One Step at a Time

As many of you may recall around a month ago I blogged about my daughter and her learning disabilities. She’s seven-years old and cannot read beyond a few simple words. This would be a challenge for any parent, but I think it stings even more for an author like me. To know that my own child is unable to read a book when I live create them is a cruel irony.

This past week it was time for parent-teacher conferences again. After the last disastrous event, I approached this one with a small amount of trepidation. There are so many teachers and aids involved in my daughter’s care that the table resembles a meeting at the UN. Okay, maybe I exaggerate a bit, but it was still three against one. My husband was off doing other parental duties, so I was going it alone.

I approached the table, sat in the chair that was ten sizes too small, and waited. Slowly, one by one, the teachers smiled at me. Not only is she doing better this year, she is improving by leaps and bounds in all areas. She is starting to read more, she is finally making friends and her speech is clearing up more and more each day. There is still a lot of hard work ahead for all of us, but I am finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. The speech therapist said she had recorded my daughter as she spoke and that had been a real turning point. She never realized how she jumbled her words until then.

I left the meeting with a bounce in my step, stopping by to gossip with some of the locals and then to buy cookies from the PTA. I arrived home at the same time as the rest of the family.

“How was school today?” I asked my daughter as she came bouncing in.

“Good, we voted for the president today.” She had already found the cookies and was diving in.

I cocked my head to the side. Democracy in the second grade? “Who did you vote for?”

“Boboma”

It only took me second to translate. “You voted for Obama? Why?”

“Mom!” She gave me her best duh stare. “I voted for him because he looks gooooooooood. I love his smile.”

“Sounds like a good reason to me,” I conceded. “Do you want to read a book before dinner?”

Her big brown eyes danced with delight as she scrambled to her bookshelf.

-Stephani Hecht