2007 Christmas Letter

Dear Family and Friends, As the holiday season approaches, we have been reflecting on the various highs and lows of this past year. We are deeply grateful to all of you that have kept us in your thoughts and prayers. We thought we would take a moment to update you on Gabriel’s development. 2007 has been a year full of exciting progress as Gabe reaches new milestones. As most of you know, Gabe is attending PPCD (Preschool Program for Children with Disabilities) through our school district. He loves his classroom, teachers, and classmates. This is a truly phenomenal program that provides speech therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, music therapy, and adaptive PE (as well as much more)! Gabe thrives in this fun, active, and highly structured environment. Since beginning this program, Gabe has become more social and has shown more interest in other children his age. He is responding to and interacting with his classmates more and more each day. It’s heart-warming to see them together and hear other parents (of children in the same class) state that their children call Gabe their friend. As a mother of a child with Autism, this is one of the greatest things I could ever hear! Gabe has worked very hard this year and made progress in his language and speech skills. In addition to the services Gabe receives through the school district, we are also doing private speech therapy, occupational therapy, and an in-home ABA program. We see that each of these interventions is helping Gabe. The exceptionally supportive and dedicated teachers and therapists that work with our son both at school as well as in our home continuously renew our hope and give us much to be thankful for. Our new private speech therapist has truly been an answer to a prayer. She has really connected with Gabe and has been able to spark more language in the few weeks since she has started than we have ever heard from him before! He has even recently said several three word sentences! Each new word is celebrated and fills us with renewed hope that he will be able to communicate his wants and needs to us in the future. As for now, we still often resort to tears and frustration as our little boy tries to communicate to us how he feels and what he needs. However, it’s heartening to know that we have a great team of teachers and therapists that see the potential in Gabe and realize how much knowledge Gabe has stored inside. We are all determined to help him find ways of expressing his knowledge. For the first time since Gabe lost certain skills, he is now calling us “Daddy” and “Ma-Ma!” Personally, this is the most meaningful achievement this year. My heart feels as if it’s about to burst each time I hear him call for me! Another significant moment of 2007 was when I received my first spontaneous kiss from my sweet boy! Many of you heard about this momentous occasion due to my uncontainable excitement! In November, I attended the National Autism Association conference in Atlanta, Georgia. I traveled with five other moms of children with Autism. These women are very special to me and play a vital role in my support system. The conference was an amazing experience. Some of the best minds in the autism world spoke at this conference. The primary focus was on the biomedical treatments available. We are currently seeing a local doctor that specializes in treating Autism biomedically. We have just begun this particular intervention and are hoping to see some positive results as we treat nutritional deficiencies, build up his immune system, remove toxins from his body, and help Gabe become healthy so that he can benefit to the greatest extent possible from the various other therapies and interventions we are implementing. We hope that this biomedical approach will also help decrease some of the intense anxiety that Gabe currently experiences. He is terrified of certain sounds, places, and even of something as simple as watching a DVD. We are trying to understand why the sudden increase in anxiety and are also working closely with our therapists in developing ways to help him overcome some of these irrational fears. In this season of giving, I am reminded of just how much I am given each day by my special boy. He rewards my hard work and frustration with a smile that lights up a room, a warm, tight hug that refuels my depleted energy level, and exciting new words that are the most beautiful music to my ears. Gabe is a gift from God as every good and perfect gift is from above. He is also a beautiful reminder of God's promise to us all in Jeremiah 29:11. As we reflect on this past year, we realize ours is a journey of peaks and valleys and we are learning to better adjust to the fact that our best days will be followed by inevitable periods of heart-break and discouragement. Some days my only and best comfort is the reassurance that God is with us. He celebrates with us on the mountaintops of success and shares our tears as we struggle to find our way through the valleys of depression. I honestly do not know what we would do without the love and support of our family and friends. You all mean so much to us and we are grateful for your love and friendship. Life with Gabe makes it difficult to pick up the phone and call as often as we would like, but please know that we think of each of you often. We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a blessed, happy, and healthy New Year! With Love, Staci, Bruno, and Gabriel