I get a phone call this morning…..

I have been trying to give T some room….she wants to be able to go to the park with her friends, walk/roll to school, go to the movies…well just to be independent. My problem with this… is it safe? Is it normal for a girl like T to do these things alone?

There are two hills on the way to school the first one goes DOWN and connects with another very busy road. T has been practicing this hill for a while now, and she can cruise it on her own….usually I am running behind yelling to slow down and to watch the ditch and to….okay I just nag her. She loves it (the hill not the nagging)…for once she can go faster then all of the other kids. You should see her face…the rush is something she has never felt.

I probably should mention that T has been using the wheelchair since school started. Her last botox treatment didn't last as long as it should have.

Emotionally, letting T roll to school alone is a very hard thing for me, I cannot seem to let go, but T has been working hard learning how to navigate hills and maneuver her wheelchair safely. I need to give her a chance, she is in 6^th grade and I feel that she needs to be able handle this stuff, without me running behind nagging.

This morning she took off to school in her wheelchair with all of the kids, her sisters were there and her friend Cody. I stayed home so I could have 15 extra minutes to do chores.

I got the phone call from David (Cody’s step dad), the phone call scared me…. I thought T had rolled into the road and was hit by a car…

I rushed out of the house to go get her and was there in 5 seconds flat… When I got there were five cars pulled over and a crowd, you would have thought that there was a fatal accident…. I really am surprised the APD, fire dept, and ambulance were not there. I am thankful that David was there because the other adults (Moms headed to schools to drop kids off and school employee’s headed to work) were totally overreacting.… but all was okay, she just a little muddy. She only ditched it. It was just a little roll over; the air bags didn’t go off, no flats, and no major damage to her or her ride.

After I dismissed the crowd, I loaded T and the chair into the truck. When I finally got into the truck, she was in tears, NOT because she was hurt, but because...

1.) the adults did not let her take care of it.

2.) the adults (other then David) were not listening to her. They wanted to call the school and everybody but me. T just wanted to upright her chair and move on. The kids could have helped her do this.

3.) the cool kids saw all of this chaos.

4.) Rumors will go around the school.

5.) Her aides will hear about it and she will never be left alone again.

With most kids, age leads to independence with T she has to work for it. She could have handled this situation on her own. She really was not that muddy and really did not need to come home. I brought her home so she could calm down and she was back at school in no time.

While at home, we talked about how to handle this and how to prevent it from happening again. We decide it wasn’t her first crash….once when she was a baby took her wheels down the “stairs from hell” at grandma‘s….and it won’t be her last crash. This means that not rolling/walking to school is not an option. We decided that I would have to chaperone her from on, not to keep her from crashing, but to keep the “Good Samaritans” away.

Thank you for your help…but sometimes it is best to ask questions first and then LISTEN to the answers. Even if they are children!!!