The Elite Journey - Chapter 10

Chapter 10
“Guess what?” Daniel greeted Jasmine at the door after university the next day
“What?” she asked her brother, entering the TV room to find Sebastian watching and enjoying NumberJacks.
“Benny communicated with his teacher today” he told her using the name they always called him
“How?”
“By copying and extending on her actions when she used them back”

“Any chance he’s requesting things with it yet?”
“No, but the teacher thinks she can use something called intensive interaction to get him there”
“And what’s that?”
“A more formal way of doing it. She sent you an invitation to an info night about”
“When?”
“Next Friday”
“What time?”
“Have a look” he suggested fishing the paper from Sebastian’s bag
“Could work, I just miss class that morning”
“In Sydney?”
She nodded
“Can you do that?”
“Yeah, I’m already in front anyway”
“So what happens with Sebastian?”
“What do you mean?”
“I work Friday nights”
“So I take him with me”
“You sure he’ll be ok?”
“If I put enough NumberJacks and Chuggington episodes on my computer”

After the information section of the session was over Jasmine approached her son’s new teacher and asked exactly how she planned to include this method of formal copying as she saw it in to something that would help him.
“By giving him the skills to work with others”
“Like?”
“Reciprocating and eventually initiating communication”
“But he’ll still be stuck in a place where his real abilities can’t be seen” she complained having had enough of the school’s attitude that they couldn’t help him unless he helped himself over the last year.
“No he won’t, I’ve already seen some of them”
“Which ones?”
“Mainly those involved in maths, but he’s also starting to show some level of symbolic communication”
“So why aren’t you working with him on that?” she was still angry at what she perceived to be a backwards step in the teaching method, although she knew it was better than the ‘do nothing’ approach his last teacher had used.
“I am, but the intensive interaction works on the social skills involved in communication”
“Does that mean you’re going to do both?”
“Yes but I’m going to put an emphasis on the II for now”
“Alright” she accepted, seeing that she could trust this teacher to actually help her son.
“So what do you want to do about the physical stuff?” Leanne finally asked, having been finally given a chance to propose another new program to this parent.
“What physical stuff? He can’t do anything” Jasmine in contradiction to her belief in his mental skills had accepted Sebastian’s lack of physical skills many years before when a string of doctors and therapists had shown the attitude of not being willing to help a child who couldn’t help himself.
“Not true” she argued before continuing on to tell Jasmine “he can hold his head up, sit with support ad use his arms to pull his body across the ground”
“When’d he do the last one?” Jasmine wanted to know having never seen or heard of him doing it before.
“Today, after another student knocked a puzzle on the floor”
“And then what?”
“He tried reaching out for it with his arm but lost balance”
“But he definitely moved forward?” she demanded, having finally been given a glimmer of hope that her son would not be the eternal baby all the doctors and therapists had been promising for the last seven years
“Yes, I can even show you on the daily video feed we do of our classroom”
“Why?”
“Because it lets us see the little achievements they make, especially when we aren’t watching carefully”
“So what happened with the puzzle after he lost balance”
“He accepted my arm to complete it when I put him back in the wheelchair”
“Are you telling me he actually has fine motor skills?”
She nodded.
“So what happened to the ‘we can’t do anything if he can’t do anything attitude this school had last year?” Jenifer wondered, in the light of not one but two revelations of how Sebastian was more able than he’d ever been given credit for
“We got a new principal who believes ability is more important than disability”
“So why are you asking about physical skills?”
“Because in addition to the intensive interaction and pecs program for communication he also wants to introduce one called move to help the students with physical disabilities”
“Is that the one that reduces prompts on equipment until the person is able to do something independently?”
“Yeah, where’d you hear of it?” Leanne herself had only just finished a weekend course in New Zealand that gave the basics and only knew of one other school in the whole of Australia who conducted the program.
“The centre my girlfriend’s best friend’s daughter attended last year did it”
“And what happened?”
“She went from fully supported standing to walking across all eight lanes of an athletics track supported only on the upper body”
“So are you willing to try it for Sebastian?”
“Of course I am, when does he start?”
“After we get a baseline done at his next PSG”
“Which is?” she prompted having forgotten in the light of all the new information being presented
“Next Wednesday”
“Alright, I’ll see you there”
Meanwhile, Zara was at her sister’s catholic school having a similar but opposite conversation with a principal who refused to accept Bronte’s abilities even though the proof was available. His main argument was that he didn’t care what she’d done at primary school because the work would have been graded differently to the way it was in a normal secondary school class.
“But her teacher had the qualifications to teach from grade prep to year ten”
“In what subjects?”
“For secondary?”
He nodded
“English and history, that’s why she knew Bronte needed acceleration in them”
“And how did the accelerated maths work? Did she have a different teacher for it?”
“No, they just followed your year seven curriculum”
“So there’s a chance she’s not as good as you think?” he argued not wanting to change the way things had been done by his school for so long.
“I don’t see how, maths is either right or wrong”
“How about you give me some decent proof that she’s advanced beyond her peers then”
“Ok” she agreed knowing that even an IQ test wouldn’t convince this man her sister was gifted.
Two terms after this Abbey walked down the aisle of the church attached to the Swan Hill Christian School. It was beautiful. Light streaming in from the windows, and everyone including her friends from the Olympics done up in their best clothes. Even her friend from Russia who’d done the 10k open water swim was there. The most important person however was Joseph, who having met her there accompanied her down the aisle.
Suddenly she started crying. Not because she was sad or frustrated, but because in her happiness she felt like she was once again in her own little world and therefore didn’t care who saw her tears. The exact same way she’d always felt when wrapped in her mum’s jacket as a kid.
Her happiness on this day was for a variety of reasons. The memories bought on by being back in Swan Hill, seeing Tristan waiting at the altar to join her life forever and best of all seeing Beth walk with no extra support on her walker for the first time. She still had the frame to support her but all the straps she’d had attached to the frame only 14 months earlier were gone. This was a total surprise to both Abbey and Tristan who even at home had gotten used to her walking with the aid of at least the arm prompts.
Suddenly she was being asked to repeat some words by the priest. She couldn’t. She was too emotional. She couldn’t speak. She’d forgotten all the lessons learned over time from her speech therapist except the physical ones. So turning to those physical lessons she started repeating the words in sign language.
Then as they walked out of the church as a couple someone put Caleb in her arms as the confetti fell all over them. He sensed his mother’s feelings of pure happiness and smiled for the first time while snuggling further in to her. He wasn’t wrapped in a traditional blanket. Instead she’d wrapped his tiny little body in her Bombers jacket. It was something she hadn’t felt comfortable doing with Bethany, preferring to wear the jacket while holding her underneath it but much had changed since then. She knew she didn’t need it anymore. She had Tristan, a man who had protected her even though it meant dire consequences.

THE END