The Kids Stole My Heart :)

Conani is a home for children with physical and/or cognitive disabilities. Six of us go to this site every morning. Recently all of the non-ambulatory children were moved to Santo Domingo so the majority of the children at Conani now are ambulatory. Our goal each day is to do therapy with at least 5 children and play/interact with the others. The Creighton PT group had designated 10 kids that they worked with the month they were there so we have continued to work with those kids and have found a couple more that would definitely benefit from therapy. Each day things go a little more smoothly at the site.

All of the kids are so great! Each day they are thrilled to see us walk through the door, have someone hold their hand, have someone show them they care about them. I have had little experience working in a pediatric setting much less working with kids with moderate to severe disabilities. I was very nervous to work in this setting, definitely out of my comfort zone. However, the first day seeing how excited they were to see us made me realize how much of a gift it is to them for us just to be there. I immediately fell in love with them. The first day I worked with a boy showing him how to jump, we practiced for 10 minutes. The next day right after we got there he had to show me that he could do it on his own.  It was a great feeling to see that carry over.

Many of these kids are very intelligent, just have physical disabilities. They seem to all understand my Spanish! :) In the D.R. individuals with disabilities are often shunned and looked down upon. It’s difficult to see such potential, but know they will probably never have adequate therapy/services.

It is tough to think that we can only be there with them for 2 weeks. And that another group of therapists won’t be here until later summer. We have 4 more days to work with these kids. It is my goal to educate some of the staff members at Conani to continue with the walking programs, the structured play. These children have such potential! As always, we never have enough time. But we must use the time we have. I have had such a great experience with them. They will always be in my heart!