The Tovington Post

2014-05-20

There has been no hospital since Adelaide - that is since January! Which is incredible. 

I'd love to take Tova back to Ability Camp. And perhaps we will, I guess it all comes down to money. We are also hoping to go back to the Adelaide program in January 2015, fingers crossed!

Both kids are loving school. Both kids are doing well at school!

I'm trying to get Tova some new canes, it has taken ages. Hopefully they will arrive soon. 

Tova has been loving walking around in her frame, she has had it for years, and has always used it, but now for some reason she is excited when she uses it. 

She has become quite amazing at walking while holding one adult hand too, that is fun, slow but fun. I can see that walking isn't too far away. She most certainly wants and tries to walk. 

The bike we want for Tova may or may not happen, that too is because of money. Special needs bikes are crazy expensive eg: $3k.

Tova has been focused this year, possibly something to do with all the therapy she has been having. 

Nissim is doing well with learning English, Hebrew and Auslan. 

Yuval and I have been learning Cert 2 - Auslan at Tafe this year, and are enjoying it. It is hard to imagine that we will ever be fluent. 

One incredible fact that I would like to share. Each Tuesday Tova comes with me to drop Nissim off at his school, it is a small school, with pretty much no parking on a tiny street and is always chaos at drop off times. There is one disable parking spot out the front of the school and about 10 regular spots. Every Tuesday I aim to park in the disabled parking spot and every Tuesday it is available. There are parents and carers parked everywhere in that street, but that one spot is always free. That is almost unheard of. I am so impressed.  And yes, Tova has a disabled parking permit which is stuck in my car for those who are wondering.  It is very good to see the respect the community have for people that need that spot. Especially as most parents don't get out of the cars, they just let the kids out and drive off, so it would be very easy to just stop in that parking spot for those few minutes. But they don't!! Which is WONDERFUL! It is so helpful. 

2014-04-08

It has been a while. 
Tova has been well, and when she hasn't, she has stayed home. 

Tova is now on school holidays, term one of grade one done. Amazing. 

Nissim still has the rest of this week before he is on holidays. He is loving prep and he and Tova have been doing homework together. Tova is more advanced with reading than Nissim so she helps him know when he gets words wrong etc, and Nissim tests her reading too. It is very cute to watch. 

All the therapy that Tova has been having seems to be doing amazing things. She is so focused and progressing with everything. 

Today she had a hearing test, if she had fluid on her ears she would have had grommets next week. But nope, there is none.. so no surgery! Not that I would have actually gone ahead with the grommets, but at least now I am not made to feel guilty. I just know that it is the chiro that has cleared up her ears. Hearing test before chiro = fluid, every hearing test since seeing chiro (she sees him every week or $o), the fluid has been less and less. Amazing. Truly amazing. 

2014-03-11

Last week Tova was touch and go with the good old croup. She managed to stay home the entire time. We gave her Pred, but didn't need to call the ambulance. We possibly could have at one stage, it was very close, a very hard decision to make. 

But for what ever reason, we decided to keep her home and she recovered over about 5 days. 

At horse riding Today, Tova was amazing. She is getting so good at it. She is a bit cheeky, as is her horse, they are a funny pair. The horse gets a bit frustrated with Tova because she lets go and stands up etc. The horse nips the very tolerant lead walker from time to time, I'm sure it is from being annoyed with little Tova. 

Nissim and Tova have been playing so well together recently. They are doing their home work together and everything. It is very cute. Tova is a bit ahead of Nissim in reading, but she loves going over the golden and red words with him. He is also getting very good at reading hebrew! So Nissim is learning, English, Hebrew and Auslan.. what an adult this young man is going to be! 

Tova is pretty much refusing to crawl anywhere at all at almost all times. She will actually wait for an adult to come over to her to hold her hand to help her, or for someone to bring her the walking frame. It is very cool, she is progressing. We also met a young boy today, he must be early teens that only just started talking recently, which gives me some inspiration for Tova. She does try to talk, I'm not sure why she doesn't use her voice, but either way, talking or Auslan or other communication devices, it is all good with us. 

Tova and Nissim Studying together:

If anyone wants to know about stem cell treatment here are a few useful links you can follow up.

I'm not comfortable writing about the treatment Tova may or may not have had as it is so controversial and other things. I'm not interested in being involved in this political debate publicly.

So, here are some links for anyone wanting to know more.

http://www.regenetec.com/

http://www.globalstemcells.com/

http://www.adistem.com/

http://www.repairstemcells.org/

http://www.donmargolis.com/

2014-01-30

Today Tova went back to school. Grade 1!

I drove her in as I wanted to see where her class room is and also wanted to meet her teachers. I did make the point of saying I will remove her from the school if she is 'strapped' to anything, such as her chair. The bike sure, she needs a seat belt, but I'd rather her learn to do what she is told such as "Tova please return to your seat" than her being trapped. Harsh words, but I need it to be completely understood. I'm not really that intense, but I do worry and so, as I am not there during the day I need to 'sound' intense. They didn't mind anyway.

She was happy to be in her new class room. One of her friends from her prep class is in the same class, so that is nice.

Nissim! Well... He started school today for the first time! Prep! Amazing. Mum and Yuval took him. They sent me a photo, he looks gorgeous. They told me that he is 100% comfortable at school. They didn't know where his class room was, he showed them. He is so smart to remember the way (I was there with him yesterday to have a 10 min meeting with his teacher before the first day of school). Apparently he told mum and yuvie to leave too. So, he is at school now! I wonder what he is doing. I hope he makes friends quickly and is so happy. Lots of the kids there know each other. Nissim went to creche with a few of them, but can't remember them because he was 3. His cousin is at the same table as him too, but they also don't know each other very well and his cousin has been going to that school creche for a few years. I'm sure he will be fine, he is not a shy child, actually he is quite the opposite, but also he is sensitive. My little dude.

Ok, well Yuval and I are now parents of two school kids. It is going to be a busy life now. Driving here and there dropping kids off, picking kids up etc.. :-)