Raising Rebel Souls

My blog post today is actually about another amazing blog :) It is beautifully written glimpse into a world most of us will never understand, written by an even more beautiful woman who lights up my life... but more importantly is starting to realize that she is lighting up the world as well.

Please let me introducte to you Heather Clark and RAISING REBEL SOULS

Heather is a dear friend of mine. I met her almost three years ago in an online forum for parents with twins. I joined an amazing group of women who all gave birth to twins in 2009... except for Heather! Her twins, Max and Ty, were a year older, born on September 4, 2008. Yup! Caleb, Matthew, Max, and Ty are birthday buddies!! How fun is that?! Anyways, we "let" Heather stay as our "big sister"... someone who had already survived that tretcherous first year with newborn twins and had lived to tell about it. Little did I know she would become one of my best friends, despite that fact that she lived half way across the country. Luckily that didn't seem to pose too much of a barrier. Two summers ago when Jon and I went down to Florida for a weekend to visit some friends, I was able to meet Heather and her boys for the first time. We spent an amazing morning together drinking coffee and walking around the gardens of the Ringling Museum in Sarasota, Florida... within minutes it was like I was talking with my best friend. It was a whole long year before I got to see Heather again... but this past summer we took the boys down to Florida for the first time and all of our boys got to spend a beautiful morning togehter on the beach.


The sad thing is that our boys have only had that one memorable morning with Max and Ty. I wish they lived next door, because the tiny but mighty Max and Ty have more to teach my boys than I ever could. More important than learning the states or the presidents... Max and Ty can teach my boys about acceptance. About understanding. About patience. Kindness. Respect. Unconditional love. About true friendship. You see, Max and Ty both have Autism. And they have the world's most amazing mother who works tirelessly to accomplish two missions- To teach the boys how to thrive in this loud, crazy, over-stimulating world and to teach the world how to accept beautiful children like Max and Ty. I should probably also mention that underneath their autism- underneath the sensory overload, the language barriers, and the social struggles that mark every single day of their lives- Max and Ty are brilliant little boys. It frigtens me to think that not only is Heather trying to deal with autism, but underneath I think she is also dealing with two highly gifted children. Gifted special needs children. But I promise you that there is no better person than to face this challenge than Heather. In fact, I'm quite certain God gave her Max and Ty entirely on purpose. I won't even try to do her justice here. You need to go see for yourself.

So please head on over and check out Raising Rebel Souls. We all have so much to learn from Heather and her amazing little boys. You will laugh. You will cry. You will realize that you would never be able to walk a single mile in her shoes. And hopefully you will soften your heart a little next time you see a mother whose child is melting down in the grocery store... not because he wants the chocolate bar at the check out, but because the bright lights and the buzz of the freezer section and the loud squeaks of the wheels on the carts have literally cause his mind to explode... and at that moment he is truly terrified of living inside his own head. Oh, and I should probably mention that Raising Rebel Souls is so incredibly awesome that it is a finalist for the Favorite Special Needs Parenting Blog of 2012... so after you read it, please take a quick second to VOTE for RAISING REBEL SOULS.

Love you more than you will ever know mama.