Gardner Family Testimonial

Jacob was born at home with a birth diagnosis of down syndrome. From the moment the NICU doctor mentioned the possibility of Jacob having down syndrome and belittling his worth at only 1 hour old, I made it a life goal to always be his biggest advocate and never feel satisfied with ‘good enough’. Jacob has experienced so many challenges in life but continues to persevere through all of it without hesitation. Through the million appts and early intervention therapies starting soon after birth, it felt like our house had a revolving door. Being a doctor of physical therapy myself, I was never satisfied with the therapies Jacob was receiving and especially was not satisfied with the therapies, nor the support, of early intervention. The constant advocating in that realm became overwhelming and unfruitful. Jacob was slowly reaching physical milestones but still had no verbal communication and was cognitively struggling.

As Jacob approached 3 years old, all therapists were telling me that life would be too difficult if I tried to homeschool him like I started to homeschool his older sister, Abigail. They told me that I would never have a life if I didn’t send him to preschool to get all his therapies in. Considering how exhausted I was with a 5 year old, 3 year old and a 1 year old, I caved and tried to go public preschool route with therapies carved into his days. After the initial IEP meeting, I knew this was not going to work as the head teacher told me “I don’t have time to write in a communication notebook each day for your son when I have so many kids I’m in charge of”. So I told them I would not be sending him to preschool but just come in multiple times a week for therapies. During the evaluation for his therapies, the speech therapist made the same joke twice, saying to her colleague, “Do you think Jacob will qualify for therapies? HAHA of course he will he has down syndrome”. Again, his worth was ridiculed and we tried therapies with them for a few months (since private therapy was so expensive) and then realized my gut was correct all along. I would homeschool Jacob. And I would find outside
therapies to help him be the greatest he can be.

After being on a 6 months waitlist for private therapies which were a 1 hour drive away from our home, we finally got on the schedule. I was ecstatic and although my PT eyes did not approve of everything they were doing in therapy, I thought I must be scrutinizing too hard. Life was busy..babysitters, doctors appts, therapy appts, homeschooling, helping my husband run his plumbing business, tending to our farm, etc. Life was around the clock. Not to mention I would stay up most nights until 1am researching about how to give the best life to Jacob.

Through the grace of God, while on a hike with my sister and our 6 kids about 6 months into private therapies, we met another homeschooling group of moms, one of which sought me out. I don’t often like to get questions in regards to Jacob and the pity people give for having such a hard life, but this mom was different. She came over to me and asked if Jacob had down syndrome. After I said he did, she told me very kindly that I needed to look into NACD because her brother with down syndrome was on program for as long as she could remember and he is now speaking at international conferences. My ears couldn’t believe what I was hearing but I went home that night and contacted NACD. I usually do tons of research into everything but I didn’t need to do that with NACD. I knew right away they were my little piece of heaven coming to help me out of a tough spot that was supposed to just be accepted as the norm. Like I said, I would not settle for “good enough” and I knew there was something missing to help give Jacob the best chance at living a normal life. Not to mention, I quickly signed Abigail up to be on program as well for things I just accepted as normal 6 year old behavior. Whole health needs to be just that, whole health. Having every doctor and therapist be on a different page and see the child 1-2 times a week is doing nothing for the overall growth of the brain.

After only a few months into our NACD journey, we are a completely changed family. Let me briefly describe what life used to look like so you can understand what I mean. We used to have one of our kiddos coming into our room 3-5 times a night and ending up sleeping in between my husband and I every night. We would wake up exhausted, aggravated, impatient, and argumentative and you can’t run a family well with those emotions in tow. We would be falling asleep while walking. We would have no energy to help with sibling disputes. We had no clue how to discipline our kids. Most meals would be loud screaming and throwing food or forks and usually hitting one of us square in the face. Most car rides were loud screaming, which ended up with everyone crying from the noise level and headaches for my husband and myself. Bedtimes took about 1-2 hours as our daughter could not fall asleep without us lying next to her. Theres a lot more I could say but you get the point. Life was rough, let alone the fact that we run our own business, run a farm and homeschool.

Since we started with NACD, it took about 2 weeks to get my oldest daughters emotions and disobeying under control and sleeping in her own bed and sleeping through the night on her own. It took 2 weeks to get Jacob’s throwing and disobeying under control, to figure out the loud yelling and to solve the horrible car rides of noise. Every day my husband and I look at each other in the morning when we are getting ready with NO CHILD in our face and we honestly cannot believe it. Do you understand a little now when I say NACD has completely changed our family? Bedtimes are now easy. Sleeping at night is now happening. Car rides are enjoyable. Homeschooling is prospering. Meal times are more relaxed. Disobeying and arguments are rare. We are finally thriving and not just surviving. I now get to be with my kids all day everyday and I’m not missing out on their lives like I was before with traveling to so many appts. Therapy is now fun and inclusive with the siblings and bringing us together as a family. It’s what it should be.

There are also so many little things Jacob is now able to do since his cognitive functioning has increased. He is able to drink from an open cup, try new foods, realize when he did something wrong and apologize, potty independently, eat snacks with other kids at co-op and not throw their food, show more patience and less screaming, buckle his car seat straps independently, play using his imagination, help with chores, walk the dog alongside us, ride a tricycle with some help, brush his teeth and bathe without screaming, walk through stores without being strapped into a stroller, sit still while I cut his nails and listen to directions.

We will never be able to thank NACD enough. The programs are in-depth and life giving. I won’t say its always easy to have the energy to be super up beat to do the program but considering how much it has given our family, we will always put our best foot forward and make it happen because I know my kids are gaining so much more than we can actually see.