Little Paul was in trouble from before he was even born

Mother tells his touching story

Paul’s life started with a lot of diagnoses, including Trisomy 21. In utero he had excess fluid in his lungs and his body, and it was certain that he had a heart defect.

The doctors were sure that he would not be able to breathe by himself. But he breathed by himself from the first minute of his birth.

Our first miracle!

Paul needed heart surgery when he was three months old and stayed in the hospital for weeks. After that his development was slower than other children.

At two years of age, Paul began walking but he struggled to learn more complex activities as he grew older. Aside from his mobility, Paul’s main problems were his speech and learning.

Just before Paul had his ninth birthday, I realized that it was possible to participate in the What to Do About Your Brain-Injured Child course live and online from overseas. I enrolled in the course, and when I graduated, I enrolled in the full Parent Lecture Series Program which I attended over the next few years.    I have learned many very helpful things!

Now Paul was 10 years old, he has learned how to calculate with numbers up to 1 million! He knows how to add, subtract, multiply and divide in a written way. I think, you can imagine, how we celebrated this! We did as much of the home treatment program that was possible to do, and it was worth it!

Paul can do everything other children his age do

I want to thank all the staff of The Institutes for everything I have learned during the courses! Today, at age 12 – Paul made so much progress during the past year as never before! He is a good swimmer and diver. Since we started the home program, Paul’s motor skills improved so much that he now can do everything other children at his age do like swimming, cycling, playing table tennis, playing basketball.

Now he is learning to play the flute. He walks to school and back 4.5 km each day. He successfully learns English and French, in addition to his native German, and he is so proud of this!

We thank God to have such a wonderful boy!  

We currently do the Oxygen Enrichment Program – it helps him so much doing homework, running, brachiation, rolling, somersaults, jumping, and Bits of Intelligence.

Paul attends a regular school. I create Bits of Intelligence for all the subjects he learns in school. His independence has improved very much. He can use the public bus to go and buy something on his own. Because of the home program we do, we see how it helps Paul to improve! We thank God to have such a wonderful boy and the support of The Institutes!

Everything is possible to learn!

I have so many ideas how to support his development, because I got such good training from you, the staff of The Institutes!” Our motto for Paul is: “Everything is possible to learn!”