TESTIMONIAL

Dear Tania,
I heard that you are bringing your programme out into the world. I am so happy because this means that fewer families will have to suffer through the full effects of dyspraxia as mine did. I hope that my sharing our story here will help others. So, here it is-

My daughter is 19 years old and we only discovered that she has dyspraxia last year.  From about 3 years old, I noticed that she was different (I recognised that she was different because my family used to offer childcare in my home country and I could relate to the many development stages of children – of which my daughter was clearly behind). She was very good in certain things ie mental concepts but when it came to physical abilities, she was lacking in many ways.

With her intellect, my daughter was able to mask her struggles and because she was so good at doing so, her teachers did not recognise her symptoms either. We used to brush her symptoms off with statements like “she is just clumsy” or “she is daydreaming again” and we believed that this was something that “she would grow out of eventually.” Even a couple of my doctor friends whom I approached, overlooked her delayed physical abilities as a tendency to favor mental processing.

I looked up some of her symptoms but she did not clearly fit into any clear diagnosis of Autism or ADHD etc. even though she did show many traits. And because there was no clear relevance to one specific condition, I deduced that perhaps my girl was just lagging a bit behind her peers. I decided on applying a series of interventions to help her overcome her weaknesses. I put her through many things that really challenged her ie. gymnastics, swimming and skating but I could see that it was very tough on her.  Every parent teacher meeting up until high school was revolved around talking about how well she was 'fitting in' instead of the normal academic discussions.

Family and friends also became another source of struggle as many has told me that I should just leave my daughter to do things herself because she was old enough and should be able to do these simple things. Their judgement that 'I was a bad mother because they believed I was doing too much for my daughter' hurt.

As she grew older, ‘dyspraxia ‘ began to present in other ways ie. in her ability to write essays (even though she is a great writer, often being top of her class in her ability to write.) Both her teachers and I were baffled.  During discussions prior to the write-ups, she would be able to articulate her findings but when it came to converting them to an essay, it did not match her understanding. 

When it came to driving, she was a puzzle to her driving instructor because simple things like turning left at junctions became hair raising moments, while she breezed through other difficult manoeuvres with absolute precision.

It was only through Tania's development of this programme that my daughter and I discovered this thing called ';dyspraxia' and my family began to gain a better understanding of why she found so many simple things that many people take for granted so very hard. 

As a mother, I saddens me that I failed to give her this diagnosis earlier but judging from what I have discovered from speaking with Tania, I can accept that ‘dyspraxia’ is often overlooked because of the nature of its presentations (meaning it often presents differently in different children). Furthermore, because of the lack of understanding of and resources for dyspraxia, it is not something commonly picked up unless her symptoms were severe.

It was a shock to me when Tania asked my then 18 year old daughter to do some simple things like crawling and picking things up, how challenging it was for her. She didn't crawl as a child and she could never bike (despite the many bicycles I bought her through out the course of her young life). That hour we spent with Tania helped me understand so much more about my daughter and the struggles she had to overcome. 

Apparently, her symptoms were quite severe but the many activities I had pushed her to participate in over the years seems to have paid off because she learnt to compensate for her lack of ability in other ways.

Tania adapted a few exercises from her kit (to better suit a young adult) and asked my daughter to do them for a week. The results was instantaneous. The next morning, she could wake up all by herself and in a clear state of mind. She could do things better on days she did her exercises. It was an amazing leap from how she was.

Since then, she has joined a club and been able to connect with other neuro-divergent individuals. She has finally found a place where she feels 'normal' with others like herself.

I cannot thank you enough for bringing this knowledge out into the open. I wish that I had this information earlier but I am thankful for knowing it now.  I can see the difference in my daughter.  Thanks again. 

A very grateful mother.

Pollin K. 

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