Pre-writting skills...

You know, as someone who considers herself 'normal' in terms of physical and mental, it never occured to me that writttng skills for a special needs child or brain injured as Glenn Doman would always refer to, would be quite difficult and take many many many many practices to master it and where we take for granted for our so-called 'normal' ways of holding a pen and learn to write...so before I begin the story of my 'oh darn it I so have to work harder now, to make sure he can write!!'....I'd like mothers out there whom have children to give a biiig kiss to that precious beautiful head of their child that stores one of the most precious and valuable organ in his/her body...that is the brain...and most of all be so thankful to god that no matter how your child may drive you nuts at times or how tiring it is to take care of them, know it in your heart that your biggest worries about them going to school is not really much of a worry actually cause Insya-Allah they'll do fine and most of all, the ability to use that cute little hands of theirs to write on a piece of paper will come automatically and will be used with much delight and happiness by them...

So this is where my journey or story pulak starts as I learn the hard way...or maybe have known but was concentrating more on other parts of the body that I forgot that there is more to learn and know....hmm, my midwife was right...should write a book about this kan...who knows...one fine day....hehee...ooh, by the way I loved that movie...oops...getting sidetracked...hehehe...

The story starts last Friday when we had our bi-weekly session with our so sweet occupational therapy or in short OT. Ridhwan's OT is very nice and sweet and on top of that, quite knowledgeable too! For someone young, she sure has amazed me with her experiences and most of all her knowledge. Which of course is good lah kan, cause it would then benefit me a lot! Anyway, as usual we would be doing our usual therapy session, playing with the thera-puty or sticky as Ridhwan calls it...hehe..it is actually something like playdoh but oh so much better cause it can come of easily by just using itself to clean away the thera-putty away...one of its advantages is to strengthen your grip..using Thera Putty can also help with the rehabilitation of injuries to your fingers, hands, and forearm muscles by simply squeezing and moving the putty in your hands. There are 5 different levels of resistance to choose from and to help build up your hand muscles. Here are some pictures to show an example.....

One ways of using the thera-putty

See how one can actually stretch it without breaking it

Different colour coded thera-putty with its different resistance

Thus, our OT would be doing some exercise to strengthen Ridhwan's grip and make his left hand be more usable by pulling the thera-putty that was stucked to his right hand...and so we have been doing this for some time already until our OT said that today lets do some writting exercises and I said okay, would be just like Shichida. Then, she took out another cool thing which was some plastic cards where we could use a special crayon to write onto it and then later just use water to wash it away. The key word here is recycable!! Trust me, when you are a mother who is 'forcing' her child to write a lot you need recycable materials definitely! So as usual, Ridhwan was not into holding the crayon, holding it then throwing it away, make him hold it again...throw it away....then the OT said, 'Okay, never mind, time to give homework!' I was like, what??!! Heehe...not that I hate homework, but you see when you have a child who doesn't really know how to hold a pencil and is given 'homeworks' monthly..umm this is from shichida ya...hehee...you'll be like, okay, hope this is not going to be one of those, in the end the mama finishes his homework...hahaa...yes, I do that sometimes...baaad mother...but i can't help it sometimes cause there's so much other things I need to do for Ridhwan you know...but he does most of his homework anyway....really!! ;) ... and so the OT gave 2 pieces of paper and said, go home and practice doing this ya...and I was like, hmm..what's this and on the top of the 1st piece of paper writes 'Assessment for pre-writting skills' and followed by simple pictures that Ridhwan needs to practice and acquire the ability to copy the pictures...and then it hit me...oh my god, he has a hard time holding a pencil and he has to draw that horizontal line??!!! okay Reenaz, you have got to do something pronto woman!!!...and to scare me even more, it writes there the normal age a child could actually draw a horizontal line is 2 years old!! What??!! He is going to be 4 for goodness sake!! Then it hit me again, now it make sense why Shichida forces their children to write at such a young age....oh my...oh me oh my...eh that sound like bunnytown...oops sidetrack again...:P

So, I realise a bit late, or maybe not I hope...that Ridhwan needs pronto full speed ahead therapy on his fingers and hands to ensure he would be able to write soon..or fast for that matter!! And so the quest to find out what this pre-writting skills is all about is being looked out now...darn I'm so angry with bookshops in Malaysia...hampehs big time!! You see, being a special needs mummy, yes you rely on the internet for info and ideas to help your child, but its nothing compared to reading a book and getting hard facts from reputable people and writers which you sometimes question when reading a website that talks about the condition your children is...but sad to say, our country lacks in this area big time...really big time...this reminds me when I called a bookshop one day asking if they had a book on Cerebral Palsy...the guy who answered was very nice actually, not knowing how to spell Cerebral Palsy, I spelled it to him nicely and he told me to wait and check in the system and he said 'I'm sorry, its not in our system...do you have any other books you'd like to find?' ..And so since he was really nice attending to my needs, I gave him 2-3 more titles of books on cerebral palsy and 'not to my surprise' there was none in his system...by that time, he somehow sounded feeling bad that they had no book of that title at all and asked why did I want the book..and so in short I told, I have a child with cerebral palsy and so I'd like to read a book about it...and somehow from his voice he sounded even more upset and must have felt bad that there was no book at all on CP in Malaysia at the moment and felt helpless...poor guy, I said its okay, not his fault...he did then say I could order and I said, ya I know, but you see I'd rather see the book itself first and check its contents before ordering it or buying it so I know its a book worth buying....so the moral of the story...our society is still not a reading society and most of all it shows how unaware and unexposed our society is concerning special needs society...and that really saddens me that day..and so I was criticising our bookshops and libraries to my husband the whole night that day...hehe..sian abang kena dengar wife dia membebel and kutuk the lack of knowledge our society can be at times...sigh...

Anyway, that should not be an issue to me right now as I have a bigger important task at hand to overcome...but never mind, I have seen a boy who had meningitis as a baby and due to that he was considered CP but now is 5 years old and one look you'd never know he had meningits once and is CP as he could talk well and one thing that amazed me was his ability to write so well and count so well after all the things he had gone through...but one advantage he has is he is well taken off in a special school in australia that emphasises their special needs children to be able to go to a normal school at the age where your child will enter school...which as usual this oh so beautiful country is lacking....hmm...but who cares, I'll do it my way somehow...as it is, our neuro paed has pressured me that she wants Ridhwan to enter a normal school regardless his condition...and I for that matter, prays very hard that he will and believe he will...he must!! But that also means pure hard work for me from now on..slacking is a big no! no!! ...oh me oh my...:D

All I can say, I pray to Allah to give me strength to do what is best for Ridhwan everyday, every hour and every minute if possible..I'm only human and I do slack and get lazy at times...but I pray that most of the time I work hard and do what's best for Ridhwan as it is an ibadah what I'm doing for him, Insya-Allah and may Allah redha it....amin....so Ridhwan my dear...we have a looong way to go but we can do it my dear, cause I'm not going to give up and have never ever given up ...and if I could overcome my Masters while taking care of you last time and yet scored with flying colours...will give ourselves flying colours results too okay my dear Ridhwan and one day give ourselves a 'standing' ovation for it ya...amin...wallahualam...