Bird (and Bear) Moms: Figuratively

I'm unsure of my parenting style.
I'm told that it wasn't that long ago that "parenting" wasn't a thing, certainly not a thing that was done in any particular style.  But I live in the twenty-teens in the United State and one can't just try one's best to raise kids to be compassionate, intelligent adults.  One need a style; be it attachment, free-range, helicopter, Chinese mom, French mom, or honey badger.

Among CHASA Facebook discussions, lots of parents talk about bringing out Mama Bear.  After all, if mom doesn't stand up to demand what a kid needs, who will?
Mama Bear is deemed necessary because pediatric stroke survivors can have a long list of special needs, physically, developmentally, and educationally.  And many of these needs can be ignored, missed, or denied.  CHASA discussions are filled with stories of doctors labeling parents as hypochondriacs rather than helping them seek help; teachers skipping the accommodations written into an IEP*; in-laws avoiding grandkids because they don't know how to deal with their sensory issues; or formerly good friends assuring mothers that "nothing is wrong" with their hemi-kids as they miss key developmental milestones. It probably doesn't need to be said that a special version of Mama Bear; Mama Bear Accounta
nt File Keeper Extraordinaire can be necessary for dealing with insurance claim paper work.

On another side of things, I am a teacher with lots of teacher friends and relatives.  Certain parents are not seen as necessarily protective bears, but rather as seagulls.  They swoop in, make a lot of noise, ruffle a lot of feathers, and leave a mess of waste in their wake.

I don't want to be a seagull parent.

I don't really like being a bear.

Eagles before color/mud race May 21, 2016

But if the Mister and I don't make some noise, sometimes nothing happens.  Our initial neurology appointment, at age 2, triggered a bunch of Early Intervention (EI) steps because of the cerebral palsy diagnosis, but we had known Aster had experienced a brain event since well before he was born. I learned about CHASA from a google search looking for toys that force the use of two hands, about botox and constraint therapy from CHASA, about physiatrists from a occupational therapists who stopped by once, and about the CP clinic in Denver from trying to find something else.  Aster has a great team of people looking out for him, but with nobody "in charge" few recommendations are every made (except, "oh, yeah, that would be definitely something to look into").  Being a barred owl (out of the box and flying in a month) isn't going to work for this family.

I need some other style.  I don't want to keep my kids as close as an Emperor Penguin, nor abandon them to crash on the rocks the first time they fly, like a gannet.

Watching the cameras on the live birds, the bald eagles most resonated with me. The cynical among you might point out how stereotypically easily persuaded American that is, or how much easier it is to get good views inside an eagle next compared to a condor cave or a cramped owl box. I choose, however, to notice how duties are split between both eagle parents.  How the eagle kids appear to get along.  How the parents give the kids space, but always seem to know what is going on.

I hope to be a proud eagle parent.**

*Individualized Education Program: the official document of special education in the United States under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

**Pun about the local Pre-K-1 elementary school being the Eagles, and this being the last night Dianthus being a student at that school, entirely unintended until about halfway through the post, when I remembered this photograph and made it intentional.