October 6th, 2017

Therapy. It’s a part of our life, and it probably will be for some time yet.

Emma’s intellectual disability means that it takes longer to learn skills - so we do therapy to help her (and us) to understand what it is that she needs to practice in order to ‘get’ those things that seem to come naturally to other kids.

Currently we do Speech and Physio and are about to do a 10 week intensive Hydrotherapy term. Dave and I are off to a Key Word Sign course this weekend and have a follow up day in two weeks time. Emma will start Occupational Therapy after she turns 2 - she had an assessment a month or so ago and the therapist was happy with her fine motor skills at that stage.

Therapy isn’t cheap, and nor should it be. These therapists help us to achieve ‘normal’ and their specialised knowledge and practice is well worth it. Fortunately, Emma receives funding for therapy through our National Disability Insurance Service (NDIS) - each year we discuss our goals for the coming year and funding is allocated accordingly. Our first plan was put in place in July and we are thrilled that her allocation is enough to cover everything she is currently requiring. We are extremely mindful that this is funded by the taxpayer, so we don’t use more than we need... but we do appreciate that it is there. As Emma’s extra chromosome will never disappear, she is eligible for this funding for life. As she grows the funding will likely lessen - most recent research into Early Development proves that the more we do in the first 5 years, the less we will need to do later. Emma will not rely on government benefits as she will be working and living independently. The money spent now saves so much later on!

We do a lot of play based stuff ourselves, so we don’t see our therapists as often as we could. Formal Therapy is exhausting some days, especially now that Emma is focusing on gross motor skills, so she’s up and down and climbing and crawling and cruising... and then sleeping 💤