It feels like it was yesterday that I was leaving the hospital with my sweet bundle of joy! Being my first born son, I had no idea what I was doing! Thankfully things like breast feeding, late night rocking sessions and well, mommy hood naturally kicked in.
As Noah started to get older I noticed he had a hard time focusing and talking. Instead of being in denial about him being behind, I decided to be proactive to teach him in other ways. I started to teach myself baby sign language and right before my eyes this once frustrated little boy was communicating with me wearing a smile. You can watch this video when he was almost two years old. For being a two year old, he had a lot of life changing moments that occurred often. Like daddy going on deployments every other month. I always tried to be compassionate about how hard that must be to process at such a young age. He received a dog before every deployment. Yeah- I really mean a lot of life changing moments…
To this day, I am so impressed with how far he has come. We did a year of speech therapy and a year of occupational therapy from the age of 25 months up until his 3rd birthday. His therapist always told me after the sessions "He just needs to work on FOCUSING more. If he could just FOCUS, he would do so much better."
How do you teach a child to focus??? You change their diet.
A typical breakfast for Noah is always something from scratch. In fact, everything he eats is homemade and doesn't come from a box. It doesn't contain any dyes, artificial ingredients and we limit his gluten. It's amazing what food can do. These were homemade sweet potato pancakes he requested on his 3rd birthday topped with fresh organic strawberries and local Okinawa raw honey. I wasn't always like this. I lived in a world of convenience which is why I have this before and after story myself, that's another story though..
Although his hyper behavior toned down quite a bit with diet alone, the ONE moment I was always nervous about was sending him off to Kindergarten. I was not going to be there to protect him or sign out words when he felt stuck. And that's when the color chart started….
Everyone starts the day off on GREEN which means, ready to start! Perfect- the only problem is Noah quickly dropped DOWN in colors rather than UP. He wasn't paying attention, talking too much in class and not doing his homework unless he had one-on-one time with his teacher. He was failing his spelling tests and crying at home for being in the purple time out zone. On a whim, I remembered that I bought him an herbal supplement before school started called "Focus Factor". It was just in case I felt he needed it. I was ready to try this bad boy out!
I found it on Amazon and it arrived so quick to our APO box living overseas. He took 2 wafers a day and within 7 days he was improving leaps and bounds. I literally could NOT believe it. AMEN a solution had been FOUND. At least that's what I thought..
I had to fly out in September for a total of 30 days. This was the longest I have EVER been away from my children and I will NEVER do it again. It was so hard but at the same time this was much needed alone time with my husband! He had just returned back from a 10 month deployment in Afghanistan and personal time with 2 young boys is almost non-existent. I hit the highest rank you can achieve right after he came home with a Health & Fitness company called Beachbody. Between interviews, photo shoots, helicopter tours and fine dining with fellow colleagues, my mind was at ease knowing my children were in good hands with Grandma Carr in Japan.
My husband returned back to our home a week before I did, while I flew to another conference in Dallas Texas. I LOVE teaching other people how to live an empowering life, how to live a healthy lifestyle and how to pay it forward. However, I love being present with my family more. More often than not, I was on Skype with them making those sweet faces giggle.
Little did I know that outside of our Skype sessions, Noah was dropping back into the lower colors. No one wants to stress mom out, right??!?! So wrong :P
Noah's behavior was so out of sorts when I returned back to the island. Crying over everything. Frustrated when I would breathe to loud or stuttering to get his point across. My two year old Jonah was still the same…. showing me how he can pick his nose.
I felt so helpless. On my 2nd day back he received a letter home from his teacher. It was so long. It explained how he went to the Principle's office that day and how this was completely NOT like Noah. He been been in the bad colors a week shortly after I left. I went home and had a heart-to-heart with Noah. I asked him what I should do if he didn't listen the next day and he replied "throw away one of my toys." Ouch! The poor little guy can be so hard on himself. I didn't want to do that, in fact- all I wanted to do was help him focus again. That day, I surprised him at school during lunch…...
He ran to me with the biggest hug. I asked him where he was on the class colored chart, he SMIRKED! He pointed to the purple color which is the 2nd to last before the principle's office. That meant he went into time out ALREADY! He told me he was not listening because his brain couldn't focus… I just didn't know how to process all of this and told him we would talk after school was over.
It hit me like a deer in headlights while talking with my husband (aka The vitamin dispenser) that NO ONE WAS GIVING HIM HIS FOCUS FACTOR, HE WAS OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
After school he got in the car and said "well, no movie for me and you are going to throw one of my toys away, right mom?" I looked at Adam with almost tears in my eyes and I said "Nope, tonight buddy we are having a PARTY! We are going to decorate for Christmas, bake cookies, watch a movie and work on your spelling words okay??" He looked so confused and said "Why mom? I was bad and didn't focus?" I felt so sad that he felt like not being able to focus meant he was bad. Of course it's not. I grew up never being able to focus in school. I failed almost every class I took unless I was passionate about the topic. Which was dance class and frowned upon in science or history. Although I never went to college, I know I will be a self made millionaire by the age of 27. I am almost there, it just took me finding something I am passionate about and that's coaching other people. I know until Noah gets through high school he will have similar struggles like I did. Do you know why? His passion is dancing too… which is why we have a "dance party Friday" ever since he found his rhythm.
How did I let that happen before leaving? I felt terrible and ordered it that very moment.
Noah is back to Noah. I am OFFICIALLY a firm believer. His focus is 100% there and he has been in the outstanding red color, ready to start or awesome… EVERY DAY SINCE! He is also now READING. YES, READING. I can't believe it. No actually, I can! Watch how stinking CUTE and SMART he is!
I chose focus factor simply because of the ingredients. I don't believe in medication and am a true hippie at heart. It is manufactured with all natural excipients, has no preservatives, no artificial coloring and no caffeine. It is also sweetened with natural cane sugar. If you know me personally, you know I won't recommend anything unless it personally effects me in a good way. This along with a serving of Shakeology has changed Noah's life!
I am sure you can buy this in health food stores but so far the Amazon store has not disappointed!
If your child is suffering with focusing, being overly hyper or just needing that extra boost during school, give this a shot! I hope it works for you, like it has for The Carr Family!
As a mom you just want your kids to be happy. As long as they are happy, I am happy. At first I had so much fear when I noticed how much Noah was just like me. I know I am far from normal and struggle every day just to think straight. Add that on top of living in a foreign country, being married to a Green Beret who is always gone, a mom of two busy boys, writing a book and running a team of over 3,000 people.. I have what my team calls "Squirrel syndrome". Been there, done that and have the necklace. (No really, I do and it has BLING on it! Thanks Annie!) <3
I would spend my life working on any "imperfections" they struggle with but I think they are perfect just the way God created them <3
I am a firm believer that instead of praying for things you want or things to change.. Just say a prayer and give thanks for what you've been given. I am so thankful I have been given the life I have. Yes, including my insane lack of focus and the endless healing possibilities we have with herbs and organic foods. I am thankful God gave me the courage to share mine & Noah's journey with his speech, behavior and motor skill development. I hope it helps another family out there like it helps us! Don't be afraid to reach out and ask someone for help!
