It's going to be a bumpy ride.....

As mothers of children with disabilities, we share similar experiences; we speak our own language; we often know more than professionals because we've lived it-not read it in a book. We tell one another which pacifier works best for a baby with a cleft palate, what sensory toys work well for some of our children with autism, and which speech therapists specialize in children with Down Syndrome. We have our crumbled copies of Welcome to Holland, dog eared pages in The Out of Sync Child, and sticky finger copies of We'll Paint the Octopus Red.

We want to use that collective wisdom to help one another navigate the systems and services that we encounter on our journey.

If you have stories to share or topics you'd like us to cover, please send them to real.IN.mom@gmail.com. We will protect your anonymity, as we are protecting ours. We want to be able to share the honest, sometimes hard to hear, truth about the hurdles we face without fear of repercussions.

Even though we're all at our own points in the journey, we're going to start at the beginning......Fasten your seat belt; it's going to be a bumpy ride.