I remember all too well our national response to the pandemic – schools were closed and my daughter lost all her services – no speech, no OT (occupational therapy) and no ABA (applied behavioral analysis therapy.) Unfortunately, remote teaching didn’t work for us, or for many of her friends, and my daughter’s progress unraveled and she actually went backwards. Only now is she catching up – but it has been a two-year slog. It doesn’t take much for things to impact our World, but we are relatively lucky. We live in the US and have access to many treatments and support networks and food is plentiful; this made our lives a little easier and more productive.
But the challenges we faced during the pandemic fade into insignificance when compared to what is going on in the Ukraine. The daily news is reporting the shelling of hospitals, shopping centres and residential areas – it is horrific and almost beyond comprehension. It must be truly awful for the Ukrainian people and the impact on their children life-changing. The impact for special needs families and their children is unimaginable.
I took my daughter to the flower shop to buy some sunflowers to provide a symbol of hope. And as NNF is about hope and making a difference we all wanted to do something different for our annual fundraising campaign during April’s Autism Acceptance Month; we need to do something different.
We can’t change geopolitics but we can try to bring some hope for our special children that are afflicted by war. At NeuroNetworks Fund, we have decided that all donations we receive in our April “Change for Change” campaign will be sent to Unicef to aid them in support of their work to care for the children of Ukraine, both those who are refugees and those who are suffering inside the country. And a bonus – the first $1,000 we receive will be matched – so you can easily double the impact of your gift! You can easily make a donation here