Show Notes

 

My name is Gordana and I am a mom to a 9-year-old boy who has Autism. I am trying to raise awareness and inclusivity for all kids through my Instagram page, which I started as well, and helps other parents in whatever way I can.

"Everything you can imagine is real and is the reason that someone believes in the goodness of people."

Follow me on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/life_health_and_autism/

 

Are you still in shock that you are a parent of a special-needs child?
This show is for parents who are morning the loss of the life and child they thought they would have. For parents who are tired, lonely, and see no hope in sight?

You will learn how to deal with your non-verbal child with a sensory processing disorder, seizures, meltdowns, haircuts, and family trips. Embark on a journey of consciousness, self-care & meditation.

My name is Chad Ratliffe. I am a single father of 5 kids 6 years of age (8-14) and 2 with special needs. 5 years ago, in a nasty divorce, my depression led me to drug addiction and hopelessness. Today, I share with others a life I never imagined possible.

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Please donate to the show in order for us to continue supporting parents with specially-needed children.

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SUMMARY KEYWORDS

parent, life, support, special needs, child, helped, christian, thought, aba, feel, sharing, autism, instagram page, people, naked, diagnosed, person, accept, journey, inspired

SPEAKERS

Gordana Tomic, Chad Ratliffe

 

Gordana  00:00

As he was growing, it took me a while and I kind of grew out of all of those feelings and accepted that he's a whole person and that he brings me joy, and that I bring Him joy. I think to myself, like I don't want to use the words destiny. I don't like using that word, but he is the type of child and the type of person that I needed to live my life and I was chosen to be his mother so we can live our life. It kind of dissipated, but it took a long time, it took a lot of work.

 

Chad Ratliffe  00:36

Welcome to the daily naked parent podcast brought to you by rocket blue. The first ever brand focused on supporting parents with special needs children. A good parent nation is a group of parents with special needs children, who are willing to give honorable, stripped it all down and take a look at ourselves, our parenting, our family and our plans create a life beyond our wildest dreams. On today's show, we're going to be discussing gratitude and the power of the mastermind. Hello naked parent nation and welcome to today's episode of The Naked parent podcast. My name is Chad ratliffe. And I'm your host. And before I introduce you to our guests today, let me start by sharing the naked parent nation offering. Naked parent nation is a worldwide community of parents and professionals, raising children with all kinds of needs. We come together to share a Naked Truth support our fellow parents and inspire the inner growth that each of us needs to build the life and family of our dreams. For the parents that are struggling, we want you to know that we will love you until you can love yourself, for your children, we pray and send power from our collective group. As we come to understand our divine nature, we realize that there's no need to feel sorry for ourselves, be angry or feel lack, we come to understand that our feelings of limitation and separation are only in our minds. Through Self Realization, we expand our consciousness so that the challenges that perplex us today, dissipate one by one until we're able to see and experience gratitude and beauty in everything just as it is. We have the power to create any kind of life we want for ourselves and our families. We do this by living in the naked present moment, one day at a time. So if you're ready to continue your journey of awareness and consciousness or take back your life, then let me welcome you to naked parent nation and the naked parent podcast. And like we often do a grounding exercise before we get to our conversation today. If you want to sit up straight, stand, lay down whatever is good. And let slowly let your eyes go. Take a deep breath and let the world slow down for a minute. With your spine erect, your eyes close, you can lift your gaze up to that space right between your eyebrows. The spiritual eye and we're going to take a deep breath in and we're going to clench our fists and clench all the muscles in our body. And we're going to hold the breath up at the top with the focus on the spiritual eye. And then we're going to exhale and relax our muscles. And we're going to do that three times. So inhale, intense hold. Exhale, relax. Inhale, intense. Hold. Exhale, relax. On this last one, inhale, intense. Hold it as long as you're comfortable and then exhale and let it go and feel that peace keep your focus on that space between your eyebrows. And forget about your breath for a minute just remember that you always have this place to come to you just have to go in there. Bathroom and shut the door for a minute. Just take a timeout for yourself. And don't forget to use the grounding of your breath and to go within for peace. And whenever you're reading, you can open your eyes. Come back into the space where you are. And join us for our conversation with gore. Donna Tomek, welcome to the show. Thank you for being with us.

 

Gordana  05:36

Thank you very much for having me.

 

Chad Ratliffe  05:39

So you are a mom of a nine year old boy who has autism. And you're raising awareness for autism and inclusivity on your Instagram page, which we're going to want to hear more about. And you're just helping parents navigate this journey that you've been navigating. Does that sound right?

 

Gordana  06:02

That's That's it. Yeah, he's Christian is nine and a half years old. I think when he was originally diagnosed, I didn't really you know, you don't know you don't have the answers. Right? You think that when you get the diagnosis that you're going to just have all the answers, and you're going to know what to do? And obviously, you don't. And I've been speaking informally to many, many parents and sharing resources and things that I have done that helped and you know, made our life better and easier. And then one day, I just thought, hey, why not do it online? where the community is much, much larger? I mean, look at us connecting, and we're not even in the same country, right?

 

Chad Ratliffe  06:39

So yes, yeah. What country are you calling from?

 

Gordana  06:42

I'm in Canada.

 

Chad Ratliffe  06:43

That's awesome. Can you take us back to kind of the beginning when you celebrating the birth of your new baby? And this you're a first time mom is that?

 

Gordana  06:56

Yeah, first time mom, and he's an only child as well. So everything was kind of new. Right?

 

Chad Ratliffe  07:01

Can you tell us just kind of how that journey unfolded? And when autism came on your radar?

 

Gordana  07:07

Yeah, yeah. Well, I always like to tell the story that Christian is, as he is now. That's the way he was born. He was born at home unexpectedly after I'd been sent home from the hospital. So he just came quick and ready into the world. Paramedics delivered him, you know, he was in the newspaper, it was it's just a bigger than life character. Right. And that's who he is now to. And just, you know, we struggled a lot, because, you know, as new parents, we didn't know that his sleep, and in some of his things, like with speech later on, and things like that, were more difficult for us than possibly other babies, because you just don't know. And around two years of age, we noticed early, I am an educator, too. I work with kids. So you kind of you compare and you notice things with other kids that you see, I originally noticed that he was starting to use words and use them frequently. Like one word things, and then he would just almost forget a word and never use it again. Around the time he turned to, to his like, it was like terrible twos times 10. Right. So I just thought, Oh, my God, you know, I am not, I just thought like, I am not capable of handling this because you just think that as a parent, that it's you and the you know, you've never dealt with it before. And little by little, we did realize that something's off and that we need to take him to the doctors and I was one of those parents where I was going to do everything to support him. But I had trouble naming it, I trouble accepting that that's what it was. So I was going to do everything they told me to do and provide him with the resources but it took me a long time to accept it. He was diagnosed before he was three. Like I had to kind of grieve the loss of like an imagined life that you would have as a parent, for your goals and dreams and for your child's. But, you know, it took me a while but I realized he is still the same person he always was. And a whole child and bigger than life. And it took us a while but you know, through resources through through living in gratitude through being mindful through helping us help him. I think we were all living a full full life, you know, and no parent really knows even if their child is quote unquote, typical, right what the future holds right for for them as a parent or for the for their child. So the worries I feel will be the same for any parent.

 

Chad Ratliffe  10:04

Yeah, that's such a loaded thought what a whole life is. And I don't know that there's any way to not hit that question the way we as special needs parents do. Because no, I don't want to put my kid against these expectations that I have. But what else do I know, all I know is I was raised and how my friends were raised in the things that we did. And then as a little kid, you dream of, you know, maybe one day being a parent and having your own kids. And so how could you not, like roll the tape? With all you know, as an educator? Were you around special needs? Children?

 

Gordana  10:51

Um, yes. But I feel like I've been an educator for 13 years now. And I feel like that around the time that I did become a parent, I didn't it was Ethan was getting diagnosed, and you were seeing special needs kids and classes. But I do feel like maybe there was a lack of diagnosis, or it didn't seem as much right as it is now. Or maybe it's my perceptive perspective. Now, right now. Now I see it differently. And maybe I am noticing things more, right. So it could be either or it can't. But yes, I did. Yeah, I did have experience, but I never comprehended it, right. Because I mean, even just for becoming a parent, you think you're ready, but you're never going to be ready until you're in it. Right? So it's just might as well go for it and see how you do. I mean, there's no preparation really, for it. And same with special needs parenting a special needs kids or teaching a special needs. Child, no matter how much you think you understand. I think every now and then you get that wake up call. And you're like, Okay, now I get that part. But now we're working on something else now. Right. And it's always that growth.

 

Chad Ratliffe  12:06

Yeah. So the special needs part of the journey started early on, right. So three years old. Yeah, it was hard for you to label but you were all in with whatever he needed, it was gonna

 

Gordana  12:21

do whatever they were telling me to do, you know, whatever the recommendations were, and I just was in denial, because that was my way of coping with it. And, you know, I think every parent thinks, oh, you know, maybe they misdiagnosed or oh, maybe it'll get better with age or then you have people telling you, which I dislike hearing now. He'll grow out of it. Right. But then you think to yourself, and those are the things that at that moment, that's the best you got. Right. So that's what you tell yourself to kind of keep moving.

 

Chad Ratliffe  12:53

Right, right. Right, right. Yeah. So did you jump into therapies and what did you do? What were the things that were recommended?

 

Gordana  13:03

ABA therapy was recommended for him. speech was recommended for him. He was verbal, but very, very short, like word words, usage. I expected to kind of receive help after the diagnosis, right. And then, like I said, I quickly realized that it's going to be on my own, that I'm going to have to figure out what's best for him what I need to do. The waitlist for funding here was, I think, two to three years at that time. Wow. So everything was done on her own. And looking back on it now, I feel lucky, because I have had exposure in education to kind of know what to do. And I don't think all the parents have that. Right. So we were lucky in that sense that I could access certain things that I could access therapies, even without the funding and know how to go about advocating for him. And the first thing I did for him, I hired someone to come to our house and teach me the picture, exchange communication system. So I learned how to take data and how to teach him to communicate, because I knew that if I don't do it, no therapist can do it for a couple of hours. And then you know, he comes home and does nothing. So we went in with that. And we did a lot of speech in the beginning. When he was about to start school, we put him in the public school system, we registered him and we had what they call an intake meeting where they kind of discussed needs and strikes and to kind of figure out a plan to how to support him. And after that meeting, I walked out feeling like he will not be supported. He was still diapered going into JK, you know, he was a flight risk and he was having hitting behaviors and he was not communicating still and All the plethora of stuff that you know you had to deal with, we decided to put him in an in an ABA based autism School, where he still is part time. And they've really helped him move him along and help them build skills to get him to a point where he can now be in a public school still have a educational assistant as a support one to one, right. But you know, have a good time at school be happy and function and learn because that's really what we're looking for in our holistic life. Like we're happy, we're learning and we're growing and whatever way that is for us. It's different for everybody else, right?

 

Chad Ratliffe  15:39

Yeah. How about the journey for you, as a mom and a human being? That what's the emotional journey for you?

 

Gordana  15:50

A lot of grief in the beginning, you kind of go through that cycle as if you've, you've lost someone, I felt that for a long time that I had lost myself too, because I no longer was a person that I was before having someone that I needed to take care of, to this extent, right and to worry about. And, you know, there's that, then you have, then you think when you're in that period, and the grief, you think like, well, what's gonna happen when I'm not there, and so on. Right? As I was working on supporting him, I was angry, because I saw lack of funding and resources and supports everywhere. And I would say I would want to put him in camp, something so simple, right, we would have very few choices that he would actually manage to go to. And it would cost 10 times the amount that regular cam costs, right. So it seems quite impossible to do for one child, let alone, you know, multiple children that you know, might have different needs. And I was very, very angry for a long time. As he was growing, I think I just, it took me a while. And I kind of grew out of all of those feelings and accepted that, you know, he's a whole person and that he brings me joy, and that I bring Him joy. I think to myself, like I don't want to use the words destiny. I don't like using that word, but he is the type of child and the type of person that I needed to live my life. And I was, you know, chosen to be his mother so we can live our life. It kind of dissipated. But it took a long time. It took a lot of work.

 

Chad Ratliffe  17:43

That was beautiful. Thank you,

 

Gordana  17:45

thank you. It took me a while. And I kind of grew out of all of those feelings and accepted that, you know, he's a whole person and that he brings me joy, and that I bring Him joy. I think to myself, like I don't want to use the words destiny. I don't like using that word, but he is the type of child and the type of person that I needed to live my life. And I was, you know, chosen to be his mother so we can live our life. It kind of dissipated. But it took a long time. It took a lot of work.

 

Chad Ratliffe  18:24

That was beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. It's like, it's just the one thing that it is, it's an emotional journey, whether it's depression and anger, or joy and celebration, of achievements, and and then we're all in this together. And this is our family. Is there a father in his life? I guess

 

Gordana  18:53

we we are separated, but we co parent, and we chosen to live very close together, we support Christian in all the ways that we can together. So we're very much a family unit in support for Christian. That truly helps. That's one of my biggest supports that I can rely on another person that Christian is going to be comfortable with and can go to because as we all very well know, special needs kids can't be babysat, or you know, to be supported by anyone. Right?

 

Chad Ratliffe  19:25

Yes. Yeah. Did the special needs take a toll on your marriage?

 

Gordana  19:31

Yeah, it did let you having a child is already hard enough as it is right but having a special needs child is already going to stress whatever's already stressed. And that's it's just going to, you know, maybe make or break something that would have broken anyway but maybe a little faster because it's such a stressor. So I do think that that contributed to it. But you know, that wasn't the only reason obviously right? And we both worked on a different timeline with accepting and helping support. And we had to work through our own emotions to accept and support all the needs that Christian had. Right. And we we just had to do it our very own in our very own ways for it to work. Yeah.

 

Chad Ratliffe  20:20

Well, I'm on that journey with you. And you know, it was so heavy on my kids, mom that, you know, she's still on meth. I mean, she just can't, she can't come off the drugs, because it's too painful to look at what's happening. And I can understand, I can understand, I mean, I don't agree with it or like it, but I can understand it's very challenging to face. I have found that as I face some of these challenges, I grow internally, in great ways to sort of undescribable ways life takes on new meaning. So have you found life like how you I see life has changed, or,

 

Gordana  21:00

Yes, I found that I always was attracted to mindfulness and meditation and yoga, and just the more Eastern philosophies on life and looking at life in in a different way. But I looking back on it, now I say to myself, there was much to learn, and that's why it had to be that way. And now, I don't worry about the small things. And I'm very, very grateful for life, even beyond life, as was, you know, we don't know what happens. We don't know what the future holds. So gratitude is quite a good medicine. And yes, it expands you beyond what you thought you were capable of as a human being, to do to handle to feel and to give, yes.

 

Chad Ratliffe  21:45

What are some things that your son likes to do? Well,

 

Gordana  21:52

Christian is a huge lover of all machines. I say, you know, we're gonna have a future lawn mowing business, potentially, you know, he's only nine and a half. But we could probably do it next year, as we're experts, that kind of stuff. Building vacuums, car washes, you know, if you see a car wash that's run by neurodivergent kids, it's probably ours. In the future, right. I'm drawing and just very, very active things like that. So he's a very sensory seeking little guy. And very, very busy. We've put him in parkour now. So he's trying that out. He's finding it hard. What is that, but he's Parkour is, is, if you see like stunts of usually, you know, like, younger guys jumping off of things. That's what that is. So yeah, so we're we put him in that to kind of get him active. But he just because he just loves that stuff. Anyway, he's finding it hard, because you got to persist, that it's not easy. But we're trying to kind of expand on all the things that he likes that are movement and sound, and you know, art so that we can incorporate and enrich his life as well. And he can try and build new skills and new interest, right?

 

Chad Ratliffe  23:08

How does he do with other people,

 

Gordana  23:09

there's people he loves people's acts, he's very friendly. He's into a phase now over the last year and a half, where he thinks he's a very funny guy. And he's got his own jokes that not everybody is going to get right. So he tries to tell his jokes, you know, on the elevator or out in public, and, you know, sometimes it works. And sometimes it doesn't. But for example, we cannot, I can't leave him at home, even with my parents. He's got a lot of separation anxiety, he goes to an ABA, new learning heights, that's what it's called a place where he loves it there. He's been going there for years. I can take him there and leave him there. But he's got a thing with staying at home with one without one of the parents. And he does not do well. So that's the challenging part where we're very limited in in, like, who can watch him and what can we do when we're around? Also, if he's had enough of someone over, you know, taking away my time from him, he will tell them by you know, he'll be very honest and open and very direct. Yeah, that it's their time to go home now. So yeah, so those are some of the challenges that you know, as I'm sure as a special needs parents, parent, you see, not everybody's going to get or you know, not maybe be pleased about it, but that's the way it is for us, and we're okay with that. Right.

 

Chad Ratliffe  24:37

Can you tell us when you became inspired to reach out to other parents and start working with other people to help them through this journey where that started and where are you with that today?

 

Gordana  24:52

Well, this was probably about three or four years ago, I had met a parent who was also a special needs parent who had stopped started the center where ABA was run in speech. And the reason she started it was because there was just a lack of resources and, you know, accessibility of activities for her daughter. And she was my go to person to cry to ask questions, you know, anything and everything she was my go to, after she would tell me things and I would kind of absorb, I could go, okay, I can do that for someone else, you know, someone gave this to me. And I feel amazing that she shared with me, you know, her emotions and experiences and things that have helped her that deeply helped me because I couldn't really talk to other parents that would get it. Other friends that you know, didn't have a special needs child. So that it really inspired me her helped inspire me to just help parents who were just going through the diagnosis, for example, because I could see I could see it in their face, I could see it in their eyes, you know, the pain that you experience, and that the hope and then the, when you suffer, and sometimes you suffer in silence, because you don't want to share it. And I started doing that informally just talking to whoever I could, and you know, sending long emails, here's all we did, and it's like, 10 pages of stuff, overwhelming people, right? And then I thought, you know, why not in the age of social media? Why not start an Instagram page where we can talk about a healthy life, and how it works with autism, because that's very possible to have. And to imagine, a healthy lifestyle, happiness, right? Wholeness for you, and your family and your kids, that incorporates special needs kids or kids who might be different from what you expected, right? And I just started loading that page slowly with, Hey, this is what we did when we were diagnosed. And hey, this is where we're going. Because this is what helps us with this. And hey, how do you feel about haircuts? Because you know, we don't love them. And I know everyone is going to connect to that if they have, you know, a similar situation. And hopefully, it helps. And I just said to myself, hey, if one person reads this, and it helps them, that's enough for me, right? Yeah. Because that person can help someone else and someone else and it doesn't really have to do anything more than that for us.

 

Chad Ratliffe  27:29

Yes. That's awesome. So what's the Instagram page, we go to the to find you.

 

Gordana  27:36

It's called life, underscore, health, underscore and underscore autism.

 

Chad Ratliffe  27:41

All right, awesome. And if you just before I forget, after this show, if you can send me any of the links on where we can find you, so we can put it in the show notes. That'd be awesome. Yeah, that's how this podcast started. I mean, it's, if it could help one other person, life hit me so hard. And when I found out that I made it through, when I was still, when I realized I was still here. If I could help one other person, you know, that was the hardest place I'd ever been to in my life. It was beyond anything I thought I could handle I don't know what that but it was somewhere back there. faced and if I can help somebody at that point, kind of pull them through the vortex or whatever that moment is, then it would be worth it. So I feel like we're inspired by a similar thing that comes from within. So I appreciate that you're doing that. What's next on your list for you what's next on your that you want to add for your well being so that you can feel more whole?

 

Gordana  28:48

Okay, I was just gonna say I'm, I'm good right now where I am. We started with the Instagram page, I'm doing some podcasts, just being a guest. I'm reaching out to just different places that offer activities and you know, giving them ideas. I'm hoping that we Christian and I get into sensitivity training of different businesses, where if we can provide workshops, and train employees at a restaurant, indoor playground, anywhere where those employees or people who run it can can kind of realize and know hey, you know, this is actually a really good idea for a business to have to cater to a variety of client needs. And you have more kids coming you have happier clientele, no matter what you are right offering, but also all the kids then have more places to go as well and they don't feel as isolated. I think that would be our next step that we wouldn't aspire to achieve together. But for now, we just want to share as much as we can and help as as many people as we can Just through sharing resources,

 

Chad Ratliffe  30:01

that's awesome. I think living their life. Yep. I think that's a great idea. I felt it, I felt it in here. Guys, you're gonna be successful. I want to thank you for sharing your journey with us. I want to thank you for touching my heart today, you really did. Okay, by sharing your journey, and kind of in closing, what, to that parent that doesn't feel whole, the parent that feels broken, and doesn't know if a place where you are today exists for them? What do you say to them?

 

Gordana  30:35

We're all broken in a way, right? Everybody has something in their life, that might feel like it's preventing them from living a full life. But if we all look at ourselves and our lives as whole as they are, no matter how painful moments are right, or how much we're suffering in that moment, it is whole. And I think the best way through it is acceptance, no matter how bad it hurts, right? Because once you accept it, it lets go, it just lets go of you and you suffer less than less. And then you start to see the light, you start to see the beauty. And that big thing that you thought was, you know, the broken thing inside, you might even become something that's an advantage. You know, or something that is a good thing in your life that brings you other good things, right.

 

Chad Ratliffe  31:31

I think that's beautiful. That was probably the right way to close, because that was beautiful. But I just want to share there's this guy, his name is Michael singer, who I've been studying recently he wrote the Untethered Soul. And he Oh, yes. And he talks about letting go of some of these things. And he says, hit the student, his students will say, well, I need a technique I need, what's the technique and he goes, you just let go of it. And they're like, waiting for this, you know, you have to be down in this funny posture. And, you know, have the incense blowing in a no, if you want to you just let go of it and let it let it go and just accept it. Yeah.

 

Gordana  32:15

And sometimes that Letting go means sitting in your pain, realizing Yes, this is my pain, this is my suffering and sitting in it. And I think most of our suffering comes from pushing it away and not wanting to experience it. Right. That's that resistance causes more issues. So letting go is actually you know, almost taking it in and accepting it, which is kind of the opposite of what you think is going to happen. Because that lets it go.

 

Chad Ratliffe  32:45

That's beautiful. Well, I, you inspired me today. So thank you for that. I'd love to stay connected, and find out how you and Christian take on the world and help us grow and learn and realize that we're whole. So thank you. And I just want to wish you guys the great rest of your day. And thank you for taking us with us. Thanks so much. Bye, bye.

 

chad ratliffe  33:14

This concludes our show for today. And I'd like to personally thank you for spending the time with us on a topic near and dear to our hearts. If you'd like to be part of the naked parent nation, and help us reach those parents that are struggling and overwhelmed, there's no better way to help them by subscribing rating and reviewing the show on iTunes. iTunes highlights the shows based on these metrics. And the more the show gets highlighted, the more opportunities people will have to be introduced to the show where they can hear that message of hope, or that tip that can change everything. So follow the link in our show notes. And we hope to have you back here tomorrow where we'll do it again. From the team here at the naked parent podcast we wish you the life you've always dreamed of and then some so long