Thank you to everyone who has already donated to our charity of the year, Brainwave, at the Hippychick checkout. Your contributions will all help to make a very real difference to the lives of children with disabilities, as well as their families.
We recognize that hearing about individual stories makes a charity donation so much more meaningful. So we would like to thank Brainwave and the families concerned for giving us permission to share these heart warming progress reports from Ivan and Thomas both of whom are on the Brainwave therapy programme.
Ivan
Ivan is three years four months old, and lives in Warwickshire. He has a rare genetic condition called, Phelan McDermid Syndrome, which causes developmental and speech delays as well as a weakened ability to feel pain and to sweat.
In January 2023, Ivan attended the Brainwave Centre for his second reassessment with his parents. Unfortunately, a hospital admission of six weeks during September and October 2022, meant his planned reassessment in late 2022 at Brainwave had to be postponed.
Whilst in hospital and undergoing many investigations, Ivan’s development regressed. Ivan’s parents have struggled to complete the Brainwave Programme recently due to hospital stays and family circumstances, though they have built many activities to aid Ivan’s progression into their daily lives. Their aims for the assessment day were to gain information regarding Ivan’s current levels of development and to be given activities to further develop these skills.
Ivan started at mainstream nursery in September 2022 attending one morning a week with plans for this to increase to two mornings in 2023.
Ivan now spends more time on his feet walking than when we last saw him. His sitting on the floor has also improved as he has greater trunk stability. He enjoys bunny hopping rather than crawling to move across the floor. He now has a pair of specialist boots to help with his stability in standing. Ivan is beginning to learn to step up and down on a step with his hand held.
The physical part of his programme includes stepping activities to improve his ability to take a step over an obstacle and across a gap. From a speech and language point of view we are working with Ivan to increase his understanding of spoken language and to help those working with him to create opportunities for him to communicate.
Despite spending an extended period of time in hospital before Christmas Ivan has made some pleasing progress both physically and with his communication. He will return to Brainwave in August 2023 to have his programme updated to reflect the progress we hope he will make.
Thomas
Thomas is from West Midlands and has a congenital disorder. He has been on a Brainwave programme since January 2019.
Thomas attended our Centre for two re-assessments during 2022, he has made good progress and reached some of his bespoke milestones. We were pleased to reward him with a Brainwave Certificate of Achievement for Independently sitting on a bench with gaiters on his arms and listening to a story.
Thomas and his family work hard on his Brainwave programme at home in-between assessments, to ensure he reaches his potential and gains greater independence. We look forward to seeing him and his family again for re-assessments during 2023.
Thank you for reading and we do hope that you will now feel even more inspired to tick the ‘donate’ button at the checkout. Brainwave couldn’t be more grateful for your generosity.