But Mommy, I love Cheezies!

I thought it was important to talk about allergies because sometimes allergies can mimic other disorders like ADHD. My oldest daughter developed a rash around her mouth when she was little and would get an upset stomach, diarrhea, headaches and at times would be very hyperactive. Our doctor confirmed that she probably had some kind of food allergy. Without subjecting to her to blood work which I didn’t want to do at the time, we were left to either keep a food diary or do an elimination diet.

We chose to do the elimination diet where she was eating pretty much only plain rice every day and bananas. After a week the rash had completely gone away. Keeping her on that diet was a struggle. I tried not to let her see us eating other foods that she enjoyed and we kept busy during the day so she wouldn’t think about wanting to snack. On the weekend however, she saw her brother eating Cheezies, one of her favourite things at the time and we finally caved and let her have one. The reaction was instant, red rash around her lips and she was very hyper. I knew that she was definitely allergic to something in those Cheezies. It turns out; she is allergic to Monosodium Glutamate. To confirm this we avoided all foods with MSG after this and the rash went away again and she was back to her old self. Whenever she accidentally consumed the MSG we would notice a rash again, but not always around her mouth, sometimes it would be on her arms or stomach. We would give her Benadryl and make sure to be more careful about our food selection in the future.

As a Child and Youth Counselor what I learned from my daughter’s food allergies is that it is important to rule this out when dealing with a child who is having difficulty concentrating at school or is displaying hyperactivity. Allergies and other health problems such as thyroid problems, low blood sugar or an insufficient diet can cause our bodies to act differently so it’s important to see your doctor and rule out these possibilities.

Below are some common food allergies to watch out for:

Milk (cow or soy)

Grains (wheat or gluten)

Additives (MSG, red and yellow dye, sulfites)

Berries (strawberries)

Tree nuts

Chocolate

Tomatoes

Shell fish and other fish

If you suspect your child has an allergy then there are many websites that can help you with elimination diets, food journals, etc. If your child is older or is suffering from a severe allergy, it is best to see your doctor for a blood test.

Dealing with an anaphylactic (life threatening) food allergy is very serious and unlike my daughter’s allergy, a child with this type of allergy must carry an Epi-pen with them that will provide them with some extra time to get to the hospital after coming in contact with an allergen. It is very important that everyone in your child’s life knows that your child has a life threatening allergy and how to administer the Epi-pen.

Whatever your child’s allergy, it is also important to educate your child. Teaching your child what foods to avoid and why will save them a lot of discomfort. They must learn to read labels and speak up when they are at school or a friend’s house about their allergy. The good news is that over the last ten years of my daughter having an MSG allergy, I have noticed an improvement in food labelling, awareness and an increase in MSG free options for her. Overall, a family can help a child to live with a food allergy by keeping the food allergen out of the home, eating simple and healthy meals and snacks and educating others.

Keeping the Winter Blahs Away!

While us Canadians haven’t had too bad of a winter this year, I find we still get a little stir crazy by the end of January and if you aren’t one of the lucky ones to go South then we need to find a way to make the best of it here at home.

Below are some ideas for bringing a little fun and excitement into your life over the winter months:

v  Mexican Night – fill a piñata with candy and dollar store items and hang it from the rafters in your rec room, make homemade burritos, nachos and/or tacos. Let the kids colour Mexican flags to decorate your house. You can even get some sombreros to wear and maracas to shake.

v  Have a regular family game night where everyone gets a chance to choose a game. Some of our favourites are monopoly, Scrabble, Yahtzee, go fish, Pictionary and Wii bowling.

v  Have a movie night – make different flavoured popcorn, make the room dark, turn the phones off, get your favourite blankets and cuddle up on the couch together.

v  Go Camping in the Living room – one of my kids favourite memories is having a ‘camp in’, my husband would get the big box fan out and put a fitted sheet around it, turn it on and voila, instant tent! You can get your sleeping bags out, sing camp songs, have a chocolate fondue with marshmallows instead of roasting them and tell stories.

v  Hawaiian Luau – I saw some little umbrellas and leis at the dollar store yesterday which inspired this blog and I thought how fun it would be to have some friends over on the March break and pretend we are somewhere warm together. Virgin Piña coladas for the kids, dressing up in bright flowered shirts and having a hula hoop challenge are just some of the ideas I have for our get together. Another fun idea is to have an indoor sandbox for the kids; you can put play sand inside a baby pool or if you’re not that brave, you can give them a big bin of rice or beans to play with.

v  Baking is always a fun and tasty thing to do in the winter. Having the oven on, on a cold wintery day and the smell of cookies or bread baking is so nice. There are so many recipes online to choose from, home-made pizza dough, bagels, etc.

v  Home Renovations – even little kids can help to design and paint a room and teaching older children how to hammer nails and putty drywall are good life skills to have. It’s a rewarding feeling to say that your family worked on a new room together.

v  Kids Yoga – get your family in shape by teaching your little ones some fun animal yoga poses. If you need help, go to You Tube and search ‘kids animal yoga poses’.

v  Play Games – hide and seek, musical chairs, and night at the museum (turn the lights down low and give one person a flashlight, they are the museum guide who shines it on each ‘statue’ and if they catch the statue moving or laughing then they are the new guide) are a few of my kids favourites.

v  Tea Party – even if you don’t have all girls, a tea party can still be fun (my husband has been to many!), have everyone dress up, make some little sandwiches and get out the fancy dishes and table cloth.

v  Crafts – my kids all love doing crafts. A trip to the dollar store can provide you with paper, glue, stickers, cotton balls, paper plates, popsicle sticks, glitter, etc. There are many ideas online but some that we’ve had fun with are popsicle stick houses, bean filled tambourines, paper bag puppets, and cards for Grandma and Grandpa.

Teaching Social Skills

Having worked with children with exceptionalities, I’ve found that something that other children often take for granted and learn naturally that others don’t is social skills. Social skills are all those little things that we do in social settings that we often don’t think twice about. We use manners, introduce ourselves, shake hands, make eye contact and pause to listen to others.

A child that has missed parts of their normal social development due to illness, cognitive delays or abuse, may need to go back and learn some of these skills over again. It really depends on where the child is at with their social skills as to where you’d begin with your teaching. Below are some suggestions as to what they may need to work on and how you can teach it.

Eye Contact – At times, children may not make eye contact or see the importance in it, they may need reminders to make eye contact during a conversation. Please note that not all cultures see eye contact as an important part of social awareness.

Minimal Encouragers – These are things like nodding your head or saying “Uh huh” during a conversation that let others know that you are paying attention. You can teach a child to do this by using flash cards that tell them when it is an appropriate time during a conversation to nod their head.

Greetings – Learning to say “Hello” or “Good Morning” is an important step for a child as it is the way that people know that we are friendly and happy people who they will want to get to know better. A good way to teach your child is to model greetings yourself, get them to practice greetings with their family at home and through role playing with siblings or even stuffed animals.

How to ask a friend to play – Having a friend to play with at recess is so important to children; if your child is struggling to make friends, get the school on board. Perhaps they can pair your child up with another student who can help them ask others to play. Role playing at home with a family friend or sibling is again, a great way your child can practice asking someone to play without the fear of rejection.

Taking Turns – Teaching a child to take turns can be done by playing simple board games where you must take turns. Another way to teach this is by trading toys with your child “It’s my turn with the truck but you can have the car”.

Saying Good Bye – Children that lack social skills don’t always think about saying good-bye, see you later or have a good night, when someone is about to leave. Just like teaching Greetings, you can model farewells and have them practice them at home. Sometimes your child will just need a reminder and you can come up with a signal that will help them to remember what they are to say.

Manners – saying please and thank-you is not always obvious to young children or those with delays. It is important to model good manners, prompt your child and practice whenever you can.

Having a Conversation – Carrying on a conversation is a much bigger social skill than we tend think it is, since most of us do it all the time. During a conversation, we do many things that let the other person know that we are listening, are interested in what they are saying and have something interesting to say back to them. When teaching a child about having a conversation, we first need to teach them to talk about an appropriate topic. If we can find a topic that interests our child, that is a good place to start. Often a popular television show is something they can use to start a conversation with a peer. Practice a conversation at home with them. Use flash cards or hand signals to teach your child when they should pause and allow the other person to talk, when to nod their head, use eye contact, etc. Watch television shows together and pause them to show your child examples of how people pause, etc.

A great resource for teaching social skills can be found at http://www.modelmekids.com/.

Thought I Was Doing a Good Job!

Why is it so infuriating when someone criticizes our parenting? I am wondering this because a parent of my daughter insinuated lately that I’m not strict enough when it comes to parenting.

Part of me thinks that we are afraid deep down that we’re going to screw up our kids and that we’re not doing all that we can to make sure that they’re healthy, learning everything they can and feel good about themselves at the end of the day. The other part of me thinks that some days it’s just darn hard work and if we’re working this hard at it, then we must be doing something right. Right?!

We see a show like ‘America’s Got Talent’ and there are children who can dance, sing and perform amazing stunts at such young ages and we wonder if we should have gotten our children into ‘this’ or ‘that’ at a younger age. Did we miss out on a special skill that our child may have had or with a little perseverance would my child have become a musical prodigy? Then we see a glimpse of ‘Toddlers in Tiaras’ and we think the opposite!

As parents we spend a good part of our day doing one thing or another for our children. We feed them, make sure they are dressed in clean clothes, get them off to school, go to work so we can make money for more food and clothes, then we’re helping with homework, taking them to extracurricular activities, feeding them again and making sure they’re getting a good night’s sleep. We drive them to practices at 5:30 in the morning and we spend ridiculous amounts of money on equipment that may end up in the shed next year.
Somewhere in between there, we’re absorbing advice from friends, family, coworkers and Dr. Phil and trying to add a multivitamin to our child’s morning routine and use more vegetables in our shepherd’s pie at dinner.

So, if after all this, someone comes to us and criticizes our job as parents, I think we just may be justified if we take offense to it, even though, I’m trying hard not to.

Childcare, A Good Fit for Your Family and Your Child

Finding great childcare for your child is first about figuring out what you consider ‘great’ childcare. Do you and your partner agree on what childcare should look like for your child? Here’s a checklist of things that you may view as important for your child:

ÿ        Individual attention

ÿ        Academics

ÿ        Nurturing

ÿ        Help with toileting

ÿ        Proximity to home and school

ÿ        Behaviour management

ÿ        Close friends

ÿ        Daily walks

ÿ        Park and community outings

ÿ        Creative freedom

ÿ        Nutritious meals

ÿ        Home cooked meals

ÿ        Cultural teachings

ÿ        Cartoons and movies

ÿ        Crafts

ÿ        Story time

ÿ        Home setting

ÿ        Lots of other children to play with

ÿ        Other: (many other qualities you may think of)

Once you have an idea of what is most important to you from the list above, you then need to start looking around at what is available in your area. You have a number of choices when it comes to childcare such as a daycare centers, preschools or Montessori schools, home daycares or a nanny or relative.

Daycare centers are located in most neighbourhoods and they provide fairly standard care at the going rate. They offer nutritious meals, activities and socialization with other children. There are benefits to going with a daycare center, there is structure and routines that are a good preparation for school and they are licenced and run by educated staff.

Daycare centers obviously vary in what they offer, from playgrounds and formalized curriculums to cameras that you can access online to check in on your child. Some of the newest daycares where I live are now connected to the new public schools and make for an even easier transition from ‘preschool’ to kindergarten. Montessori schools are centers whose philosophy is child development through independence and creativity. Children are given more choices and there are less rules imposed on them in order to stimulate their ability to explore.

Home daycares vary to greater degrees than daycare centers, which means parents must do more leg work initially to find a good fit. It could be worth it though. Home daycares are often more affordable, offer more individualized attention and can still provide the education piece that many parents are looking for. Home daycare providers can also be in your neighbourhood and offer before and after school care once your child is in school which provides them with consistency.

The last choice you have is you or your spouse. If after going through the process of looking for suitable childcare, you don’t find any, then perhaps you have overlooked the possibility of extending your parental leave, switching to a part time position or even quitting your job to stay home with your child. No one can really make this decision for you, it has nothing to do with how much you love your child, and it has everything to do with your own personal career and financial goals and how they fit with parenting. Whatever your decision, if you’ve done your homework, you can rest easy that it will be a good fit for your family and your child.

The Shy Child

I was a painfully shy child so it’s not surprising to me that my own children also were shy. My first day of kindergarten I held in a cough all day because I didn’t want to draw attention to myself! My son had a huge meltdown when I tried to take him to a new craft class and he refused to go. My middle daughter (who is now very outgoing) use to give me the grip of death when I tried to drop her off at kindergarten (God Bless that teacher who was willing to peel her off of me every day) and my third child, also a girl, has also been attached at my hip for most of her young life! I even became a ‘Sparks’ leader when I discovered that was the only way I was going to get her to try out Girl Guides!

While I don’t think shyness is always a bad thing, I do think that it’s something that over time most of us can overcome so that it doesn’t prevent us from being the social butterflies that we desire to be. For my own kids, it was about being comfortable in a new environment. It took some of them longer than others but once they knew that they were going to school every day, whether they liked it or not, they managed and even grew to enjoy it.

Please note that there is a condition called school phobia and I once worked with a young girl that had this condition. It may present as severe shyness, however it usually involves physical symptoms such as stomach aches, headaches, nervous twitching and even nausea. The child may refuse to go to school and if forced, may refuse to speak, eat or interact. They may cry the entire time and not engage in activities. The physical symptoms will often disappear on the weekends. If you suspect that your child may have school phobia then it’s important that you see your family doctor and speak with the school about what supports could be put in place. What may help a student with this disorder is gradual entry to school (a shortened day), having a teaching assistant for reassurance and therapy to help them deal with their anxiety.

Personally, I believe that many of us have a tendency to be shy and that it’s okay. In fact quiet people are often preferred over loud flagrant people when it comes to shy children. My daughter opens up much quicker to people that aren’t ‘in her face’ or trying to force her to talk or engage in an activity. Shy children and adults, don’t like being centered out but often they are 'taking in' everything around them and can be quite perceptive when it comes to the world around them.

Below are some tricks that I’ve used to help my own children overcome their shyness:

      v  Use your child’s strengths and likes to get them involved in activities

v  Expose your child to many different situations, take them with you grocery shopping, to the arena, library, church, etc. so that they can get comfortable in the different environments

v  Talk to your child’s teacher about their shyness so that they are on board at helping them to ‘come out of their shell’ gradually without directly centering them out

v  If a child has to do a presentation in front of the class, don’t allow them to see that you’re worried. Express to them in a nonchalant way that you are confident in their ability to do so and make sure that they practice lots so they are well prepared

v  Often shy children are not so shy at home where they are comfortable, so have them engage in acting out skits and role playing social situations like meeting a new person, so they are better prepared when it happens in the real world

v  Allow your child to wave, smile, give thumbs up, etc. instead of talking when someone greets them in public so that they are still engaging but don’t have to speak if they don’t want to and so that you aren’t always speaking for them

v  Exchange a special item with your child before they go to daycare or school

v  Some children like to have a calendar or daily schedule so they know what to expect that day, while other children may worry too much about an upcoming dentist appointment, etc. so gage whether this would help your child or not

v  Have a grandparent, spouse, etc. take your child to a doctor’s appointment instead of yourself as they often will do better when not with their primary caregiver

v  Try to stick to routines and be at places on time so your child doesn’t become more anxious

v  When leaving your child at daycare, school, etc. do it fairly quickly, a kiss and good-bye and then go! Sticking around to comfort a crying child is just prolonging both of your discomfort. You can always call the daycare or school in 20 minutes to see how they are and most of the time they’ll tell you that the tears stopped as soon as you were out of sight!

Decisions, decisions, decisions...

If we want our children to grow up to be able to problem solve and make good decisions then we need to give them that practice from an early age. And we mustn’t stop once they are teens but give them more opportunities to practice their decision making so that once they are under pressure in the real world they will feel confident in their own ability.

Young children should be given choices such as picking out their clothes, snacks and toys. Once children are older, add to the number of things they can choose between, in addition to giving them the knowledge they need to make the decisions. For example, teach a child about nutrition so they can make healthy snack choices and praise them when they decide to have an apple instead of a pudding. This isn’t to say that we’re going to give our children free reign on what they eat, (lord knows my own son would never choose the apple if I had) but we can let them choose what vegetable they want for dinner or what day they want to have treat night, etc.

Adolescents should be given even more choices. Think of it this way, if it’s not going to affect their health, reputation or safety then you should probably ‘bite your tongue’ and let them live with the consequences of their decision. Things like fashion, music and friends are common things that teens must make decisions about every day. They are also common irritants of parents and I’m sure they will be for many years. My daughter went through a stage that I like to call the ‘hair dye era’ and she had to colour her hair every week and she was never happy with it. I remember running to the drugstore at 9 o’clock one night to get a box of dye when a colour came out bad. My daughter learned a couple of lessons that night. 1. Sometimes your dull natural colour is exactly what you want and 2. My Mom really does have my back. That’s really the whole point isn’t it? That our kids can feel safe knowing that if they do make a bad decision that we’ll still support them.

I did leave out that in between my daughter colouring her hair an awful orange colour and me going to the store, I did let her sweat a little bit while she attempted to style her orange hair until she came up with the idea of colouring it her natural colour. While we may be tempted to swoop in and save our children every time they make a mistake, getting themselves out of a bad decision is part of the process.

It is important that your children see how you make decisions. While you wouldn’t normally talk out loud when decision making, it is a good idea to verbalize in front of your child so that they can hear your process.

“Should I buy this dress? It costs $50 which isn’t bad but what if it goes on sale? I really need it for the wedding this weekend and I don’t want to make another trip back to the mall. Maybe if it goes on sale they will reimburse the difference. I’m going to ask the salesperson and if they will then I’m going to get it.”

When dealing with a larger decision, show your child how to make a pro versus cons list.

Should we move?

Pros	Cons
Larger home	Bigger Mortgage
Nicer neighbourhood	Further from best friends
Larger yard	Kids would have to change schools
	Less cash flow available for vacations

Maybe we should wait until we have a larger down payment.

Involve your children in family decisions. Not adult decisions about marital problems! But family decisions like ‘where should we go on vacation’ and ‘what kind of dog should we get’?

My last suggestion for helping your kids make decisions is through role play. Although it may sound silly, turn it into a fun game and give your children different scenarios where they can practice making difficult decisions in a safe place. Below are just a few ideas of what scenarios you could role play, depending on your child’s age of course and don’t leave your teens out, even if they don’t want to physically act it out, you can play ‘what if’ and allow them to come up with creative solutions to the problems.

Scenarios

-         What would you do if you saw someone being bullied?

-         What would you do if you were with a friend and they shoplifted?

-         What would you do if you were handed a beer at a party?

-         What could you do if you failed your science test and you had studied hard for it?

-         What could you do to improve your ability to speak in public?

The most important thing to remember is to REMEMBER! Remember to give your child choices, remember to model different decision making processes, and remember to support your child while living with their decisions without being too quick to bail them out.