A Proud Momma Moment!

A little background: Foster plays for his school's third grade football team. The girls formed cheer squads for each grade's football team, so the third grade girls cheer for the third grade boys. But if you have a male sibling playing football, they will let the girls from other grades cheer for their brother's team (Thank the Lord!) so that means my 5 YO kindergartener is cheering on a team with girls serveral years older and a few in between. There are three high school and middle school cheerleaders that help coach the girls and they are fantastic with the young ones! I love them to pieces but they are teenagers and don't always understand Faith's hearing loss and how it affects her (not their fault at all), but they do make an effort and I appreciate all they do. So that sets up my proud-momma-moment.

Monday Faith had cheer practice. Ella had fallen asleep in her car seat, so rather than wake her up, I let Faith out and parked where I could watch from the car and let Ella keep sleeping. Faith was at the end of the line (where she usually is because she is one of the smallest) and it was becoming obvious from her behavior that she couldn't understanding what was going on. I had a mommy-dilema; I couldn't leave a sleeping baby alone in the car, but Faith was struggling and needed help!

I was feeling bad about not being in a position to intervene when I saw Faith get one of the teen's attention. She talked with Faith for a quick moment, then I see her move Faith the the center of the group right in front of the other coach leading the practice. Faith quickly caught up on the new cheer they were working on and this momma's eye's got teary.

When Faith came bounding to the car after practice finished up, I asked her non-chalantly, "What were you talking to Baily about during practice?"

Faith answered, "I couldn't understand Shannon and so I told Bailey an' I asked if I could move an' then I could hear her better 'cause I was close to her an' then I could do my cheer!"

WOW! Faith spoke up in a group of older girls she doesn't know very well to say she couldn't hear and needed to move closer to the coach! Talk about being a great self-advocate! I was so proud! I was glad I got stuck in the car so Faith had the opportunity to do that for herself without mom stepping in.

It also makes me laugh because self-advocay goals are one thing I personally should be included in just about every child's IEP, of course they would be tailored to fit the child's ability levels and their needs. Whenever I have brought this up to our committee, I am told by some of the 'professionals' that Faith is much too young to be expected to advocate for herself. (I do have to say we have an awesome deaf ed. teacher that recognizes that Faith is capable of self-advocacy and has said as much.) I can't wait to share that little story with some of them! :)

For a person with hearing loss, the skill of being able to speak up and ask for help when you need it is not as easy as hearing people often think, regardless of age. For a five-year-old to be able to speak up is huge! One of my biggest goals is for Faith to feel comfortable and confident as a hard-of-hearing person, and this little act helped reassure me that we have at least planted the seeds.