Cooper Cares Spotlight: Harper Hajjar

Welcome to the Cooper Cares Spotlight! We are excited to share the journeys of other special needs families, written by them, and provide a space for parents, siblings and friends to give a window into their amazing, unique worlds.

This spotlight features our friends, the Hajjar family, and their amazing daughter, Harper. Harper’s mom, Ashley, is a mutual friend that we connected with recently. We’re honored to share this beautiful piece written by Ashley about their amazing family!

Harper Girl, where do I begin?

Harper is the sweetest, most fun, most affectionate little girl. Harper loves drawing, she loves running, she loves taking a bath and she loves hanging with her family. She is motivated by books. She loves anything by Eric Carle or Dr. Seuss and her current fav is Giraffes Can’t Dance. Harper loves playing with her dollhouse, with animals, with cars, with any characters from Paw Patrol, Baby Shark or Frozen :) Harper is a sensory seeker and has the most fun riding her scooter, running fast or getting tickled.

Harper has taught me so much about myself and about how to treat others. She has taught me humility, kindness, trust and passion. She loves hard. She is strong. She is brave. She is a girl who knows what she wants and can hold her own. She is confident and self-assured. She is so smart. She learns quickly. She loves to learn. This is all going to serve her well in life. We’re so blessed to be her parents; to love and protect her. To advocate and fight for her. To teach her and at times lead her to those people who can teach her, and teach us, how she will best learn and thrive. Harper was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder at 2 and a half years old. The road to her autism diagnosis was not easy.

We started having significant challenges with Harper around 18 months. She couldn’t communicate her wants and needs. She would often get so frustrated that she engaged in self injurious behavior. This was heartbreaking. It was gut wrenching to desperately want to help her to communicate her needs but not know how to give her the tools to do so.

I was in denial for some time. I honestly don’t like to look back at that version of myself because I was negative. I was living in a “what if” mentality of the worst case scenario. It took putting one foot in front of the other every day, trusting that the universe would support us through this challenge and taking action. Like any parent, I didn’t want anyone to judge our baby girl for her differences.

Slowly we started to get set up with services for our girl. It was May 2020 when we arrived in Cincinnati from NJ. It was the beginning of a global pandemic, my husband was starting a very demanding cardiology fellowship, and we had just brought Harper’s little sister, London, into the world. It was a lot.

We were able to get Harper enrolled in an early intervention program at Cincinnati Children’s starting in August, but in the meantime I wanted to figure out ways to engage and motivate Harper at home. I took a course by Dr. Mary Barbera during my maternity leave (thankfully little London was a champ sleeper; God gave us the most perfect addition to our family in London!). Mary’s course taught me HOW to engage with Harper and provided tangible, specific examples on WHAT to do. I felt really good making small changes every day. We would do “table time” together, and she absolutely thrived. I found out ways to make her laugh, to play, to hug, to “work” - I was able to figure out what motivates her, and we started to see so much JOY out of this little girl. I knew then that we were going to be okay.

I know that Harper is going to continue to shine. We are going to be better than okay. Everything is working out and as long as we continue to bring out that JOY in our girl - we are on the right path. Trust your instincts as a mother, as a father, as a parent - fight for what your little one needs, and strive to create a space for your child to be the best version of themselves. No one else.

I feel so blessed for the progress we’ve seen in Harper in just 2 short years. Harper is now four and a half. She is making requests independently + verbally, and she’s expanding her conversational language. She has been potty trained since Nov. 2020, and we are now working on hygiene (wiping, washing hands, etc.). We continue to work through getting out of rigid routines. Social stories and visuals, for Harper, make such a difference. We use visual schedules and an assisted (AAC) communication device to help expand her language.  Harper does ABA therapy (in her early intervention program and through at home ABA) as well as speech therapy and occupational therapy. The tools that we’ve been given simply by sharing our story, asking for help and working together as a family have been remarkable.

It’s okay to ask for help. It’s more than okay to feel like you can’t do it alone - because, guess what - you can’t! You need a village. You need the support, the therapy, the tools, the PEOPLE to cheer you on. When we started asking for help, they delivered.

I’m happy to be part of the Family Advisory Counsel at Cincinnati Children’s in their DDBP Department (Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics) - for me, getting involved and using my voice has been powerful. Sharing Harper Girl’s progress via my social media has also been an amazing outlet for me. It’s incredible how many people are in your corner if you let them be. We have no idea what cards we will be dealt but we can decide how to play the hand we’re holding!

One of my favorite quotes: “Want it more than you fear it.” I continue to learn everyday. I want to grow, I want to evolve, I want to learn, I want to do the work… way more than I fear it. It doesn’t get easier, you get stronger.

Sending love to all the families out there of a child with special needs - YOU GOT THIS!! And guess what, they’ve got this. These little humans are our biggest teachers.

Thanks for listening and thank you to Katie + Cooper + family for having us share Harper Girl’s story! You can find me on IG @ashfehrhajjar :)