A ballerina's special Valentine
Mother starts fundraiser to send daughter to Russian training program
Simone Wulfhorst, left, 12, practices ballet under the watchful eye of instructor Mia Song Seshiki on Wednesday in Moscow. Parker was accepted into a summer ballet training program at the Bolshoi Ballet Academy in Connecticut, and is now raising funds so she can attend. Dean Hare/Daily News.
By Elizabeth Rudd, Daily News staff writer
Mar 5, 2013 Updated Mar 5, 2013
Click here to read the article online.
Valentines come in the form of flowers or chocolates for many people. For 12-year-old Simone Wulfhorst, this year it came as an acceptance letter into the Bolshoi Ballet Academy summer program.
Valentines come in the form of flowers or chocolates for many people. For 12-year-old Simone Wulfhorst, this year it came as an acceptance letter into the Bolshoi Ballet Academy summer program.
Simone, who has been dancing since she was 3 or 4, became serious about ballet around 8. Her mother, Julia Parker, said she thought Simone would really enjoy dance, so they enrolled her at Spectrum Dance in Pullman.
"She was always a little girl who was spinning around," said Parker, a nurse for the Moscow School District.
When Simone was 6, she started with Festival Dance in Moscow. Parker, a single mother of three other children, said once she was out of the really little age, it became apparent Simone was good at ballet - her teachers would pull Parker aside to tell her Simone could really excel at dance.
"She just kind of quickly became good at it," Parker said.
Three years ago, Simone auditioned for the Kirov Academy summer program and was accepted. Last year, she auditioned for six or seven companies and the only one she didn't get into was Bolshoi.
This year, Simone was offered a spot in the Ballet West program by its director without an audition after he worked with her at the Northwest Music Festival in Spokane. Parker said she asked Simone if she wanted to audition for any other company or if she would be happy with the Ballet West offer.
Simone said she only wanted to tryout for Bolshoi.
"I just wanted to see if I could make it because I didn't make it last year, so it was like, 'Huh, I wonder if I can make it,' " Simone said.
The audition was the first week of February and a couple weeks later both Parker and Simone received emails with an attached acceptance letter.
"I was really happy, and I was kind of startled because I wasn't very happy with my performance that audition," Simone said. "But it was by far the best Valentines I've ever gotten."
The Bolshoi Ballet Academy is located in Moscow, Russia, but coordinates with the Russian American Foundation in New York to operate summer programs, including the one in Connecticut that Simone will attend. The programs are based on a curriculum designed by the academy and taught by its master teachers.
"I think it will be cool because the classes are taught in Russian with a translator," Simone said as one reason she is excited for the program.
Parker said she believes the Bolshoi program is the best out there for classical ballet training. The teachers, she said, are very precise, strict and demanding, which will help to develop Simone's skills.
"All that's good for her because it will push her forward in a short amount of time," Parker said.
Simone will attend the second three-week session that begins July 15. Parker said the program costs $3,750 for tuition, room and board, plus additional costs for plane tickets to and from.
"I really have mixed feelings about it," Parker said, "because I'm really excited for her but it's also really expensive."
To help pay for it, they began a FundRazr webpage Feb. 16 that is a crowd-sourcing fundraiser, and also held a bake sale at the last Winter Market. As of Feb. 27, they had raised $1,750. Parker said they have received donations from a variety of people from family and friends to next door neighbors, people who support the arts, children or just want to help, and even those who have remained anonymous.
"People have been so kind and generous," Parker said. "It's just really been great."
Simone said the Bolshoi program will allow her to see what is out there in terms of ballet, and what other dancers her age can and can't do, what to improve and what to work toward.
Because Simone wants to be a professional dancer, Parker said she needs to be exposed to that type of environment. She said while she has a great teacher and program in Moscow, Simone can't get the training she needs without going to the ballet schools, which is why the program is so expensive.
"For several years she's really focused on wanting to be a professional ballet dancer," Parker said. "That's not easy. She has a lot of potential, but it's a really difficult road. The training is key."
But for Simone, it's worth the long hours of daily practice.
"It's become so much part of my life that it would be hard to live without it ... so it's like a necessity, like food," she said.
On the web
To see Simone's FundRazr site, visit https://fundrazr.com/campaigns/5RJs5.
Moscow no exception to rise in juvenile diabetes
Families say more awareness is needed about Type 1 disease
Moscow School District nurse Julia Parker helps a student with his insulin shot at McDonald Elementary School in Moscow on Friday. Geoff Crimmins/Daily News
By Holly Bowen Daily News staff writer
Mar 10, 2012
Click here to read the article online.
An emergency helicopter ride and a hospital stay aren't what Mary Silvernale Shook planned when her family visited Massachusetts last summer, but that fateful vacation may have been a lifesaver for her 10-year-old son.
Silvernale Shook assumed her son had been suffering from the flu, but he wasn't any getting better. One night in their hotel room, the boy got up five times during the night to use the restroom, and he was begging his mother for ice water.
"Ten-year-old boys don't send their mothers to the ice machine in the hotel," the Moscow woman said. "At 5 a.m., something came into my brain, and I Googled the signs of juvenile Type 1 diabetes."
The symptoms fit. Her son had lost weight, was constantly thirsty, needed frequent bathroom breaks and was having trouble seeing the blackboard at school.
Type 1 diabetes, known as juvenile diabetes, is mysteriously on the rise worldwide. Doctors and researchers don't know why. Genetics, environment and other factors may all play a role, but to what extent is still unknown.
Unlike Type 2 diabetes, Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disorder and isn't connected to poor diet and exercise habits. It can occur at any age but mostly arises in children.
"We were traveling with relatives for a family reunion, and my younger brother is Type 2," Silvernale Shook said.
Uncle Chuck used his blood glucose meter to check his nephew's blood sugar level - it was through the roof.
Her son was life-flighted from Salem, Mass., to Boston, where he spent 12 hours being stabilized in a pediatric intensive-care unit before coming home to Idaho.
Silvernale Shook said her son's symptoms set in over a period of two weeks, but his pancreas had likely been under attack for years.
In people with Type 1 diabetes, their pancreases don't produce enough insulin, a hormone that helps the body's cells use glucose for energy. Without enough insulin, the glucose stays in the blood and can cause deadly side effects.
People with Type 1 diabetes must monitor their blood glucose levels throughout the day and inject themselves with insulin accordingly. That presents extra challenges for young children who attend school.
School nurses
The Moscow School District is hiring a part-time nurse assistant to help care for an increasing number of young students who have Type 1 diabetes.
Julia Parker, the district's full-time nurse, is being stretched too thin between McDonald Elementary School, which has four diabetic students, and Lena Whitmore Elementary School, which has three. She can't be two places at once, hence the hiring of the nurse assistant.
At lunchtime Friday, Parker sat in the school office with a boy diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes about a month ago.
First she asked him whether he'd be eating school lunch that day, or if he had brought a sack lunch from home. School lunch.
So, she got a menu from the cafeteria and figured out the number of carbohydrates he would be eating.
The boy pricked his finger to test his own blood sugar with a meter. Parker took the number and entered it into a formula with the number of carbs. That told the boy how much insulin he needed to inject before eating.
Because it's a careful balance between injected insulin and blood glucose levels, it's imperative that juvenile diabetics be completely honest about what foods they plan to eat.
If they don't eat what they say they will, Parker said, "It only hurts them."
Living with diabetes
Silvernale Shook said her son was still in the ICU when the doctor started her family's diabetes education. They met with dietitians, pediatric endocrinologists and social workers, who all told them their lives would be different from then on.
"Diabetes is managed 24 hours a day," she said. "They told my husband and me that we had new jobs - 'You are your son's pancreas.' ... For 24 hours a day, we put diabetes on top of everything else we do."
Blood glucose monitoring and insulin shots are now part of family trips and sports participation, she said.
Jacki Riley's 11-year-old daughter was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was just 4 years old.
Riley said having a very young child with diabetes was a struggle. She said her daughter had to be retrained to eat.
"No more mindlessly eating," she said. "We had to know every little morsel of food that went into her mouth."
She said her daughter now checks her own blood sugar and wears an insulin pump that eliminates injections.
"It's like a little calculator that holds the insulin in it," Riley said. "A tube goes from the pump into her body. She'll put in how many carbs, then her blood glucose level. Then it calculates (insulin) for her based on the numbers we've preprogrammed."
Cindy Schneider's son was diagnosed on April Fool's Day 2008 when he was 3-and-a-half years old.
Schneider said at first it was difficult to determine whether her son's unquenchable thirst, frequent bathroom breaks and irritable mood were just part of being a toddler or if they were something more serious.
Schneider said the family had a steep learning curve for about six months, especially because her son wasn't yet able to verbalize his needs well.
"It kind of takes away your spontaneity and flexibility from your daily routine," she said. "You test up to eight to 10 times per day, then overnight. We still do."
She said her son injects insulin at breakfast, lunch, dinner and during special food-centric occasions, like birthday parties.
School parties challenge juvenile diabetics, but Parker said children can participate with some planning.
"These parents are good at being homeroom moms and attending parties," she said.
The children can take extra insulin if they know they'll be eating extra carbs, or they can take the sugary snacks home to eat with dinner.
Riley said juvenile diabetics can typically eat any kind of food as long as they dose their insulin accordingly.
Grateful for the help
Schneider said she and the other parents are thankful that the Moscow School District is hiring a nurse assistant to help Parker.
"It's definitely been a long time coming," she said.
Schneider, Silvernale Shook and Riley all said it's important that people remember that Type 1 diabetics didn't get their disease from poor health habits.
"The community in general needs to be more aware of what it is," Riley said, adding that family members have to deal with the stigma of people assuming their children had to be overweight to get the disease.
"I was in the same boat before (my son) was diagnosed," Schneider admitted. "I thought they were overweight, eat too much sugar and don't take care of themselves. For a family of a Type 1, that's a hard pill to swallow. None of those things is the reason why our child is a diabetic."
She said she doesn't think people are trying to be insensitive or not care - they just don't know any better.
Riley, who coordinates a local support group for families of Type 1 diabetics, said she's not sure exactly how many children in the area are affected by the disease because some families don't attend the group's meetings.
"Every couple of months has a new diagnosis in the area," she said. "Last month, there were two new diagnoses."
The Type 1 support group meets at 6:30 p.m. the first Monday of each month at Pullman Regional Hospital.
Riley also recommended the research and support of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation at www.jdrf.org.