Parenting | Geek in Heels

Claire has been thriving at her Montessori preschool. I recently went in for the mid-year parent-teacher conference, and her teacher couldn't say enough positive things about her. For example, although Claire is one of the youngest kids in the class, she's always one of the first to understand and complete new assignments and activities. Not only that, she is a leader in the classroom — I'm told that other kids look to her for cues and guidance. This isn't always a good thing, however, because when she becomes disruptive, all the other kids tend to follow too! ;-) I was AMAZED to observe Claire already identifying continents. Claire has been able to read short, simple words for a few months now, but last month (at 3...

Aerin, Parenting, Personal

Mega-Update on the Girls, Part 1: Aerin

Mar 06. 2014

A few weeks ago, Aerin had her 6-month evaluation by the state's early intervention services. To be completely fair, it hasn't been 6 months since we started therapy — it had taken a month to find our therapists, and we had missed a lot of sessions in the months of December and January due to all the crazy stuff that was going on in our household. So when we finally held the review, we had just started to have regular sessions again. For this reason, I believe that Aerin could have done a lot better at her evaluation. Nonetheless, I was satisfied with the results, which is that we will continue the current schedule of therapy (developmental intervention 2x a week, speech therapy...

Claire, Motherhood, Parenting, Personal

Neglected

Nov 20. 2013

Last week, my mother told me something that made me want to lock myself in a dark room and sob like a little girl. You see, Claire had told her, "엄마는 다정이 안좋아해. 엄마는 효정이만 좋아해." ("Mommy doesn't like Claire. Mommy only likes Aerin.") Now, I know that kids often say things they don't necessarily mean. And both J and my sister think that she was probably trying to get extra attention (and gifts!) from my mother. After all, she's been playing off, and sometimes even taking advantage of people's emotions since she turned 1! But I can't help but think that at least a portion of that statement must be rooted in the truth. Because Aerin's hearing is still impaired and she requires extra...

Aerin, Parenting, Personal

Tubes in Her Ears

Oct 28. 2013

Aerin has been doing wonderfully with her speech and developmental therapies. In just one month, the number of words she says has more than doubled to over 50, and she has even started to put together two-word sentences. (e.g., "Blow bubbles," "Juice please") She can now count to ten, and tries her best to sing along to familiar songs. I really believed her hearing was back to normal, and both her therapists agreed. We were wrong. I brought Aerin to our follow-up ENT appointment this past weekend, confident that the doctor would give her a clean bill of health. But as soon as he examined her ears, he shook his head and said, "There's still a buildup of fluid behind her eardrums. The...