MOM CONFESSIONALS

I turn on the radio, my TV and even twitter and next to 50 Shades of Grey, the trending topic is attachment parenting. Time Magazine’s latest cover of a young hip mom with a toddler standing on a chair attached to her boob is shocking to say the least.  At the same time, it doesn’t seem so odd to me. By definition I seem like I practice attachment parenting. My son is about 2 and a half years old now and I am still breastfeeding and we co-sleep. Although I am not ashamed to admit this because its instinctive to me, I do often find myself gauging who I say this too and I often follow up with the sentence, I know I need to start weaning him. Then again, I feel like I have a crutch, my son is severely allergic to cow dairy, and of course I also mentally justify it because my son has a brain tumor. I wear it like a defensive armor – don’t judge me, my son may be dying, I will do what I want and if I want to be attached to my son and spend every waking minute basking in his love, I will because I don’t know how many days or weeks or months or even years he has and I don’t want to regret a minute of it. I even switched careers to spend and maximize my time with my children. I always tell anyone who questions my choices, I didn’t have children for someone else to take care of them or raise them. I’ve never defined his attachment to me other than simply a phase toddler boys go thru, but if I am an attachment parent, then so be it.
According to Dr. Sears, founder of the term “Attachment Parenting”, infants’ brains are “hardwired with strong needs to be nurtured and to remain physically close to the primary caregiver, usually the mother, during the first few years of life.” I agree!

While my husband has always been incredibly supportive of my commitment to breastfeeding, I can see him waning as my son can now throw full on temper tantrums to get his “nai nai“.  Why does society want to make me feel ashamed about doing something so natural all around the world?  I love this article by USA Today entitled, Breast-feeding a 3-year-old is normal, anthropologist says

Breast milk is one of the only sources of long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids that build brain tissue… It isn’t until age 5 or 6 that “95% of brain growth has been reached, and that’s also about the time that the child’s immune system is ramped up to full production,”  says Katherine Dettwyler, a professor of anthropology at the University of Delaware in Newark, Del.

I think our time with them as youngsters who so wholeheartly love us with all their hearts is all too short and soon they will run off to be with their friends, want not to hold your hands anymore and be independent. I’ve seen it many times with my nieces and nephews, my friend’s children and years later, all is well. I don’t know any grown ups that are still attached to their mothers physically rather I admire the many close mother/son relationships that I do observe. I think it’s sweet and it speaks a lot to the character of that man, who respects, loves and adores his mother. I am slowly weaning my son off breastmilk, but it’s not a hard stop, I’m not forcing it.  He only nurses when he wakes up and when he goes to bed.  I don’t know any teenagers still breastfeeding.

As for the co-sleeping, I know those days are numbered too and when he’s ready, he will go and sleep in his big boy bed on his own. In fact, last night, with my sister visiting from Beirut and the aerobed pulled out, he actually wanted to sleep in the bouncy bed with his sister.  He only lasted about an hour, but it was a step towards moving out of our bed.

I am not an extreme Attachment Parent. Yes my sex life had to get a little more creative with baby making three in the bed, but at the same time it made it more fun too. The careful planning, the anticipation.

So what do you think about Time Magazine’s new cover? Attachment Parenting?

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As a mom, nothing is more scary than when your child needs emergency medical care.  Your first instinct is to head to the Emergency Department (otherwise known more colloquially as ER) where you will place your entire trusted care of your child in their hands.  It would be shocking to learn that not all Emergency Departments are equipped, not only with the tools, but also the properly trained staff to care for your child.  Just because it says Pediatric Emergency Department on the outside of the building does not mean that they are an emergency department that is equipped to care for a child in a medical crisis.

RBaby Foundation is is the first and only not-for-profit foundation uniquely focused on saving babies lives through improving pediatric emergency care.

R Baby Foundation is dedicated to ensuring that babies, including those in the first month of life suffering from viral infections and other infectious diseases, receive the highest quality of care and service through supporting life-saving pediatric training, education, research, treatment and equipment.

In addition R Baby is educating and empowering parents with resources to better understand their medical options and make more informed choices in their care.  Before I became an RN, I remember going to the Emergency Room with my daughter and completely trusting them with my child’s care.  Everyone was a doctor to me.  Little did I know that most of them were residents, doctor’s in training, practicing on my child.  As an RN now, I cringe every time I think of that day when they asked both my husband and I to step outside as they performed a spinal tap on my child. I thought my child was getting top priority care when a handful of doctors entered the room and closed the door.  I was just a scared mom who wasn’t informed.  An absolute must read is their PDF entitled: What you need to know about Emergency Rooms

Before your child has a medical emergency, visit R Baby Foundation’s Emergency Resource Page for information on preparing before a medical situation arises and understanding your options.

I am proud to be an #RBabyMom, not just as a mother who has spent many times in the ER with her child, but as a Registered Nurse, who when is in the ER with her child, is only a mom who is scared for her child.

At the end of the day, you are your child’s best advocate.  If you don’t think a doctor or nurse is understanding your concerns, make them understand them.

If you have a moment, please join R Baby Foundation in petitioning the US Senate, the US House of Representatives & the Council of State Governments for a better, clearer definition of a Pediatric Emergency Department, mandatory pediatric equipment and supplies in all EDs, and increased pediatric training for ED doctors.  To sign the petition, please visit: http://www.change.org/petitions/demand-that-your-emergency-department-is-prepared-for-your-child

Feeling inspired? Spread the word, visit RBaby Foundation’s Volunteer page for more ways to engage and share the message.

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As a blogger I have been privileged to attend so many amazing events and interact with so many amazing and inspiring people.  To date, this may be the most amazing and honoring experience yet.  I have been invited to participate in a live in-person Minority Health Blogger Town Hall hosted by the Department of Health & Human Services on Tuesday, April 24th at 12:30 p.m. at the White House. The event will be an interactive, open dialogue with stakeholder groups and bloggers to highlight what the health care law, the Affordable Care Act, means for racial and ethnic minorities. We will also discuss racial and ethnic heath disparities and how the Administration is addressing these disparities.

As a person in the medical field, you would imagine that I know quite a bit about the healthcare system and yet many times I just throw my hands up in the air and say, it’s too complicated, it is what it is.  I don’t know nearly enough about it but I should.   Ironically enough I am a nurse because I want to help people.  I embraced everything I feared my whole life, medicine, science and became a nurse.  I want to take what I see as the natural extension of being a mom and loving others in an area that I was so uncomfortable in and embrace it while helping others to do the same.  In this day and age, and especially now with children of my own and their whole futures to look forward to, I simply cannot live in the dark.  Its sad to hear generations of ill-feeling towards the healthcare system on my families part.  The fear in both my now deceased grandparents eyes and voices when they had to see a doctor or enter a hospital for care.  It is forever burned in my mind, my grandmother holding my hand, I was very young,just starting college at the time, begging me not to take her to the hospital because she feared once she was there, she’d never leave.  The sad fact is both my grandparents never left the hospital alive once they entered.  Not that their fears were reality based, only because they feared the healthcare system so much they only entered it too late.

The debate even post passing of the Affordable Healthcare Act is still very active.  I have to admit, I am very nervous to be doing this.  I myself have many questions and this town hall is a ground-breaking opportunity for us, (for me!), to interact with key stakeholders, to look pass the misunderstandings and misconceptions and get right at the heart of the truth.  When I finally sat down to really understand what the state of the healthcare system is in the US, I was shocked.  It really gave me a raw look at what an incredibly privileged life I live.  I have always had health insurance and never understood growing up what that meant to my parents who were obsessive about making sure we always had coverage, to fully understand that fear I once thought was absolutely ludicrous in my grandparents’ eyes.  It shocked me to learn that most minorities, not just my “old-school” grandparents have a poor view of healthcare in America.  With strong research showing that improving patients’ perception of their care is important to improving outcomes, it’s upsetting to see how prevalent this view is. Negative experiences can lead to less time spent with a physician and poor communications between doctor and patient which only can lead a to a vicious cycle of an even more declining view of the healthcare system.

This year’s theme, Health Equity Can’t Wait. Act Now in Your CommUNITY!, is a call to action for all of us to work together to reduce health disparities.  Join us and learn more about how the Administration is working to improve the health of minority communities and achieve health equity for all Americans.  I’m particularly interested in what specifically they are doing to reach the minorities on a one to one basis.  What are they doing locally?  How will they measure their success?  How can someone like me, simply a mom, help to foster change?  What can I do as a daughter, a granddaughter, a niece, to change decades of thought and perceived history?    What questions do you have?

You can watch the Townhall live at www.whitehouse.gov/live. Please submit questions in advance using the hashtag #MinorityHealth or on their Facebook page.  Or leave me a comment!

To view the National Healthcare Quality Report and National Healthcare Disparities Report, visit: http://www.ahrq.gov/qual/qrdr11.htm

To learn more about the Affordable Healthcare Act, visit: healthcare.gov

A great documentary about healthcare around the world to watch is: Frontline: Sick Around the World

A great documentary to watch about the state of the nation’s healthcare system and why an overhaul is necessary is: Frontline: Sick Around the America

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Going about your normal routine, sometimes a little self absorbed, doing the things you normally do like getting in the car and turning on the radio.  You start a little swagger in your seat with the beat and soon you’re in full swing singing along with the radio.  You listen to the weather update, the traffic update and the sleeze report.  You’re laughing, it’s a good day!  They start playing the phone tap and you’re cracking up.  They work up the Topic train and you’re shaking your head in agreement and laughing!  Until a little voice behind you asks, “What stick does she want to smell Mommy?“  Oh CRAP!

Suddenly I realize, I’m carpooling a bunch of 4 year olds!  Who have no idea what Elvis Duran and the Z100 Morning Show are talking about.  The potty talk is just way over their head and completely inappropriate for the ride to school.  I’m sad.  I’ve been listening to Elvis Duran and the Z100 Morning Show for ages!  But alas, I’ve got to grow up and pray none of these 4 years olds go repeating to their parents any of the potty humor mention during our rides to school.  Yikes!

For my own sanity though, I can’t be singing the Wheels on the Bus or Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes on the way to school.  There has to be a happy medium.  So hello PANDORA!  You may have ads but at least they are short, sweet and clean.  Sorry Elvis, it’s been great, but I have to set an example, you know how it goes.  Turning off the radio and tuning into Pandora.

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After my 2nd night shift in a row, I had trouble sleeping and decided to watch my DVR of the latest Grey’s Anatomy episode entitled One Step Too Far.  It began as every episode does with a monologue, fading into and out of each characters lives.  After about 5 minutes I was gripping my bed sheets as the medical drama this week was an arachnoid cyst, the very same diagnosis that M has.  I was literally flabbergasted that this was their choice of medical portrayal of all things, paralleling my life.  There’s nothing I hate more than when a television show mirrors that of real life because it really messes with you.  Granted this case was an adult, but she had an incredibly promising future ahead of her as M does.  The episode plays out with the bold removal of the tumor by Lexie Grey which results in the patient having dysphasia – difficulty speaking.  The actress who portrayed the patient deserves an Emmy or something because the reaction and horror she was portraying was very real for me.  Just like her, I was screaming inside my head but it wasn’t coming out right.  I almost threw up right then and there.  And of course, sleep was even harder to come by then.

My mind was once again fixed on my little man.  My heart was breaking and my mind completely spacy.  You see I’m kind of at a stand still.  I don’t know what to do.  The neurosurgeon who we were seeing, wants to have MRI’s every 6 months to monitor the growth of the tumor and in between I am simply to doing nothing.  NOTHING!  For a person who is so completely task oriented, this defies every bone in my body to play this waiting game.  This game of will we operate or will we wait.  I am definitely not a gambler.  Ask my husband.  Every time he hits the tables, I have to go for a walk.  I can’t handle the unpredictability.  I’m not a risk taker.  I like to know my cards and play them accordingly.  This time I feel like a gun is being held to my head and I’m being force to play this game.  Is surgery inevitable?  I don’t know.  Will he be operated in 6 months, 1 year? 5 years? 15 years?  I don’t know.

Every time I am asked how M is doing, I say he’s doing good, but really… I just don’t know.  It may sound stupid but I feel this immense pressure to find a solution for everyone who asks as if he just had a cold and can get over it.  Sometimes I want to say, to be honest, I don’t know how he’s doing.  He’s happy, he’s M.  As for his tumor which you’re referring to, it won’t get solved overnight.  I may be his mom, but I don’t have all the answers.  Don’t expect me to answer like I got it taken care of yesterday after I went grocery shopping.  All I know is that I love him more than life itself and he brings me so much joy it hurts to imagine a day without him.  He lights up the world and is such a happy happy baby.  He always has a Hi! and a Bye Bye! for everyone he crosses paths with and when he says Thank you without being prompted everyone smiles and I am brimming with pride because he wasn’t taught this, it simply is M.

As for my husband, I can’t even have this conversation with him at all.  Although he is M’s father, I can’t share the burden of this with him, because I know it’s too much for any parent to handle.  I mentioned the Grey’s Anatomy episode and he said he was “completely freaking out now.”  I’m not just M’s mom, but I’m a medical professional who bears the responsibility of knowing what the right thing to do is and yet I just don’t.  It’s so much easier to answer the question, How are you doing? Not so good.

Here’s your dose of M, playing at the park yesterday on the most gorgeous of spring NYC days, happy as can be.

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If you know me, you know I’m a busy gal.  Between juggling being a mom, a wife, a student, a designer, a nurse, certified lactation counselor and blogger, I’m often asked if I get any sleep at all.  Many days I definitely look like I haven’t gotten any in a long while.  This year I’ve made it a priority to love myself again.  To kick my butt out of that mommy slump and bring back that hot mama that use to be in me somewhere.  Like everything else in my life, it’s a work in progress.

On days I barely have time to sleep, I definitely have less time to take care of me and even 5 minutes extra in the morning can be hard to come by.  How do I make the most of the 5 minutes I set aside for myself you ask?  I’m a multi-tasker of course!

I’m usually at my worst coming off a night shift, barely able to stand and yet sleep is still out of reach with kids to get off to school and chores to square away for the morning.  I usually come through the door and straight up to the bathroom where I shed the night off and jump into a refreshing shower.  I love using my loofah to waken up my skin with a vigorous scrub and I have this divine peppermint bar soap that just perks me up.  Once out of the shower it’s like a timer is counting down.  I quickly lotion my body from head to toe and then brush my teeth.  While blow drying my hair, I’m usually also post-rinsing my teeth with my listerine rinse.

With my hair somewhat dry, I pull it back quickly and mix up Olay Regenerist Micro Sculpting Serum, with one squirt of liquid foundation and one squirt of tinted moisturizer.  A quick blend with my fingers, I apply it quickly and evenly with a sponge. I’ve combined just enough coverage and waken my skin to feel like myself again.   A little dab of blush and CoverGirl Nature Luxe Gloss Balm and I’m off!

If I know I’ve got to be a little more than presentable, I make time to shave my legs, trim that bikini line with the newly Venus Gillette Bikini Trimmer.  I’ll even throw in Aussie’s 3 minute miracle right before I brush my teeth and rinse for hair that once again has life.  I’ll peel off one Crest 3D White 2-Hour Express Whitestrips treatment and gather my thoughts/ to do’s for the day.

It’s not much but just taking that extra 5 minutes does wonders for the outlook of my day.  I feel much better, refreshed and ready to take on the day… even on no sleep.  Just another day in the life of a mom!

GIVEAWAY: Enter NOW!  Making those 5 minutes a priority can do wonders for yourself and for your day.  P&G wants to help you find those 5 minutes with this amazing P&G Beauty Giveaway.  From now until April 5th 2012 you MUST visit this FORM and leave a comment with your beauty tip.  ONE (1) lucky winner will win this amazing gift set containing:

• Aussie 3 Minute Miracle (Elle Essential)
• Crest 3D White 2-Hour Express Whitestrips (Elle Essential)
• Secret Clinical Strength Waterproof (Real Beauty Gold Star Awards)
• Venus Bikini Trimmer (Marie Claire 25 Products That Will Change Your Life)
• Olay Regernerist Micro Sculpting Serum (Redbook MVP Awards)
• Covergirl Nature Luxe Gloss Balm (Oprah Spring Makeup O-wards)

For an additional (3) entries – 1st Option – If you follow me on twitter @momconfessional and re-tweet this giveaway (I just entered @momconfessional’s #PGBeauty #Giveaway and you should too! http://wp.me/pLvfH-1d8) – 2nd Option – If you “like” us on Facebook and share the giveaway with your friends.  – 3rd option – subscribe to Mom Confessionals.  DON’T FORGET to leave a comment with your beauty tip and leave a separate entry for each action on this FORM. Giveaway only open to those with U.S. addresses and must be 18 years or older. Giveaway ends on April 5th 2012 at 11:59 EST. A winner will be selected randomly by Random.org and notified by e-mail.

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Well it’s been just about 3 weeks since we started the Oral Care Challenge and while I am sad to say we are still a work in progress, I think we are on the road to setting some #HealthyHabits for a lifetime.  The most consistently healthy oral care habits have actually been from my own darling Apple.  We have our own chore rewards chart and it has made for quite the incentive combined with the Barbie Toothbrush and Listerine Smart Rinse.  Initially we had to work up to brushing for 2 whole minutes.  Now that we have that down pat, we’re working on the finer details of brushing, like all the sides of your teeth. She still struggles with rinsing for 1 full minute, but I’m giving her some leeway as she’s only 4 years old.  We haven’t gotten to flossing yet, but like I said, work in progress.

My little monster loves to spit, so it’s become a little game of open mouth, brush with his Batman “man!” a little and spit… brush a little and spit, brush a little and spit.  You can imagine this takes a while.  I’m just happy he likes brushing.  He’s quite the ham too.  I usually brush along side him and he loves to copy my one hand on my hip and brushing with the other.  Look how cute he is, standing on his chair, pretending to be a big boy, brushing his own teeth.  He’s very serious about his oral care.

As for the monkey, he loved his Phineas & Ferb toothbrush and Smart Rinse.  Each kid really liked having their own set up – toothbrush, cup, toothpaste and Smart Rinse.  In a couple of weeks the kids will be going to their first dentist appointment and I am trying not to let my own personal anxiety get to them.  I am crossing my fingers that all goes well.  I did thorough research on this dentist and if all the review read right, she’s the bee’s knees!

Not only have we been taking better care of our teeth but ever since the mother-in-law left us to our own devices, we’ve been trying to eat better too.  Want some oranges instead of a lollypop?  How about a fruit pop instead of ice cream?  Sliced apples with pancakes are a hit!

To learn more about building Healthy Habits for a Lifetime please visit Walmart’s information page at: http://instoresnow.walmart.com/enhancedRenderContent_ektid102809.aspx

{ disclosure: I received products and compensation from Johnson & Johnson and The Motherhood as part of my participation in the Oral Care Challenge.  All thoughts and opinions expressed in this post are my own. }

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I have to work tonight.  And as usual I am having trouble sleeping during the day.  Today I am lucky though.  My son is sleeping next to me.  I love the days when I’m sleeping for the night and he’s taking his nap.  Although it irks me that he sleeps way better than I do during this time, I do love to wake up and hear the sweet sound of his breathing snoring.  It’s a rather calming sound, strange I know.  I sit here whispering into those darling little ears, almost begging him… Please don’t leave your momma.  I don’t know what I’d do without you.  Promise me you’ll be here with me forever.  Promise your momma, please. My heart breaking at the thought, with tears streaming down my face.  It’s a private pain.

I want to see his first day of school, to see him play his first baseball game, watch him ride his bicycle for the first time.  I want to see beyond the next few years.  It’s every mom’s wish but not many mom’s have to really worry that they won’t.

The questions still come.  How is he doing? What are you going to do?  I never have an answer more than, day by day.

We don’t know much more about M’s condition and where his course of treatment will take him.  It suffices to say that the medical bureaucracy that is the insurance company is not one easy to understand.  We’re still handling issues while he was in utero and I expect we will be battling these issues for a long time to come.

That is why, all I can do is enjoy moments like this.  While I can’t seem to sleep, I can sit here in the quiet of the afternoon and place kisses all over my sleeping baby and listen to the soothing sounds of his rhythmic breathing snoring….

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When I got asked to join the Listerine Oral Care Challenge, it was a no-brainer.  My own teeth have been the bane of my existence.  As a child, my dental visits were few and far between, as I aged I fell victim to dental carries and a few crap dentists who seemed a little too drill happy, both to my teeth and my wallet.  To make matters worse, as a grown adult, post-pregnancy, I had over $10,000 worth of dental work done due to weakening of the teeth.  The dentist even had the nerve to blame my 28 months of breastfeeding for calcium depletion… the nerve!  The bill itself was enough to scare me from ever going to the dentist again.  And really, going to see a dentist only when something hurts is not a good thing.  While I have since found better care, it still isn’t an easy place for me to go.  In fact my anxiety is at its all time high when visiting the dentist.   My newly discovered favorite form of treatment is nitrous oxide otherwise known as laughing gas.

Worried that my own experience with the dentist would taint that of my own children, I am eager to take this challenge head on.   Since learning that 50 percent of children will have a cavity or filling between the ages of 5 and 9 and the surgeon general reports that 51 million school hours are missed each year because of dental-related illness, I am scared. If prevention is worth its weight in gold, I needed to get going ASAP.  With my daughter at 4 years old and my son at 2 years old, neither of which have seen a dentist yet nor have very consistent dental hygiene habits, we might be on a road to trouble.

After participating in the Healthy Habits Kick Off call I was feeling a little disgusted and also very inspired.  Disgusted because I found out that brushing your teeth alone misses the germs in 75% of your mouth.  Yuk!  First things first, I picked up the phone and made dentist appointments for the kids.  I was very proud of myself for taking this first step.  Next it was time to unpack my Listerine Gift Pack.  I was thrilled to find Character themed products which made the introduction all the more easier.

J was thrilled to bits with his Phineas and Ferbs rinse and toothbrush, while A was giddy with glee over her new Barbie rinse and toothbrush.  M is still too little for a rinse but I couldn’t leave him out, so he got his very own Batman toothbrush, otherwise fondly known as “Man!”  We were off to a good start.

The good thing is that my husband has been firmly making sure that J & A brush their teethes, not just at night but first thing in the morning.  That was a habit that never stuck with me as a kid.  Having the character rinses definitely makes things a lot easier if not a little more troublesome.  A wants to brush and rinse her teeth all the time now.   I’ve had to put my foot down several times.  Really!  It could become a real problem.  The baby just loves to copy his older sibs and this time, it’s a good thing.  If they’ve got good oral hygiene, he is sure to follow suit.  As it stands, he has his own cup and toothbrush and loves to spit out water.  I mean who doesn’t!  He loves to stand side by side with them as they brush.  It’s really too cute for words.

I also found the time to dig out a toy timer from a now defunct game which will act as a 2-minute brush timer and 1-minute rinse timer.  I was so excited!

With the kids squared away, it was time to examine my own dental hygiene.  You’d think with my history, I’d be neurotic about my dental health habits… but I’m not.  I still never brush my teeth in the morning, unless I’m coming off a night shift.  Sometimes out of pure exhaustion, I skip the flossing and just brush.  Sometimes I’m soooo lazy, I don’t even use the Listerine rinse.  Working the night shift 3-4 days a week doesn’t help either, my times are always turned upside down.  That’s the problem with being a mom whose candle is being burnt at both ends.  I learned though from the call that, oral care has advanced so much that it takes just minutes a day to improve your oral care routine and establish a healthy habit that will benefit you for a lifetime.  The sooner you improve your oral care, the more money you will save. Fortunately, Walmart offers LISTERINE® and REACH® products at affordable prices!

This is a fresh start for everyone.  With new tools in hand, we are going to start creating some healthy dental habits.  Won’t you join us?

Visit www.walmart.com/AHA/Listerine/Reach to access to tips from leading dental experts and find great values and prices on oral care products.

{ disclosure: I received products and compensation from Johnson & Johnson and The Motherhood
as part of my participation in the Oral Care Challenge but have been a long-time loyal user of Listerine & REACH products. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this post and any post on this site are always my own. }

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A year later and my education angst is no less than it was when looking for an appropriate Pre-K for Ava.  If you’re wondering what happened in our quest to place in the NYC Pre-K system… nothing.  We applied to 10 schools total.  Not because we wanted to go to all 10 schools but we wanted to assure ourselves of placing into one school… PERIOD.  I’m always the optimist and although I had done my research, I really wanted to be one of the LUCKY ones.  Of the 10 schools we applied to I’d say there was only really 2 that we wanted to go to, or would consider going to.  Thank goodness I had the smarts to look into CBO Pre-K’s as well as private schools.  In total, we had applied to one private school and 10 NYC public school based Pre-K programs.  We didn’t apply to any CBO Pre-K’s because the selection criteria was about elusive as Big Foot.  I’d even wager, it had more to do with how much you were willing to pay for the longer program, minus the supposed discount for the free 2.5 hours provided under the CBO Pre-K label.  Shady you think?  I agree.

The one private school that we applied to, after extensive research, was another “I wish, I wish…” and for once in my life I am happy I wished such a big dream for my daughter.  There’s something to be said about private schools.  If you’ve done the research and compared, it’s really hard to even accept a public school education as plausible when you want only the best for your child.  With our feet in both pools, we waited.  We first got our acceptance to the private school a few weeks before we would know about the NYC Public Pre-K and I could hardly believe it.  They loved our little Ava just as much as we did.  And that’s where the anxiety really began.  Could we really afford such an undertaking and were the benefits enough to choose this over public school?

When the public school Pre-K selections were announced, we were denied acceptance to ALL 10 schools.  I kind of breathed a sigh of relief.  Of course I was disappointed but in my head, I had already committed to sending Ava to private school.  As all of our friends found our their results, it was astonishing, although it really shouldn’t have been, that out of 12 friends with kids hoping to enter Pre-K in the Fall of 2011, not ONE of them got in.  You see, simply by not having a sibling already in the system, we had already fallen down the seniority tree, to the very bottom.  Which begs to ask, how does one even get a sibling into the system to begin with?

Long story short, we cut corners, made sacrifices and our Ava got to attend her wonderfully amazing and nurturing private school where she is taught and loved by her two teachers and 11 classmates.  She has enjoyed every minute in this close knit community where everyone is invested in the children’s education.

So why the anxiety you ask?  I can’t help be the cautious bee.  While the husband has expressed that he will stop at nothing to continue sending her to this school, I live in fear constantly that this may not be the reality.  Every year we will have to apply for financial assistance and while current families receive preferential consideration, it’s still a nail biting thing to think one year I may not be able to afford to send her to this amazing school that she too, has fallen in love with.  Not to mention in a few years I have to consider Marcus’ schooling.  I have politely declined invitations for Marcus’ to join their toddler program, making excuses about scheduling, but the real reason is mostly fear that we just don’t have the money to do so.  It’s a really scary position for a parent to be in.

Trying to hedge my bets, I was completely devastated to find out we had missed the Gifted and Talented application deadline.  It was the only plausible public school alternative that I would let my Ava attend and I had blown it by missing the deadline.  Again the husband reiterated his commitment to sending Ava to her current school.  I wish I could be as cavalier as he.  Our latest financial aid application just submitted I sit here biting my tongue and once again wishing…and I opened my inbox to read an email that I almost deleted as junk… about an amazing app that is worthy of so many accolades… Sage: Pre-K and Elementary Schools Search

I visited the site and was blown away.  All at my fingertips was all the information I spent so much time looking for, all compactly placed.  Each parent will have their own experience with the NYC admission process, and for some, the research found on this app will make them happy they live in the neighborhood they live in and for others, like myself, happy they made alternative choices in their child’s education.  I have to admit, I couldn’t help just looking and comparing the report cards of neighboring schools, all of which we are not zoned for or could get in even if we wanted to.  The app was a real eye opener.  Founder Edward Yau (and fellow Columbian) of Dendro Kids said it best, “In times like these, where the city is closing schools for underperformance (See: http://nyti.ms/wA4t1K), it’s even more important for parents to keep track on how their school is doing.”

While I love the goal of this program, I have one edit to make.  I think this app goes beyond helping parents whose children are just coming into school age, it’s a tool for parents of any age.  Perhaps it can be a catalyst for change, mobilizing parents to ask more from their schools and set higher standards.

If you agree, please vote for Sage: Pre-K and Elementary Schools Search in the NYC Big Apps 3.0 competition. Now in its 3rd year, NYC Big Apps is a competition where the NYC administration releases a data from city agencies and invites software developers to make innovative applications to improve the lives of NYC citizens.  NYC Big Apps has received a record number of app submissions in this year’s competition but Sage: Pre-K and Elementary Schools Search is getting my vote.

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