4-year-old Dimi loves to hang out with other preschoolers his age, play in the park, and ride his bike like a regular kid, but his mother Frances is fearing his first day of kindergarten because of his rare disease.
Frances remembers an unfortunate incident at a shopping mall when a stranger came up to her and asked what was wrong with Dimi. She felt perplexed by the lack of education toward disabled people in the current society.
When Dimi was born, doctors discovered a very deaf and short-sighted boy. He suffers from Stickler Marshal Syndrome which is characterized by flattened or scooped out facial features, along with a receding chin that is caused by underdevelopment of the bone. Dimi also suffers from a shortening of limbs which will soon develop into arthritis at his early age. To learn more about Stickler Syndrome, click here.
Frances found support through Can: Do 4 Kids, which she discovered thanks to the National Disability Insurance Scheme. The organization works tirelessly with children that have sensory impairments in all areas of education. They are prepping Dimi to enter the new chapter of kindergarten through group therapy called Learn 4 Kindy.
Esther Sprod is Can: Do 4 Kids’s very own occupational therapist that works one on one with Dimi as part of his Learn 4 Kindy therapy group. They focus on things like sitting, attending and social skills with other kids and adults. They also hone in on motor skills for basic functions like drawing and cutting. Esther believes that every child should have a mainstream education environment.
Deputy chief executive of the group, Heidi Limareff, is confident that they are empowering kids with disabilities and preparing them to face the challenges of the world head on.
In the meantime, Frances has a few well wishes for her son about facing the world:
“For him to be like every other child; to play, go to school … when he gets to school he will find out that he is a little bit different, but I tell him that everyone looks different — some are small, some are tall, some have big eyes, some are small and he doesn’t know any different,” she said to the Advertiser.
Now if those aren’t tear-jerking words to end on, I don’t know what is.
