Jodie was diagnosed with developmental delay. By the time Jodie was in year 6 I felt out of my depth. I did not know were to go for help or advice. We have four other children all older than Jodie, our family life revolved around hospitals, speech therapy appointments, school meetings and of course statement reviews, which at that time were all about what Jodie could not do, all the points where she was struggling e.g. hand writing, maths, science, not working on her own, support with changing for PE or swimming, besides this, neither teachers nor other children could understand what she said or what she was asking for. Jodie was about to change schools, she was in a school for mild learning difficulties but they were talking about her going to another school further away because of her lack of speech. I had always struggled with Jodie going to school so far away, so the idea of her going further away sent me into a panic.
Then I met a mum who went to Advance with her son and we talked about the changes the technique has made for her son, so I thought what have we to lose! On the first visit assessment I was able to see that Jodie had poor immature breathing and how that connected to all her other problems, Two weeks later we had our first week’s training and during the training Jodie’s breathing changed while she was sleeping. Linda explained that Jodie was now able to get into REM sleep (dream sleep), which is when the brain processes the information from the day and grows new connections.
Just over 3 years later we are still attending Advance, Jodie’s progress is amazing, past any expectations we ever had. Jodie can speak clearly and has no difficulty making herself understood, she is now in mainstream school and she has her hopes and dreams. Jodie is working on GCSE Art and is supported in her options; she loves sports, talking to people, taking part in every thing she wants too. Our lives have been turned around.