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One of my articles appeared on Tanyetta’s blog Days Like These! I wrote about six powerful lessons parents (and adults for that matter) can learn from children. Read it here…

What Children Can Teach Us about Life and Happiness: The Six Forgotten Lessons

While you are there, check out Tanyetta’s blog. Mainly about her toddler. Be warned, some can be very hilarious!
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Seriously, I have never thought things like this could happen.

It’s sad to find out that a 7-year old child has been struggling to be accepted by a school. Simply because Wong Bi Jun is a special needs child.

Her mother seeking frantically (both private schools and international schools) for a school that will accept her but to no avail. Everyone, upon hearing that she has a delay in development, gives excuses not to enroll her.

Isn’t it ironic? A school is supposed to help children to better equip themselves with knowledge and skills. But in this case, not only did the schools reject the child’s application to be a student, they gave no encouragement but snide remarks.

For example, I quote this from the story:

“One principal from a private school even told me that she hated to deal with special needs students and that such students were actually handicapped and not special needs.”

How could a school principal make such a heartbreaking statement? Shame on her!

I pity the mother and now she doesn’t know where to turn to for help. I think something has gone wrong somewhere that needs to be corrected for such a thing to happen.

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Follow on note (July 20th): Some parents responded to the story by giving suggestions to deal with this particular issue. They speak from their own experiences. Bravo!

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I found this story on Tiffany’s Nature Moms:

"It shows how Fox News killed a well researched story about the dangers of Monsanto’s rBST in our milk and the connection of it to cancer. Fox News was threatened by Monsanto with “dire consequences” and it in turn killed the story and fired the reporters who investigated it."

Watch the video and read in full here

Related:
The hidden force behind milk formula conspiracy


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The problem my wife and I face is our daughter always sticks to food that she's familiar with and likes. Whenever we have new food items, she always stays away without even trying.

And I realize many parents face the same problem. Fortunately, Dave of Daddy Daze has written an interesting post on this. It's not the usual "how to make your kids eat stuff" though.

He applies a psychological approach called "shaping." All in all, there are seven steps. Three of them are the prep work. The rest of the steps are when "shaping" is taking shape. The steps are…darn, why don't you hop over and read it. Dave has done a great job detailing how he successfully got the kids to enjoy salmon and brown rice:

7 steps to end mealtime battles forever

You'll see an example of what "shaping" is all about there. Don't worry, nothing technical.
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Hi parent,

We lost our son Brandon on the 9th of Feb 2006. He died of asphyxia and during the care of a lady who operates a childcare centre in Jalan Changgai, Petaling Jaya (opposite of Assunta Girls Secondary School), Malaysia. We are deeply saddened by the death of our son within such a short time. He was a healthy boy, weighing 6kg and drinking 5oz at 2 1/2 mths. You may have read about it in the papers, Malay Mail, Harian Metro and most of the Chinese dailies.

Initial findings were that he choked on his own milk and by the time he was sent to the hospital, he already died. At first we did not want to allow an autopsy, because we couldn’t bear to see our child being “cut-up” but after discussing it with family members, we agreed to it as we needed to know the actual cause of death. When the results were out, the doctors concluded that there was a lump of curdled milk impacted within the esophagus. How could this have happened, if proper care and first aid was given immediately??!! It soon, struck us that he could have been left alone after his feed and may not have been burped properly; therefore he may have vomited and choked on the back-flow of the milk. Till today, the babysitter has not said anything on the incident and we still do not know what actually happened. She only cries when we ask her for the details. Maybe she is too scared to respond or feels guilty; we will never know.

It is being investigated by the police now, as well as the Selangor Welfare Dept and MPPJ as initial findings by the Malay Mail was that the babysitter is operating without any form of license from the proper authorities. But so far there is no conclusion whatsoever. To the authorities, this is considered an accident and the case would just be like any other case to them. We were quite disappointed, because before we sent our child to her, she quoted so many proficiencies and skills in managing a child care centre and infants. That’s why we agreed to give it a try. Now we feel as if we were somewhat responsible for our child’s death by sending him there.

Ironically, this was only his 8th day at the babysitter’s care. And suddenly, he is gone, just like that. It was very traumatic for me, as I was the first to arrive at the hospital. The scene plays over and over in my mind. Our pain and suffering is being shared by all who are around us and through this sharing we have learned to cope with the loss, although I still cry anytime of the day, at work, in my sleep, while driving etc. We searched for support through some local website for grieving mothers who in one way or another lost their child but, sadly, there weren’t many active sites and we had to turn to CBS (S’pore) and one site which were operated locally by Lillian Chan.

I hope to join other grieving mothers to share my feelings. I believe that it is easier to speak to someone who has had experience of losing a child as she would understand how I feel right now.

We decided that through the local media and the internet, we would be able to inform and educate those parents-to-be to be more prudent when it comes to selecting babysitter and child care centres. Do not just go for economical, locality and because someone says the babysitter is good. Through our plight, we generated some focus from the Ministry of Women, Family & Community Development to provide some form of guidance and regulations for these child services and to act on them if they flout the laws.

Here, I would like to thank those who have provided us with the care and support throughout our bereavement and with the grace of God, we will overcome this experience but never a day forgetting our beloved son Brandon.

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