Wide Smiles Cleft Symposium Photo Album
August 8 - 10, 1997
Sacramento, California
More friendly faces
Paul, the first cleft-talk baby!! He is just a sweetie ~ just like his mommy Beth :-)
Cleft-talk and Joanne Green
are very special to me and my family. I
found Joanne about 2-3 weeks before I gave birth to my son, Paul. I
found out via ultrasound that Paul would have a cleft and had been
gathering info, mostly through snail mail, when I decided to join the
information highway and get on the internet. I remeber reading all the
info on the Widesmiles webpage (it was much smaller then-thanks Andrea
for all your hard work), but the message of love and strength I felt
from the website were what I needed. I needed someone to tell me my
baby was going to be ok. I needed someone to tell me *I* was going to
be ok, that I could do this. I could be this babies Mommy and that he
would grow up to be anything he wanted.
I was scared, but Joanne helped. I remember sitting in the computer lab
at Rob's school and tears were streaming down my face as I read the note
from Joanne Green that reads, "Your baby needs the same thing from you
that every other baby needs. He needs you to hold him and cuddle him and
sing to him and kiss his soft skin. He needs to bond to you and you to
him, because he doesn't know that his cleft makes him 'different'. He
only knows that that warm body lying next to him is Mommy and he needs
you and your love more than he needs anything else in this world."
This is so true. I knew at that moment that I would be ok and that the
baby kicking inside me would be ok too. I joined cleft-talk a few days
later and was thrilled to meet a whole new set of friends. Many of my
"friends" have moved on since I joined in February of 96, but I have
made many more, and more join our "family" every day. Thank you Joanne
for all you do, and thank you my cleft-talk friends for being a part of
my life.
Paul is 22 months old now and is the most beautiful boy in the world.
Beth
Zac and Tiera enjoy a meal together.
Michelle and Derek
Teri shows us her wide smile! :-)
Mona, Jesse, Teri, Jessica and Tracey
