The Lochridge Family

My cup overflows today. I am so grateful for all Little Giant Steps has done for my family. My oldest son has had 3 perfect behavior days at school in a row this week. When we started Little Giant Steps we wouldn’t have been able to get 20 minutes of good behavior from him. Now, he sits in our adult Sunday school class and takes notes. What shines through now is how smart and gifted he is, instead of others just getting hung up on his behavior. We have been working for over a year on his low arches with the activities Jan suggested. He was walking barefooted this morning across the grass and when I sent him back to the house for his shoes he left his wet footprints on the sidewalk. I was looking at a good profile of what a footprint is suppose to look like instead of the imprint of a whole foot being on the ground. It was very encouraging to see this progress. Also these past four months has seen the transition from me having to be in the room with him to make sure he carries out my instructions; to me being able to call him to me, give him 2-3 instructions and him carry them out independently. Just this week he has started to do some of his routine jobs without being told to do so. Wow!! God is just so good.

I was thinking about my other son today as well. He could not relate to anyone outside of the family before we began working the Little Giant Steps program with him. When we went over to our friends houses, he would sit and play by himself (line up all their toys). I have been doing program activities with him for over a year now. He is interacting with friends, not always in the right ways, but I am just happy to see him have friends. He has started noticing and talking to people when we are running errands. He has been joining in when we play family games. In December, for the first time, he played a game all the way to the end with us! I can remember thinking that he would never get to this point.

I have been doing some of the activities with my daughter from Developmental Foundations. She has just made a leap forward! An OT that had worked with her 4-5 months ago saw her last week. She was amazed at how much progress she has made with her motor skills. My daughter will not have to deal with some of the academic delays that my boys have had and I know it is because of the Little Giant Step activities that we have done with her.

We had no family life before starting Little Giant Steps. Life was so overwhelming for the boys; it took all our energy as parents to just survive each day. The greatest gift for us has been being able to laugh and play and enjoy one another as a family. Indeed, God has blessed us beyond measure and I am so thankful that He led us to Little Giant Steps.

Lochridge, Dallas, Texas

Jonathan (age 9), on program from 10/05 to 6/07
David (age 6), still on program as of 2/08
Hannah (age 5), on Developmental Foundations