wolfhirschhorn.org

Hello everyone, hope you’re all well.

Mia will turn 11 in January, and she’s doing great. She still uses her wheelchair and walking frame, but can now also walk holding a hand, and recently completed a 5km walking challenge over the month of October. She wears a full torso brace to help with her scoliosis, which is a real pain for changing etc. – but she’s an absolute trooper and tolerates it really well.

Lockdown was tough for Mia as she’s so social by nature, and she has relished being able to get back out and about more recently. She waves to pretty much everyone we meet and shouts “hello!” at them until she gets the response she’s looking for – which I find hilarious. She also attends the local Girl Guides (like Girl Scouts) and a couple of weekly sports clubs for kiddos with additional needs.

Mia loves her iPad, particularly watching familiar shows (over, and over, and over!), current fave being The Wiggles. We do try to limit how much we use it, but find ourselves often caving in at meal times as it can be such a slog getting Mia to eat otherwise. We are also about to embark on trialling a couple of different assistive communication apps to try and develop Mia’s expressive vocab and choice making – we’ll see how that goes.

Seizures remain very well controlled and we’ve managed to avoid any non-routine hospital trips for as long as I can remember – touch wood. We also got a puppy last year, and it has been lovely to see the bond develop between her and Mia.

That’s all for now, I’ve added a few recent pics and a video clip below.

Cheers, Ross