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Your Mask is Completely Inappropriate and What Happened Later
A week or so ago I wrote this Your Mask is Completely Inappropriate post for CBC Parents. Here’s what happened afterwards. As some of you probably already know, I freelance and publish content in many other spaces. This year, a lot of that content has appeared on CBC Parents. Happy to hang my hat there sometimes. An Excerpt From My Recent Post on CBC Parents This past week we were walking through a grocery store near my home when my teenage daughter spied something scrawled on a face mask. In fact, I heard her speaking to a stranger before I even saw why. So Why Did She Speak Up? This…
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Time to Stop Smoking in Movies Now
I have partnered with YMC and Region of Peel and have received compensation for this post. All opinions are my own. Smoking in movies has been irksome to me for years. It’s so very unnecessary and irresponsible. I am a drama Mom. Both of my girls act and have for years with a local youth theatre troupe. It’s an amazing emotional outlet and youth development program. So I know all about character and plot devices and that smoking has traditionally been used as a character tool, but here’s the thing. It doesn’t have to be. I’ve seen many of the plays my kids act in altered ever so slightly to…
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Six Ways to Empower Your Child to Take Charge of Health Care
My regular readers know my kids have special needs. I write about the challenges involved in parenting them sometimes. We shuttle (mostly I to be honest) both girls back and forth to doctors and medical appointments and for assessments so much that I get tired and overwhelmed. So I imagine they must also. Which brings me to a tricky balance question. I was a child when I was sick with Crohn’s disease. I was in hospital a lot and shuttled back and forth to doctors a lot and I never felt empowered throughout the process until I became an adult with a career. Honest To God. I never felt…
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Embracing Caregivers #CareforaCarer
Are you a caregiver for someone with unique needs or health care challenges? I see you. I know you miss many social events, or family gatherings. Perhaps you stopped work entirely to care for someone you love. Or you switched to part time, freelance or contract. Chances are good you have missed your own doctor’s and dentist’s appointments. Maybe, you woke up so bone weary one morning you drove down the street without your glasses. Maybe you forgot to take your own medicine. How do I know any of this? Been there, done that. For years my life has been health care triage. Juggling an overwhelming number of specialist’s appointments,…
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Bumped from a Flight? Know Your Rights As a Traveler
Bumped from a flight? It’s more common than you might think. Airlines routinely oversell their flights, booking more passengers than the plane can accommodate. You might be asking why they’d do such a ridiculous thing. It all boils down to economics. Airlines have to take into account that a certain percentage of passengers may have a delay from another flight, miss their flight, cancel their tickets, or any number of other things. Airlines overbook flights by selling last minute, highly priced tickets and then bumping people with lower priced tickets. They’ll give them a credit to take a different flight and still come out further ahead than they would if…
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Infertility Statistics in British Columbia – It’s Time for Accessible Health Care #IVF4BC
Infertility statistics in British Columbia might surprise you. They might shock you. They should be repeated and shared and talked about. 1 in 6 Families in BC struggle with infertility. That means you know someone in your circle that has infertility, or has been through infertility. Maybe they shared their story with you. Maybe they struggled quietly. This upcoming May British Columbia marks two important events. The provincial election occurs May 9th, and the lead up weeks are a time to inquire where the parties stand on IVF funding. When the politicians running for office in your riding come to your door, ask them where they stand on public funding for…
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Adoption, Awareness and Advocacy – Why Are We Still Here? #adoption
This past week someone googled ” I hate adoption awareness month” and they arrived here on this blog which had me shaking my head at google. So I wanted to set the record straight. Here’s the truth. I don’t hate National Adoption Awareness Month. Quite the opposite actually. But I have gone on record many times over saying awareness is not enough. And I stand by that. I am an adoptive parent. Our family was built via adoption and it is a wonderful means of forming a family. I celebrate that all year round. I celebrate adoption awareness activities and fundraisers that raise the profile of adoption as a means of…
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“I Want Them To Know They Are Loved” – On Holiday Gifts That Matter #MeaningfulGifts
Boys play with a wooden gun used in re-enactment dramas, which can be part of rehabilitation therapy sessions. Many are familiar with how to handle the weapon. – Photographs from World Vision’s Children of War Rehabilitation Center in Gulu: daily life under World Vision’s care and reunions with their families; portraits to accompany Nigel Marsh interviews. This is a Guest Post by my Daughter Payton Schuck, she’s in grade nine this year and has been involved with helping us choose which World Vision Canada gift catalogue holiday gifts that we give as a family. This family tradition started last year. In grade seven Payton did a project about child soldiers.…
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Why I am Speaking Martian Again: FASD Looks Like This and I am Still Proud to be a Health and Special Needs Blogger
It’s been an interesting week here, in which several signs have made me realize again what I am supposed to be writing about. It’s funny how sometimes you, as a blogger, get tunnel vision watching stats and striving for growth and page views and SEO. These are the tools of the trade and we all get really great at understanding them. We watch our posts for engagement and comments and we tick them off and file them away with headings like: improved or needs improvement, or blogging goals for the year. We worry on a day when the stats dive and we question sometimes what happened there. We wallow. We question…
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Five Steps to Becoming a More Healthy and Empowered Patient
How many times have you gone to the doctor and felt less than happy with the visit? Do you leave feeling like an empowered patient or not?If you spend any time at all visiting this blog, then you know I often write about health matters. I write almost as often about advocacy and causes that matter to me. The lives of the members of my family intersect often with the traditional health care system. I was a child when I was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease and I spent many weeks, months and school vacations in the hospital or racing back and forth to doctor’s appointments. I never felt like I…
