos with beef broth in his lunchbag yesterday, and he ate it all up.

OK, I would make this longer, but I have to actually work now.

Picky eaters almost won

2011-08-20T21:00:00.001+02:00

This morning I was ready to call it quits with the diet. It's just so hard. It's not the food. In fact, after only five days I've lost 6 lbs, and I never have any cravings. Well, not never. Day 5 was pretty rough. I desperately wanted some bread. And the food is soooo delicious. It is organic, it is rich in fat which makes me feel not only full, but satisfied, something I never felt no matter how many carbs I guzzled when I was on my typical diet of sandwiches, chips, and cookies.
No, what's hard is that I have to plan ahead. That was hard even when we ate the other way, but then at least we could just go get some fries to everyone's delight when mommy didn't plan to make dinner in time, or have some rice crackers. And the other thing that's really hard is trusting that my children will eventually eat what they have been refusing for five years now. It's so heart-wrenching to see them this hungry, and to know that the easy way out could fix that. I'm not withholding food from them per se, they are withholding it from themselves, by not eating the healthy protein, fat, and carbs I provide for them. But it still feels like I'm the mother whose not feeding her kids, and what mother would do that? I keep on telling them though when they ask for the 'bad stuff' that I love them too much to give them things that will hurt their body.
I don't want to give up and go back to feeding them things that make them hyper, give them rashes, make their stomachs hurt, and have to cook the same three things for them, because they won't eat anything but rice, pasta, and chips. On the other hand I don't want to have to do this either. I wish I just wouldn't care. Whenever I have a bit of freedom ahead on the horizon, I manage to create more work for myself.
On the other hand, how can I not? Once I realized what is causing their health and mental problems, how can I not help it? But if I'm making the right decisions, choosing the better part if you will, why doesn't it feel better? Why isn't it easier? Why am I not happier? And why do other people get to have the cake and eat it too (I specifically mean have singing jobs, and have children as well)? I realize I'm getting very philosophical here, but with all the free time I have from not scheming about the foods I can eat, I find myself confronted with the very questions I tried to drown out with those carbs.
If I had to guess I would look for the explanation in delayed gratification. Often it seems that choosing the right is really choosing what will in the end benefit you most in the long run, not what is pleasant and easy first. I chose pleasant and easy (well, not that easy) for 5 years now (and much longer than that if we're honest), and I haven't gotten very far, and frankly it wasn't all that pleasant either. Not with my personal weightloss by giving in to my sweet tooth, and not with Ezra's recovery from autism. This morning I just couldn't take another fight about the food from the kids. I was ready to give up, but thankfully I had support from my mom, who lives with us, in case you didn't know. She just told me to hang in there. And then I got another gift from a dear friend in Washington, which she had promised to send me for over a year now. The dedication in the book even read September 2010, but what a perfect day for it to arrive. It can't have been coincidence, that a ring with the inscription "Never, never, never quit" came on the day that I was ready to quit. (Therese you're an angel sent from heaven!) So I didn't. And tonight as I'm writing this post Micah was so hungry he asked for me to bring him more broth. Both of the kids ate a few bites of vegetables for dinner. Maybe, just maybe, this might work out in the end.

Picky eaters battles: day 3 on the GAPS diet

2011-08-18T00:27:00.000+02:00

Favorite quotes of the day:

Ezra: No soup. I want PIE for dinner. Make me some pie!

Micah: Mom, my tummy is saying it wants rice crackers, bread, cookies, butter and jam for dinner.

Mom: Uhu!

Micah: But my tummy said it.

Mom: Darling, your tummy is talking rubbish. Don't listen to it.
Oh boy! I think at the end of the day I won the most battles. My little picky eaters are no less picky, but in absence of all they love, they are learning to push through some comfort zones. The kids were really like dead flies today, all the way up until it came to actually eating something they don't want to eat. They didn't want to drink anymore chicken broth in the morning, so I promised them a Lightning McQueen toy cell phone if they would drink their soup all up. It worked. They did use some gag reflex on the chicken broth, but we got there in the end, and they were delighted with their new toy. I usually forbid toys with batteries. They are bad for the brain. If you want me to cite an article you're out of luck, because I have no time, but if you do some research you will come to the same conclusion which you then are free to ignore or follow.

You know, once you're trained in the Son-Rise program, it feels like plain old bribery when I do something like let them watch TV or get a toy to get them to eat the foods they don't want to eat. Typically Son-Rise is on the exact opposite of ABA (applied behavior analysis). To me Son-Rise makes a lot of sense. If you can get your kids excited about doing something, so they want to do it, then you have only fun and no battles. If you use ABA to do it, then they will do it, but they won't love it. As soon as you remove the incentive they discontinue the behavior. At least...that's what I think. I hope I'm wrong. I hope that the healthy foods I'm "bribing" them to eat will seal their stomachs, so that when they have moved through detox, they can learn to appreciate other tastes again. Today required a lot of comforting, holding, and explaining why we are doing this. At some level they understand that this diet will help them eat more foods, but as kids often do they thought there was no work involved, and they would get it now. I tried to explain to them the process, until I finally realized I was getting no where, I told them this was the "you eat whatever mommy makes for you"-diet, because I will make food for you that will help you.

For dinner we had meat ball soup with veggies. I gave the kids each a bowl. None of them would touch it. Ezra started screaming and having a panic attack. He kept asking for juice and TV, and I said he could have both if he ate his whole bowl of soup. He continued to cry and scream for 45 minutes without eating anything. Finally, seeing that this wasn't going anywhere, I told him he could have TV for one minute if he took a bite. He did. Micah had been refusing the soup too. Once the TV was on all I had to do was pause the video every minute. I told them that for every bite they took, I would let it play one minute. They tried to get away with taking tiny bites. I made a game out of it saying they would have take lion bites not birdy bites, or chipmunk bites. I would do funny little animal impressions corresponding to their bites. So I guess I did get a little bit of Son-rise technique in there. In the end they both ate all of their food, and got their juice.

It is remarkable to me how different Ezra is already, and even Micah. Ezra is typically so incredibly hyperactive and loud. Today he took a nap, and he slept in. He was only loud when he had his 45 minute tantrum before he finally ate his soup. Other than that, I saw more eye contact, and more presence in his eyes.

I did end up buying a juicer today and introducing juiced vegetable and fruit a bit earlier than the introduction diet suggests. I figured...it's organic, fresh juice, and they are little kids who need some energy. Ezra gulped it down. He didn't even care that I put some celery in it. My little picky eater number 2 remained unconvinced, but did have at least one glass.

Personally I'm surprised at how well I'm doing. I didn't eat much today (lack of planning), but I am not craving the carbs as much anymore. I had more energy, and tonight I even made my very first Sauerkraut, and Kimchi. This dog is learning new tricks!

Lovely England: 1st day of the Trip, Ferry and Canterbury.

2011-08-16T21:49:00.000+02:00

I love England so much. It's the perfect place for someone like me, who is torn between her love for Europe and the US. England has the best of both worlds: beautiful open countryside, excellent and affordable dining, organic stores in every village, cheap shopping, amazon.co.uk, English bookstores, and of course, art, culture, history, and amazing architecture. On this blessed island I felt so at home that I had a very hard time leaving it.

Sadly I have a very lousy camera on my iPod. It didn't stop me from taking over 600 pictures. I'll condense them a bit.

This was our very first Cornish Pasty. It's a pastry filled with beef and potatoes. It was actually one of the best I had on the whole trip. Ezra ate nothing but sausages and "chips" whenever we ate out, which was almost every day.

Gotta admit, I had to get some fresh air on the Ferry ride.

Ezra looking out the window of the ferry.

They have a very efficient system in place. I highly recommend a ferry ride. They have shops on board, restaurants, and a lounge with cartoons on a TV for kids.

The white cliffs of dover.

Canterbury Cathedral. No photo I put up will do it justice. Canterbury is the head of the Anglican Church.

Loved, loved, loved the courtyard.

On the way to our cottage in Bath we stopped to see my aunt and uncle who emigrated from Zimbabwe and now live in Basingstoke. I hadn't seen her for 16 years.

The boys and daddy at the restaurant.

The kids loved visiting Auntie Doreen's little cottage.

Rough dieting day

2011-08-16T19:51:00.000+02:00

Today was overwhelming. The kids were pretty whiny in the morning, because they were so hungry. But it wasn't the usual whiny when they want something they don't need, but a true pleading: mommy I'm hungry. It's hard to watch them detox. They were lying around like dead flies today, even took a nap. Typically super hyper Ezra just shuffled around the house. They refused the soup again, so I applied some ABA and said that if they just had a little bit of soup I would let them watch one episode of Winnie the Pooh. I got a whole cup of soup into them. They both said it tasted and felt good. I think of lot of their taste issues are in their heads.
I'm missing fruit right now, and I'm a bit hungry too. I should go down and have more broth. We won't be eating any fruit for the next few weeks. I also am starting to realize what I've really gotten myself into. I wanted to throw in the towel several times today, when I realized that I would be responsible for cooking, and preparing everything. Right now for example, I should be downstairs preparing fermented vegetables and some more broth.
I should explain: the introduction to the GAPS diet is a phase during which all fiber is removed so the intestines have a chance to rest and heal (heal and seal). You're supposed to drink home made meat broth made from organic, preferably grass-fed animals for every meal. To that broth you add some fermented vegetable juice, or fermented yogurt, or whatever. Those two together help coat the intestines, and restore good bacteria to the gut. At the same time depriving our body from fiber and carbohydrates, helps eliminate the bad bacteria. However home made meat broth is essential, and although it doesn't take much work to make it, it does take time to cook (like 24-36 hours). This requires forethought. I have up until now not been very good at making and sticking with a meal plan. One of the reasons was that I simply got tired of making meals my kids wouldn't eat.

Another hard part was that I spent 54 Euros for meat at the organic butcher. 3 organic chicken breasts cost me 19 Euros! It's insane. I got through that episode by thinking of the $10,000 we had to spend because of Aaron's kidney cancer, and about how a year in an autism school costs $75,000. Or supplements, or chelation, or all these other treatments cost so much more, than simply eating organic healthy food. And perhaps if more people did, it would get cheaper.

Then at dinner Ezra had a full on melt down and tantrum. It lasted about 30 minutes. I made sausages and "rice" which is cauliflower shredded to the consistency of rice and boiled in salt water. It's rather tasty, actually. I just put the cauliflower on his plate. He didn't want it there, so he started screaming and throwing some food. He ate his two sausages and wanted more. I made him have a bite of his cauliflower before giving him a slice of sausage. I remained calm and kind during the whole tantrum, but I still had a hard time seeing him like that. In the end what got me through this day was thinking
of how he threw a tantrum in the restaurant when we were on vacation, and how he refused to eat anything but sausages and fries at every place we went to. I thought of how short 2 years really are compared to a life time, and last but not least I thought of all the other mothers out there with picky eaters, and autistic children, who might come across my blog, and perhaps could find hope that it's possible, if I could only hang in there long enough to prove that it is. So I'll do it one more day. Off to pickled some cucumbers now.

Getting picky eaters to eat

2011-08-15T20:37:00.002+02:00

Today has been the first day on our new grain free diet. We are doing the GAPS diet. GAPS stands for Gut and Psychology Syndrome. I have detailed in a previous post why we are doing this diet, so I'll leave you to this link if you want to find out more about it.

I know I'm not the only mother out there struggling to get my kids to eat. It is a rare child that isn't picky.

Some of the reasons that children are picky include these:

they have sensory processing issues. That means that the food either doesn't feel good or does feel really good in their mouth. For example, I really can't stand creamy things. I don't care for the way it feels on my tongue. On the other hand I love everything crunchy.
We as mothers have taught them through our actions that if they fuss long enough we will give them what they want, just to get them to be quiet.
They have an unhealthy gut with too many bad bacteria which thrive on sugary foods. The bad bacteria makes us crave processed carbs.
They are getting high on food. Food is like a drug. In fact in the book "The Sugar Addict's Total Recovery Program" Dr. Katheleen Desmaisons recounts some studies done under a functional MRI to show that some people's brains (about 50%) react to sugar the same way as if they had just had heroine. They get a pay off. Now put that reaction in a three year old with an unlimited capacity, motivation, and stubbornness to demand what he wants, and you know why you're still feeding him those crackers and cookies.
They have underlying medical conditions. Ezra never did like peanut butter, refused it all the time. Turns out he is very allergic to it.
They watch what their parents eat and eat the same.

I'm sure there are loads more reasons. In fact if you know some please feel free to comment. I can see on my stats page that lots of people read this blog, but very few comment.

The challenge in helping your picky eater overcome his habits is that you can't always be sure why he isn't eating. I can say from my personal experience that I let my mommy fear "but he'll be hungry and starve" always get in the way. And behind the fear is of course a realization that I simply don't want to deal with tantrums, or that I don't want to be a mean mom who lets her child go hungry. Also, it is just easier to give the food they want rather than spending money and time preparing something delicious and healthy only to have them fuss or throw food.

So how come I'm brave enough to try it now? Having two very picky eaters at home, one autistic, and one highly sensitive to texture I have put off this diet for 3 years now, because I just couldn't imagine doing it and getting them to eat. Finally, I have read enough to convince me that there just isn't any other way if I want them to have a healthy, happy life. In addition to that I talked to several friends whose autistic sibling has gotten older and their food preferences have narrowed even more. They are all carb addicts, if not treated. My kids complain about itchy ears (from eczema), and stomach pains every day. They get colds, they have food intolerances and allergies that only get worse, and are severely limited in their diet. Some people might think...but isn't it limiting to eat a grain free diet? No bread, no pasta, no chips, no fries, no cakes, no muffins? Well, that's the only thing they really ate before, so really their diet is limited now. I think this will broaden their horizons. Micah refuses all fruits and vegetables for example. I should also mention that the GAPS diet does have recipes for cakes, cookies, muffins, pancakes etc, but using nut flour instead of normal flour. And once they're through the introduction phase, I don't see the GAPS being much more complicated than anything else. A salad with some protein takes less time to assemble than cooking rice and pasta. Even broccoli is boiled quicker than rice. The only thing that really is less convenient is that you can't just go buy food at the store. Just about everything has to be prepared at home. My mother keeps saying that this is the way they used to live, and cook back on the farm in South Africa. In a sense I think one of the major stumbling blocks to a healthy diet in children is the desire of the mother to lead her own life, have a career, and a family on the side. Being a homemaker is looked down on. How many times have we heard or said: I'm JUST a mom? But that is a discussion for another blog.

Anyway, enough rambling. The first day went OK. In preparation to starting the diet I got rid of all the food we can't eat. Yes, I'm doing it with them. I didn't throw it all away. I do believe in food storage, so I stored it away in case of emergency. I stocked my kitchen with the necessary foods and equipment, bought a GAPS introductory meal plan online, and took a cooking class for GAPS (also online). I have also been talking for a month now with the kids about the special diet we would be doing together. I explained to them why we are doing it and what it will help us do (like eat cheese, and yogurt, not have stomach aches or itchy ears).
Today I got up and had some beef broth. Yes, not that yum for breakfast, but it felt good. For lunch I had some delicious chicken and broccoli. I eat whenever I'm hungry, or drink some soup. The kids ate nothing all morning refusing soup. Micah ate a handful of chicken at lunch. Whenever they asked for food I would offer them what we had. If they declined I didn't press the issue. In a way I'm doing this just how I potty trained Ezra. I just got rid of the diapers, and apologized that we didn't buy them anymore every time he asked for one. Eventually Ezra went potty. Took him 3 days, but he did it, and we never looked back. I'm hoping it will go this smooth with this.
So in short they didn't eat hardly anything all day. At dinner I made hamburger patties with grated carrots and onions, fried in some beef tallow. DELICIOUS, by the way. I served them with raw carrots. The kids refused again, and I left it at that. At about 7 PM Ezra was starving and so he sat down and ate all his carrots, the beef patty, as well as Micah's. I gave them Red Bush tea to drink.
Now they're in bed, slightly hungry. I'm feeling hungry too, but that's just because I didn't eat enough vegetables.
I definitely need to get a juicer tomorrow, so I can start making some juices for them. I invite you to check back to see our progress in getting my carb addicts to eat other foods. I expect there will be some ups and downs.

Preparing for Life's Spiritual Storms

2011-07-17T19:14:00.001+02:00

This is a 15 minute talk/sermon I was asked to give in Church today. Some of you requested copies of it, so here it is.

Growing up in Switzerland I didn't watch the news much. There is however one news report that I remember vividly. It was the images of utter desolation in Southern Florida, after hurricane Andrew hit Miami. Switzerland is safely landlocked and cushioned between mountains. I couldn't imagine why someone would possibly be crazy enough to want to live in flat place, that was below ocean level, and known to have such severe storms. At the time, I believe I hadn't heard the saying "Never say Never."

Years past without me thinking of hurricanes until I left my mountains in 1999 to serve a mission in the North of France. On December 26, an extra-tropical Cyclone called Lothar hit right over our area. Thousands of trees were damaged, and many homes remained without power for six weeks. Yet, with the fatigue only a missionary knows, I slept right through it and remained safe.
A few years later I ended up living as a newly wed in downtown Baltimore, when in 2003 one of the deadliest storms ever to hit the Midatlantic East coast, Hurricane Isabel, flooded Baltimore and left thousands without power. Again, we were lucky, and were spared.
Just six months later, I followed my love to Tampa, Florida where Aaron's family lives. The year was 2004. According to Wikipedia the 2004 Atlantic hurricane season...[had]...one of the highest Accumulated Cyclone Energy totals ever observed. The season was notable as one of the deadliest and most costly Atlantic hurricane seasons on record. This was the only time in recorded history that four hurricanes made landfall on Florida (Charley, Frances, Ivan, Jeanne, and TS Bonnie). Aaron helped clean up a community that was worst hit by the hurricane and told me the destruction was truly devastating. I wouldn't be surprised if at the time there was a girl in Switzerland watching the news, thinking what kind of crazy person moves willingly to a below sea-level country in a hurricane prone area. Miraculously we were spared every single time. The most interesting thing I can tell you about hurricanes in Florida is that even though Floridians know that they could hit, many of them never seem prepared, and go into a panic. They made a mad dash to the stores to buy water, and gas up their cars every time another one was announced.

There are several lessons we can take from these experiences.

First: clearly, severe weather follows me everywhere, and we are probably due an extra tropical cyclone in the Netherlands soon.
Second: no matter what hits, as long as God sees fit, it won't matter what comes at me because He will protect me.
Third: the one thing everyone knows they need when bad weather hits is water.

Now before I bore you all silly by talking about the weather for 15 minutes, let me get to spiritual storms. What are spiritual storms and how can we prepare for them?

While we were engaged, Aaron and I took a marriage prep class at BYU. Our teacher handed out a list of about 30 different spiritual storms that could hit during a life time, and cause serious damage to a family. He explained that statistically speaking everyone lives through about five of these during a life time.
You will recognize many of these storms from the general conference talks. They include grave transgressions, natural disasters, health issues, financial troubles and so on. Here is just an excerpt:

any type of addiction such as porn, gambling, drugs, alcohol, food, shopping
verbal or physical abuse
spouse falling away from the gospel
committing crime
adultery
chronic illnesses like diabetes, Alzheimer, depression, cancer, mental illnesses
death in the family,
infertility, miscarriage, having a handicapped child
job loss
losing your home
poor communication
having an in-law move in with you (not kidding, it was on the list)
moving to a different country
natural disasters
change of career

The list goes on and on. In the last 5 years we had not one of these happen to us but 12 of them.
And yet here I am, a little worse for wear, but still here I am. As I reflect on what we have been through and what helped us through these storms, I can see that the reason I'm still here, is because I had the one thing everyone needs to survive, and the first thing the unprepared buy up, when they hear of an impending storm: I had WATER. Spiritual Water.

In the famous scripture of Christ at a well, teaching a Samarian woman he says:

...whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. John 4:14

I think I survived these trials because I had drunk deeply from that well. That scripture was actually always a bit of a mystery to me, until I read in 1 Ne 11: 25, where Nephi explains what this water is that we can partake of.

And it came to pass that I beheld that the ^arod of iron, which my father had seen, was the ^bword of God, which ^cled to the fountain of ^dliving waters, or to the ^etree of life; which waters are a representation of the love of God; and I also beheld that the tree of life was a representation of the love of God. 1 Ne 11: 15

The water represents the love of God, and the way we get to God's love is by learning about him through his scriptures. If we have a firm knowledge of the love that GOD has for us, we can weather any storm. Having gone through what I did, I more fully understand that the years I spent getting to know GOD as a young single adult, as a missionary, as a faithful single adult, and later as a newly wed, prepared me for what was to come.
I admit that while the storms were raging I didn't have much energy to go search the scriptures. In fact, sometimes I was just plain angry at God for allowing me to suffer through such things. I thought it unfair. However, when the waves of emotion threatened to drown me, I clung to two testimonies I had gained during my years. I knew: God is faithful, and he will not give me anything I can't bear.

Elder Eyring said this concerning spiritual storms:

The Prophet Joseph Smith gave us the Lord’s description of the test we face... We have these words to tell us about the purpose of the Creation: “We will go down, for there is space there, and we will take of these materials, and we will make an earth whereon these may dwell; And we will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them.”¹

So, the great test of life is to see whether we will hearken to and obey God’s commands in the midst of the storms of life. It is not to endure storms, but to choose the right while they rage. And the tragedy of life is to fail in that test and so fail to qualify to return in glory to our heavenly home. Henry B. Eyring

We will need to have developed and nurtured faith in Jesus Christ long before Satan hits us, as he will, with doubts and appeals to our carnal desires and with lying voices saying that good is bad and that there is no sin. Those spiritual storms are already raging. We can expect that they will worsen until the Savior returns.

However much faith to obey God we now have, we will need to strengthen it continually and keep it refreshed constantly. We can do that by deciding now to be more quick to obey and more determined to endure. Learning to start early and to be steady are the keys to spiritual preparation. Procrastination and inconsistency are its mortal enemies. (Elder Eyring, General Conference October 2005 "Spiritual Preparedness: Start Early and Be Steady")

From Elder Eyring's words I take that a spiritual storm is simply when something happens to us that tests our commitment to God and his commandments.

So let me suggest a simple formula to remember to keep our water stocked at all time.

W: Worship. Come to church, no matter how you feel about yourself, about God, and about life. This one act will keep you steady, because it puts you in a place where you are likely to feel the Spirit.
A: Attitude. Elder Holland once said: there is no misfortune in life so great, that complaining won't make it worse. Your attitude can make your trial seem short, or unbearably long, or in fact, with the right attitude you might see that what you’re going through might not even be a trial, but an opportunity to grow. And sometimes, a sucky attitude is what causes your spiritual storms.
T: Testimony. What is a testimony? In short it is something you know for sure to be true. If you want a testimony to grow stronger, pray and read your scriptures with the burning intent to get to know GOD, versus just so He can't say you weren't keeping that commandment.
E: Endurance. In the words of one of my favorite movie characters of all time, Dory: just keep swimming, just keep swimming
R: Repent. You may have done nothing wrong, but if the point of a test is to test our humility, then it won't hurt to humble ourselves and ask for forgiveness. If you have done something wrong, then all the more reason to repent. Many spiritual storms are caused or made worse by carrying around unnecessary burdens of guilt.
S: Serve in your callings. If you want to understand the love that Christ and God have for you, act as Christ did. When you act as his servant, and feel the love He has for others, you will come to believe the love He has for you. And serving others helps you think less of your own problems.

In a sense we are all like those crazy people who chose to live in a below sea level country, prone to severe storms. We came to earth, willingly, knowing full well what we were getting ourselves into. So why did we come? Because we followed the person we loved, our big brother Jesus Christ, and because in the grand scheme of things, we knew that just like in Florida, hurricanes last only a few days, while 9-10 months out of the year the weather is warm, sunny, and absolutely fabulous.

How Diet causes autism, and why the Gluten Casein Free Diet is not the answer

2011-07-12T20:40:00.006+02:00

OK, I admit, the title is purposefully sensationalistic. I don't actually know what causes autism, but after reading Gut and Psychology Syndrome from Doctor Natasha Campbell-McBride I'm 150% convinced that diet is one of the main factors in what causes autism.

I'm not a Doctor, or medical expert, just a mom who does a lot of research. However, Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride is not only a mother of a successfully recovered autistic child, she is also a trained medical doctor (Neurologist, and brain surgeon), as well as having specialized in nutrition after finding out her son was autistic. So if you don't believe me for my lack of training and titles, then read her book. No need for me to re-invent the wheel. It's pretty easy to understand, and it will give you all the details and explanations of what I am about to summarize below, with research and scientific studies quoted to back her up.

I found myself chanting mentally on every page "Why didn't anybody tell me about this? Why didn't I know?" (and if I'm honest with myself, I did have a friend who told me about this, and at the time I thought it was too extreme, and that I didn't have the guts to do it, because I myself was addicted to carbs). In my previous post about what to do when you suspect your child is autistic, I said that if I could go back and know then what I know now, I would have started a GAPS or a SCD diet immediately. I constantly think of all the things I could have done differently but after reading this book, I would prioritize this as the MOST IMPORTANT INTERVENTION ALONGSIDE ONE ON ONE EDUCATION.
So here is why I tell you: don't shy away from the work. You will soooo regret not doing this. I'm convinced that this diet is 50% of the solution (with the other 50% being training the brain through one on one intensive education and something like Brain Balance or Neurofeedback).

OK here is the explanation of why I recommend you do this diet summed up as simply as I can:

Our gut is the first line of defense to foreign objects, bacteria, toxins, etc. and a very important part of our immune system. Normally the gut is populated with good and bad bacteria. They are in balance and take care of anything that doesn't belong in our body. In children and adults with Autism, ADHD, ADD, Dispraxia, etc their digestive tracts are out of balance (omitting explanation why, for brevity but it's in the book), and therefore their immune system is compromised. When there are too many bad bacteria and not enough good the body can't handle the toxic load. Foods and toxins get into their blood stream and into the brain that shouldn't and cause heaps of damage (This condition is called Leaky Gut). And on the other hand important nutrients that the body and brain need for normal development do not make it to the brain because food isn't digested right, thus the brain doesn't develop the way it should, making it all worse and compromising the immune system even more.

The idea of the diet is to replenish the good bacteria with pro-biotic foods like fermented vegetables (and perhaps some supplements), and at the same time starving the bad bacteria of it's main source of nutrition: starches. The foods allowed on the diet are very nourishing and simple to digest, thus giving the stomach a chance to repair itself and supplying the body with nutrition. Essentially this diet is a complete sugar free, grain free diet (although fruits, and honey are allowed, just fyi). You do that for about 2 years or until your child has been symptom free for at least 6 months. Now before you throw your hands up in the air and say: no way, that's too hard, let me tell you what it looks like after you've waited a few years and tried other stuff first (like the GFCF diet, Feingold, etc).

Autism doesn't go away or get better by doing nothing and waiting it out. In fact it gets worse and the gap to catch up to peers widens (which -you've guessed it- means more work for you, mama, or daddy)
Trying easier things first only works for a little bit, because the root of the problem is still there. Only GAPS, or the SCD diet address and cure the actual problem in the gut.
No matter how finicky of an eater your toddler is now, when he's older he'll be stronger, more verbal, and more finicky, and the tantrums and control battles are more aggressive and louder.
Two years of work are nothing compared to the work you'll have to put in if you don't do it. You're child will develop more food allergies, more intolerances, and refuse anything besides starch. Every meal is a battle.

Now what about the Gluten and Casein Free diet? I did that for 3 years now. At first we saw a huge improvement, and so will you, but it won't last long. Here is what Dr. Campbell-McBride says about that:
"If you transfer this child to the GFCF diet, processed carbohydrates containing gluten are replaced with gluten free processed carbohydrates, made with rice, sugar potato starch, tapioca flour, soy, buckwheat flour etc. This sort of food will feed the abnormal flora in the child's gut just as much as the previous diet did, perpetuating the vicious cycle of a damaged leaky gut and toxicity escaping from this leaky gut into the blood and brain. Of course the fact that out of dozens of various toxins, flowing from the gut into the body, two toxins have been removed -gluteomorphin and casomorphins - does some good."

It does help a tiny bit, and I can testify to that, but it hasn't solved his picky eating and carb addiction, and his gut flora is still a mess. In addition to those problems the gluten free products are very high on the glycemic index, even higher than the gluten containing ones (because gluten is a protein which slows down digestions, i.e. requires less insulin). High glycemic foods cause inflammation in the body. Children with autism already have chronic inflammation in their bodies and brains, so when you give them GFCF diets it doesn't abate the inflammation, it makes it worse, and the bad bacteria are still fed.

Here are some resources to help you get started with a GAPS or SCD diet (by the way SCD stands for Specific Carbohydrate Diet. It has been around since the 1920's with 90 years of scientific evidence to back up it's effectiveness. However it wasn't specifically created for autism. The GAPS diet is based on the SCD diet, but was specifically altered for patients suffering from autism, ADD, ADHD, etc.)

Book Gut and Psychology Syndrome
Cooking class to reverse food allergies
Meal Plans
FAQ from the Gaps Site
Dr. Campbell-McBride on youtube.
SCD Recipes and help

DISCLAIMER: I have not yet started this diet with Ezra. WHY? Because I have abnormal gut flora, and I have struggled with a carb addiction my whole life (thanks to not being breastfed, and having multiple courses of antibiotic treatments because of ear infections). It's difficult to break this vicious cycle for me, but I know I will do it. I'm now in the process of purging my kitchen, taking the cooking class, and gearing up for a full blown assault on our collective digestive issues as a family.

Funny Micah quotes

2011-06-20T22:08:00.002+02:00

June 20, 2011

Ezra is jumping about the living room, like a chimpanzee in heat, screaming and yelling, totally hyper.
Micah: Whoa Ezra. You need to calm down. Take some medicine. MO-OM! Ezra needs some GABA (a supplement we used to give him to help him be more calm).

Talking on the skype with grandma and grandpa.

Grandma: Ezra, how is Granny?
Ezra: She's reading a book.
Micah: No. She's an old lady. She's not very strong.

Put off having more children

2011-06-20T20:11:00.001+02:00

Disclaimer: do what you think is best. I have no business telling you to put off having kids. Everyone decides what is best for them.

My story

Ezra was merely a year old when we got pregnant with Micah. I had a little inkling something wasn't developing right with Ezra but it was too early to tell, and I didn't even know about autism. We wanted more children, but didn't really plan to get pregnant again. A little moment of indiscretion led to our darling Micah. I'm so grateful for my treasure, and I love him with all my heart.

I do admit though that as a mother one of the major sources of my stress and anxiety about Ezra's challenges have to do with Micah. When I was 8 months pregnant, Aaron had kidney cancer. He had to have his kidney removed, and I was left to care for both him and Ezra. He couldn't even move or lift anything. I'm sure Ezra felt the anxiety I felt for Aaron. He became more and more difficult, and it was obvious by now (he was 18 months old) that something was really wrong. He didn't have any words, and had multiple tantrums a day. He had severe separation anxiety, and freaked out if he couldn't see me. He spent most of the day right at my side, or on my hip. His attention span was non-existent. He would spend less than a second with a toy, and demanded my attention every second of the day. Then Micah was born. He was such a beautiful little baby. He was gentle, calm, snuggly, and just plain adorable. I was in love with him just as any mother is with her newborn. Ezra of course was jealous, and became more and more difficult to manage, but would only go to me. I had to constantly hand Micah off to granny or daddy, so I could calm Ezra. I started resenting Ezra for being so demanding. Two months after Micah's birth, we had Ezra assessed and he started getting therapies. I spent a lot of my week taking Ezra to his different therapies, where I couldn't bring Micah along. For me that was and still is very difficult.

One of my major inner conflicts is to want to be with Micah, but knowing that Ezra is the one who needs my help the most. If I don't spend time with Micah, he will still develop normally, whereas leaving Ezra alone to his own world, will severely hinder his brain development. Temple Grandin says in her book The Way I See It, that the worst thing you can do with an autistic child under six is nothing, because the brain is not creating pathways on it's own, and needs stimulation. It tears my heart to shreds when Micah looks at me with big sad eyes, says things like "I wish I was autistic too. Then people would come play with me," when I choose to play with Ezra in the playroom, or spend time training volunteers, watching Ezra in the playroom with them, giving feedback etc. Ezra gets all the attention. People will come to our house, even family, and exclaim with all their energy EZRA, how are you? just to get his attention. Micah will come running up with shining eyes and say HI! and repeat it four or five times, but be completely ignored. When people call, they always ask how Ezra is doing, rarely do they want to know anything about Micah, and he notices. Ezra can demand so much of my energy that I simply have none left to play with Micah. Then I feel guilty, and start to resent Ezra again for taking up so much of my time. It has gotten a bit easier now that Micah is able to understand more that Ezra is different. The other source of major concern is that Ezra is still jealous of Micah and pinches and hurts him all day long. There is nothing that makes me angrier than seeing Ezra who is almost twice Micah's size constantly beating him up.

I know that these problems can be solved by attitudinal work with the Option Process of the Son-Rise program. Life isn't fair for anyone, and the sooner we can accept that, the better...in theory. It's easier said than done.

When we went to Massachusetts, just Ezra, Daddy, and I we saw a completely different boy. Ezra was calm, happy, sweet, and attentive. He never screamed those blood curling screams that he uses at home. Sure he had excellent support from the playroom staff at the Autism Treatment Center, but the major difference was that Micah wasn't there. The minute we got off the plane when we got home and into the car it's like someone flipped a switch and he instead of hugging Micah started pinching him and screaming.
Ezra does love Micah, and Micah adores his older brother. Like all other siblings they learn from each other, the good and bad things.

I just think, that my life would have been a lot easier, if I had waited to have another child until Ezra was six or seven years old. Then I wouldn't have to deal with all this guilt and knowing that no matter how much I give someone is always going to come up short.

Have your child tested for food intolerances

2011-06-20T19:36:00.003+02:00

This could be a fairly extensive post, but I don't want to go into all the medical details. I'll try to keep it really simple and short.

The Short Version:

A healthy child is a happier child. If you remove all the things that the immune system is reacting to, then the body has a chance to rest and strengthen it's immune system. The better the immune system, the healthier the child. The healthier the child the less problem behaviors you see, and the more progress you'll see. Or a simple metaphor: if your child's body is a fortress under attack, you want to only send in the troupes that will bring provisions for the soldiers, not the enemy troupes that will attack and weaken your child and that it will have to fight off, when what it really needs is reinforcement. Our job as parents is to figure out what our child's body considers enemy and what reinforcement.

OK. Great idea. Where can I do that?

There are two ways I think. Through bioresonance (non invasive) or blood test. We used Alltess lab. It cost $160 for 180 IgG test. We had the kids' blood drawn here in the Netherlands and sent it via Fedex to the US.
Disclaimer: Food intolerance (IgG) and food allergy (IgE) are not the same. A food allergy can be life threatening whereas an intolerance just causes problems with the immune system. It's best to just google the difference (and test for both).

A bit more explanation

There are so many different explanations for what causes or exacerbates autism/autism like symptoms. The most simple and elegant explanation that I've ever read is by Dr. Melillo. He states that Autism, ADHD, and all those kind of brain problems are really a problem of the brain halves not communicating in sync, because one of the brain halves (in ASD that is typically the right side) didn't develop at the same rate as the other half (and here is where you could come up with lots of different reasons why, such as genes, toxicity, vaccines, viruses, etc.) The function of the immune system is divided up between the left and the right brain. When the left brain is doing it's job nicely in producing anti-bodies to patrol the blood for harmful pathogens and the right brain isn't keeping up it's job to check the anti-bodies, then the child develops a lot of food intolerances, because the immune system is compromised.
The solution to this is to strengthen the brain half that is weaker so it can communicate in sync. There are various ways of doing that. Here are the methods I read that will strengthen the weaker brain side:

Brain Balance program by Dr. Melillo. Costs around $5400-$6000 for a 3hrs/week treatments for 12 weeks. Some include the intolerance blood tests in that price. All the parents I have talked to that did this treatment say it helped their child recover completely from the intolerances and even from autism. Read the book Disconnected Kids, by Dr. Melillo.
Interactive Metronome helps the brains communicate in sync to some degree.
Handle I haven't done much research on this but my friend tells me that this does the same thing as brain balance, but with the benefit that you don't need your child's cooperation.
Neurofeedback training. This is highly effective, but as with all these treatments the efficiency depends on the number of sessions you have the development gap you are trying to fix. I heard it can take up to 100 sessions or more.
Cranio Sacral Therapy Read this from a fellow blogger with a child that had more allergies than I have ever encountered.

What have I done so far? Well, nothing. Mainly because of costs. I was going to go to Florida this summer for three months with the kids, so I could do the brain balance program with Ezra, but we didn't quite get the support we needed to do such a venture.
What would I do if I had the money I needed ($22,000)? I would do two 12 week programs of brain balance, and then also buy the Zengar institute's computer and software so we can do neurofeedback training at home with Ezra and Micah with unlimited sessions. Then I would find someone to do Cranio Sacral Therapy with Ezra, and I think we would be good to go.

However, fixing the brain is only 1/2 of the solution. The wrong kinds of foods cause havoc in the digestive system, and once damaged, it will not operate the way it needs to. Everything I've read indicates that the digestive tract doesn't heal itself or recover spontaneously, but needs dietary intervention to heal what was hurt, and restore proper balance. One without the other won't work long term, i.e. just diet alone won't fix the reason the digestion is off, and just fixing the brain, won't help the stomach heal.
Ezra is totally obsessed with food. He wants to eat all the time. He can't get enough into himself, and wants basically only carbs. However, he simply doesn't get enough nutrition from it because his digestion is messed up. So his body keeps demanding more. It's a vicious cycle, which is why the next thing I would recommend is putting your kid on a SCD, or GAPS diet immediately.

Call the Son-Rise Program immediately

2011-06-06T22:34:00.000+02:00

There are several different treatments out there, so why do the Son-Rise program? Because it is the only program that focuses on the relationship between you and your child, and that gives the PARENTS the tools to cope. As I mentioned in Putting myself first, helping your child is all about your attitude. The Son-Rise program is the master of attitudes, beliefs, and hope. When I went to the Start Up program in the UK last January, it was the first time I truly felt hope for Ezra. Before it was desperation. The Son-Rise program gave me the tools to be OK with Ezra's diagnosis, to understand, and accept him. It was liberating, not to have to try and change him.

Kids in the Son-Rise program can recover completely. ABA therapies can work in helping your child manage tasks, but if you want your child to become a connected human being who WANTS to be a part of this world, this is the program to use. As evidence of this claim, the Son-Rise program was just voted the number one therapy tool in the Autism One Conference in Chicago 2011.
Now, not all kids will recover with this program. I'm not telling you to not consider other programs, but knowing what I know now, I wish I could go back and tell myself to throw all skepticism overboard, and run it while Ezra was even just one year old. It seems to me that the kids that recover completely are those who had intensive one on one therapy for 40-70 hours a week, for 2-3 years before they turned 6 years of age.

It might seem as if it costs a lot, but really, it's a drop on the hot stone compared what an ABA full time school costs, or even a DIR floor time school. I think the Rebecca School in NYC which would be one of my dream schools for Ezra costs $72,500 a year. Speech and occupational therapy twice a week costs $1200 a month. With this program, some of those therapies become superfluous. You will run it with the help of volunteers.

Before you skip over this blog post, reconsider giving it a try. Even if you don't have a full time program, the people at the Autism Treatment Center of America are the most loving and caring people you'll ever meet. Their attitude is infectious.

Raise some money to go the Start Up. We did it. It's doable. They also have scholarships.
http://www.autismtreatmentcenter.org/contents/programs_and_services/index.php

A view you'll need

2011-06-06T22:13:00.000+02:00

2a) Thinking in Pictures and The Way I see it by Temple Grandin

A lot of what you will read when reading up on autism and treatments will be written by experts. Experts that is...who have never in their life been autistic, and can only provide the accumulative knowledge of observation, not introspection. If your child is autistic, I highly recommend reading these books, because Temple Grandin is autistic, and she is a phenomenal, brilliant scientist. Her insight has more to say than any so called expert. She has walked the walk! I was so much in awe of what she wrote, and it helped me see my own son in a very different light.

Here are the links to buy the book, or check it out at your local library.

The Way I See It!

Thinking In Pictures

Put Myself first, not my child

2011-06-06T22:02:00.001+02:00

1. Put Myself first not my child

Trust me, nothing is as important as you. You make or break your child's future. That is the truth! You are responsible. It is an enormous responsibility, and sometimes seems like a burden too heavy for your shoulders to bare. When you look at it that way, it will be a terrible burden. Life will be hard. Rather look at it as your blessing, your opportunity to grow in humanity, humility, and understanding far beyond what others will experience. It also means, that if you are in charge of it, you need to be in top mental shape. You're in it for the long run.
I just recently spoke to a friend of mine who has a relative with a teen-aged special needs child. She apparently just tried to kill herself for the 10th time. In my opinion, if you tried that many times without succeeding it is because you want your current life to be over, not for actual life to be over. Anyway, it was a wake up call to me. I was so close to burn out. I don't exactly have suicidal ambitions, but sometimes I do cast my eyes to heaven and think 'Can I come home now'? In fact, I'm sure that's burn out. I yelled at my kids for the smallest things, I lost it all the time, with myself, with my husband, with the kitchen cupboard that wouldn't shut...I couldn't seem to find my smile, and I felt generally just down and depressed. Sometimes I don't know where I'll get the energy to face another day. I cried multiple times a week, sometimes a day. So how did it get to that? Talking to my friend about his relative helped me realize that all these years, I had been putting Ezra first. I have been denying myself needed time off. How could I take time off, when no one knew how to take care of Ezra, when leaving him meant he would scream for me for two hours, when I knew I was inflicting this burden on someone else? I couldn't even enjoy time off if I had it because I was so worried about him. He had such severe separation anxiety that if I left his line of sight he would start wailing. He did that for about 4 years.
Yes, no one can take care of your child like you can. But you cannot let that stop you from living your life. If I could go back I would tell myself, that he will be OK. And so will yours. It's hard at first, but find someone you trust to take your child off your hands for a couple hours a week, or even a day if you can. I know you're not sleeping well. I know he's probably up at night, and early in the morning. My life got so much easier to handle once I realized that he was not hurting himself at night, and that I could just put in the earplugs. It took me three years to let go and realize that I needed sleep if I wanted to cope.

You are the marathon runner. Your child is just hitched to you in a trailer, and you are pulling him. You need to stop and hydrate. Enjoy the scenery along the way, because otherwise you will never make it to the finish line. So find a hobby and do it. Breathe! Forget about your child for a few hours. Interact with others, find friends you can enjoy your hobby with. Nothing is as refreshing as human interaction. My hobby is horseback riding and my riding pal who knows about my situation usually amuses herself by counting the deep contented sighs I make when I ride through the forests. It's like the weight of the burden is lifted for a few hours.

This deserves a whole separate post, but if you are having a hard time it's because you are having a S.A.D. S.A.D. stands for sucky attitude depression, or sucky attitude day. I know from experience that the only thing that makes having an autistic child harder is having a sucky attitude about it, which leads me to point number 2. The Son-Rise Program!

What to do when you suspect your child is autistic

2011-06-06T21:36:00.011+02:00

This post is intended as a guideline, a starting point, perhaps even a lighthouse in your hurricane for you moms and dads who have just found out or suspect that your child is autistic, or simply different from the rest. (If you suspect your child is different, get a diagnosis YESTERDAY! Don't waste time sitting around wondering.) You are my fellow warriors. I salute you. Yours is the errand of angels. I can tell you now that no matter how much your family, friend, and therapists care, no matter how involved they are, none of them will ever truly understand you as well as another parent with a special needs child. If you're looking for support and understanding, join a yahoo group or a parent group of autistic children in your neighborhood. It is such a relief to be able to share your frustrations, challenges, joys, and tears without the judgment of "you're just making it up, it's not that hard, it's your fault he's like this, you're just not a good parent." Also, it saves you the trouble from having to reinvent the wheel. Chances are they've been there, done that. This is what this post is about. The lessons I've learned, and the things I wish I could go back and do over.
My oldest son Ezra is now 5.5 years old. He was diagnosed in January 2008 with being not typically developing, and probably autistic. The diagnosis of autism and ADHD has since then been confirmed. At the time of his diagnosis he was just about 2.5 years old. I have and still spend many nights lying awake, trying to drown out the regrets and the guilt that pound at my consciousness for not acting on my instincts, and doing more for Ezra earlier on. I am working hard on accepting that I did the very best I could, with the information available to me. I thought myself very well read at this point, because I spent the last 4 years reading up on treatments, protocols, personal recovery stories, biomedical treatments etc, learning and comparing all along. And then I joined a yahoogroup for parents of autistic children, and was blown away by how little I really know. Some of these mothers have been researching for 1-20 years. They are amazing. Anyway, if I had a time machine and could go back in time, these are the things I wish I had done right away. I hope this list helps some of you out there. And no matter how much you would like it to be, journey through autism is not a sprint. It's a marathon. You're in it for the long run. There are no quick fixes. So make peace with that fact. These suggestions are especially for ASD kids under 6 years of age. Although if they're older, I would still

1. Put myself first, not my child. Why?

2. Call the Son-Rise program immediately Make a special playroom, and find volunteers to help you. Why?

2a.) Read Thinking in Pictures, and The Way I See It by Temple Grandin. Why?

3. Have your child tested for food intolerances and allergies and remove all foods immediately that he is intolerant to. Also, if you can afford it go organic, but at the very least, stop buying food with colorants, E's, or any type of preservatives. Why?

4. Start a SCD or GAPS diet now! Why?

5. Put off having more kids, if you don't have more than one. Why?

6. Do neurofeedback training, or brain balance program with your kid.

7. Find a sensory integration therapist, and have them start working with your child. Read all you can about sensory integration.

8. Get rid of all electronics. No battery operated toys, no TV, nada. You think it helps you have a break, but really, it prolongs the problem.

9. Cancel all your plans and dreams for you and your child's future. Wasting thoughts on them will only make you miserable. Live in the moment.

10. Find a pediatrician who is with DAN or with Dr.G, or someone who is knowledgeable about treating autism bio-medically.

I understand that this list might be harsh to process. If I could go back and talk to myself, I would probably smack my past self and tell her to just get on with it. Coming to think of it, that's actually what I did, so perhaps I should stop feeling guilty? I didn't let his diagnosis stop me, and I don't think I'll ever give up fighting for him. But I would like to stop fighting myself. This is life now, and there is joy in it, if one doesn't waste too much time thinking about what could and should have been. It doesn't exist. All there is, is now!

Stay posted as I write the reasons for all these steps. I don't have the time to include them all right now, but promise to write them up in the next few weeks. Also, if you are one of my anonymous readers, and have something to contribute to this subject, something you wish you had done, or would like to ask me a question, please put it in the comment section.

Micah's mini lecture

2011-06-06T08:07:00.001+02:00

After six months of trying to find Ezra a school, we've finally found one that is at least willing to see Ezra in person (rather than making all sorts of assumptions based on the label of autism and a low IQ test score). I really hope it works out for Ezra. Anyway, he's very excited to go. His 3 year old brother Micah who has been going to a Dutch playgroup every morning for a year had some words of advice for him.

Micah: You gotta learn friends, Ezra.
Ezra: No, you have to learn friends.
Micah: No, I'm not autistic. You are, and you gotta learn friends. You gotta learn to calm down. And you gotta look in the eyes VEEERY slowly. And when you say something, you gotta say it in Dutch, 'cause kids speak only Dutch here. No one will understand English.

I LOVE IT! Micah totally gets all the things we keep on teaching Ezra. When I look at him he says: good job looking in my eyes mom.

PS: By the way this is a word for word rendition.

Osama's Death

2011-05-03T10:19:00.002+02:00

I have been reading some of the posts on facebook and articles in reaction to Osama bin Laden's death. I have to admit that I'm a bit appalled at the celebration that is going on. Was he wicked? Very much so. Should we celebrate his death? Well, I don't think that does him or us any good. Of course we are more than justified to breathe a collective sigh of relief that he is no longer in a position to plan more innocent killings. If you think however that this is the end of it, it is not.
In fact these celebrations reminded me very much of a scripture:

Now, they [the more righteous people] were sorry to take up arms against the Lamanites [the ones who are blood thirsty], because they did not delight in the shedding of blood; yea, and this was not all—they were sorry to be the means of sending so many of their brethren out of this world into an eternal world, unprepared to meet their God. (Alma 48:23)

This scripture is from the Book of Mormon, which is basically an account of a family that lived in the Americas long before it was ever colonized (in other words the ancestors of the Mayans and Inkas, etc.). Their family divided themselves up into Nephites, who believed in God and tried to keep his commandments, and Lamanites, who were constantly seeking to destroy the Nephites, because they felt wronged by them. This scriptures refers to a massive war in which the Lamanites were seeking to infiltrate and overtake the Nephite cities. At this point in time they didn't succeed, but eventually the Nephites became so prideful and unrighteous, thinking themselves better than everyone else, that they did in fact get completely destroyed.

I see a parallel to what is going on today. Don't get me wrong. I'm glad that Osama is no longer running around planning killings, and I'm not saying anything against the fact that he was killed. I'm not opposed to taking actions to defend and protect life. But evil hasn't stopped because of it. There is a difference between defending to protect, and gloating revenge. When we gloat, and celebrate we are allowing some of that same evil, the complete disregard for the sanctity of human life, into our own hearts. There will always be evil as long as we rejoice over taking someone's life, as long as we think we are better than others. And it doesn't matter who is doing the celebrating and gloating. A life is a life.

Dummies Guide to ruining Easter (or Holidays)

2011-04-24T19:51:00.003+02:00

For all you supermoms out there who are not content with celebrating holiday in a normal, relaxed way, and would like some pointers on how to create a big enough mess for yourself, so you can put on your cape to save the day, here it is. This is...um...a friend of mine's guide to ruining Easter (can be applied to any holiday).

First things first. When you wake up, give yourself a good mental smack for not getting up earlier to make a huge fancy breakfast.
While you're making the kids the special nut, egg, gluten, casein free pancakes they can eat, beat yourself up about the fact that you can't make them their favorite foods, or the big eggs, bacon, and cinnamon rolls breakfast, because they're intolerant to it.
While your kids are having a great time finding the eggs you hid the night before, berate yourself for not being able to give them big baskets full of candy, and not having decorated the table with chocolate eggs. If you're tempted to remember the reason why you can't give them those candies, just blame yourself for not giving them a better DNA.
Have high expectations of your kids. Assume that they will behave and be kind just because it's a holiday.
While they're eating their candy, feel guilty that you broke down and gave them chocolate eggs.
When after five minutes your autistic child reacts to the chocolate and casein, starts screaming, barking, and hurting his younger sibling, remind yourself that it's your fault and feel guilty. (For good measure give yourself a mental kick for believing all these judgmental people around you who call you a strict parent, and have no clue what it's like to have a special needs child.)
If you are a Mormon, go to church with huge expectations that everyone else will have grasped how significant Easter is and that they too will want to celebrate this grand occasion with beautiful music, and uplifting talks.
Look for opportunities to be annoyed, like when the meeting starts 8 minutes late.
During the sacrament don't focus on remembering the resurrection or Christ. Instead get annoyed at the lack of common courtesy demonstrated by the parent of the screaming child, who won't take her into the hall.
Determine the nationality of the parent, and remind yourself of every time a person with that nationality has lacked common courtesy. Then get irritated at your spouse for taking a job in a country that lacks common courtesy.
When the first speaker announces that you can go to sleep because he'll give a boring talk, take it as evidence that everyone is out to annoy you today.
When the second speaker gets up and also demonstrates a lack of courtesy by speaking for 40 minutes, so the bishop has to cut his talk to 2 minutes and dispense with the intermediate hymn, repeat step 10.
When the same speaker who started the meeting late and took up all the time then gets up to close the meeting by giving another mini talk, repeat step 10.
Complain to your spouse, and to anyone who will listen that you don't belong to a church that values music, and good talks. As much as you are tempted, don't remember General Conference talks or MoTab. Just focus on how these talks are ruining your Easter expectations.
If you happen to get happy feelings during church because the primary kids are extra cute, squish them as soon as you can by reminding yourself that you might feel good now, but it's just the calm before the storm.
When church is over, and you realize that the potluck isn't happening because it's Easter, berate yourself for not trusting your common sense, which told you early that morning there wouldn't be one.
When your autistic child freaks out because he expected a pot luck and there wasn't one, remind yourself that you're a lousy parent.
After you get your kids in the car, and your autistic child freaks out even more because you also didn't prepare a lunch box, berate yourself again for not being prepared for every eventuality.
Remind yourself that this situation warrants dining out, and then get very angry because you left your credit card at home.
Get angry at your spouse because he didn't comply with your assumption that he had his wallet, and that he didn't read your mind to bring it. Remind yourself of everything else he does wrong, and take it as evidence for a disastrous marriage.
After 30 minutes of crying from your autistic child, first curse scientists for not inventing beaming technology. Blame yourself for not having invented it. Assume your child will starve, or melt down completely. Up your anxiety level, throw caution and blood pressure to the wind by flooring it home.
When you get home and your special needs child acts completely remote, doesn't listen, respond, and switches between hyperactive and despondent, feel really sorry for yourself, and assume that everyone else's life is easier than yours.
Whatever else you do, take yourself and your thoughts seriously. Don't think about the fact that you're being ridiculous and negative. It will ruin all your hard work!

Alright jokes aside here. Dr. Daniel Amen, a noted psychiatrist and author, wrote that everyone has what are called ANT's: Automative Negative Thoughts. They vary depending on which part of our brain is most challenged. Hormone levels really do influence our thoughts as well, so some days during the month you have to fight harder to remember that the world isn't actually rotten, it's just a lack of happy hormones causing you to think so. Some have dark and evil thoughts, some minds readily paint worst case scenarios, some have thoughts of hopelessness, self-hatred, etc. The point is that, although they feel real, they aren't true. They're just thoughts, and when you focus on negative thoughts, you just feel worse. He suggests to write them down and talk back to them. It's pretty funny once you write them down, how ridiculous they really are.

Anyway, hope you found some entertainment in this post. I'm going to go celebrate now how silly I was being today, I mean, er...how silly my friend was today, and enjoy the gorgeous evening, and the feeling of satisfaction one has on a perfect spring evening after eating a lovely Easter dinner.

My opinion on Gay Relationships and Christians

2011-04-22T21:54:00.005+02:00

I've been thinking a lot about this, and I just wanted to make my position clear. There is a lot about the gay movement that irks me, and a lot of (not so) "Christian" responses that irritate me.

What prompted this post? I was called in for an interrogation at the police station the other day. I wouldn't really call it an interrogation, because there were no two-way mirrors, no harsh lights, no cops hovering over you to squeeze that ultimate confession from you, just one girl with short spiky hair, angular glasses, no make-up, and a great desire to talk about her gay relationship.

We were talking about my autistic son, and the difficulty I've been having getting help for him here. Somehow that prompted her to open up about how judgmental the Dutch are about her being in a Gay relationship, which surprised me, as I thought the Dutch were fairly progressive. She related how she lives in a village where a lot of people attend church. She called herself atheist and told me that those Christians were crazy because they believed gay people were evil.
As the mother of an autistic child, I'm well aware of what it feels like to be judged. Many look at Ezra as stupid, weird, different, and at me as the one to blame. Even those close to us, who know and love us don't really get it. So in some way I can very easily relate to what it's like to be judged for who you are. People see Ezra's autistic behaviors. They rarely see him, a human being in need of love and acceptance. He is different, and it's obvious. But as Temple Grandin's mother would say: different, not less!

I told this police officer, and I tell you dear readers, that I absolutely know that there is a God, and that it is my belief that he didn't intend for women or men to act on same sex attraction or engage in same sex relationships. I'm not denying the reality of same sex attraction (nor did God, for that matter), and I'm definitely not going to get into a debate on whether or not one is born with it. My personal opinion is that one isn't born with it, but honestly, it's just an opinion, which I can neither prove nor disprove, and might change in a few years. Either way, it doesn't matter how you feel, or where it came from. It doesn't matter what happened to you in your past, or even now, whether you were abused or not. The only relevant question for every one is: what do you want to do with this now, and really: what do YOU want!

I explained to the officer, that even though I strongly held these beliefs, I had no issue whatsoever with her living her life as she saw fit. I don't judge her for her choice. In fact, as a singer, I have come in contact with many people who have same sex attraction and are married to each other. I love them, I respect them, enjoy working with them, and I'm proud to call them friends. I'm happy for their joy in their relationship. Happy people are usually kinder people!

It seems perhaps a contradiction that I call myself Christian, disagree with same sex relationships, but still have no problem with people living them. This however is what I take from reading in Christ's teachings, and I think a lot of Christians are missing the point, when they go around accusing others of being evil. To you I say: how on earth did you come to the conclusion after reading the scriptures that it's OK to judge or hurt others for not choosing to live the principles Christ taught? And what about the woman taken in adultery whom the pharisees wanted to stone? Christ asked those who were without sin to cast the first stone. Everyone left, because no one was without sin. None of us are innocent before God except little children. God gave us free agency, and it is up to each individual to either accept or refuse his teachings. Christ is the judge. If Christ has a problem with gay couples, I'm sure He can handle it without us. I want for myself the right to believe whatever I want to believe, and live my life according to the principles that I think will lead to my happiness. And if I want that for myself, I can only truly have it, if I grant that same freedom to others. I don't need the whole world to be married heterosexual couples for myself to be happy. So that's what irks me about Christians. If you truly call yourself Christian, then be kind, tolerant, and loving to all men and women, regardless of how they live and what they do. And by the way, and this deserves a whole separate post, telling people they're evil doesn't help them come to Christ. Ask yourself: if you're unkind and judgmental to someone, why would they want to learn about Christ, let alone attend a meeting where there are more people like you? The motivating-by-hellfire-and-damnation is a medieval church practice. It doesn't work well. The only power that can affect healing, and change is love, charity, and acceptance.

That said, here is what irks me about the "gay movement." Now please note, this doesn't apply to every gay person I ever met, just to some of the "extremists." I just stated above that "I don't need the whole world to be happily married heterosexual couples to be happy myself." I find some gays apply a double standard when they ask to believe as they choose and call Christians gay bashers, while they are bashing Christians for not agreeing with their choices.
Also, I've only ever experienced gays do this, but some seem to feel the need to flaunt their sexual exploits to the world through pictures or detailed accounts. Personally, I don't want to hear it from anyone regardless of orientation. And this brings me to pride parades...what the heck? I don't want to see floats with huge genitalia and sexual exploits portrayed. I choose to stay home, but I really don't understand why anyone feels such a display is necessary. If you have attended one and care to enlighten me, please feel free to comment.
Further: you can't claim that you are equal and at the same time demand to be treated differently. What I mean is why ask for harsher punishments on gay persecution, or gay attacks. No one should be persecuted, attacked, or bullied whether they are Straight, Gay, Black, Caucasian, Jews, Muslims, Christians, handicapped, or whatever. (The only exception I make here is harsher punishments for child traffickers, and pedophiles, because children need to be protected!) And no one should be killed because they look or believe differently!
And lastly, what I fundamentally disagree with is that when you have same sex attraction you have no choice but to act on it, and that you can never change. This to me is a limiting belief and a victim-mentality which very often has unhappiness as a consequence. I believe humans are capable of anything they want to do, even if it seems impossible. I have an overwhelming desire to eat all the chocolate I see. I believe it's not good for my body, and so I choose to abstain from it (no really, haven't eaten it in 3.5 years). If someone has same sex attraction, and if they believe that it's not good for their soul to act on it, and if they want to change how they feel, and find joy in a heterosexual relationship, then who are we to tell them he/she can't or shouldn't, or that he/she is denying her true nature? Humans change and evolve all the time. It's none of our business how others choose to find happiness. And just like with my son Ezra, I resent people telling me what he can and cannot do. You don't know! Keep your limiting beliefs to yourself, please! Let him find out what he's capable of, and let us support and believe in him no matter what it is he wants to do. Seeing same sex attraction -or any feeling, tendency, interest- as something you have no choice in is a victim mentality. You always have a choice whether it is to embrace it or alter it.

I have observed that people who blame others for their unhappiness, instead of taking responsibility for their own actions, tend to not be very happy. Think about it. You try to change everyone around you, so you can be happy? Everyone has to agree with you for you to be happy? Waste of time, friends. As mother Theresa once said: if you judge people, you have no time to love them. We can choose how we want to feel, and we decide on our definition of happiness. We are our own best experts. Today is Good Friday, the day I remember that Christ gave his life because he loved us all, even though we rejected him and crucified him. I dedicate this post to Him and to you all. I don't care what you believe, or what you do. I only care about your happiness. Today I want to just love and celebrate you for being human.

Yummy Gluten, Casein, Egg, and Nut free "Conference" Waffles

2011-04-03T18:59:00.001+02:00

What, another food post? What the heck is up with that? I thought you're not into food blogging?

And I'm not. Let's face it. Life has been pretty challenging lately (and what's up with that, by the way? I thought there were seasons of rest planned into the whole trials thing. Just saying, I'm about ready here!)
Having a special needs child, and two children with lots of food intolerances can be frustrating, aggravating, inconvenient, and expensive. I don't really enjoy reading rants though, unless they are super witty. And honestly, everyone has to go through some tough times! The refining of character isn't measured by how many trials we endure, but how we endure them. I for one get lots of opportunities to practice patience, and choosing happiness. I guess I really needed to learn some things.
Anyway, this is why food blogs have increased lately, because it is a way for me to share a positive outcome of my 'faith-promoting' opportunities. If nothing else my kids' food issues definitely give me opportunity to experiment in the kitchen.

So here it is. My super yummy Conference* waffles recipe.
Disclaimer: are these anything like the real waffles from Belgium? Well, sweet cheeks, I actually lived in Brussels for a while, and enjoyed many a piping hot belge waffle straight off the press, and no!, nothing is like a real belge waffle. And those horrible, dry, pancake-battery tasting things they try to pass off as belge waffles in the US, are definitely NOTHING like the real Belge waffles. In my baking experience nothing makes up for one pound of butter, white flour, and sugar. But, you know, a yummy, sweet, moist, waffle is still better than no waffle at all when you're allowed to eat basically nothing. Oh and by the way, any waffle tastes better when fresh off the press. Even if you eat them the same day, it's just not as good as piping hot.

"CONFERENCE" WAFFLES

This recipe makes about 30 waffles. You can just half it, but if your family is anything like mine, 10 waffles are not enough for a meal.

Wet Ingredients:

2 bananas
5 tbsp apple sauce
4 tbsp honey Put all wet ingredients in the blender and blend on high.
3 cups rice milk
4 tbsp oil

Dry Ingredients:

2 cups sorghum flour (also known as Juvar, which you can find in Indian markets)
1.5 cups rice flour
1/2 cup corn starch (or arrow root powder, or potato starch)
2 tsp xantham gum
2 1/2 tbsp baking powder (yes, you read it right, table spoons)
2 tsp salt
1 cup of secret ingredient**

In a separate bowl whisk these dry ingredients together and then add wet ingredients. Mix well.

Put two table spoons of batter into your waffle iron. Depends of course how big it is. Cook until the waffle stays firm when the lid is lifted. You'll have to figure out for yourself how long it is.

In my experience it is easier to wait until the waffle is an amber color.

Things I've learned along the way:

if you lift the lid too early the waffle will tear, but you can just put it back down, and it will still work.
light brown waffles are harder to get out than a dark amber colored waffle
2 tbsp of batter is really enough to make the waffle

*I call them conference waffles because the first time I made them was General Conference weekend. I bought a waffle maker the day before and experimented with this recipe. It turned out well on the first try. I spread out a blanket in front of the TV and gave my kids waffles for dinner, and for breakfast while they were listening to conference. This is a tradition I hope will last.

** The secret ingredient: this is it. Pearled sugar. Not sure that you can get it in the US. I highly doubt it. It's just sugar in lumps that caramelize on the surface, but stay crunchy in the batter.

Sweet Potato Corn Bread GFCF, and egg free

2011-03-23T18:03:00.002+01:00

Curiosity has it's price. I should have remembered the movie The Matrix before having my kids blood tested for food intolerances. Why, oh why, didn't I just take the blue pill? Now I know. It's too late.
I suppose I could ignore all the results by just continuing to give them the food they want to eat, but my conscience would haunt me even in my sleep. Not kidding by the way.
So on top of food preservatives, colorings, Gluten and Casein, which upon seeing it listed amongst their intolerances I uttered a satisfied "ha, I knew it", I can now add eggs and nuts to the Do-Not-Eat list. Ezra can also not eat most acidic fruits (like lemon, orange, melons, kiwi, apricots, etc). Surprisingly the boys are also very intolerant to oats, coconuts, garlic, flaxseed, sesame, and coffee. Pretty random. I thought, well at least that leaves some baked goods and fries, but Ezra can't have vanilla bean, and Micah can't have white potatoes. Ugh. Blue pill! I should have taken the blue pill!

Now I feel the responsibility to respect those intolerances and come up with new food they can and WANT to eat. It would all be very simple if I could just feed them meat and vegetables. In fact, that would be awesome, because it would help my persistent lbs melt away too. Instead of cooking three different types of foods for Aaron, kids, and myself I could just make the same thing for everyone, and we would all be slender and healthy! However, my picky little friends eat no veggies, and Ezra despises most forms of meat except the unhealthy ones like Hot Dogs and bacon. He's not yet stopped throwing unwanted food across the table or screaming at his salad bowl, so I'm not really keen on introducing him to all chicken and meatloaf.

Tonight, I browsed through some recipes and found one that was quite tasty. I substituted some flours, because I didn't have enough corn on hand and it came out very moist, and yummy.

Sweet Potato Corn Squares

Ingredients

1        cup   yellow corn meal
1/2     cup   rice flour
1/2     cup   sorghum flour
2    tsp    baking powder
1        tsp    xantham gum
1        tsp   salt
1        cup mashed sweet potatoes
1                egg (I used Egg Replacer)
1         cup rice milk
1/3      cup white sugar and molasses (1/3 cup total, I just filled the measuring cup with half molasses, half sugar)
2         tbsp sunflower oil

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Mix dry ingredients
3. Mix wet ingredients until well blended
4. Mix them all together and either put in muffin cups or a square cake tin sprayed with PAM
5. Bake for about 30 min or until firm
6. Cut into squares and serve with butter/jam, or even soup or savory meal

Totally awesome Cinnamon Roll Recipe for Gluten and Casein Free Families

2011-03-06T18:48:00.006+01:00

My mom makes the absolute best cinnamon rolls. I hate and love when she makes them, because there is nothing more delicious, and nothing worse for me than to have to deny my kids the same yummy treat that I love to eat. And besides, enjoying the company with the treat, is have to fun of having it. I've been looking for a GFCF recipe that would mirror my moms fluffy, white flour, butter soaked cinnamon rolls.
A few days ago I came across a GFCF pizza dough recipe, and thought to myself, if I tweak it might make a decent cinnamon roll. It worked on the first try.
I'm not gonna lie, and pretend that these are just as good, and exactly like the ones made with flour and butter. I secretly always laugh at the food bloggers, who claim that it tastes just as good or better than "the real deal". I kind of assume it's been too long for them to remember what flour and butter taste like. However, what I will say about these rolls is that they are delicious, they are soft, fluffy, and they don't have that weird GFCF aftertaste. If your kids (and you) are GFCF you have nothing to lose in trying them. If you don't have these handicaps, you'll still enjoy them, if you happen to be offered some. And hey, my kids can have them, and I can have one of my favorite treats and share it with them. I still have no ambitions of becoming a food blogger, and so have not yet gotten into the habit of taking pictures. I will make them again and hopefully take some decent pictures.

Vanessa's GFCF Cinnamon Rolls

Proof the yeast:

1 1/4 cup warm water
1 tsp white sugar (or any other sweetener you want, of course the taste will alter)
1 tbsp dry yeast

Let stand and make sure it foams, while you mix the dry ingredients.

In a large mixing bowl first sieve, and then stir together these dry ingredients:

Dry ingredients:
3/4 cup tapioca flour
1/4 cup corn starch (or arrow root powder, or potato starch)
1/2 cup almond flour (or substitute with either sorghum or white rice flour if you're allergic)
1/2 cup millet flour
1 cup sorghum flour (also called Juvar flour in Indian markets)
1 cup white rice flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp xanthan gum
1/3 cup white sugar (experiment with other sweeteners if you don't use sugar. If it's fluid, you might want to add more flour though)
3 tsp baking powder
1 grated lemon zest (optional)

Fluid ingredients:
1/4 cup sunflower oil (or any good oil with no flavor)
1 egg beaten
1/4 tsp rice vinegar

Filling:
1/2 cup sugar
oil to brush
cinnamon
raisins (optional)

Mix all ingredients together, using dough hooks on your hand mixer. Mix about 5 minutes until the dough is smooth. It will be sticky, but still firm enough so it doesn't stick to your hands too much.
Take a piece of parchment paper and spray with Pam.
Pat down the dough onto the paper to form a large rectangle.
Brush the whole surface with oil (or butter if you have no issue with casein).
Sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon, whatever is your preference. If you like you can also grate another lemon peel on top of the roll, and then add raisins. Personally I think everything tastes better with raisins.
Grasping the corners of the long side of the parchment paper, gently roll the dough over, until it's all rolled up.
Cut into about 3 inch rolls.
Spray a round cake pan with Pam, and arrange the rolls in them.
By the way, I didn't have enough dough to fill the pan, otherwise there would be a nice big roll in the middle here.
Let rise only once in a warm environment (I put them at 40 Celsius in our oven for 40 minutes).
Bake them at 180 Celsius (350 degrees fahrenheit) for about 40 minutes.

The baking time will vary greatly depending on your oven. Just test it by hand. If you push on it, it should firm, and a bit browned on top, neither squishy on the bottom, nor too hard.
Pour over your favorite icing. Personally I enjoy them just plain, or with a lemon juice & powder sugar glaze, but I know there are some cream cheese icing lovers out there, so go for it.

If you do end up trying them, and find some better versions feel free to comment.

This dough can make either pizza crust or cinnamon roll. For the pizza crust I just omitted so much sugar. Then I divided the dough and added sugar to the rest of it for the cinnamon rolls.

Beautiful Day

2011-02-24T19:45:00.000+01:00

This is a really sunless country in winter time. It basically is overcast and rainy from October to March. However, when the sun does come out, it is sublime. We don't waste sunny days around here. I take the kids to the forest as soon as I can. There is nothing more beautiful to me in nature than the rays of sun shining through thick trees and turning the mossy floor a vibrant green. When the kids then decide to be extra nice to each other, I really feel like I'm in heaven. I try to have my iPod on me at all times so I can record them being nice, not only to remember the blessed event myself, but also as a cunning little parenting technique. They see they get attention for being nice, and they get to watch themselves on the iPod afterward, so they're extra motivated to be kind.

Batman and Robin!

Ezra can be such a good brother sometimes, helping Micah with his zipper.

18 months in the Netherlands/Autism in the Netherlands

2011-02-01T23:22:00.002+01:00

This is a dual purpose post. It is partially meant us an update and will hopefully also serve as a bit of a guide if you're considering moving over here with your special needs child (and don't, if your child has autism). It's been 18 months since we left our home and friends in Indiana to move to the land of windmills. I fear that like Don Quixote we might have been chasing windmills when we decided to come here. It's not all bad. They have the best horses in the world, the most beautiful flowers, and some absolutely wonderful people. But some days it feels like it's just mostly bad, and not only because the weather is basically overcast from October to March. I think to a large extent this has to do with the fact that we are only here for 3 years, and I have Ezra's life and education to worry about. I don't worry about Micah (much), because he is typically developing, at least as far as mental ability goes. Ezra however is so far behind in everything, that his future in this cold country is a constant concern. In fact I've been so frustrated with the government here that for the first time I started understanding why people do bombings. Don't get me wrong. I think those acts are absolutely heinous. How dare you take the lives of a father or mother, son or daughter? Just the thought that because of some act of terrorism a son might be waiting in vain at the door that night to jump into daddy's arms after work. It makes me sick. However, I do understand the sentiment to want to send a message, and be heard.

Here is an overview of my battle with the Dutch windmills of bureaucracy:

First let me explain that there is something called PGB. It's a type of assistance the government provides to those with special needs, whose needs aren't covered by health insurance. Health insurance is supposed to cover speech therapy and physio therapy. It does not however cover occupational therapy more than 10 hours per year. To effectively treat the sensory integration problem that underlies most autism ideally you would get at least one hour a week if not every day, for 2-3 years. So this is something you could use the PGB for, if it is obvious you need it. PGB also covers physical help at home if you're handicapped, group therapy, parent respite in form of weekend camps for their handicapped children, etc.

Here is a chronology of the help I've been trying to get for Ezra:

2009
August
Calling International School, Therapists, etc. No answer until September when school is in.

September
Finally get people on the phone. Make appointments 2 weeks to 3 months from now for initial intake. Then you get an appointment after that 3 weeks later to see if you can get help (therapies etc.)
International school says: "we don't want a child with problems."
I get an appointment with Bureau Jeugdzorg (youth office) responsible for giving the diagnosis of help. I've learned since in my dealings with this office that they are mainly overworked people who don't really know what it is like to need the help. I explain exactly what I want, and that I need PGB in order to do the Floortime therapy as prescribed by Dr. Greenspan.

October
Ezra starts school at Tomteboe, what I thought was a school for special needs children with Autism.

November
Still haven't found a speech therapist who can work in English. Start work with an occupational therapist.

December
Ezra leaves home at 8 am and comes home at 4 pm on the taxi every day totally overwhelmed and either cries for hours or obsesses over the DVD player (i.e. pushing DVD's in and out).
I visit him in school. They aren't doing anything I asked them to do. Ezra is completely bored and overloaded by the chaos and noise of the classroom (although there are only 10 students). They don't speak to him in English. I learn that they really aren't a school, but a medical baby sitting service. Kids get put in there to find out what school they should go to after this. What they call treatment doesn't look any different from Micah's typical playgroup, just less kids, and a visual schedule. Still no therapies for Ezra at the school. They said they first have to observe him for 6 months to determine if he needs therapy (despite having a detailed treatment plan from the foremost authorities on childhood developmental delays, and the treatment plans and evaluation of his former speech & occupational therapists).

2010
January
I finally get the translation from the indication from Bureau Jeugdzorg. They say we won't get PGB, because Tomteboe is all he needs. We arrange for an interview with the school leaders. Together we agree that it isn't working, and they said: Ezra is too autistic for this place. We can't help him. I determine to take Ezra out of school by March.
I attend the son-rise Start up in the UK, and learn about the Son-Rise program.

February
Ezra is out of school at 1 pm every day. He's doing better. Final meeting with Tomteboe and B.S. from bureau jeugdzorg. She gives me the absolute smallest amount of PGB, because I don't want Ezra in that "school".

The main problem is that Dutch people don't know how to treat autism according to me, and they certainly don't believe that you can recover from it. They are so far behind in their research. Everything in this country goes slowly and with a lot of paperwork. They still think that Autism is a psychological disorder, and wait to diagnose it until they're older. In fact many of these special needs schools for kids with Autism don't start until the kids are six years old. To me that doesn't make any sense in light of all the research proving that early intervention is critical. I've even had them tell me that if you wait it out it gets better. Well it doesn't, dear Dutch people, and there are loads of accredited studies that prove that. Early intervention is crucial!

March
We start our son-rise program at home. Life seems great. Micah is now going to playgroup every morning.

April-June
Things are looking up. We don't have a lot of volunteers, and aren't terribly good at the program, but progress is being made.

July
I finally get the PGB that they promised in February. Six weeks later I get the translation of the paperwork. It states that if I want to complain I have to do it within six weeks. Great. After talking to my friends, I learn that they get thousands of Euros in PGB for their programs, and we got barely enough to cover anything. SCREWED, but, oops too late to complain.

July-September
All volunteers go on vacation, and Micah and Ezra are home together all day. Ezra becomes aggressive and starts to hit/bite/pinch make Micah scream non stop. Micah goes from happy camper to crying, screaming teasing all the time.

October
Things are getting more difficult between Micah and Ezra. It's constant fighting. I get the local authority to clear Ezra from obligatory school. He's excited about the Son-Rise program and impressed by what it accomplished. He also says that doing this program saves the government at least 17,000 Euros a year in schooling costs for Ezra.

November-December
Hire a professional to fill out our forms to reapply for PGB.
AWBZ tells me I need to have an indication from them to get special budget. I fill out a form, and they return it to me saying that Bureau Jeugdzorg needs to give me the indication as Ezra is under aged. I fill it out and Bureau Jeugdzorg says CIZ is responsible. I call CIZ and they say AWBZ is responsible for giving me the indication. WTF? So finally I fill out the form, give it to Bureau Jeugdzorg, and they tell me that because Ezra's IQ is so low I have to send it to CIZ. Oh good!

2011
January
After numerous calls to CIZ, I finally get a response around the 10th. I get an extremely unfriendly, defensive person on the phone. She denies my case, saying that because I don't send Ezra to school we have no right to help. I can appeal however within the first six weeks. Hurray! Of course it takes months to process it.
I call International school pleading with them to take Ezra. They again deny him, saying he wouldn't be able to function in a normal classroom setting (and they're right). I call the special needs school central to see if the local special needs school could take Ezra half days or at least give me written proof that I tried to put him in school and was denied. They explain that he first has to go to a normal school for six months so they can find out if he qualifies for normal school with assistance (and by the way, I have a brain scan now proving that Ezra has autism and ADHD?!?!!). How can it possibly take six months to find this out? Honestly! And have I mentioned: he has a speech delay and doesn't speak a lick of Dutch. OK, so I'm promised that they will call me back, which in my experience is equal to: "Don't call me. I'll call you!" So I call them again this morning and this is our conversation. She was in fact very friendly!

M: It will be very difficult to get an indication for Ezra to go to a cluster 4 school

They have normal schools, and then special needs schools: Cluster 1-4. 2 is for communication difficulties, and 4 is for behavior challenges like autism).

M: He wouldn't be able to function in a classroom there because there are too many students. You should put him in Tomteboe for two days a week.
Me: I asked them to do that, but they said it would be too disruptive to their process.
M: They wouldn't be able to do son-rise program with him school.
Me: Yes, I realize that, but CIZ needs me to prove that I've tried putting him in school. I don't think it's the best thing for him, but they're not interested what's best for him, only what fits their definitions.
M: Perhaps you could put him in the International school.
Me: I've tried twice. They said no. We're only here for another 18 months, so I really would rather have him speak English, because he doesn't understand Dutch, and it would delay his speech even further.

M: A.O. from Tomteboe told me he had communication problems. He should try a Cluster 2 school.
Me: You can only get an indication for a cluster 2 school if you have six months reports from a speech therapist which we don't have, because we couldn't find a speech therapist in the Netherlands who speaks English.
M: But coming to a Cluster 4 school wouldn't help his language. They speak Dutch. He wouldn't be able to integrate there.
Me: I KNOW! That's why I'm running a son-rise program at home.
M: OK, how much PGB do you get?
Me: None.
M: What do you mean none?
Me: I mean, the Dutch government specifically CIZ isn't giving me any PGB, because they say I chose to keep him at home.
M: But where can you send him?
Me: Nowhere, that's the point. The only English speaking school in the Netherlands for autistic children is in The Hague and costs 18,000 Euros a year.
M: Can't CIZ give you the money for that to cover it?
Me: Nope, I tried.
M: I'll help you get an indication for a Cluster 4 school.

OH, and the joke of all of this is: guess how much it will cost to send Ezra to a Cluster 4 school if he ever gets the indication? Yup, that's right about 18,000 Euros paid by the same government that is denying me the money that could help me run the most effective program at home! So the moral of this lengthy blog which really was more for my own amusement is: if you have an autistic child and don't intend to have him/her learn Dutch, don't come to the Netherlands.

PS: update. Talked to the Cluster 4 school and apparently Ezra needs an IQ of 80 to go to this school, which he doesn't (at least that you can test). They might make an exception for him, but he couldn't start until he's six years old which is in October. So essentially there isn't anywhere that I can send him to school right now (that we could afford like the private school in The Hague or on the American Airforce base).

How to get a picky eater to eat

2011-01-25T23:20:00.001+01:00

This day was so exciting, I have to double blog about it. Check out my Son-Rise blog for Ezra's program here. It was the best day ever.
One thing that made this day so awesome was the fact that for the first time Ezra ate all the food I gave him, including chicken, and salad. Ezra is really food defensive. He's so stubborn and inflexible that he would not even tolerate chicken on his side of the table. Today however was different. Why, you can read on the blog. Here however is what I did specifically to get him to eat.

Check my attitude: don't care if he eats it or not. If he wants more of his favorites, he has to eat the others first. I'm not going to fight about it or get upset if he doesn't eat or screams at me. He won't starve. He has enough food to sustain him.
I bought a darling little tray with kittens on it.
I arranged the food in a visually pleasing way, with at least two favorites (potatoes, and oranges)
I bought a bowl in the shape of half an apple for his fruits
I put salad in a separate little glass bowl on the tray.
When he wanted more potatoes I explained that he had to eat everything else first. I explained why protein was good for his body, and what it would help him do (i.e., it builds your muscles, it helps you feel full), and that vegetables are very good for his stomach
I celebrated him once for trying new foods, when he nibbled a bite of the chicken, and then completely ignored him and enjoyed my own food.

He ate the whole thing. It was amazing. And did I mention: he's never done that before.

I just added these pictures. This is not the lunch I was talking about, but nonetheless he ate it.

Rice and Beans is one of Ezra's favorites. Healthy, cheap, and easy! Right up my alley! Notice that the salad looks happy in this picture.

I told Ezra: look the salad is happy. He giggled and turned the carrot around. Ezra: nope, sad salad, mommy! Touche kiddo.

Things you say to get your kids to eat: (very excited) look it's like green, curly spaghetti

Delicious Creme Anglaise - Gluten, Casein Free

2011-01-22T19:05:00.003+01:00

I'm so not a food blogger and I don't really aspire to be either. There are too many other people who do that, and do it well. So I don't have lovely pictures to show for this recipe. But it turned out so yummy I thought I'd post it anyway.
I've been wanting to make a nice vanilla cream (or Creme Anglaise) that I could use in my Gluten Free Trifle, and today I found it. (I'll post the trifle recipe later). I just want to be able to celebrate holidays eating the deserts I love, without having to tell my kids: um, sorry, you can't eat this, or the alternative which is making two of every kind. I like food to be delicious, even if it doesn't contain Gluten or Casein. I can't stand recipes that claim they taste just like the "real thing" and then instead of having a yummy, gooey cookie melt on your tongue, you bite into a gluten free, chocolate free/carob substituted wannabe cookie that leaves your mouth feeling like you were just caught in a moldy sandstorm.

This recipe works (although admittedly I use approximates with the sugar, starch, and vanilla). It's delicious. I like having custard with fruit, because fruit is easy, available, quickly cooked, and makes a yummy dessert.

Here it is:

2 cups almond milk (I have tried it with coconut milk, but the coconut flavor was too strong for my taste)
4 egg yolks
2 tsps vanilla essence
1/3 cup white sugar
1/4 corn starch

Warm the almond milk to hot, but not boiling.
In a separate bowl beat the eggs with the sugar. Either warm the metal bowl on a stove (being careful to make it warm to the touch, not burning hot) or for even better results put the bowl in hot water and mix it up with a hand mixer until the sugar dissolves and the eggs are frothy, thick and pale yellow.
Pour the hot milk into the eggs while continuing to use the hand mixer, and then pour the eggs into the pot. Don't try to do it in reverse (i.e. pour eggs into the milk).
Continuously stir on the stove. You have to stir.
Dissolve cornstarch in a bit of water or almond milk, and add to the mixture.
Key is to keep stirring, keeping it at a low temperature so it goes to almost boiling, but doesn't.

That makes for a creamy sauce that isn't too thick. Enjoy with some steamed fruit, pour over crumble, or use in a trifle recipe.

Brand new look

2011-01-16T22:34:00.002+01:00

I just spent valuable time that could be used elsewhere revamping my blog look. Please do comment, and tell me how you like it. Truth is, I get bored quickly, and love changing things around. That goes for furniture and online profiles, but not for my hair. I play it safe when it comes to my hair.
Anyway, we're currently living in Holland, so I figured why not use a windmill background? They are all around us. Don't be deceived by the blue sky however. You see that mainly during the summer months. In winter it's gray, gray, and Gray with capital "G". I longed to put up a background of palm trees and beaches, but felt like a total fake.

I need to get some sleep. I have a long day tomorrow. Drop off Micah at playgroup, go to work, come back to pick up Micah and make lunch, train volunteers from 1-5 pm, make Lasagna somewhere in between there for Aaron's birthday dinner with his parents at 5 pm, put the kids to bed, and then hold a group meeting for our Team Ezra from 8-9:30 pm (which I haven't prepared yet). Oh, and I need to go yell at the morons in our Dutch bank too somewhere in there, because they froze our account for the entire last week, because we deposited 1400 Euros into our account. Yes, added 1400 Euros not overdrew. The guy who deposited the money bought two iPads from us, and apparently is being watched by the police. Fine, then freeze the deposits, not the entire account. Oh, and we can only complain in writing, which we did, immediately, but to no avail. Aren't they lucky we have an American bank account as well! Otherwise we couldn't even buy food! This is just one more of those Dutch experiences of utter inefficiency and lack of customer service.

The Dog Experiment

2010-12-24T20:08:00.002+01:00

My week as a dog owner was very interesting. For one thing I figured out that I'm really more of a cat person, because I prefer their independence. And picking up poop is kind of gross. It might be the size of the dog though, and perhaps I just need a dog that doesn't follow me around everywhere so I can trip over yet another body lying around the floor (I'm referring obviously to my live kids who trail me everywhere, not the dead bodies I keep stashed away on my floor).
The most interesting insight I had into a dog owner's life is that I was suddenly in the "in"-club. I have been going walking in the beautiful Joe Mannweg Forest all year with my kids. Both boys loved Lea and they generally love all dogs. They show their enthusiasm by jumping up and down, laughing, screaming, running up to them and asking (well we're working on that part) to pet them. There were always some friendly people who would give them a little smile and let them pet their dog. Some exceptionally awesome people even let Ezra throw a ball for the dog to fetch it, but in general people gave me the keep-your-psychotic-kids-away-from-my-dog-look. During our week with Lea we walked her every day in that same forest. This time however I was no longer the dog-less mom with psycho kids. Suddenly people were smiling, returning my greetings, and nodding in Lea's direction when she would have a little sniff-up with her fellow four-legged friends. Keep in mind here that this is the same forest, same kids, same trail, same behavior (if anything more exuberant), but now I was getting the benevolent look-how-much-those-kids-love-their-dog-they're-so-cute-look. Perhaps this immediate acceptance comes from a knowledge of what it takes to be a dog owner, the early walks, the training, the brushing, feeding, picking up poop, snuggling, and loving your pet. Perhaps it's just an immediate visual commonality that makes the unfamiliar less threatening. I miss that part.
I'm glad Lea is back with her owner, although I miss the walks with my kids who are now not as motivated to go to the forest and that unspoken bond that people dog owners seem to share.

I love how Ezra got so used to Lea that he wanted to have contact with her all the time.

I'm grateful I got to take pictures with my iPod but I wish it would have done the incredible winter light justice. It was truly magical.

Our favorite place here, the Joe Mannweg forest.

Discussing Divorce Part 4: How your marriage affects your kids

2010-12-15T19:12:00.004+01:00

Your marital problems affect your parenting, your children, the beliefs they form about themselves, and ultimately how they will parent their children.
If you think about it, most people enter parenthood with very little training. Very few universities or high schools offer a parenting 101 class. Why isn't it part of general education? We need to learn how to add and write, but how do we shape a child's view of himself, and help them become successful, happy, independent members of our society? Most of us become parents with little more than the example our parents gave us, for better or worse.
In the Son-Rise program for our special needs son, Ezra, we learn to be completely authentic, present, positive, and hopeful. We teach our kids through our example. Actions speak louder than words. The Son-Rise principles of non-judgmental, unconditional love, and acceptance are a way of life, not just a momentary therapeutic intervention. If we aren't accepting outside the playroom with ourselves and others it's hard to do it in the playroom (even if we manage, the effect is canceled out when I behave differently outside the room).
Guess what parents? Kids pick up everything! They're not stupid. They know if you have something going on, if you're happy or struggling. They know if you beat yourself up about your mistakes. They pick up how you feel about yourself. They see how you talk to your spouse. They hear what you say about him/her when he/she's not around. Nothing matters more to them than you two. You are their focus, their anchor.
For women: we are good at finding faults, at being dissatisfied when things aren't "just so". Have you ever gone to a play date and then ranted about all your husband's faults to your friend while your kids were in the same room? Don't think they aren't listening. They are! And to make matters worse, they'll in some way probably feel like it's their fault. They pick up everything you do and feel. If you are unhappy or stressed in your marriage, they will feel it, and it will show in your parenting. You might find yourself yelling at your kids a lot, and trying to control every little thing they do just to compensate for the lack of control you feel over your partner's emotions. Either you smother your kids with attention to compensate for lack of love which will lead to difficult, spoiled children who get no discipline and structure, or you push them away because you're overwhelmed with your feelings and they start acting out, doing things you tell them not to, just so they can get you to interact with them. Anger, fear, and frustration always come out in some form or another, as do happiness, gratitude, and love.
For men: the way you treat your wife, the way you talk to her, thank her, defend her, back her up, or on the other hand, talk down, beat, criticize her will shape your children's self-confidence and sexual identity in more ways than you can possibly imagine (according to research and personal experience). The best thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother.
The love and emotional bond between a husband and wife is the anchor that holds the family through every storm, be it the colicky and teething infant, handicapped child, a wayward child, death, job-loss, natural disaster, etc. If the children can trust that their parents love each other, they will be happier children.

So what? I have to be happy, positive, patient, loving, kind, and love my spouse unconditionally all the time, so that my kids won't be affected, and happy? No! That was a trick question. Remember Part 3 of this blog? You are not responsible for their feelings either. You are entitled to feel whatever you want to feel. If you're angry at your spouse, don't judge yourself for it. Just acknowledge it, and then figure out why you're angry. Talk to yourself, and him/her about it. You don't have to make sure your children are always happy. Only they can control they're happiness. I love a quote from a dear friend to her whiny toddler: "It's not my job to keep you happy. It's my job to keep you alive". A belief that you have to be perfect and always happy is self-defeating. Instead may I suggest that you adopt the belief that your kids will come to terms with your parenting like every other child out there has to do. We all have to work out the biases our parents pass on to us. But we can assume we are doing the very best we can. Teach them that they can chose how they want to feel. Teach them early on that they have the power to alter their feelings, and that only they are responsible for them.
Avoid telling them: "you make me so angry when you do this", "you just made your sister cry", "if you do this I'll be very sad", or "if you do your homework I'll be very happy". You're basically teaching them: you are responsible for my feelings, and so when you are unhappy only someone else can fix it. That's a big responsibility for a 3 year old, 2 year old, even a 10 year old. If you as the adult can't manage to make yourself happy, how do you expect someone with no life experience, let alone verbal and cognitive skills to do it for you? I can't control my feelings, so I'll control you! Yeah, that doesn't work too well.

In the playroom with Ezra we use the following technique: we explain what we are feeling and thinking. For example: I am really angry right now, because I didn't want to clean up that mess you just made. And then you can always follow it up by saying: but I can chose how I want to feel, so I'm not going to be happy now, even though I don't want to do this. My three year old Micah is hilarious when it comes to fake crying. We've been teaching him for 2 years now that crying doesn't work, and he just keeps on persisting, thinking that if he whines and cries it will get him what he wants. I've come up with a game for him. One time he was whining, and I said: oops, someone pushed your whiny button. Let me push your happy button. I then picked random spots on his face for happy, sad, angry, calm, and silly. Now whenever he's whiny or crying, I just go push the button. It usually only takes one or two pushes before he's laughing again.
Teach your kids to laugh at your mistakes, and at their own. Then they will learn that mistakes are there to be learned from.
Love your spouse. Speak respectfully about them. That goes for whether or not you decide to stay together. If you get divorced, you don't have to be unhappy. You can of course, if you want to. You can chose how you want to feel. Thoughts and words have an effect on our body. Happy memories and thoughts release endorphines, they make us feel good. Bad memories, sad thoughts release adrenaline. Our blood pressure rises, our breathing becomes more shallow, less oxygen gets to the organs. All thoughts affect our body. It's up to you to chose which one works best for you.

Discussing Divorce part 3: What almost wrecked it for us

2010-12-15T19:12:00.002+01:00

In our previous post I elaborated on the Option Process model of Stimulus - Belief- Response and how our beliefs are what determine our feelings.
In this post let me tell you about what belief almost wrecked our marriage. First of all our story in a nutshell:

We met during college, got engaged after 3 weeks, and were married 4 months later. We've been married for 8 years now. In our short 8 years together we've gone through just about everything, good and bad.
Without dishing out the specific details of our struggles I want to share the key principle we learned that I believe might be helpful to all of you who don't feel connected to your spouse in some way.
First of all, as I explained in Part 2, our feelings are a direct response to the beliefs we chose to hold on to. That means however, that ultimately how we want to feel and what we want to believe is our choice. Simply put: happiness is your choice. Nobody has the power to MAKE you unhappy or happy, but yourself. If you find yourself saying a lot: but he/she did this and that makes me soo mad, you really are saying, I give my free agency over to my spouse/children/random-crazy-driver-who-cut-me-off and expect them to take care of my happiness. Happiness is not a feeling you get when everything goes your way, when spouse does x or doesn't do x. Happiness comes from choosing a belief that will allow you to be happy independent of anyone else s actions. Strong and happy marriages are made up of two people who are independently happy, who don't depend on the other to make them happy, but chose to be together because they genuinely like each other. I remember the key deciding factor in my decision to marry Aaron (other than that he's tall, dark, handsome, and smart). I could be myself around him, and he loved me the way I was.
Aaron and I both feared divorce so much we were doing everything to prevent it, including taking responsibility for one another s feelings. Here are some more examples of how we were trying to take care of each others feelings:

Vanessa: [pinches finger in door] Ouwwww!!! Stupid door.
Aaron: Oh no. She's angry. It's probably my fault. Defensively Just be more careful.
Vanessa: Annoyed at his defensive tone: Geez, I hurt myself! Don't tell me what to do. Can't you just let me be angry?

So in this example we see that Aaron is uncomfortable with me being angry because he believes perhaps that he's a bad person and my anger is evidence of him being a bad provider because he's a bad person. He reacts defensively when all I was doing was venting at a door.

Aaron: [big sigh, acts remote]
Vanessa: What's wrong?
Aaron: Just tired.
Vanessa: common' I can tell something's up?
Aaron: no it's just been a long day.

Vanessa: angry Whatever, why won't you just talk to me?

Clearly I'm the one who is uncomfortable with him not being happy, so I try to fix him, so I can feel better. My belief here is that if he's too stressed out he'll leave, and people who don't communicate break up (like my parents).

Those are similar examples to things we have previously thought and done. Can you see what will happen when I feel responsible for Aaron s feelings, and he for mine?
Let me make our experience universally applicable. Essentially you stop being yourselves. You become afraid to share feelings of frustration with him/her because you don't want to "make" him/her unhappy or angry. That ends up in a lot of bottled up emotions which instead of being shared in a loving way end up in shouting matches, arguments, yelling at the kids, crying yourself to sleep, numbing your mind through endless video games/TV/reading/excessive exercising just to avoid talking and therefore hurting your spouses feelings. After a while you don't want to even share happy emotions because you feel they don't really care, they don't really love you unless you're happy, and all they want you for is to be happy so they can be happy. It doesn't work!
Coming back to Aaron and I, we were so focused on what we didn't want that we stopped being ourselves, and just backed away from anything we thought would lead us to divorce. Where attention goes, Energy flows. I'm sure that our course of action would have led us straight to the D-Door. We were focusing so much on what we don't want that we stopped doing the things we want.
One of the tools in the Option Process Dialogue that we use in the son-rise program is to question beliefs, and dig deeper. We don't content ourselves with stating our fears. We play out our fear scenario, describing what that would look like, to find out why we fear it so much. Often it turns out that the fear is illogical, and once you go there mentally it's easier to see that it isn't necessarily a valid fear. Anyway, Aaron and I played it out. Essentially both of us assumed that we didn't want divorce, and that getting one would lead to any number of unpleasant things like fights, custody battles, loneliness, stress, unhappiness, and basically feeling like a failure for the rest of our lives. The reason we held those beliefs were simply because we had chosen to believe them. What did we do? We changed our belief. (Surprise, I knew you knew this was coming). Instead of thinking we don't want divorce because we'll be unhappy we changed it to, we are working things out, and there is a chance that it won't work out between us. And if it doesn't we'll be happy anyway. We are no longer willing to pretend that we feel something we don't just to keep the other happy (which really doesn't work anyway). We decided to be ourselves again, 100% authentic with each other and risk that once we are we might actually not like each other. But we would rather know and then see from there than live the rest of our marriage (and eternity) pretending to be someone we aren't. This simple switch of beliefs has turned our marriage experience into a cherished choice rather than painful perseverance. Of course it wasn't as simple as just saying "now I believe something else". It meant moving through that painful fear. It took courage. It still does, to just let go of the outcome, and the need to control the unknown. Once I did let go, I realized that I actually wanted to be with Aaron. I'm not saying that I can guarantee our marriage will work out. But if it doesn't I assume I can find a way to be happy then, and I'll start by choosing to be happy now.

I hope these posts have been useful to you in some way. If you want to talk with me and do an option dialogue, just skype me or send me a message. I believe there is hope for everyone!

Click here to read about how your marriage can affect your parenting.

Discussing Divorce Part 2: The real problem and the solution

2010-12-15T19:11:00.008+01:00

I just spent a while writing this post and realized that there is a short way of saying what I'm saying. Here it is, for you who want an overview:

How to be miserable: believe the worst about your spouse and blame them for how you feel
How to be happy: believe that your spouse is doing the best he can based on his current beliefs, and that he/she loves you. Take responsibility for your own feelings.

Explanation, please? You got it. Here it is.
I remember talking to a friend of mine whose parents had been "happily" married for 30 years, and both of her grandparents were still together. She had no doubt that she would find someone to be happily married to for the duration of this life. It was her experience, and there was no reason for her to doubt it. I however feared divorce because my parents split when I was eight years old. I remember crying when I overheard them and running back to my bedroom to hide under my covers, as if somehow that would make reality go away. Making ends meet was a challenge after divorce and I really missed having a father figure around. We rarely saw him growing up. At some point I learned not to care or want my dad's input. What I took from our relationship is that I would avoid at all costs marrying someone like him, and thereby would avoid divorce.
Our experiences shape us, and at some point we adopt a belief that seems so natural so familiar that we no longer question it's veracity, because it seems like we have always believed it. When we hold a belief we automatically look for evidence to support our beliefs. Our body is wired to obey our mind. If we tell it that men are not trustworthy (a belief I adopted after my parents split), it will search for evidence to support that belief. If you believe that your spouse hates you, guess what? You will take everything he/she says or does as evidence for that, whether or not it's true. Here are some examples of how that has worked in our relationship. See if you recognize yourself a bit.

In the car:
Vanessa: would you mind slowing down a little, please. The roads are slick, and it's dark. (Belief: slick and dark roads are dangerous.)
Aaron: She's criticizing my driving. She's unhappy with the way I drive. I should slow down, so she's not unhappy, because if she's unhappy then she'll want a divorce. (Belief: Nothing I do is ever good enough. I'm a bad person.)

In the Netherlands:
Vanessa: Gosh, it's raining again. I hate this Dutch weather. (Belief: a lot of rain is bad, sunshine is good.)
Aaron: I'm a bad person for moving here. She hates it here. If I hadn't forced us to move here, she'd be happy. (Belief I'm a bad person.)

At home after work:
Aaron: I have such a headache. I wish the kids would stop screaming.
Vanessa: He hates the kids. I can't keep them quiet. He's stressed out again. He's unhappy. If I can't control the kids, he'll leave."EZRA, MICAH, FOR THE LOVE OF IT, BE QUIEEETTTT! (Belief: men leave if they're too stressed.)

Beliefs don't have to be negative though. In fact the Option Process (I'll explain in it below) teaches us that beliefs are neutral. They have desirable and less desirable behaviors and feelings as consequences. And what is desirable is entirely up to us. They always work FOR us and we can decide how we want them to work. Here's an example of how a belief results in happy feelings.

At home:
Aaron: [Comes home tired but goes to play with the kids anyway]
Vanessa: He is such a great dad. I'm so happy to hear the kids laughing and having a good time with him. (Belief: people who do things even when they don't feel like it are good people.)

Out and about:
Cashier or random person: [smiles at Aaron and says hello in a friendly voice]
Aaron: [smiles back and texts me that someone was nice] (Belief: having people be friendly feels good).

Often people think that the outside world is what causes our reactions and feelings. The Option Process basically teaches us that it is our Beliefs that cause us to react in a certain way, and that we can chose to retain or discard any belief. Here is the model as we were taught it in the Option Institute.

                           STIMULUS --> BELIEF --> RESPONSE

Let's take a look at how some of our beliefs could shape our reactions to our spouse and thus the marital climate at home.

STIMULUS                --> BELIEF                 --> RESPONSE
Aaron plays with kids --> dads who play with kids are good           --> I feel happy, lucky, am kind
Aaron plays with kids -->   Nobody loves me, the kids prefer daddy --> I feel unhappy, lonely, jealous

and another example:

Aaron misses the train--> He doesn't want to be with us          --> I feel angry, hurt
Aaron misses the train--> He works so hard to provide for us --> I feel grateful, happy

In this process is where the real secret to a happy relationship lies. Find what beliefs you have and then evaluate how they are working for you. Then you can decide if you want to change them. If you try to change the stimulus (your spouse, the world) you'll end up trying to control everything and everyone. Exhausting and ineffective! If you try to change your response you'll succeed only in ideal conditions (i.e. when your spouse never does what annoys you, when everything goes the way you want it to). That doesn't work either and leads to guilt. You can only change your beliefs. And, by the way, you CAN!

Read Part 3 for the belief and behavior that almost certainly would have wrecked our marriage.

Discussing Divorce Part 1: Why do we fear divorce?

2010-12-15T19:11:00.006+01:00

The word "divorce" is almost synonymous with failure. Our movies and stories raise us to believe that the best ending is "and they lived happily ever after". I for one don't feel completely satisfied when i walk out of a movie and there was no resolution to the conflict. Conveniently most love stories end right after the wedding. There is no mention of sleep deprivation, teething infants, financial struggles, job loss, depression, contentious children, the strain created by special needs children, difficult in-laws, special needs, cancer, addictions, abuse, clashing cultures, etc. I'm pretty sure stories would sell half as well if they ended with: and they lived happily until trouble hit after which they got divorced and lived out their lives in bitterness. It is natural to want to hold on to happiness, and see it last forever.
Generalizing grossly I believe men fear divorce because it costs a lot of money. They fear either getting custody of the children, or not getting to see them enough. Women fear rejection, infidelity, giving up their lives, dreams, bodies, and hearts to end up alone with no job and 1- however many kids to take care of by themselves.
Then there is the fear of judgment, and that fear is definitely a valid one. I've often overheard in conversations and sometimes have myself been guilty of professing opinions over divorced couples as to the reason they got divorced. You might be single and meet a really nice guy/girl and then hear, oh but he/she's divorced, as if that marked them as incapable of having a good relationship, or as if it stamped them as less valuable, less desirable. Typically I've noticed that when we judge others we really pass on them the judgment we give ourselves. If we think that something must be wrong with that person for having gotten divorced, then we really think that if we get divorced something must be wrong with us or someone else. When it's not a clear cut case of severe abuse or neglect we look first for a reason and then someone to blame, as if finding the reason and blame could protect our own happy ending. And perhaps secretly we're grateful it hasn't happened to us, and then we might even worry in some tiny corner of our mind that it will. Either way divorce has few positive connotations.
FEAR is at the bottom of these reasons. Fear is nothing but the promise of future pain. Why do we fear? Because we don't like the unknown. It means giving up control, admitting that we aren't in control. By buying into our fears we chose to experience the feelings we fear now, so we can prepare ourselves for when they hit, or prevent them from ever occurring in the first place. The only problem is we ARE already living them. How can we change that?

Read on: Part 2

Discussing Divorce

2010-12-15T19:11:00.005+01:00

Divorce. The big "D" word that most of us secretly or openly fear. The word that lurks in the back of the minds of every couple not yet married, and of those already married who have been together long enough to have discovered annoying idiosyncrasies.
Why do we fear divorce so much?
Marital problems are rarely discussed openly, perhaps because we would all like others to believe that we are happy and in love or we put up a facade to keep our problems private, either because we believe it really is no one else s business or because we worry about what others think of us.
I think it is important to keep your relationship private and refrain from gossiping about your spouse. However it could be tremendously helpful to share challenges and how we worked through them. I hope by sharing the things Aaron and I have learned, that I can give hope to some of you out there who have just gotten divorced, or are desperately trying to hide from the world and probably yourself how unhappy you really are in your marriage.

Part 1: Why we fear divorce
Part 2: The real problem and the answer to it!
Part 3: What almost wrecked our marriage
Part 4: How your relationship affects your children

Borrowed Dog

2010-12-13T21:09:00.000+01:00

I now have an 8 year old golden retriever lying right outside my living room door. Her name is Leah. She is affectionate, sweet, and currently snoring. I'm taking care of her for a week while her owner is on vacation. The idea is also to see if we want to get a dog. Golden Retrievers and Labradors are of course highly trainable. We had considered the idea of a service dog for Ezra, as they are used more and more for autistic children. We stopped short however at the amount of work training a dog takes, and the alternative of buying a fully trained dog was not financially feasible at $15,000 per dog. Frankly I'd rather buy a horse for that money...a good one. And some fish. Several parents have reported that having a dog helped their child relate more.
I also thought that having a dog would force me to exercise. So far our experiment has proved true on both accounts. Last night I went for a 20 minute walk despite below 0 temperatures, and today with equally chilling weather we went for a one hour walk in the forest with the kids. Running after Leah and throwing sticks for her to catch, motivated the children much more, than just trotting after me. At first Ezra was afraid of the dog. He spent this morning with granny as I had to go to my first day at my new job. It still feels weird that I'm not a working mom. Anyway, when Leah was lying down, Granny got him to get closer and closer to her, until he lay snuggled up next to her. After that, I really could see that his eye contact started increasing during the day. During our walk he even held a hand on Leah's back and ran along side her for 10 minutes. Tonight after dinner he wanted her to come play outside with him. These are all spontaneous interactions. Another plus I didn't consider is that Micah likes having a buddy to hug and play with. He loves animals and gets a very soft cute voice when he talks to them.
Minuses? I don't like having my hands smell like dog, the hair gets everywhere, and I'm not a huge fan of the begging for food.

Kindness from strangers

2010-12-01T14:40:00.000+01:00

I'm back in the US for the Son-Rise intensive treatment for Ezra. In the past few days I've been struck by the difference in the culture here and in the Netherlands and what an impact little acts of kindness make.
Here are some small things people did yesterday that made me take note and marvel at what an impact friendliness and kindness make:

A woman in her 60s held the door open for us when she saw Ezra and I approach.
A clerk in the store overheard me saying that those massive carts, the ones with the car attachment for kids, was hard to navigate, so he went and got me a different one, and told me not to worry about it.
The clerk in the post office was so friendly and helpful, smiled at us, joked with us, and helped us find the right packet for the things we had to mail.
When I was pulling out of a parking spot the guy in the car behind us stopped instead of trying to speed past us, and gave us a friendly you-first-wave.
A clerk in the health food store immediately stopped what she was doing when I asked her for help in finding Stevia.

Perhaps these acts are just part of the American customer service mentality. Perhaps they are cultural. I've certainly witnessed the same kind of courtesy and friendliness in other countries, and in turn have experienced unfriendly behavior at times in the US.It is so pleasant it when people are friendly. And it feels better to be friendly with others. Every emotion, every feeling has a physical effect in our body. Anger raises the blood pressure. Stress increases our adrenalin levels. Love manifests in form of dopamine in the brain, which feels good. When we choose to be angry, unkind, or friendly we really are choosing how we want to feel in our body. Acting angry or unfriendly rarely motivates someone else to change, and really in the end hurts only our own bodies, and our own happiness. One of the key teachings at the Option institute and in the Son-Rise program is that happiness is a choice. That means, others don't MAKE us angry by being rude. We choose to be angry about that. Others don't make us happy by being kind. We choose how we want to feel. One of my husband's favorite quotes is: You can make yourself happy, or you can make yourself miserable. Either way it's the same amount of work." One way doesn't take more time than the other. And even if being friendly did take three seconds more, it might just increase your joy in living.

It may not seem like a big deal if someone opens the door for you, but I think that many small acts of kindness done especially to strangers, when no one else is watching, define where we stand as a society. Imagine if everyone was kind to strangers, if everyone was friendly and polite? What a pleasant place would that be?

This reminds me of something Elder D. Todd Christofferson said at a Conference:

The societies in which many of us live have for more than a generation failed to foster moral discipline. They have taught that truth is relative and that everyone decides for himself or herself what is right. Concepts such as sin and wrong have been condemned as “value judgments.” As the Lord describes it, “Every man walketh in his own way, and after the image of his own god” (D&C 1:16).

As a consequence, self-discipline has eroded and societies are left to try to maintain order and civility by compulsion. The lack of internal control by individuals breeds external control by governments. One columnist observed that “gentlemanly behavior [for example, once] protected women from coarse behavior. Today, we expect sexual harassment laws to restrain coarse behavior. …

“Policemen and laws can never replace customs, traditions and moral values as a means for regulating human behavior. At best, the police and criminal justice system are the last desperate line of defense for a civilized society. Our increased reliance on laws to regulate behavior is a measure of how uncivilized we’ve become.”²

I get worried about the state of the world today, but when people take time to be kind, I always feel hopeful. I for one have decided that it feels good, and will take it back to the Netherlands where I know I'll have lots of opportunities to practice being kind.

Adjustments

2010-11-17T19:55:00.002+01:00

Alright, I admit. I stayed on until 7:38 pm last night, instead of turning it off, because I can't come upstairs without the kids wanting my attention, so I again didn't get to prepare the meeting enough, and frankly it won't be 7:30 pm by the time I turn it off tonight either, and here's my big justification: my kids are now going to bed later, and then all I have is 10 minutes on the computer. That's not enough to make phone calls. In the evening is the only time I can call the states because of the time difference, and I'm not about to pay long distance when I can use handy dandy google call and call all US numbers for free. So you see darlings, I might extend my computer from 7:15-8:00 pm.
Or is this perhaps a similar phenomenon to dieting, where you say: well I was going to stick with my diet, but then my aunt's sister's cousin celebrated a birthday and I really didn't want to offend her by not eating a piece of cake? Oh, the second piece, you say, why did I eat that? Well, otherwise she might think I didn't like it, right? Or the general addict's reply: well I would have abstained from -fill in the blank- but the kids were just too crazy/ work was just to overwhelming etc.
I don't know. It's possible. I know that I go to bed earlier now, and that being aware of what I'm doing has led to at least four blog posts so far. Not bad.

The other dilemma I have, is now that I'm not mindlessly surfing the internet, I'm dying to use the computer to write, and I also want to do the Rosetta Stone Dutch course. I'm tired of feeling so isolated here. Yes, almost everyone speaks English, and yes I understand Dutch, but that doesn't mean that people speak to me. When I drop off Micah in playgroup all the moms stand around in little clusters chatting, laughing, having some nice social interaction. They all speak English, but no one speaks to me. Most of them grew up right here, so they know each other too. It's very isolating. Most of all I want to be able to speak to the children though.
Anyway, I have so many things, I want to write about and create. Not stories, just thoughts, experiences, like how Ezra amazes me every day with his progress, and that my children acted like absolute angels today. If my kids were always like today, happily playing with each other, sharing, talking, laughing, than I would say that being a mother and parent is just about the greatest thing you'll ever do. Then of course, perhaps I wouldn't see that, if I didn't have to work so hard for it. And can I just put on my firm grip boots and climb onto my soapbox here? (Of course I can. It's my blog after all and isn't that the point of blogs?)
If you want your children to share and play nicely, there's no way around it: get down on the floor and play with them. Teach them. Tell them what to do, and how to do it, instead of what not to do. For example: if child #1 takes toy away from child #2 and both start screaming and hitting, you just take them aside and say: no, that's not peaceful (if they're older you can explain more). This is how you could do it: Child #1 May I have a turn with that toy? have him/her repeat, and then Child #2 you say: Sure. Celebrate them like crazy, praising them for how nicely and peacefully they were doing it. Reinforce rules kindly but firmly. Explain why and how we do things, and show it to them by playing with them. The parent is the most important educator to the child. Our success in life to a large extent is defined by our social skills and our self-confidence, and no one has greater influence on a child's self-confidence than the parent. He/she will learn more from you than from anyone else. A child invites you to become who you want to be. Be in the world what you want to see in the world.

Anyway, way overtime here and Aaron and I want to go watch a movie. Goodnight friends.

The first 24 hours

2010-11-16T18:08:00.000+01:00

I'm sure you're all dying to know what I did after I turned off the computer at 7:30 pm last night...not! But here it is anyway. Don't worry, I'm not planning on giving you a run down every day, but I myself am impressed at how much I got done.

I did in fact turn it off right when I said I would, even though I hadn't even started planning the group meeting for tonight, and in fact should be doing that right now, probably. Anyway, I went downstairs, sat on the couch, and tried myself at doing nothing for a while. It lasted all of two minutes, before I noticed that there were toys everywhere, the kitchen was cleaned only superficially and the playroom was a total disaster area. One thing lead to another, and although I tried periods of just sitting down and relaxing they never lasted longer than two minutes. Apparently I have a very short chill-span. In some ways I think I'm very much like Ezra. He's so hyperactive, always bouncing about from one thing to the next. The only time he slows down is when he reads a book. While I no longer bounce, except perhaps as a passive reaction to my movement, I still move a lot, and only sit still when I read. Anyway, darlings, this is what I did while trying to just chill:

November 15, past 7:30 pm

picked up all the toys
vacuumed downstairs
cleaned dishes
cleaned kitchen (2x)
sorted out the pantry/closet for stuff to give away
organized the toy closet
organized pantry
did a load of laundry
folded a load of laundry
put said laundry away (always my least favorite part, frankly)
tidied and organized playroom
swept playroom
prepared a glutenfree pastry crust for a quiche in the morning
prepared 3 GFCF muffin and cake mixes
prepared tea/coffee for the morning (relax Mormons, it's herbal tea, and cereal coffee)
chopped up chicken for chicken nuggets lunch, and prepared the mix for chicken nuggets

All of this took me until about 10:00 pm. The result showed this morning and during the day where things just ran more smoothly, it seemed. Now, if I had set myself a to-do-list like this, I would have done maybe two things, and then would have just thought, meh, who cares, I can do it tomorrow. I was pretty pleased with all I got done, but I would consider my evening just as productive, had I just taken time for myself to play through a Sonata, learn new music, or do whatever just for myself. This is what the option process has taught me and I'm starting to grasp and translate it better every day: happiness is the result of your own choice and belief. You are more likely to be happy, if you do what you do, because you want to do it. If you tell yourself: I have to make breakfast for the kids, I have to clean the house, I have to do this or that, because who else will do it, then you are setting yourself up for disappointment. If you however see that you're doing it out of love, because you want your children to have a healthy, yummy breakfast, because -and let's be honest here, friends- YOU like the house nice and tidy, and so on, then you're already doing what you want to be doing, without needing anyone else to "give" you happiness by saying thank you or appreciating your efforts.

OK, enough for today. I really need to prepare the meeting for tonight.

First day of computer in moderation

2010-11-15T19:18:00.001+01:00

Not bad for my first day, really. I can already see the results today in my new approach. I actually spent probably three hours in front of the computer, but I got the fund-raising letter written, called the appropriate agencies, researched treatments and agencies here in the Netherlands and can say that it was a very productive three hours. And, here I am blogging. So far so good. I did get off the computer yesterday at around 8:15 pm, after I finished writing the last post. I admit it was hard to go to bed without checking my mail or sitting down at the computer, which usually ends up in another 20- 60 min of my time sucked away. Instead of using the computer I went downstairs, made the menu plans for this coming week which surprisingly took an hour, because I had to come up with two plans as I'm doing a special diet right now in preparation for my Thanksgain-a-ton. Aaron and I held a real face to face conversation with some talking involved and then I went to bed earlier than usual and got a decent amount of sleep. Me likey!

I was going to give you an update on us here, but as I started writing, Micah demanded a bedtime story. Clouds on my computer horizon! I came upstairs today to use the computer while Aaron puts the kids to bed, at around 6:30 pm. Usually I stay downstairs so he gets to spend time with them. He typically leaves home at around 7:30 am and comes back between 5-5:20 pm which gives him just a bit less than two hours a day with the kids. Now, that I come upstairs though, the kids want me to read stories, sing, and do bath time. Not so ideal. I'll see what I can do about that. So update will have to wait until tomorrow. Now, one more

OK. It's 7:17 pm and I'm starting to feel antsy. What on earth am I going to do with myself after turning off the computer, and how am going to refrain from just nibbling out of boredom? Yikes. What did I get myself into?

Three month computer-in-moderation experiment

2010-11-14T20:32:00.000+01:00

How much time do YOU spend on the computer? How much time is leisure, how much work, research, play? Are you spending hours on your computer browsing facebook or youtube after your kids go to bed? Do you obsessively check your email/facebook/twitter (I don't have twitter, but just to include everyone) to see if someone has emailed you or replied to your thread? Do you fill out quiz after quiz for entertainment or to find answers to questions you wish you knew? Do you measure your value as a person by how many people reply to your posts? Have you looked at pictures of your friends, and secretly coveted their life/house/vacations/job/children/fill-in-the-blank? Have you ever said to yourself: how on earth is it 11 pm already, and then stayed on for no reason in particular? Do you consistently stay up past the point when you're body signals for you to go to sleep? Have you ever chatted with your husband online while you're in adjacent rooms (actually that works quite well for us when we're sharing links and looking at places to move to, as well as when we're arguing, because it removes tone of voice, and encourages thinking before writing. Just saying!)?
I have at some point or other been guilty of all the above, and I deem this no longer a desirable way of living. Mainly I'm just curious how much I could do, and frankly WHAT I would do, if I put my computer time to good use. Let's face it: I can't live without the internet anymore. I don't want to. It's cheap and practical to stay in touch with my family and friends back home in the States, and all over the world. And if people move, it doesn't matter, because I no longer need to keep track of their physical address. And I'm certainly not about to head down to our library in Eindhoven, to research a subject when all they have are outdated Dutch books, that you have to pay for to check out. I wouldn't even do that in the US. Google rocks. Thanks for inventing it. And can I just say: AMAZON!!!

Just FYI we don't have TV in our home. Many people find that bizarre, but we don't miss it. At first I only wanted to watch two shows, but then we would record others on the DVR just out of curiosity. It got to the point, where I felt I had to schedule time to keep up with all my shows. We were amazed at all the time it freed up once we got rid of it. Now that we live in the Netherlands and have few friends, it seems that our free time has gradually shifted towards the computer. I can live without TV. DVD's work fine, and occasional going to the movies. But how do I live with the internet without letting it take over my life, and replace my real life socializing with virtual friendships? Here's my experiment. Since I don't want to live without internet, I will attempt a three month computer-in-moderation plan. I will actually schedule time during the day to do what I need to do, and then cap off my computer time at 7:30 pm at night (except for tonight because I'm writing this lengthy blog post, and Micah wanted extra attention). My kids go to bed at around 7-ish, so I have 30 minutes to write a blog entry, and check email and calendar for the following day.
I find that for me one of the major problems with staying on too late is that I have valid things to do that I really need the computer for. My main online work consists in organizing my son-rise program, creating, editing, and reviewing forms, searching for volunteers, and researching more treatment options for Ezra, and Micah. On the leisure side I would like to create videos and photo albums of the kids, write a novel, or at least update my blog more than once every two months. I also use the computer as a phone book and a cookbook. However I simply don't get to these during the day, because as soon as I sit down in the office, the kids come bouncing in with requests for music, or play, or they get into trouble, because they tend to be aggressive with each other. I think I'll just do it when the kids are in bed. By the time they are though, I'm just too exhausted, and the last thing I want to do is look for more treatments for autistic children. So I log on, feeling somewhat isolated after a whole day of talking to just my kids and my mom, thinking I'll first catch up with some friends and get some social interaction. And sometimes I do get to skype with a friend and that is fun. YAY, skype inventer. Well done! Best thing invented since google. But other than that I just browse facebook, and watch funny youtube videos to distract myself and relax. The result is, that I get less real interaction with friends, and I probably make less friends here in the Netherlands, because a) I hardly go out because I'm tired, and it's rainy, dark, and cold now, and b) the friends I have online I rarely email them (why email if I can just post in one line how I'm doing on facebook, and aren't they all on facebook?). I get no work done, and then feel more stressed about it, because I have to do it some other time. I go to bed too late, wake up slightly sleep deprived and somewhat groggy, which affects my parenting, and my health, and after one and a half of staying up late, I don't speak Dutch, I've written no novel, found only two stable volunteers, and haven't gotten all that much closer to my friends back home. Bit of a wast of time, huh? To be fair, I did create a website for Ezra, have organized several of our pictures, written blog entries, and have learned a lot about treatment options for him, not to mention the countless research papers and articles I read. Still, I'm hopeful that with budgeted screen time, I will be more productive and happier. Wish me perseverance!

Autism in the morning

2010-10-25T22:37:00.000+02:00

If it wasn't a daily occurrence it might be hilarious. When it happened yesterday I did in fact just start laughing.

We have early risers. Our kids go to bed at 7 pm, and then wake up usually around 6 am give or take 30 minutes. I'm pretty certain any kid is annoying to a parent who has gone to bed at too late an hour because they had to either get stuff done they couldn't do during the day, or because they just wanted to enjoy some peace and quiet. I'm not saying I'm the only lucky mom privy to such nocturnal nonsense. Micah gets up at 6 am this morning, and wants to snuggle. Usually my snuggle rule is no earlier then 6:30 am, because once snuggling commences I can't sleep (mostly because Micah launches into a tirade of questions). Micah was so loud Ezra woke up also, and came into our room. I don't know why I think every day, that they'll just come and cuddle with us. Apparently I have no access to my memories in early waking hours that would help me think better of it. Ezra isn't capable of just lying still and snuggling unless he's really sick. He moves around like an octopus, can't lay still for more than 3 seconds. Today he didn't even come to snuggle, but instead looked out our window. This is what followed, and this is a typical autistic behavior. It's called an ism, and specifically a vocal ism, meaning he will do a thing repetitiously, without interacting.

Ezra: look mommy, the stars.
Mom: yes, it's night time. We should be sleeping. I hope he heard the hint in that.
Ezra: look, mommy, stars.
Mom: mhm
Ezra: look, mommy, stars
Mom: I don't care
Ezra: look, mommy, stars
Mom: this is so autistic. I wish he would start his isms after 7 am
Ezra: mommy, stars
Mom: Remember son-rise. Be supportive, be interested, join his ism
Ezra: mommy, stars
Mom: Yes, stars are out a night time
Ezra: look mommy, stars
Mom: Maybe I should try distraction Hey Ezra, why don't you go read a book in your room?
Ezra: silent for a moment Look mommy the stars
Mom: oh right. Distraction doesn't work. Whatever. I'll just ignore him. Maybe I should write a blog post about this and count how many times he says it.
Ezra: Look mommy, stars ...repeats it 38 times....then silence for 30 seconds...switch to other noise ism...starts bouncing a glass marble repetitively on the floor to hear the noise it makes
Mom: Why me? Do parents of normal children have to deal with this?

Ezra's Birthday

2010-10-25T19:45:00.000+02:00

Where has September gone? And for that matter, October is almost over and here I haven't posted since August.
We celebrated Ezra's birthday recently. It was exciting to see Ezra finally understand what birthday's are about. Now he knows to expect a cake, presents, and a party. We delivered of course. His wish list kept getting longer and longer the closer we got to the event. Of course the flip side of the coin is that true to his autism he's not only excited about his birthday, he now asks to have a cake and party every day.

I have a few very gifted cake decorating friends. I always admire their creations and thought I'd give it creating a themed birthday cake for Ezra a shot. He's really into airports, runways, and planes right now, so I thought I'd try to make him an airport cake (at first I thought of making him a galaxy cake but with no food colorings, no can do). Turns out that a perfectionist with no cake decorating skills has no business in making themed cakes, unless she does the decorating way in advance, instead of spending the morning cursing at her misshapen project, instead of showering her birthday boy with love and affection. It also is less fun to decorate a cake when you can't use any food colorings. Although despite my gluten/casein/food color/preservative free creation he still melted down from all the sugar and had a really hard day after until the sugar left his system. The cake tasted fine though.

We spent the morning unwrapping gifts and playing with them. In the afternoon we went to Ezra's favorite playground to have a BBQ. The weather cooperated beautifully. We stayed out later than usual, so by the time we got home, Ezra was ready for sleep. Day over!

Breda with the family and what to do when you see an autistic child

2010-08-23T20:25:00.001+02:00

View of the old city, canal, and citadel of Breda

Traveling with an autistic child is difficult, sometimes even impossible. Can you imagine what it is like to get very little sleep every night because of your child's difficulty sleeping, then go put in a hard day's work, come home at the end of the day justifiably tired to tantrums, an exhausted spouse. Then know that when all your colleagues and friends go on vacation to beautiful beaches and exotic locations, you will be staying home, because your child can't handle any change in routine, and because crowds and noises overwhelm him. Can you fathom what it is like to never go anywhere, not even the store, without planning for someone to take care of your child? To drive five miles out of your way, just to avoid the tantrum you know will ensue if he sees a certain store/restaurant that he wants to go to? No visits to the beautiful places of the world, even the ones close to you, and creating for your kids the kind of childhood memories you still cherish. No stays in hotels or camping, because your autistic child can't figure out how to rest his body, and all of you will be up for most of the night, listening to screaming.
Autistic children crave control, because their surroundings don't make sense to them. It is an overwhelming, chaotic influx of stimuli, which brains of neuro-typical children can easily sort out and categorize, tuning some things out if necessary. Not so for the autistic brain. From what I've gathered overwhelming stimuli has one of two effects on them: either it is such an overload that they shut down and cry trying to get out of the situation, or it is so stimulating to them that it acts on their brain like a drug, making them crave more and more. They will have a high from going out, but as we all know, what goes up comes down, and when they come down, we have the same reaction as the child that is overwhelmed at the beginning.
Consider then, dear reader, that the next time you are enjoying some time out with your family or friends, and you see a child acting completely out of control, that this might just be a family who has spent the last 3 years at home every single day with their child, have not had a break, a vacation, or time away from or with their children, have spent most of their money funding therapies, spend their time cooking special diets, can't eat out without their child having reactions, haven't slept right since the child was born, and against all odds have decided to venture out to give life in the world out there a try. The child isn't bad or evil, and the parents aren't irresponsible and incapable. No need to call the police or child services. Offering help, however kindly meant, will likely result in the child screaming more. Don't judge, don't criticize, and if you want to roll your eyes, and shake your head...by all means, although if you're doing it to get the parents to notice that their child is misbehaving...um, thank you captain obvious! And before you kindly or impatiently suggest to them to tell their child to stop just ask yourself: if they could, wouldn't they have already? At the end of the day though, I can promise you that you'll feel a lot better if you assume the child has special needs, and the parents and child are doing the best they can. Think a good thought for them, and thank whatever Higher Power you believe in, that your children are healthy, and that you can take them places and enjoy the good things in life (to whatever extent you chose to).

We are very fortunate that we can take Ezra with us. He is the second type I described and really craves input, and then melts down afterward, when his brain craves another fix that he doesn't get. We only take him for short trips. Lucky for us we live in Holland, and are surrounded by gorgeous, ancient cities within 1-2 hours driving distance.

Here then is another visit to a city close by; beautiful Breda. This is one of the "younger" cities of the Netherlands dating back to 1100 AD. We spent about two hours walking around the charming old town, and then found a park for the kids to play in. It was very manageable and absolutely perfect weather.

Ezra and Daddy in front of the Cathedral

I absolutely loved the ceiling.

There is a famous organ festival held in Breda each year.

By the way, I did not coordinate my children's clothes. Ezra likes to dress Micah, and usually makes sure that whatever he is wearing matches what Micah wears.

Having a little snack on the bridge.

Nothing like a giant cell phone to entertain the kids!


"Whipped Cream, Spaghetti, Coffee, Sausage, Ice Cream" We had our doubts about this restaurant.

Hideous playground structure in the castle park. The kids had a lot of fun though.

8th Anniversary tour of Netherlands

2010-08-20T23:18:00.000+02:00

We had a blast. There you go. That's all I'll tell you. Just kidding. I know all five of you reading my blog are dying to read about our anniversary in the Netherlands. It was pretty lovely and smooth going I must say.

To be honest we are pretty broke at the moment. I love a good challenge and thought it would be fun to organize a wedding anniversary with the theme no-money, no-complaints, with the goal to spend absolutely nothing and love it. I envisioned us biking to a beautiful nature reserve, and spending the night camping out, building a fire, and cooking re-hydrated pasta and then smores like in movies and books that I've read. Yes, I've never had to build my own fire in the wild before. Ever. Someone else (usually a guy) was there to take charge. I think this is a major lack in my survival skills set. So why not combine pleasure, learning and romance for our anniversary? Turns out though, that there is no "wild" in the Netherlands, and that starting a fire anywhere is illegal. There are nature preserves that have campgrounds, called natuur campeeren, which means, basically a camping ground in nature. The tent spaces are further apart, and there are usually very basic to no facilities (i.e. running water/toilets). Natuur campeeren differs from normal camping which is just your basic camp ground somewhere outside the city, with tents lined up within arms reach of each other, and full facilities. Turns out though that to go nature camping you have to buy a permit for 15 Euros, and then once you get to the camp ground you have to pay per adult, reservation fee, and for the space. If you use a shower you also have to pay. So we would have ended up paying about 30-40 Euros to go camping, which kind of wasn't what I had in mind with a romantic getaway and no spending. Then there is vrij campeeren, where you can camp for free at the edge of the field. However you can only camp after 7 pm and then it's first come first serve. Only three spots available, and no exact location. Camping laws here are very strict, and the police department even has their own unit who do nothing but patrol for illegal camping. The final nail in the camping coffin was that apparently there is a major tic problem in the forests here with Lyme disease. I know you were all just dying to know about this, so now that your curiosity on camping in the Netherlands is satisfied, back to the anniversary.

We threw all previous attempts to not spend money out the window, and settled for good ol' American credit card vacation. Our hotel actually ended up being just slightly more than the camp ground, and we had shower, and a king size bed!!! As soon as my head hit the hotel pillow for an afternoon nap (pure luxury) I laughed at the thought of camping somewhere on a hard floor, with no running water close by and bugs swarming us.

We started out our day in the amazing city of Utrecht. The earliest origins of this city date back to 2200 BC!!!! In the 2nd century Romans built a fortress there, but couldn't maintain it, and finally it is spoken of again in the 7th century. I love how steeped in history everything in Europe is. The city itself reminded us a little of San Antonio with it's river boardwalk. We arrived before 9:30 so shops were all still closed, and the atmosphere was very peaceful.

Aaron in Utrecht

Behind the Cathedral


This is taken from underneath the cathedral tower. The cathedral was destroyed in a hurricane.


Tower of Utrecht, part of the former cathedral.

This is by far one of the most elegant catholic churches I've had the pleasure of visiting.

Boardwalk in Utrecht

Little shops line the canal

wacky tree along canal

Cool Stone with ancient carvings in front of Cathedral

After Utrecht we headed out to the Kastel De Haar, a very pretty castle outside of Utrecht, with an underwhelming park. Sorry, but after seeing Schoenbrunn I'm not easily blown away. We had a fun little picnic in the park and walked around the castle which is being renovated.

Aaron washing out raspberry vinaigrette from his shorts and white shirt in the super fancy guest bathroom of the castle.

Seriously, wrought iron hardware, solid wood door, ceramic tiles...and we got all the raspberry dressing out.

We headed straight up to our hotel which was about an hour North of Amsterdam, and took aforementioned nap. I think, only parents can truly appreciate the luxury of an uninterrupted afternoon nap.
The beach was next on our list. The water was freeeezzzing, and my legs mysteriously started itching. After we were thoroughly cold, we headed back to the beach and saw a disgusting, dead jelly fish. Ewww. I paid closer attention to the water and saw several small jellyfish floating next to the shore, and many dead ones on the beach. With the mystery of my itching legs solved I didn't return to the water after that.

Then we had dinner in Haarlem, which is probably the prettiest city I've been too so far in the Netherlands. Or maybe the second prettiest. I don't know, so many to chose from. After a stroll through the narrow streets and peeking at the menus of several restaurants we decided on Japanese, because it had the nicest interior decor and the least likelihood of me ending up toppled over with stomach cramps an hour after eating.


Haarlem City Center

The only thing I'll mention about going back to the hotel was that we got to sleep in the next morning. That alone was worth going away for!!!

Micah's 3rd Birthday

2010-07-12T19:41:00.000+02:00

We had a blast on Micah's birthday. We live in a tiny town called Best, outside of Eindhoven. In this tiny town there is a huge fair once a year, one of the biggest in the Netherlands. 250,000 people visit it and it happened to fall on Micah's birthday. Saturday and Sunday it was horribly hot, so we stayed away, but the temperatures cooled on Monday and Tuesday, so we went and had such a blast watching the kids go on rides. I wanted to get myself a stuffed tiger so badly, that I ended up buying one, because my archery skills are not quite up to par. But at least I hit one balloon, after my first try shooting an arrow.
Micah had a great day, I think, enjoyed all his favorite foods, and especially his new toys.

Micah's 3rd Birthday July 5th 2010

Independence Day, and Micah's 3rd Birthday Party

2010-07-12T19:24:00.004+02:00

Micah's birthday is so close to Independence Day that we decided to combine the two events. We had an absolutely brilliant time barbecuing and swimming in our back yard with our friends the Knudsens and the Daams. Ezra and Micah are madly in love with the Knudsens oldest daughter Jori, who has been volunteering for Ezra's son-rise program. She has the most amazing blue eyes. And the three "younger" sons Chris, Malachi, and DJ have acquired hero status in Micah's and Ezra's eyes. Of course any party must include Melissa and Mark with their daughters Kailea and Ella. Our gathering was very merry, and I admit publicly that Sheldon Knudsen was in fact not as biased as I thought, and that Oscar Meyer hot dogs (supplied from the Airforce base, thank you very kindly) really are worlds better than Lidl hot dogs from Europe.

It was fun to see Micah being the center of attention. He was so shy about it, but thrilled too. Usually everything is about Ezra. People come over to play with Ezra in a special room. In reality Micah gets a lot of attention, but it's still different. Micah's favorite present was probably having Jori all to himself. She showered him with attention and he ate it up. Another great gift was that his Opa finally came to visit. He spent time playing with the kids, and treated us to Chinese dinner, and to the awesome fair here in Best. It's one of the biggest in the Netherlands, and more than 250,000 people visit during the course of five days.

Enjoy some the pictures.

4th of July and Micah's 3 Birthday Party July 2010

I'm so powerful

2010-07-01T23:40:00.003+02:00

It's one of these nights where I'm really wishing for A/C. It's about 93 degrees outside and only starting to cool off. Our house has a tarred flat roof which means it's essentially like a sauna on the second floor, where the bedrooms are. It might be a good thing though, because if it wasn't for me being so uncomfortable I know this would never get written. I'd just go to sleep, instead of writing.

I've begun following my natural inclinations and have started counseling and feel very at home in it. It is a very specific type of counseling and differs greatly from most counseling jobs. It is based on the principles of the Option Process, which was created by the same guy who created the Son-Rise program that we're doing with Ezra. Essentially in this type of counseling, the client is the director. I ask questions that help the client examine their behaviors and beliefs, and then to find their own answers, and solutions, based on what they want to do. The key principles of this method are to be non-judgmental, loving, accepting, and especially non-directive as a counselor. FYI if any of you are interested in trying it out, I'm looking for clients to practice on. No charge, yet.

Tonight I did such a session with a friend of mine. This is the second session we've had, and I feel so edified after it I have to write it down. But first a little introduction to the the process is necessary. In the option process we believe that all our actions, all our behaviors are the results not of our external surroundings and the stimuli they emit but of our internal beliefs about them. We MAKE belief!

STIMULUS ----> BELIEF ------> RESPONSE

To clarify, an example:
Stimulus: there is a traffic jam on the way to work
Response: Client gets angry and cranky

What can the client change about that? He could in future avoid that route. That would be trying to change the stimulus. But that could lead to him getting stuck behind a tractor, or his car breaking down, his spouse calling saying he forgot his key card at home, and he might still be late to work. So in essence trying to control the stimulus is difficult/impossible. The next thing the client might try to change is the response: "well getting angry and cranky is bad. I shouldn't do that, it's bad for my cholesterol, etc." So he tries to change the behavior. That usually results in a long list of to-do's, shoulds, needs, and the familiar new years resolutions, that leave everyone falling short. Controlling behavior is possible but it works only sporadically in best case scenarios and is rather laborious. In the option process I try to identify the belief behind the getting angry and cranky. Why do you get angry, I would ask. And after some probing it turns out that he gets angry because he believes that being late will make him look bad and his boss won't like it. And after more probing we'll figure out that the real belief is: I'm not good enough, I want my boss to confirm that, and by being late, he won't. So here he thinks the problem is that he has a short fuse in traffic, when really his belief of not being good enough is the cause. He could change it simply to I'm good enough and don't have to prove anything.

This view of stimulus-belief-response means that we are in control of our response, because we can chose what we believe. We have the power to chose how we want to feel and what we want to believe. It struck me during the session with my friend how beautifully her main underlying belief, I am a bad person, guided her every action and in-action. She made the entire world, all the people in it align with that belief. No matter how successful she is in her chosen career (and she is) she finds ways to confirm how others are better than her, and how she is a bad person because of being in that chosen career. Whatever good she does is viewed only in terms of the good she didn't do. When we chose a belief, our entire body and our subconscious immediately goes to work to confirm our belief, looking for evidence of said belief. I was so in awe of her power and celebrated her for it. I realized that no matter what our mental or physical challenges, no matter the circumstances we find ourselves in, there is a power within us that no man can take from us. We can align the entire world, and every one in it, to serve our belief. And if that belief is: I'm a bad person, I'm not good enough, or I'm truly happy and blessed...we will find the evidence for it. That is truly inspiring!

So with that thought all written down, I will now go to sleep with my brand new belief that I can sleep when it's really hot, and even though it's late, I will have enough rest to get up early.

Christ Centered Parenting

2010-06-27T18:45:00.006+02:00

I was asked to give a talk this Sunday at Church on Christ centered parenting. Here it
is.

Christ centered parenting

What is parenting and how can it be Christ centered: Wikipedia defines parenting as the process of promoting and supporting the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development of a child from infancy to adulthood.
To this definition I would add in the words of King Benjamin:
Mosia 4: 15-16
ye will teach [your children] to walk in the ways of truth and soberness; ye will teach them to love one another, and to serve one another.

And in the next verse King Benjamin points the way to how this is to be done.
And also, ye yourselves will succor those that stand in need of your succor. Ye will administer of your substance unto him that standeth in need.

Our teaching is useless unless we set the example. Aaron and I recently spent a week in the States. During that time my mother and Aaron's parents took care of the children. When we returned we were going to have dinner together. After dinner we went to play outside in the garden. Most of us were already outside, when I heard Ezra yell: come on, Bill, in perfect imitation of Grandma. Whether we like it or not, our children see everything we do, and copy us. We pass our own biases on to our children. This can work in our favor. Ralph Waldo Emerson put it this way:Your actions speak so loud I could not hear your words?
Another new favorite quote of mine is: Be in the world what you want to see in the world.

So how does plain parenting differ from Christ centered parenting? Nephi has an apt description that you are all familiar with:
2 Ne:25:26
And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins.
This mission, this mandate, is not unlike Christ’s mission. He came to earth to teach us of the love our Heavenly Father has for us. How did he accomplish his mission? What was his method?
John 5:19
Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.

If we want our children to love Christ to know him, to be like him, then we need to love him, be like him, and serve him. Don’t think that we can fool our children. They know the difference. Let me radically suggest that parenting is about becoming ourselves who we want our children to be. Our children depend on us for direction and guidance, especially in their younger years. But it doesn’t follow that because we are teaching them they have nothing to teach us. Parenting children is the greatest opportunity we are given in this life to become Christ like whether these be our biological children, or our nieces, nephews, or children in our care.

As I was preparing this talk I reflected on the pattern Heavenly Father set for the experience of his children here on earth. He has blessed each of us with individual talents, situations, and challenges. But there are four gifts that each of us have been given regardless of the family situation we have been placed in. They are a beautiful earth, honesty and assurance, free agency, and the atonement. I think that we can give these gifts to our children.

1 A beautiful place to call home
Before our Father in Heaven parted with us, he created a beautiful earth for us to live in. Everything around us is a testament of where we came from. Alma teaches Korihor:
Alma 30:44
yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and call things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.
What kind of home do we provide for our children? I’m not suggesting we need an expensive mansion filled with paraphernalia. Is it a place you want to come home to? Is it a place where a child is and feels safe, and can grow in strength and health? When your children look at the walls and shelves, what are the values they will see? Is our home neat and clean?

2 Honesty and Assurance
The earth God created for us is beautiful but it has it’s risks: natural disasters and human corruption abound. God has warned and prepared us for these occasions and assured us that he is always there for us. He let’s us know what is about to happen through his prophets. He warns us of dangers. He doesn’t sugar coat the dangers and consequences of sinful behaviors. He makes no excuses. He is completely honest with us, and assures us that he will be there for us through it all.
Deuteronomy 31:8
And the Lord, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed.
Elder Hale said: we raise our families in a wicked and hostile world…But we also weave around our children a protective basket—a vessel called “the family”—and guide them to safe places where our teachings can be reinforced in the home and at church.
Our family can be the haven where our children find comfort and guidance.

3 Agency
Perhaps his greatest gift to us is our agency.
Moses 7: 32
32 The Lord said unto Enoch: Behold [Humans] are the workmanship of mine own hands, and I gave unto them their knowledge, in the day I created them; and in the Garden of Eden, gave I unto man his agency;
Our agency allows us to chose for ourselves, to have our own experiences. Do we bestow the same trust in our children? What greater evidence of His faith in us could God have given us? What greater gift of love could he have offered, then to let us chose for ourselves? Only one! Which brings me to the last gift I want to mention.

4 Atonement
God knew us so well he understood that we mess up at times. So with the gift of our agency, he also provided a way out. Providing a way out, to me, evidences his acceptance of our weakness.
1 Jn. 4:10
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and bent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
John 3: 16
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Are we forgiving and accepting of our children’s mistakes, or to we continuously remind them of their failings in the past?

So this is the point in a talk where usually one makes suggestions for behaviors we can change or add to be Christ centered parents (suggestions perhaps like, get rid of bad movies, hang up pictures of Christ, read scriptures with your kids, pray every day, attend the temple, be loving, don’t judge, forgive, etc). Through the Son-Rise program I have come to understand that it is not our behaviors we need to change, but our beliefs. We all act according to our beliefs and in accordance of what we want the most. Our behaviors and actions are only the result of what we believe. And in this lies the key: if we want. I have come to believe that everyone does what they want to do the most. We can chose what we want to do. Therein lies our free agency. And in circumstances beyond our control, we can choose how react. Perhaps you might be thinking, well I don’t have a choice about working. I have to work to support my family. I say: no you don’t. There are plenty of people who don’t. If you are working to support your family, it is because you want your family to be supported. Or at least you want it more than you want to feel like you can’t support your family. Or what about a mother: I have to stay home from work to take care of my children. Again, no you don’t. If you’re staying home it is because you want to take care of your children. I believe that if we acknowledge that what we do is what we want to do, life becomes easier. We become happier, because we are no longer the victims of circumstances. We own up to who we are and what we want to do. So how do we become Christ centered parents? We don’t, unless we WANT to center ourselves on Christ. This is something that will be up to each of you to decide for themselves. You can ask yourself: Do I want a Christ centered home?

The scriptures assure us that God will honor our free agency, regardless of our choice:
Psalm 37:4 [God] shall give thee the desire of thine heart
Alma 29:4 I know that [God] granteth unto men according to their desire, whether it be unto death or unto life; yea, I know that he allotteth unto men, ….according to their wills, whether they be unto salvation or unto destruction.
D&C 137:9 For I, the Lord, will judge all men according to their works, according to the desire of their hearts.

If it is the desire of our hearts to have a Christ at the center of our family, then it will be easy for us to extend the four gifts I have mentioned. We will keep our home beautiful and peaceful, we will assure our children of our continued presence and support, we will trust them to chose the best options for themselves, and we will be loving and forgiving if they lose their way, or make mistakes.

How can you “increase” your desire, assuming you want to increase it? I have no real short cut to that. Let me borrow Alma’s suggestion from
Alma 32:27
But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words.

And finally let me close with Almas invitation to the Zoramites:
Alma 33:23
And now, my brethren, I desire that ye shall plant this word in your hearts, and as it beginneth to swell even so nourish it by your faith. And behold, it will become a tree, springing up in you unto everlasting life. And then may God grant unto you that your burdens may be light, through the joy of his Son. And even all this can ye do if ye will. Amen.

Potty trained!!!

2010-06-03T20:25:00.001+02:00

After 4.5 years Ezra is finally potty trained. Today he went NR 2 in the potty and got the lollipop he had been staring at for the last five months. We hadn't really tried to potty train him before. It was clear he was not ready to give up control. He has been going NR 1 in the potty for close to a year, but only sporadically. Then four weeks ago he decided he wanted underwear and was promptly dry during the whole day, and even the nights. Every time he went potty we praised him for staying dry (not for going potty) and rewarded him with his major motivation, stickers of airplanes. However when it came to going NR 2 he was just terrified and ran away screaming every time. Whenever it was time to go he would get completely undressed grab a diaper, do his business, and then dump it in the toilet and wipe his bum, like I trained him to do. After we came back from the New Frontiers program, we decided to use our new tools to help him go. We simply stopped buying diapers. We were always encouraging, but left it up to him to go. He held it in for three days, refusing to go. He kept asking for a diaper, and I apologized that I didn't have any more. The clever kid even told me which store I could go buy them at. Then today, the third day, he lay miserable in the playroom, and held his stomach. Every time he complained that his stomach hurt, I explained it was because he needed to go to the bathroom. I gave him a bottle of apple juice as a laxative. After waddling around for an hour with a pinched bottom, he finally went NR 2 in the potty. Of course all appropriate parties were notified, and the act duly admired and celebrated. A new helicopter and fighter jet grace the potty page in his sticker book, and the lollipop was greatly enjoyed, and discarded.

Boring Templates

2010-05-17T21:44:00.001+02:00

So I've changed my template again. I'm not completely happy with this one either but it is less boring than the other blog. Why don't they have more fun free templates? These are such a yawn fest. Anyway, if you are reading my blog, let me know what you think of this deep blue.

Amsterdam Canal Cruise

2010-05-09T20:51:00.002+02:00

Aaron flew to Atlanta for CHI conference in April, but got stuck there because of the Volcano eruption in Iceland. When he finally was able to get a flight home, we picked him up at the Airport in Amsterdam and went on a canal cruise together, and then to the Safari Park. If you ever want to visit Amsterdam, I highly recommend you don't drive and just take a canal cruise, perhaps one of those you can hop on and off. We had a great time. It's the best way to see the city.

A trip down Dutch memory lane in Zaanse Schans

2010-05-09T20:21:00.003+02:00

We visited this fun little village north of Amsterdam where everything is preserved the way Dutch villages used to look like. People actually live in the houses you see in those pictures. It is not a reconstruction of a village, rather it has been maintained as a cultural heritage.
It is very touristy, but well worth a visit. There is a wood shoe factory there, as well as a cheese factory, pewter shop, and several operating windmills. Good fun. I'll let the pictures speak.


By the way, I didn't have enough dough to fill the pan, otherwise there would be a nice big roll in the middle here.