Teaching Maxwell to Read

I fell into the trap of thinking that he would just fit into the Abby mold and pick it up like she did, naturally, as a Psych degree holder you would think that I would've known better than that. Big surprise that Maxwell didn't fit the Abby learning how to read mold. He didn't want to even attempt to, which scared me, but I'm a worrier. I love being able to be in my kiddos' classrooms and being involved in that way in their education.Being in his classroom I've learned techniques to use with him at home, like: echo read, word groups, listening to books. It's CHAMPION to be on the same page with his teacher.
One week that I was in his classroom, I saw Max reading Captain Underpants to his friends. His excitement was contagious. 
We've found that Maxwell will put in the effort to read these books: Captain Underpants,  Comic books, & STARWARS. It's a start.I do remember that when I was doing literacy workshops for KUED for parents the information said to let them pick what they would read.
He's catching on, even reading everything while in the car. It's been quite the process, but worth it.
When we are at church we bring a churchbag with some paper and crayons to help entertain the kiddos. A few months ago, Max showed me what he'd been working on, he wrote a  Halloween book about the costumes. He was very proud to show me the illustrations.We took it to family dinner, where Amber Shaffer, Lex's sister-in-law commented that he may be a writer,  instead of a reader. I'm happy that he could be both now.
 He's constantly looking  for shortcuts to be able to crack the code.Not wanting to follow rules or to work too hard.
it takes time. I kept telling him, but really was reminding myself this fact.
I got him STARWARS phonics books at the library. I was so excited that one Saturday morning instead of sitting in front of the TV, he brought the books to me and asked me if he could read them with me. I almost cried with joy.He wants to read fast, getting ahead of himself. A CHAMPION  problem to have. 

I was looking on GROUPON, a weakness of mine. I've had to learn to check with Lex before I buy anything.I saw and didn't buy, I'm proud to say, a pack of Tshirts, one of them said, "World's Okayest DAD." After this learning curve with my Maxwell I felt that I could've gotten away with someday owning one. One of my lines that I always tell people about my kiddos is, they're a lot of work, but worth it.

My 2015 New Year's Goals Review:

I cannot remember where I heard it, I think that it might have been on a Dr. Oz episode, but was appalled when I found that by the end of February, a mere two months into the new year, that most people have forgotten and, or given up their New Year’s resolutions. This is my attempt to keep mine alive.

My wheelchair free year isn’t as free as it could be, but it’s a step in the right direction, freer than 2014. I’ve used it at the school on Tuesdays, but did walk during their jump-a-thon and at church for the past two weeks. One day out of seven isn't to shabby.On President’s day Lex used her day off to help me get it repaired; with a new axel, a casualty of our Disneyland trip with new tires and bearings too. When I had Cole-Cole home sick with me the other day we went to feed the ducks at the parkway near our house and it felt like s new chair.

Getting back to the temple, have you ever felt close, yet so far away from something at the same time? As a “recovering perfectionist” a term I get from the book, Am I a Saint Yet? I understand that I’m a work in progress. I will get there and am excited for the desire of my heart to be evident in my life.

I told my Pa that I need to schedule a time with him to come and spot me while I walk over to his home sometime this year. He smiled and said, Sometime this year? Sometime this month! He then told me that I could just walk home with him an my kiddos from church on Sunday, but after walking in church and teaching a Sunday School lesson every other week to the youth, I'm mentally not up for the marathon quite yet.

I added the goal of using George, my left hand, more, specifically to turn on and off light switches. Lex laughed at/with me a few weeks ago as she watched me attempt to do this, but kept turning the light back on right after I’d turned it off. Frustrating and rewarding. At times I’ll forget after reaching with my right hand, only to notice that the light is already on or off. I’ll flip it back to what it was before my overly anxious right hand beat George to it and do it again with my left hand.
I remembered the other goal that I had was to start to do presentation on distracted driving. I've been given permission to use the video that was done as a PR promotional piece, so please contact me if there are any takers. I still believe that if there is anything good that can come from the accident. I want to make it happen.

What I Wanted to Say in My Story Video

Peta, the author who read my blog and contacted me to do the video piece for her exhibit on distracted driving, Exit By Text sent me a list of questions that she wanted me to answer on the video. I wrote them down, but they didn't come across completely, but I am a recovering perfectionist.She emailed me and underlined here are those responses that I attempted to convey.

Some of the questions I’d like to ask you in the interview (I won’t be on the video, just you) include the following:

1. ·         What lead up to the accident?

•  it was a normal Sunday

1. What do you remember from it or know about it?
2. My first memory of after the accident or bump as we call itbwith my kiddos is my mom stranding over me making vowel sounds.
3. What were you doing in your life at the time prior to the accident?
   I was fiercely independent,  living 100 miles a minute: with full time school, a full time job, training for half marathons
4. How has it altered your perspective on life, being a dad…?

• My kids saved & save me, not the other way around. Watching Abby wake up one morning, getting Maxwell out of bed now.

1. ·         If you met the young woman who ran into you today, what would you say to her?

• It's not your fault, I don't blame you. Live & learn from the past, don't let it hold you hostage.From A Touch of Wonder, change if only to next time. From a thought by pres. Monson,

1. ·         You could be bitter, why aren’t you?

• It's not noble, it's selfish,  I have enough on my plate as it isx being bitter could send me over the edge of depression

1. ·         How did the accident affect your body and brain?

• Humor me, i'm a Psych undergraduate B.S. Degree holder from the U of U. My right side of the brain was damagedx so my left side of my body is effected with paralysis, i've been told that I present like a person who has had a stroke, with the accompanying effect of left side neglect. Meet George & Bob
• My progress in rehabilitation is how Dale Hull, the founder of Neuroworx put it, glacerly slow. Others see the big chunks fall off, but I feel every inch of grauting progress forwaed.

·         How do you explain to your children what dad can and cannot do?

• Focus on what I can do, i'm not in a hospital bed or gone all day at work or school

1. ·         Tell me why you respond “CHAMPION” when people ask you how you are doing?

• Over 10 years ago Brother Grossen, one of my LDS seminary teachers in High school taught a lesson asking us why if we knew what we know we didn't respond with CHAMPION when we're asked how we're doing. I'm just now catching on. I want my   Kids to know that they can do hard things

Relearning to Walk Insights

Working on breaking bad habits, unlearning them with Matt Carter, my fellow Brain Injury friend and therapist at Neuroworx. It's more effective to patiently learn things correctly and not just to get by, than to have to unlearn things and have to learn the better way any ways.
Faith walking and stepping:

 weight shift onto "Bob(my kiddos named my left leg this)"

 for a "longer step with your right, Curtis!" The voice in my head from Neuroworx,  or my Pa, and any friend or family member who aspires to be my therapist(you're all so hopeful & helpful)

My relazation that when I look in a mirror and see myself leaning to the right and it feels like I'm balanced, to trust what I see and not what I  feel? Isn't this the opposite of living by/ walking by faith?

Walking to actually get some where. With the longer step with my right leg(Abby's named him, because he's obviously a boy, Ralph and not pausing after each step to reset my balance.
Starting point of pointing my feet in the right direction.

Turning off the lights at night with George and losing equilibrium because then I further handicap myself, without being able to see as well as being hemiparalized.

Get up in the morning to use the bathroom, the joys of getting old, growing up is so oveatted. I won't use my cane .This started me having the confidence to walk inside my house without it, that and talking with my Grandpa Morgan about how he doesn't use his at his home. Thanks for your example Grandpa.

Walking:

1. It doesn't just happen, just like anything else worthwhile, it takes hard work and persistance.
2. Process of moving from one stage to another.

• Step by step

1. Desire
2. Effort
3. Consistancy
4. My confidence has to wax strong

Paradigm shift:
Who knew that it was all a mental battle? (Lex knows that everything is one to me.)

• • from I cannot
  • to there's a possibility.
  • I don't want to
  • This is hard
  • I'm scared
  • I finally want to.
  • i'm going to try and even if I fail, I'll be better off than before,
  • to look what I can do! And what's next? 
  • My thespist Mikey told me that I was doing, "better" with the exercise of getting of the floor in case I fall at home. He then asked me to do it two more times. He said, "why stop at better when you are able to get to "best?"
  • My evolution better to best:

1. 1. 1. No wheelchair on Saturdays when we lived in West Jordan
      2. No wheelchair in new house
      3. No cane  bouts"
      4. Cane-fee home
      5. Unassisted step in my livinroom and steps with cane instead of someone's shoulder out in the real world
      6. Next step: Walking to my parent's

Environmental Psychology

was the name of one of the classes that I took up at the U of U for my BS degree. I remember that before I decided to drop the class, it conflicted with another one that I wanted to take, I went to a few lectures that were about how city planners, civic engineers and architects used shapes, Geometry and light to influence the feeling of a place.
One of mine and Lexy's friends heard about me being trapped at home and unable to drive myself, so she volunteered to come to my home once a week and bring her kids to play with mine and give me some adult conversation. Antoinette did this, she said because she had been on bed-rest for a few weeks and understood what it was like.
It was CHAMPION to have her over and I love the perspective she has on life. she is one of those positive people that enters a room and you feel of their energy, speaking of environmental psychology.
I would frantically attempt to clean up for her once a week visit. I told this to her and made a joke about how you need a room in your house that is kept clean for the Home and Visiting Teachers to come and sit down in once a month. Sh gave me a courtiousy laugh and told me that she tries to keep things clean because she noticed that she was less stressed in a clean environment.  Once again someone else is better able to put into words something that I have always felt, but didn't know exactly how to say it.

My story video

Exit By Texts did this video of me so that I can be a public speaker to compliment the exhibit. Here is the link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_BXm8fLkKQ

Mental fitness

What do you do for it in the morning and before going on autopilot? Other than getting yourself dressed? (try it, when half of your body is paralyzed and you'll see how much of a mental, problem-solving activity it becomes)  I keep telling people who are graduating from college that they will miss it going to college not getting dressed, most people need convincing that will be true. I miss not being in school, If I had the money I would always be in it, but I am a nerd.
My Pa signed me up for Brain HQ and I've been on that once a month for a half a year. I just recently discovered Luminosity, which is a free sight, and have got hooked and play against my kiddos. I was frustrated that My Abbyster was beating me. My Maxwell heard me and got serious, having me look in his eyes as he reminded me, " you were in a car accident and have had some short-term memory loss." Who is the parent in this scenario?

Special Needs

I have always secretly thought that Lex and I would be great parents to a child who needed extra attention. I never imagined that I would be that husband and father that would be special needs. I have done well in not feeling like I was in this category until I did a video recording at Neuroworx for a Exit By Text exhibit. While on camera I was working with my therapist Matt Hansen, Big Man Matt. He kept talking me up, to the point that it felt a bit awkward. I thought, I do this too, to my kids and people who are a bit slower mentally.

Ups & downs

My goal is not to use my wheelchair in the new house. So far so good, I am amazed at how many times I sit down and have to stand back up during the day. This reminds me of a part in my favorite Disney movie Sword in the Stone, when Merlin turns Arthur into a fish  and He says, "Life has lots of ups and downs, like a helicopter."Of course Arthur doesn't know what a helicopter is. In the same show, Fiar Tuck is taken away during the song," Sometimes ups out number the downs" being played in the background
 Lex noticed a more laxidasical attitude that I had about things. I thought that this was like Maxwell and him being exhausted from the change of being at school all day, getting home and being completely unreasonable because of it. I was exhausted from the mental effort of walking all day. She was worried that it was more than that and that I should talk to my rehab Dr. about possibly going off my "chill-pill "which I did. Thanks  to getting off of it and to my "light therapy," I am on an upswing. I think that a vacation with the family to the Magical Kingdom may have had a part in the upswing too. I know that the mundane wears on me, grinding away at my sense of purpose. My Bishop still comes over once a week to check on me and to get tutored in Spanish. I am grateful that he gives me a chance to serve him.He told me that while he was listening to the radio, to a motivational speaker, the comment was made that the two most important days of your life are, first the day that you were born and second, the day that you find out why you were born. I have the unique experience to have had the chance to choose to come back to this life. I know that I am here for a reason and am daunted at my imperfections and weaknesses. Not many people have second chances in life. I'm excited to continue to uncover joy in the Journey, as iI'm a work in progress, just like all of us are.
I am currently reading a book that was given to me for Christmas, Am I a Saint, Yet? It is all about overcoming perfectionism. The first technique talked about has you journal your thoughts to help you become more self-aware of the negative self-talk that holds you back and strangles the life out of best, yet imperfect attempts at anything. I was shocked to see how unrelentingly cruel I am to myself.
 "I need more help than you can offer" is my usual response to my Abby girl who is always looking to help her CHAMPION of a Dork dad.
My Pa keeps reminding me that although my situation is a bit on the extreme side, I am not alone, that my problems are just like everyone else's, in that we all have problems. This leads to on of his favorite sayings, "Life is exchanging one set of problems for another." One of Lex's hopes as a parent is to instill in our children are that they are problem-solvers. As a mentor she sees first hand both sides of the spectrum of young adults who, on one side are avoiders or in denial to the other side of taking on everyone's problems.

Life's simple,

At least the answers to life's hard questions are. I read 'Dad is Fat' by Jim Gaffigan. Thanks to it being recommended to me by my second cousins' husband. I love it and read it quickly,  staying up until 11pm to laugh out load. I text Lanea to have her tell Chris that I was enjoying it so and she text back, "Sometimes the heart needs a good laugh." I agree.
It was one of the books that became my gift of choice to others this year at Christmas. Nerdy, giving a book, but I loved the books that I got this year.
I saw my therapist Dr. Jeff Robinson  a few months ago and he gave me a calendar to chart my prayers, scripture reading, meditation, and visualizations of success. For the last one he used the story of a client who had a paper route and would say to himself, "Not in the bushes, not in the bushes!" and guess where he would end upthrowing the newspaper when he would say that to himself? it would go right into the bushes. I need to meditate and visualize my success. I watched a news story on the power of meditation. the report was on a school in California that had tried everything to help their students, but only found success, and were amazed at the impact, when they implemented having their students have 2 15mins of quiet time during the school day. The teachers thought that it was a joke at first. ready, (No joke) clear your mind and breath with me.