by Jessie Cooper | Nov 3, 2021
After writing to you about my career and company, last week I detoured into my wishes for my nieces’ futures. I wrote of some of my own personal hardships as a woman in business as well as as a woman leaving domestic abuse. This week I’d like to speak to you about my perspective as a woman who is unwilling to bend, and the cost and benefits.
Women in Society
Over the past year, as I have stood my sacred ground, I have witnessed both the external and internal costs of taking a stand. Externally I have navigated (and continue to navigate) cultural stereotypes. Internally I have fought and am fighting to keep the voices at bay that tell me I am being too loud; that I must become small. I’m walking through fire and slowly learning that I am in fact fireproof.
As women, we are taught from a young age to make ourselves small and to make other people comfortable. That it is somehow our gender’s job to make men comfy. And not only should we make men comfortable but we should excuse ourselves at any point in which a person around us is hurt or offended by anything we say or do.
By societal standards the perfect woman is polite, accommodating, nurturing, and apologetic. She is beautiful, slight in her waist, and ready to smile through the adversities of life. I realize in writing this you may have a gut reaction of, “I don’t expect this of other women, or myself,” but if you ask yourself, “has society taught me this or shown me this,” I assure you the answer is yes. While we do not wear the corset of the 1800’s I guarantee you each woman reading this article has tried a diet at some point in her life. We are still wearing the expectations of our gender on a large scale even if your experience isn’t as dramatic as mine.
Internal & External Perfectionism
In the book, “Brave, Not Perfect,” the author writes about the concept of perfectionism as it affects women. On a much deeper level, she recants how from infancy through college (and even well into marriage) women are taught to be perfect and polite. Soft and docile. Desirable. In her work, she writes about overcoming the need to meet society’s standards and to be brave enough to be herself. It sounds like a small thing but as a woman, I assure you it is not. As soon as you slip off “soft and docile” the crowd in the stand wakes up. I have yet to meet a woman who is boldly herself that has not pushed away these crowds and at times even gone to battle with them. What does this battle entail?
In my experience, the battle is first and always presented internally. You know you have something to say, you know injustice is happening, and you know your soul is trying to break free. Your internal self scans the external world. Unskilled in any first attempt, when a woman boldly speaks her mind, she is almost always met with judgment. Sometimes she is met with hate. The judgment could be from an external person scolding or bullying the woman for being bold or from her own internal interpretation of how the world perceives her.
In both instances, the woman will question her own mind, her own soul, and her own desires. Was standing up, speaking out, and being herself worth the cost? The cost of losing a perceived community, relationship, place to fit in, or being ‘liked?’ In extreme cases, like domestic violence or any type of restriction of safety/liberty, the woman is hurt for speaking up.
Speaking up, unwilling to bend on who she is, the woman will learn quickly who in the world is not ready for her and who accepts her as the being she always was. The thing here is that the woman, unwilling to bend, has to accept herself as she always was. She must learn to ignore the explosions from the outside, call internal questioning a liar, and stand her sacred ground. As the wounds from the outside accumulate the woman must tend to the wounds with care and not accept the wounds as a reflection of her worth. They are battle scars from the fights.
Looking to the Future
As I wrote about my nieces I wrote with hope for a future in which no corsets (physical or mental) exist in the world. Where they are free to boldly be themselves. This goes for my three sons too. To set a future for our children when little boys and little girls are able to be who they are and one where we as parents don’t bend. We cannot accept the status quo or any type of gender stereotyping that restricts the freedom of another person. This freedom can be tiny, such as domestic division of labor, or large, such as equal representation in the legal system. We have a long way to go. But if more of us are willing to stand our ground and realize that by speaking our desires and advocating for our equality there will eventually be more people in the ring fighting for justice than the stands.
I’ve been down here a solid year, fighting for equal representation in domestic law, I’m not tired yet. I am my children’s mama, my niece’s aunt, and I am a woman unwilling to bend.
Xoxo,
Jessie
by Jessie Cooper | Oct 27, 2021
Over the past two weeks, I’ve written a little to you about my business Instructional ABA Consultants and my early career as a BCBA. This week I celebrated my twin nieces Grace and Emma’s third birthday. That’s them in the photo for this blog. They are related, I promise. As I held my now not-so-baby nieces on my lap I also held my desire for the world I want them to live in. This one’s for the girls.
Being There & Not Being There
In the fall of 2018, my sister was 32 weeks pregnant with the girls and I was around four months pregnant with Declan. My sister shared her birth plan with me as she got closer to the delivery. A piece of that plan was not wanting family there until after the girls were born.
On a Friday morning, Kristen’s plan changed when she found out she had preeclampsia and HELLP syndrome meaning the girls had to be delivered immediately. At the time I was overcome with fear for my sister and what to do with Henry. My ex-husband was less than kind when I spent time with family or when I was not the one caring for our son. I called my dear friend and babysitter in tears. She immediately jumped in to help with Henry. I called my sister, let her know that I was on my way to Ohio, and left.
This is a day of joy and despair that I will always remember. My sister and baby nieces were in crisis, I was pregnant, and felt fear for my family. Isolation is a common tactic of domestic violence and my ex-husband used this birth just the same. Nothing was below him. As I drove to Ohio I was ordered to turn the car around and when my nieces were born I was told I didn’t love my own son if I didn’t come home. I cried in relief of their birth, for my sister’s wellbeing, and for the cruelty of my ex-husband. I stood my ground, of course, and stayed with my sister and the girls.
My Sister’s Beautiful Little Girls
I remember their tiny little fingers and toes as my brother-in-law took me to the NICU. Emma’s soft, fuzzy blonde hair and Grace’s dark brown are still clear in my memory. I kept thinking for 32 weeks these babies have so much hair! Linked up to tubes and swaddled into boxes, my baby nieces were safe and still developing as though they were in the womb.
I will never forget braiding my sister’s hair and wheeling her to see her daughters. To see her reach into each incubator and brush their hands, “I’m mommy, I’m mommy.” Healing from her emergency c-section my sister poured love into those baby girls (their papa too) as they welcomed their daughters into the world. Me? I was an aunt. The very thing I wanted, even before I wanted to be a mommy of my own.
Leaving Domestic Violence Behind
Over the last three years so much has happened and changed. My baby nieces came home from the NICU after four weeks and just in time for Thanksgiving. Wonderful, beautiful Declan was born. Dametrius became my son. And I left domestic violence.
I have spent an incredible amount of time in shock over how I have been treated simply because I am a woman over the past year. Raised in a household where gender did not define our worth, I have been overcome with disbelief time and time again as I have been met with discrimination. Discrimination that I, until I faced, did not know still occurred in this day and age let alone in my own family.
When I came out to my father’s family about my experience with domestic violence last fall, his family’s radical views on women came out of the woodwork. A cousin I held dearly turned on me within a day of me standing up to my ex-husband reciting the 10 Commandments to my dad. An uncle told my dad, his own brother, that if I submitted to my alpha husband God would restore my marriage. Another uncle sent me a weekend retreat I could attend to learn my place in my marriage. Another cousin even went as far as to state, “he didn’t hit her, it’s not abuse, what’s next she’s going to say he raped her? Husbands cannot rape their wives.”
I did not and do not have words for the belief system that was exposed. As I let go of a family I thought I had, but never really did, I wailed to the skies, “What?! I am losing my family because I am a woman with a voice? Because I refuse to be abused?” I cannot tell you the pain and relief that came due to the separation from this side of my family. As I chose to set the boundary of, “I will not be in relationship with those who support my abuser or use religion to oppress women,” I set a precedent for my nieces. I cannot imagine a world, Goddess forbid, that Grace or Emma find themselves being mistreated and told how to act, or else, because they are women.
Overcoming Discrimination
Over the course of the last year not only have I been discriminated against by my family but questioned time and time again in the court system. To this day my legal team is fighting against that stereotype that because I am a successful business owner I must be a bitch. For a year now, when I have brought forth true concerns of safety for myself and my sons we have to fight this narrative. Time and time again I have been told I cannot fly my feminist flag in court.
What if it’s not a feminist flag? What if I am a human being who is just asking to be considered equally within the court system? What if I am not trying to control but instead a frightened, concerned mother? What if I am not a bitch but instead an excellent, caring leader? And what if I am just a person being brave and trying to call for justice, as well as create hope, through my talents in business?
I do not want this for myself yet more than that I do not want to ever see my nieces treated as less because they are women. I want a world in which when my nieces speak, they are heard and believed. A world where when they wish, dream, desire, lust, and wonder they are free to pursue what lights the fires in their souls. A world where when injustice comes it’s met with justice, not discrimination. I never want my nieces to even consider being a woman a limitation. It is not. We have a long way to go in building a world where the world does not default to limiting them. Unfortunately, it took a divorce for me to see exactly what is still happening in our world.
Grace & Emma, be thirsty my loves. Be brave. Be fearless. Your Aunt Jessie? I’m trying, my darlings, to create a small but carefully laid path of hope and justice in our family and world so you may walk a little easier than me.
Xoxo,
“Aunt” Jessie
by IABA Team | Oct 19, 2021
One of the challenges of modern life is the lure of having it all. We believe that if we can just manage our time, our child with autism can have the best experiences at school, at ABA therapy, with friends, and at home with family. When we’re spread too thin, though, we don’t benefit fully from anything. But when we learn to prioritize according to our values, we may not feel regret about making difficult choices and doing less.
Letting our values guide our choices is an unfamiliar concept for most of us — and it requires a little self-exploration to determine our priorities. But the rewards can be huge.
How COVID-19 Affected Priorities
Despite COVID’s continued impact, families are beginning to have more options for kids with autism. In-person school might be slotted in next to ABA therapy, and the combination can radically alter evening routines as everyone in the family also needs to take time to prepare to do it all again the following day. Here, families may struggle to decide which treatments to pursue for their child.
A family may see major benefits with ABA therapy but also recognize that COVID-related disruptions were very hard. Many parents think their child will benefit from going back to school, yet they don’t want to lose ABA therapy and they also want to have family time.
In a situation like this would a family benefit from having some of everything? Or would fewer activities that allow for richer experiences be better? In a lot of cases, efforts are not necessarily concentrated enough to have positive outcomes in any of the choices.
A tough decision is easier when a family can figure out what they really value. Evaluating what parts of in-school therapy, clinical therapy, and at-home therapy can help families decide what is most important for their child.
Developing Priorities for Children with ASD
As with everything else in life, values are not necessarily constant. This means we can adjust behaviors and choices to align with shifting values.
Determining our values can help steer us toward more fulfilling outcomes, even on a day-to-day basis. If your child is working toward learning to tie their shoes independently, for instance, repetition will help them achieve this more quickly. The downside to a lot of repetition is that you aren’t able to get other values-related tasks done. Putting the things you value most at the front of your list can help tackle important issues first.
The beauty of a values-based approach to lifestyle choices is that each parent’s values are personal and specific to them. There’s no comparison or measurement of personal values, so no guilt should be involved.
For example; if a parent can better approach each day when there’s no lingering laundry to fold, they’re not prioritizing laundry over children. But they are placing value on having an uncluttered mind so they can be more present in the moments that really matter.
ABA Therapy from IABA Consultants
If you have questions regarding autism treatment, education, or plans using ABA therapy, we are here for you! Our goal is to make sure no family is turned away due to financial constraints. Our therapy team would love to talk to you. Find the location closest to you and give us a call. We’re here for you.
Originally Posted as Values Can Help Clarify Choices With a Child With Autism, Chicago Parent, September 17, 2021
by Jessie Cooper | Sep 30, 2021
Over the last few weeks, I’ve written to you from a more personal place than usual. My intention in writing these pieces of my story is to share my humanity with you. As human beings, we all go through trials and tribulations. We all have hardships. And we all fall down but rise to stand tall another day. The last twenty or so months have been challenging as a society and the world has certainly not been hardship-free, even before COVID entered our worlds.
Mitigating Damage from Outside Noise
This week I’d like to write about the noise of the world, including the noise that has surrounded me, and how to differentiate noise from the truth. When I say the noise of the world I’m referring to Brene Brown and her reference to the warrior’s ring featuring Theodore Roosevelt’s speech.
Remember that Brene teaches us that the noise from the stands (the outside world) says nothing about our worth and that worth is inside each warrior dusting the blood from their knees to fight another day. In my observations over these past 20 months, and speaking honestly since our last administration took office, the noise from the stands seems to have increased in volume. At times the roar of the crowd can be deafening.
As someone living with PTSD, noise in and of itself can be challenging for me. When that noise is coming from others, it may not hurt my ears but can hurt my heart. Do you all remember this little ditty as a child; “Stick and stones may break your bones but words will never hurt me”? Yeah, me too. It’s a bullshit ditty if that’s a thing.
What the ditty should go like is “sticks and stones may break your bones but words can break your heart.” We as humans are not immune from the painful words of others and those words can make us question our own worth. It’s painful to realize that when others say unkind words (and worse) that there is a subset of people who choose to behave this way intentionally. These are the people making noise in the stands.
The Worst Part of the Crowd
The intentionally hurtful people in the stands seem to believe that by pointing out the imperfections of others that they are somehow pointing out their own perfection. That is to say that if they can be loud enough about how their belief system, sexual identity, race, gender, and the like is perfect that maybe, just maybe, it means their own, differing lifestyle is better than yours.
This may have made sense tens of thousands of years ago; classifying each other by how they looked and behaved. This allowed our ancient ancestors to know who was in their tribe and who was an actual threat. Yet as language and thought developed, currency also developed, and all of a sudden these cheap shot demographics became a sorting of worth. You need not look further than slavery and the treatment of women or look into the holocaust as societal examples for the danger of this type of behavior.
At a societal level, in a power-over dynamic, fear is necessary to keep the power in place. Teaching people to fear other people is very simple to do: just sprinkle in judgment, divide a few resources you say are scarce, add a God of your choosing, and tada! you have power. This is also bullshit, yet remains very real for a lot of people today.
Power & Control
Personally, I’ve always hated power-over dynamics used for power and control. Using resources to restrict others fires up my soul up like nothing else. Using both covert and overt differences as the fuel to feed this power is the match before the gasoline that starts the fire. For those of us who refuse to use a power-over approach and believe in our bones that humanity is equal, deserving a life with choice, a life with resources to live day-to-day encounters can be maddening.
Also, personally, even as a woman I have never felt this attempted power-over as closely as I have this past year. I have been told hideous things from my father’s family regarding women and their “God.” I have heard messaging from almost every person in the legal system to not fly my “feminist flag,” in our country courthouse. I have even faced the local football team head-on about racism in regards to my son.
The words I have heard from others in the stands this past year have been ugly, to put it mildly. It took me almost a full year to realize the noise from the stands was not real but my worth is. I have stood in the ring, dusting blood from my knees, and forcing myself to face the hate but not using it to fight. Hate begets hate.
Stop Listening to the Noise
Here in the US, we’ve been struggling for over a year, but it’s been a lifetime for so many others. My son surely did not have his first encounter with racism on his freshman football team. I’ve been questioned as a woman countless times even before this past year began. And people in “power,” have been using others for personal gain at any cost (including human lives) for centuries. Yet outside of this power-over dynamic is a power within with a different dynamic. A power that demands that all humanity is treated equally and deserving of respect. A power that tells us that no matter how loud hate is, love can overcome it.
So which will you choose? Will you choose to continue to section off pieces of humanity based on what they believe, how they look, or if you feel you can gain control over them? I certainly hope not. I also certainly hope that if you are choosing not to use power-over, you are using power with and standing up for your worth, as well as the worth of others.
We are brothers and sisters. We are more alike than we are different. If you ever find yourself in the stands, adding your anger to that of the crowd, know that you can stop, walk to the ring, and help your sister stand.
Xoxo,
Jessie
by Jessie Cooper | Sep 8, 2021
Last week I wrote to you about how gratitude can be a life raft in the middle of adversity. Specifically, I wrote to you about the stressors of the COVID-19 pandemic knowing so many of us are exhausted. I hope that shifting to a mindset of gratitude was able to help you find a little joy last week as our nation’s COVID-19 cases continue to rise. I know firsthand, outside of the pandemic, how hard it is to find gratitude during pain. I also know firsthand that it is life-saving. I’d like to tell you more.
Fear or Love?
Around seven years ago I was new to running a business and had been single for a bit. During that time I was settling into my path. This was the beginning of building a spiritual mindset that still carries me today. Gabrielle Bernstein is a spiritual leader I followed who taught (and still teaches) about enlightenment. In her work, Gabrielle guides her readers through their egos back into their spirits. She encourages others to drop fear and embrace radical self-love. It is a hard and worthwhile journey I promise you.
Back to me. At the time, I was light, joyful, and a little naive, if you will. I did give myself a piece of advice that was worth remembering; “Jessie, my love, there is fear and there is love. Both are hungry wolves within your soul-chose wisely which wolf you feed.” Even today, with much more at stake, I often center with this teaching and remember to lean into love, even when fear seeps in.
The Wolves of Fear
I would like to tell you that as I aged into my 30s I became wiser and kinder, that I was a cocoon that turned into a butterfly on my way to full enlightenment. I was not. I was breaking from the inside out. You see, in believing that love conquers all, I got married very quickly after my stint as a single woman. Within one week of becoming a married woman, my ex-husband changed his behavior towards me.
Five years later, in the office of a trauma counselor, I realized that I had experienced domestic abuse. 5 years of domestic abuse. It was only through the work of an amazing trauma team that I was able to quiet the fear, to rest the wolf. Yet, as I progressed through treatment, it was as though new wolves were growling to be fed.
To begin, I had just moved back home to Ohio. I had grown up incredibly close to my father’s family. I knew my family and I approached the world differently but I still loved them despite our differing beliefs. What I was unprepared for was what came when I opened up to my family about my experience of domestic abuse and what would come next.
Feeding the Wolves
Within two weeks of opening up to my family about my experience with domestic abuse, my father’s family decided to side with my abuser because I was not submitting to my husband. I was told by a cousin I loved dearly that because I wasn’t being physically beaten that I was making it up. When my wonderful, kind, and bright father stood up for me, one of my uncles explained that an exorcism might be helpful (seriously). Another uncle, my favorite, sent me information on a retreat I could attend to learn my role as a wife so that God would restore my marriage (seriously).
In leaning into my family I was exposed to a radical belief system that men are the head of the household and strong women need only to submit to make any abuse stop. To this day my ex-husband spends time with my father’s family and to this day my young sons are exposed to them on a regular basis. I just tell my little lions, “boys and girls are the same,” to hopefully plant the seed of equality amongst a field of bigotry.
You may wonder why I haven’t shared this before or why I am sharing it with you now. I’ll tell you. I didn’t share this earlier because I was afraid of the court system. I thought if I spoke out it would be used against me. I guess it still might. I’m just not feeding the wolf of fear today. I am sharing it with you now because I want to let you know that I’m not just talking, I’m action. You see, leaving domestic abuse and going through a divorce combined with the exposure of and loss of a portion of my family is a pain I never saw myself dealing with.
Finding Love
Yet here I am on a Monday morning, snuggled with my dogs, happily planning a quiet day on my farm. How? I remembered my own wisdom and, through the healing I embraced last winter, I also embraced gratitude. My experience with domestic abuse and divorce is just that, an experience. I got out and found that the most incredible family and friends were standing alongside me. They reminded me every day I was worthy and reflected love to me unconditionally until I was able to slowly feed my own wolf of love.
I’ve changed my own language from what I’ve lost to what I’ve gained. I haven’t lost a marriage, I’ve gained freedom. I haven’t lost a family, I found my true family. I haven’t lost myself, I’ve found her.
In shifting to a daily practice of gratitude I am not able to stop pain from happening and I am not totally free of fear. Remember the crowds in the stands? They can be hateful and loud. It hurts even more when a portion of the crowd shares your DNA. At least for me, it did. But outside of that noise is peace and knowledge that every human life matters, including mine. I am able to wipe the dust off my knees from whatever battle is ahead and bow in gratitude to the people standing beside me.
I do not know what pain outside of the COVID-19 pandemic you might be facing. But this I know to be true: love is stronger than fear. Dig deep into your soul and coax that darling wolf of love out. If you can’t feed her yet let others help, then say thank you.
The world will always bring adversity but your heart will always offer you love.
In gratitude to my family, friends, and employees for reminding me of who I am.
Xoxo,
Jessie
If you are experiencing domestic violence or abuse speak up, reach out, get out.
