The R word Is No Joke

Submitted by Kimberly Jensen-I couldn't have written it better than Maria

The 'R-word' Is No Joke, By Maria ShriverFrom the Los Angeles Times.This has been a year filled with teachable political moments. Racism, sexism, ageism and "change" have been debated at kitchen tables and water coolers across America. But this last week, those gathered around my kitchen table have been consumed with another discussion, one that is not Democratic or Republican -- it's the "R-word" debate.The "R-word" stands for "retard." For the 6 million to 8 million Americans with intellectual disabilities and their families, this word and its hurtful use is equal to the impact of the "N-word" on an African American.The reason it's kitchen-table fodder is because of the Dreamworks film "Tropic Thunder," which topped the box-office charts when it opened last weekend and which will attract many more moviegoers this weekend. In the R-rated film, which I've seen, a character named Simple Jack is a caricature of a person with a developmental disability. In one of the scenes, the character played by Robert Downey Jr. chastises Ben Stiller's character for "going full retard," and the "R-word" is repeated many times.As a journalist, I respect the right to freedom of speech, and my kids will tell you I laugh the loudest when we see a comedy. But as the niece of someone who had a developmental disability, and as a member of the board of directors of Special Olympics International, I know how hurtful the "R-word"is to someone with a disability. I know why "Tropic Thunder's" opening was met by protests on behalf of the intellectually disabled.Listen to actor Eddie Barbanell, who serves on the Special Olympics board with me, and he will tell you in very emotional terms how the use of that word has made him feel rejected, stupid, demeaned.Or you can talk to Special Olympics athlete Loretta Claiborne, who speaks on behalf of millions when she describes how the "R-word" has been used to mock and degrade her. She asks all of us to stop using this word without regard to its effect on the hearts and minds of people with disabilities.There is an old saying: "Sticks and stones will break my bones but names will never hurt me." Even when I chanted it as a child, I never believed it.Words do hurt -- they break people's spirits, they break people's dreams, they break people's hearts.Kids will see "Tropic Thunder," no matter the rating, and when they leave the theater and go out to their schools, their homes and their communities, they'll call each other the "R-word" because they think it's funny. They'll do it without any idea or regard to how it makes a person with a disability feel.Too many in the intellectually disabled movement cannot speak out for themselves. It is up to their families and those of us who advocate on their behalf to explain that calling someone by the "R-word" is no longer acceptable and is anything but funny.It's not acceptable in a movie theater; it's not acceptable on a playground.It's not acceptable that college coaches use it to chastise athletes. It's not OK to use it in a classroom or a boardroom."Tropic Thunder" is giving Claiborne, Barbanell and many other individuals and organizations that serve those with special needs -- the Special Olympics, the National Down Syndrome Society, the Arc, the American Assn. of People with Disabilities, Parent to Parent-USA -- a teachable moment. They are ready to join with the entertainment industry to change minds.Dreamworks' decision to include a public service announcement with DVDs of "Tropic Thunder" is an important first step, but far more needs to be done.Just as important, parents must talk to kids at our kitchen tables about how we have felt when someone called us stupid, idiotic or lame. Because once we put ourselves in someone else's shoes, certain names just aren't that funny any more.I often quote the Hopi prayer that tells us not to look outside ourselves for a leader. It tells us that we are the ones we have been waiting for. We can exchange one "R-word" for another: respect. We can teach our children that name-calling hurts.Let's makes the "R-word" as unacceptable as the "N-word." Think of all we can accomplish if we work together.It's one thing in this political season that shouldn't require a water-cooler debate.Maria Shriver is the first lady of California.

A TRYING DAY

BY KIMBERLY JENSEN

It was one of those trying days, where you “try” too much to make your kids have fun. I never thought there would come a day where I would have to drag my kids out of the house and force them into outdoor fun. Being outside in the sunshine and breathing fresh air is essential to my survival. I need it, crave it and must have it. My children, two of who are teenagers would rather sleep until 11am and then lounge on the couch for the better part of the day. One short year ago, they were waiting at the front door for me with their swimsuits on or their water bottles filled and ready for a bike ride. Today, I am dragging them out of bed.
So today I forced them to go to the splash park with their younger brother for a full 90 minutes, with promises of dropping them off at the movie theatre or the mall after attending their brother’s social gathering.
A few moms from my son’s special education classroom have been gathering for about three months now and holding social outings for our kids, who rarely (if ever) get invited out.
We arrived at the splash park and my two older children immediately plopped down in the shade and made sure everyone knew how completely bored they were. Bennett, being autistic, moved as far away from the other children as possible and then stood in the shade and recited cartoons and a list of movies he would like to see, in order.
I chatted with the other moms and watched their children splash through the fountains and falling water. Mine continued to stay in the shade. Exactly 90 minutes later, my older kids reminded me of my promise and so we packed up, said our goodbyes and headed to the mall.
As I drove home from the mall with Bennett in the back seat, reciting for the thousandth time the movies he wanted to see, in order. I took a deep breath and thought how trying my day had been. Trying to make my kids have fun, trying to give them new experiences, trying to expose them to new and different people, trying to make them smile, trying to keep myself sane, trying, trying trying.
So I went home and did what good writers do, I looked up trying in the dictionary. Trying: causing annoyance, exasperating. I think my kids would agree that I am trying too hard.
Then I scanned up a line or two and saw the word try; to test the result of effect by experiment; to test; to make an effort.
Tomorrow, I will wake up and continue to annoy my kids.

Keeping Keller Is To Be Cherished-Book Review

By Kimberly Jensen

I purchased "Keeping Keller" because of its subject matter. I have a child with autism and of course I read everything, fact or fiction on the subject. I read the book in two days straight because of its beautiful and poignant writing. Tracy Winegar takes a couple from the 1950's and brings them to life; their raw, honest life. I loved this book as it tells the story of how a couple deals with having a special needs child during a decade where trimmed lawns, high heeled shoes and appearances meant everything. They bucked what was "normal" and fought to include their young son into everyday society. I highly recommend this book to everyone who wants to love and understand that which is "not normal," and embrace those who love someone with special needs. Bravo, Tracy, Bravo!

Why Do You Keep Him

By Kimberly Jensen

Kids can be so brutally honest, just go and visit an elementary school classroom or meet my 12 year old niece Savanah. This week we are spending a week with my sister in sunny Arizona. My sister and I shared a bedroom growing up and today we share the joys and challenges of raising special needs children. My son has Autism, while her daughter's disability has never received a clinical name. We were driving home from the pool yesterday and my older two children were telling Savanah that their little brother, the one with autism, can sometimes be quite annoying. Savanah quickly asked, "Well, why do you keep him then?" We laughed and my sister and I exchanged glances and smiles that needed no words, because we are part of the special club that gets to visit Holland again and again.


Welcome To Holland by Emily Perl Kingsley
©1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved. Article printed with permission of the author.
I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......
When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."
"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."
But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It’s just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away...because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Within An Arm's Reach

Within An Arm's Reach
by Kimberly Jensen

"Go away, stop following me," Bennett said as he pulled himself out of the swimming pool and marched over to the line of children standing behind the diving board. He wiped the water from his face and stood in line, looking straight ahead, ignoring the children around him as they giggled and chatted about the next 'big dive' they were going to perform.

"I can't stop following you. I have to keep you safe." I whispered to myself as I watched my 9-year-old attempt to be independent of me, his mom, who is always just two steps behind and an arm's reach away.

I tried to stay far enough behind him so he wouldn't stand out in a crowd of children whose mothers were nowhere to be seen. They didn't need the constant mother shadow, like Bennett did. But as mothers of autistic children know, thier kids stand out anyway. Bennett brought stares and smiles as he mimicked his favorite cartoon episode, complete with sound and action at the back of the diving board line.

As we ventured through the water park that day, I noticed other special needs children splashing in the surf and playing in the sun. I scanned the area around them and within an arm's reach, was of course, their mother, carefully watching, admiring and smiling at her child who was playing alone in the water, oblivious to his mother's constant guard.

Like all mothers, we go through the natural tug-of-war between mother and child. As our children grow up, they want to pull away,we want to pull them closer. As mothers of special needs children, we know we are more than just mothers, we are their protectors, their teachers and their friend, oftentimes, their only friend.

So while other children lose their shadow mothers early, we mothers of special needs children are called to stay within an arm's reach for many more years, sometimes forever.

May 15th: An Answer To Everything

May 15th: An Answer to Everything

By Kimberly Jensen

It seems the older I get, the more questions I have. When I was 16 years old I thought I had most of the answers; when I was 25 I thought I knew where to find most of the answers. I turned 41 over the weekend and I realize I don't have any of the answers. However, my son has the answer for just about anything and I marvel at his simplicity. My son Bennett has Autism and I love how literal everything is to him. If you say, "It's raining cats and dogs," he says "where?" and he is actually looking for cats and dogs. If you say "keep off the grass" he will ask "which piece of grass and for how long?" and if you ask him not to pull the dog's hair, he will say "which hair" and pull the one he didn't pull before. He also has a pat answer for everything. If you ask him how old he is, he says, "May 15th," If you ask him his address he says "May 15th," and if you ask him what his birthday is, he will say, "May 15th." On this answer, he is right. So when he answers "May 15th," it means he is finished answering your question and you can now go away and leave him alone. He doesn't elaborate and he won't take another question. He's given you the answer and that it that. Don't you wish we all could be so simple and give a quick pat answer and have the rest of the world (even teenagers) just deal with the answer, whether they like it or not and move on. What would your answer be? I think Jesus has the best answer of all, "Love One Another."

When Dr. Suess Came To Dinner

When the Cat In the Hat Came To Dinner

By Kimberly Jensen

The red and white striped paper hat stood two feet off of his head and bounced to the rhythm of the words as he spoke.
”I do not like green eggs and ham, I do not like them Sam I am.”
He stirred the green eggs on his plate and said, “I do not like them with a fox, I do not like them in a box.”
He took a forkful of green eggs, held it over the plate and walked over to his sister, “Would you could you in the rain? Would you could you on a train?”
He walked the plate and fork over to his brother, “Would you could you with a goat, would you could you on a boat?”
This was not an unusual happening in our household. Bennett was playing the part of Sam I Am from his favorite Dr. Suess book. It has been Dr. Seuss week at school and Bennett enjoyed getting the rest of his family to play along.
He has requested the same dinner for the last five nights; green eggs and ham. Since I am rarely a consumer of ham, he has been satisfied with the green eggs only. Each night he gets the pan out of the cupboard, a spatula out of the drawer and two eggs out of the refrigerator. As he stands on the stool, balancing with one foot and a fork, he closes his eyes and repeats the lines from the famous orange-bound children’s book.
Again, this is not unusual at our house. It may be the first time Sam I Am has come to dinner but many characters have graced our dinner table over the last six years. We have had the honor to host; Tom and Jerry, Batman, Spiderman, The Pink Panther, Simba The Lion King and Darth Vader. Tom stayed the longest. In fact the famous mouse-chasing cartoon cat had dinner with us the entire year that Bennett was in second grade. That was also the same year my husband and I got called into the school to try to tame our son who would constantly leap into teacher’s laps, purr and lick his paws (I mean hands.)
So when Bennett shows up in character, we oblige and play along because we know that is how he is learning to relate to a foreign world that is full of words, gestures and body language he doesn’t understand. He copies the way cartoon characters communicate and then he tries it out himself.
He gets plenty of stares and giggles and sometimes rude comments and looks that say, “can’t you control that kid?” There are also times when his brother and sister would like to crawl under the closest rock to avoid his over-animated personality.
While some call autism a disability, I look at Bennett’s abilities and marvel at his genius. Bennett has figured our how to navigate our confusing social world and make the rest of us smile and wish we could steal the words and wisdom of Dr. Seuss and balance on a chair with one foot, holding a fork eating green eggs and ham and say, “I like it, I like it, Sam I am.”

When Dr. Suess Came To Dinner

When the Cat In the Hat Came To Dinner

By Kimberly Jensen

The red and white striped paper hat stood two feet off of his head and bounced to the rhythm of the words as he spoke.
”I do not like green eggs and ham, I do not like them Sam I am.”
He stirred the green eggs on his plate and said, “I do not like them with a fox, I do not like them in a box.”
He took a forkful of green eggs, held it over the plate and walked over to his sister, “Would you could you in the rain? Would you could you on a train?”
He walked the plate and fork over to his brother, “Would you could you with a goat, would you could you on a boat?”
This was not an unusual happening in our household. Bennett was playing the part of Sam I Am from his favorite Dr. Suess book. It has been Dr. Seuss week at school and Bennett enjoyed getting the rest of his family to play along.
He has requested the same dinner for the last five nights; green eggs and ham. Since I am rarely a consumer of ham, he has been satisfied with the green eggs only. Each night he gets the pan out of the cupboard, a spatula out of the drawer and two eggs out of the refrigerator. As he stands on the stool, balancing with one foot and a fork, he closes his eyes and repeats the lines from the famous orange-bound children’s book.
Again, this is not unusual at our house. It may be the first time Sam I Am has come to dinner but many characters have graced our dinner table over the last six years. We have had the honor to host; Tom and Jerry, Batman, Spiderman, The Pink Panther, Simba The Lion King and Darth Vader. Tom stayed the longest. In fact the famous mouse-chasing cartoon cat had dinner with us the entire year that Bennett was in second grade. That was also the same year my husband and I got called into the school to try to tame our son who would constantly leap into teacher’s laps, purr and lick his paws (I mean hands.)
So when Bennett shows up in character, we oblige and play along because we know that is how he is learning to relate to a foreign world that is full of words, gestures and body language he doesn’t understand. He copies the way cartoon characters communicate and then he tries it out himself.
He gets plenty of stares and giggles and sometimes rude comments and looks that say, “can’t you control that kid?” There are also times when his brother and sister would like to crawl under the closest rock to avoid his over-animated personality.
While some call autism a disability, I look at Bennett’s abilities and marvel at his genius. Bennett has figured our how to navigate our confusing social world and make the rest of us smile and wish we could steal the words and wisdom of Dr. Seuss and balance on a chair with one foot, holding a fork eating green eggs and ham and say, “I like it, I like it, Sam I am.”